The voices of the junior teachers 1931-1945: exploitation or experience in South Australian schools?

On 13 September 1943, The News, Adelaide's daily afternoon newspaper, carried an account of a serious accusation made that day against the South Australian Education Department. Under the headline 'Junior Teachers job "too big"' it reported that:

   Answers to questionnaires sent to junior teachers reveal that, in
   most cases, the duties they perform are too heavy, and that the
   department exploits their services by giving them responsibilities
   that should be assigned only to trained teachers. Most of them
   work all day. They have no time to observe the methods of trained
   teachers.

This information had been given to the Education Inquiry Committee (1) by the South Australian Teachers' Union in a case for the abolition of the junior teacher system in which since 1931, all candidates awaiting entry to the Teachers College were employed to teach in primary and secondary schools. The evidence had been collected from what seventy four junior teachers had said was required of them in schools during this experience (2) and, with further evidence from psychologists, educationalists and parent groups, the Union went on to demonstrate that this system was not merely exploitative but also harmful to both the junior teacher and the pupils. (3) In its first report in 1945 the Inquiry recommended the abolition of the system in which 'children are practiced on by adolescents fresh from their own schooling, which means, inevitably, by youngsters whose experience is limited, whose emotional development is far from complete, and whose training is nil'. (4)

While the documented evidence against the system is most persuasive, it is also a classic example of victors providing practically all the evidence for any subsequent history. The focus of this article, part of a wider research, (5) is to show that by calling on another set of voices, those of former junior teachers from the same period, it is possible to test in a similar way a counter claim prevalent at the time that a lengthy period of practical experience was an important and indeed necessary feature of teacher preparation. Such an approach provides for a better balanced and more useful analysis from both an historical and educational point of view. The system did at least introduce trainee teachers to the realities of the classroom over an extended period, an aspect that deserves a deeper analysis in view of the current resurgence of interest in teacher training circles in providing for the practical aspects through lengthy periods in schools. (6)

It appears that in the 1930s junior teaching 'enjoyed something of an Indian summer with educational leaders proclaiming the educational advantages of practical experience prior to college entry' (7) in the period just before serious concerns about the system began emerging in South Australia. A national conference of Directors of Education in 1936 had, in fact, discussed the issue and given it some support. (8) Something of this support can be seen in the response of Director of Education Fenner to a request from the annual conference of the Union in 1942 to 'discontinue the use of junior teachers in schools'. (9) Fenner replied that the Department was convinced of the value of the system both as a means of finding out if the junior teacher 'had the faculty and liking for teaching', and to allow the Department to discover whether the selected persons were capable of becoming good teachers. (10) He added that 'the period of teaching is regarded as training only. In apprenticeship for teaching, as in other apprenticeships, practical work is essential'.

Clearly the argument about the junior teacher period being training only had been demolished by the details produced about their teaching roles and when he appeared before the Inquiry in 1944 Dr Fenner raised instead the matter of pre-training practical as being helpful for understanding the lectures at the College and went on to say that he was prepared to make junior teachers supernumeraries so that they could observe, study and teach at approved schools under the supervision of headmasters, free from a heavy teaching load. (11) This would have removed the features of most concern at the Inquiry but it was too late by then to save the system and in any case Fenner had provided no direct supporting evidence for his claims by calling for junior teachers and former junior teachers to be questioned at the Inquiry. The evidence tendered in 1943 about the way it had been used, and in the opinion of the Union, abused, since 1931 had ensured that the weight of opinion was against its continuation in any form at all. With it went any possibility of long term exposure of trainees to the realities of ordinary schools. Brief teaching rounds at practicing schools became again the only way to learn the practical side of teaching and this system continued in South Australia well into the second half of the century. (12)

Dealing with a new kind of junior teacher

The problems faced by the Union and the Director of Education had arisen due to the advent of the Great Depression, and World War II added further to the straitened financial situation and staff shortages. The junior teacher system had been virtually abandoned as a part of the teaching force in the reforms of 1921 that introduced probationary studentships to enable candidates to continue with their secondary education instead of teaching for a year or more. (13) In 1931 studentships were suspended on account of the financial pressures and appointing candidates as junior teachers proved to be a cheap and generally useful way of augmenting the teaching force and one that could be justified as being in their interests. However, these junior teachers were used in quite a new and different way to that of the apprenticeship type system that had existed between 1875 and 1920, partly as training and partly as a means of staffing the larger schools where head masters and senior staff could supervise practice and teach theory. In the 1930s junior teachers were generally appointed to larger one-teacher schools where their role was to assist the head teacher, usually by taking full teaching responsibility for the lower grades. These were rural schools and untrained teenagers now had to board away from home and teach in circumstances where generally little supervision and assistance was available from head teachers coping with heavy teaching and administrative responsibilities of their own. In the early 1940s junior teachers had to be used in secondary schools, often to teach subjects they had just completed themselves to the highest levels, in place of teachers joining the armed forces. It is understandable why the Union, in its effort to advance the teaching profession, was determined to block out evidence of any advantages in a system that employed practices that professions such as medicine and law would have regarded as unacceptable.

The problem for an educational historian is that there is no detailed documentation to support any view about it except that put forward against the system, a situation that does not allow for a balanced understanding of the period. Stanford refers to history as 'an unending detective story' where a historian, seeing that something is out of balance, tries to solve mysteries in the evidence so as to tell a more ordered story. (14) Cunningham and Gardner note one of the duties of the historian is 'to record, as best as he or she can, the way in which the past actually happened' while another is to show 'that the past is always composed of resources, often overlooked by posterity' but which 'always hold out to us much more than we may at first imagine'. (15) According to Tucker, 'a text that is not corroborated by comparison with other evidence is of little value or interest to historians ... paucity of evidence engenders underdetermination of historiographic hypotheses'. (16) Welsh, in questioning the reliability of policy-maker and stake-holder accounts, notes that it is possible for educational historians to achieve a greater depth of analysis by consulting other sources including 'comparing, contrasting and combining documentary and interview data'. (17) Data from the memoirs of seventy-five former junior teachers from this period would appear to provide the only such sources now available to address issues of balance, corroboration and depth of analysis. (18)

The voices of these witnesses can now be heard through a humanistic sociological analysis of memoirs of their time in schools in the early 1940s. This allows for a review of the validity of the evidence against the system as well as for the possibility of finding data that might support there being something of value in a lengthy teaching experience as part of teacher preparation. MacCullough, in referring to 'the urge to compare, to assess, rather than to contemplate and acquiesce' that he has noticed as part of a 'virtually unprecedented western effort to understand history', goes on to link history with what he sees as an allied discipline, archeology. (19) Turning to humanistic sociology to help delve into the memories of those who experienced life as a junior teacher to unearth new evidence would seem, too, to be a more historically useful research option than a mere reliance on somewhat flawed contemporary documents.

A humanistic sociological analysis

These recollections were obtained by means of a Memoir Document based on the principles of humanistic sociology and framed around the perceived failings and benefits of the junior teacher system that were aired at the Education Inquiry Committee. They make available a large number and variety of experiences for a humanistic sociological analysis on the lines pioneered by Thomas and Znaciecki in 1919 and since further developed by other exponents of the use of autobiographical materials in sociological research. (20) The inspiration for this approach came from a statement by Smolicz and Secombe that their use of memoirs to elucidate cultural facts from young Polish-Australians could be adapted to the study of any other social group. (21) The study analysed the experiences of former junior teachers through their own eyes, an emphasis that arises from Znaniecki's belief that all data must be taken with what he termed 'the human coefficient i.e., as it appears to the human individual who experiences it and uses it'. (22) Of importance, too, in such an analysis is Znaniecki's view '... of the need to interpret all social and cultural activities from the standpoint of the actors themselves, and not merely that of the outside observer', an aspect stressed by Smolicz who points to the significance that Znaniecki placed on a directly attitudinal category of cultural facts and notes how he contrasted the use made of data by an historian, an aspect of particular interest in this investigation, part historical and part sociological as it is:

   Thus, while historians tend to regard the author of a document as
   a witness of some event in which they happen to be interested,
   sociologists examine the writer per se, and treat the whole social
   milieu exclusively in relation to this particular person. (23)

The gathering of these memoirs gave some former junior teachers at least, an opportunity now, albeit somewhat belatedly, to present their story and, in the process, to throw new light on the experience by providing a perspective that differs in certain respects from the witness of those who saw it as only exploitative and harmful.

As with any research it is important to be aware of the limitations of the methodology. (24) A key criticism of memoirs relates to the possibility of memory loss and the consequent distortion of the data. Respondents sometimes admitted to not being sure of certain aspects, most of which tended to be minor ones. The strength of this analysis lies not only in the similarities found between the historical and sociological data but also in the major differences reported, differences which more often than not allowed for deeper insights into the reality of life as a junior teacher.

The analysis of the memoirs is similar to that used by Smolicz and Secombe. It required two different types of data to be assembled, the first of which concerned generally verifiable and observable facts about the respondents such as when they were junior teachers, at what school and for how long. (25) Using Smolicz and Secombe's term concrete facts, these refer to material realities, the existence of which does not depend on the consciousness of the respondent. This information included age, gender, year of appointment, length of time as a junior teacher, teaching duties, levels of responsibility, assistance given and boarding arrangements. This material was collected in the twenty-six sections in Part A of the Memoir Document and was presented largely in tabular form, a presentation that closely resembled the way the concrete material was tabled at the Education Inquiry Committee in 1943.

The other information, of a different nature, came in response to the seven sections of Part B of the Document. Here the respondents gave their own account of events, their own description of their situations, their thoughts and feelings about them and their own actions in response to them. As with Smolicz and Secombe's analysis, such data was labeled as cultural facts as they were the direct expression of the consciousness of the memoir writers. The first six sections consisted of requests for information framed in such a way as to link the responses directly with aspects of major importance in the documented history of the system from 1931 on, e.g. whether the system seemed exploitative, whether it was harmful to both the junior teacher and the pupils, whether or not it should have been abolished and whether they had found anything of value in it. A final section allowed for a free flowing memoir that enabled respondents to write more about the issues or to mention other aspects of particular personal significance for them.

A survey of recent texts helps to set the investigation in the context of the historiography of education and to support aspects of both the methodology and the conclusions arising from it. Vick, in commenting on the 'relatively few' accounts of teacher training in South Australia in the first half of the twentieth century, notes the research from which this article derives as one of the 'major studies' which systematically examine aspects of this topic. (26) On the wider scene McCulloch and Richardson, in their extensive account of historiographical and methodological literature, note a number of aspects pertinent to this kind of research, the most significant of which is their reference to the recent emergence of a new form of historical study 'strongly reliant on a combination of the field work methods of qualitative research in the social sciences.... and critical theory'. (27) They go on to show that aspects, variously labelled 'life history', 'biography', 'policy' and 'narrative' research, are best grouped as 'humanistic' approaches in that they provide 'understanding and an interpretive account of educational phenomena' while the critical theory aspect is concerned with 'the introduction of change through social action'. Of the social sciences they see sociology being 'a most potent force [that] remains undoubtedly the most influential of the social sciences in this regard'. (28) They note the potential value of combining different kinds of sources or methods, such as qualitative research complemented by documentary sources, to help understanding of historical problems where, for example, 'interviews with ... retired teachers ... can, in combination with documentary evidence, shed interesting light on change in education over the longer period'. (29) Certain aspects of feminist studies, too, owe much to this life history/memoir approach labeled 'history from below', that is, an emphasis on giving a voice to those whose opinions rarely feature in mainstream history by exploring the meanings and beliefs of such individuals. (30) Campbell and Sherington, in another comprehensive review of the historiography of education refer to new discoveries about how to read the documentary evidence of the past that have led 'the historian's gaze into areas barely touched previously'. (31)

As the memoir writers relived and reinterpreted past events they provided access to a great deal of additional and often different concrete and cultural material to that ever documented about the system. Both types of material add greatly to a fuller understanding of what it meant to be a junior teacher and what effect departmental policies had for those people at the grass-roots level. The view from the other side is that of the status holders, those responsible for staffing the schools and managing the system and from others promoting the professional status of teachers and the welfare of pupils; both groups investigating and judging the system accordingly. That view reflected the political, economic and societal values of the times. The memoirs, on the other hand, provided a different view, that of the less privileged participants--people who could 'tell it as it was' free from both the defensive departmental rhetoric and the very negative and biased counter-attacks of its opponents. (32) Both accounts have their own particular and generally different bases. Juxtaposing the two allows for a more holistic understanding of the system, and the opportunity to investigate a number of issues in ways that otherwise would not be possible.

The authenticity of these memoirs

One such investigation that is possible from this double view of reality concerned the authenticity of these memoirs, a matter of prime importance for establishing the value of this type of sociological analysis. The availability of documented evidence of an official nature allows for a comparison with the details respondents recalled about the nature of the work they had to undertake. The centre piece of the Union's case was the detailed summary of the work of fifty-nine junior teachers in primary schools and of eighteen in secondary schools. The existence of this tabulated document is of particular value as it serves to confirm the authenticity of what former junior teachers recalled of the same period. Although there were insufficient memoirs from 1942 to replicate the Union's survey, a similar one was constructed from the concrete data provided by fifty-six former primary school junior teachers and twenty-one from secondary schools employed from 1940 to 1943.

With the two constructs set side by side much of the material recalled by the respondents can be seen to mirror that of the 1942 survey as these extracts show:

The list of duties from those in secondary schools indicated that, like those surveyed in 1942, respondents recalled heavy teaching loads with any time free from classes being taken up with relieving absent teachers, duplicating, typing, clerical and administrative duties, running messages and even making tea for the staff. Both surveys show a similar range of subjects from large classes at First Year level to smaller ones at Intermediate, Leaving and a few at Leaving Honours.

One of the key issues at the Inquiry concerned the unacceptable amount of responsibility given to such young and inexperienced people and most respondents did feel that they were solely responsible for what happened in their classrooms. This issue was explored in greater detail in the cultural section where the findings about the effect of such responsibility, involving as it did dealing with students close to their own ages and with subjects they had just learnt themselves, and without much support and help, confirmed a number of the faults identified at the Inquiry. Both sets of data back up the Union contention that the junior teachership was not merely a 'training' opportunity but more usually a heavy teaching responsibility in which there was generally little opportunity for even close supervision and assistance, let alone much training in how to teach. It was generally, as a number of respondents claimed, more a matter of 'being thrown in at the deep end'.

Overall, there is sufficient similarity between what is known from the documented evidence from the Inquiry and what is in the memoirs to justify a claim that the concrete and the cultural material can be regarded as authentic sources of historical and sociological data and as worthy of the same careful and systematic evaluation as those contained in documents of the Inquiry. The general picture of what it was like to be a junior teacher between 1931 and the Inquiry is enhanced by the additional material in the memoirs such as details of their ages, boarding conditions and social life, whether they had matriculated, whether they were studying successfully and what happened to them at the end of the junior teachership period. All of this makes available a personal and societal history not otherwise accessible; one that brings to light a quite different perspective as well as confirming aspects of the contemporary documents.

A better balanced account

In considering such issues as whether the system was exploitative, whether they had felt that they were being trained or whether they or the children were harmed by the experience, the respondents often tended to see things from quite a different point of view to that presented at the Inquiry and this is of considerable value in establishing a balanced account of the realities of the situation.

Some 55 per cent believed that they had been exploited but many qualified this by explaining that this was more in hindsight as it was not a concept with much meaning to them at the time. One respondent recalled the situation thus 'No doubt 23/4d a week was a cheap science teacher but I did not see it that way at the time. They were the war years, the science teachers had enlisted' while another believed

'I feel the system and conditions were accepted as the first step in preparation for training not for haggling and complaint'.

One can see clearly why, when staffing problems of the 1930s and 1940s were solved by the imposition of what was considered by opponents of the system to be a serious exploitative problem in itself, it counted for little amongst the junior teachers themselves if it meant that they had a guarantee of employment or were doing their bit for the war effort.

As regards harm to children, 37 per cent believed that children had suffered under the system, 21 per cent were not sure and 42 per cent were quite sure that they had not. Responses ranged from:

   'Yes--they simply had untrained teachers';

   'We were too young';

   'There was a lot of trial and error'
   to:

   'No--I doubt they suffered much even though we were raw
   inexperienced teachers because we were highly motivated and fond
   of children with a real goal to reach (a vocation?)'; and

   'Children have told me since that they were not aware that I had
   just left school myself'.

On the question of abolition, almost equal numbers believed that the system was rightly done away with as did those who saw value in the continuation of such a period of practical experience. Some 65 per cent of the latter commented on the benefits in such terms as:

   'We benefited';

   'Definitely had a headstart';

   'More perspective regarding children's needs, difficulties';

   'I felt quite at home in my practical teaching at the College'; and

   'Sure--it confirmed my ambition to be a teacher'.

On the question of academic success, however, more than half of the respondents recalled disadvantage--'I had not done Leaving Honours. This time would have been better spent on further studies. My first year at university was hard' and 'I found it most difficult to resume studies after that break'.

It was, however, the opportunity given to respondents to assess their overall success as junior teachers and the value of it that allows the most scope for what can be seen as a type of sociological deconstruction of at least some aspects in the case against the system. Analyses of the respondents' feelings about these issues are best illustrated from the cultural data where they had the opportunities to gauge their success as junior teachers, consider its usefulness and to estimate their degree of happiness at the time. From the details of the very negative material presented to the Inquiry and from the very critical findings of the Committee, a reader could well expect that a junior teacher of that period would not have found much success or value in the responsibilities they were given or that they could have been particularly happy in such circumstances. Much of the material in the memoirs, however, shows that such an assumption would be far from correct. In one section respondents were required to assess their levels of success and the results are shown in the following table:

The striking feature of this is that in every period the vast majority found some measure of success in the experience and that there were few failures, even in situations that others, and indeed many of the respondents themselves, indicated as being very difficult. They explained themselves in terms such as:

   'All the feedback from both the Inspector and the Head was positive'

   'I felt successful. I tried hard, the students passed the yearly
   exams ... discipline had not been a problem'

   'I was happy enough in my work and had no reason to think I'd
   failed. Certainly no-one had ever complained about the work I had
   done'

   'I felt I had been a failure. I just could not relate to students
   only two years my junior'.

In another table respondents indicated how they remembered the experience against four criteria--whether it was happy, useful, frustrating or just bearable time. Again, a reader of the documentation could probably assume that few would have found the experience particularly useful or an especially happy one in an exploitative situation, on low pay and generally far from home. On the contrary, comparatively few recalled it being otherwise and, indeed, of those who chose only one category, the matter of general happiness rated considerably higher in 1940-45 than in any other period. Over the period under review, some 85% rated happiness and usefulness highly while less than 10 per cent marked the negative criteria. They explained themselves in such terms as:

   'Yes--I was happy--the greatest reward was the affection I won
   from my little pupils';

   'It was a useful time for gaining teaching skills';

   'I was conscious of maturing greatly during my junior teacher
   year and this was a great help in my College and University years'

   'My abilities were so narrow and restricted--I taught from past
   experience';

   'The head teacher treated me as a dogsbody and anything that went
   wrong was my fault'.

A balanced account shows that there is not really a question of exploitation or experience to be answered at all. These junior teachers had a variety of experiences, negative and positive, individual and collective, that at least gave them the opportunity to come to terms with the realities of the classroom, an aspect of contemporary teacher preparation that appears to be decidedly questionable.

A perspective on current issues

In addressing the future of the history of education, Campbell and Sherington conclude that 'Historical perspectives remain essentially perspectives on the problems and issues of our times'. (36) Sweeney, however, points out that the historical approach is not often used to keep educational innovations in perspective or to assist in the objective appraisal of systems of education and goes on to say 'there is, perhaps, no more liberating an influence than the knowledge that things have not always been as they are now and need not remain so'. (37) Miller notes that historians 'by carefully examining the past ... can help sharpen answers to contemporary questions--and sometimes alter the questions themselves'. (38) What a review of this particular period with its strong attachment to long term practical experience could have to offer on issues of current concern in teacher training is best illustrated by looking at what such concerns are and what remedies are being suggested.

Professor T.J. Lovat of the Australian Council of Deans of Education, writing in 2003, noted that a majority of submissions to the Ramsey Review of Teacher Education in NSW 'lamented that beginning teachers were taking up their positions ill-prepared for actual classroom teaching' and 'unfamiliar with the operation of school and classroom cultures'. (39) He went on to indicate that a large body of research and literature in the Review demonstrated 'the desirability of maximizing the amount of time students engage in the practicum; and the importance of 'the whole school' context of the practicum'. Bennett, Carre and Dunne refer to research that leads to the implication that the training environment should be the same as the environment in which the knowledge and skills are to be used, an aspect they see as an argument for a substantial proportion of training to be classroom based 'initially, at least, within an apprenticeship model'. (40) A report on teacher training in Australia commissioned in 1990 by the National Board of Employment, Education and Training concluded that no matter how well planned or executed it might be, teaching practice which involved teaching in isolated lessons over a few weeks of the year 'suffers from the limitations that result from lack of opportunity for students to experience "whole school" operation' and that 'the area of practical experience in schools stands out as one which the vast majority of interested parties would wish to see reform'. (41) Tickle suggests that one such limitation is that during very short exposure to learning classroom practice the mastering of general technical competencies becomes the major concern with the result that such classroom practice 'is often divorced from ... issues of theory which have the potential to inform practice'. (42)

It would seem that the basic principles put forward in favour of the training aspect of the junior teacher system were not dissimilar in many ways to those being promoted today. The nature of the case against the system did, however, cast a heavy shadow over not just the period under review but also over any apprenticeship type approach, a situation that has tended to relegate accounts of this aspect of training to being little more than footnotes in South Australian educational history. Yet the period from 1873 to at least 1920 was one in which the issue of the balance between theory and practice and how and where each should be provided was the subject of several inquiries and commissions and the source of much debate and experimentation at school, university, departmental and union levels, (43) still clearly matters of concern in such circles. The Inquiry Committee, too, appears to have been well aware of what was being lost in the abolition of the system as it made two significant further proposals in 1945. One was that all one and two-year training courses be extended to at least three years in order to give more opportunities for practical experience and the other was that ex-student teachers be appointed as junior assistants at an appropriate school for a year to enable their practical training to be consolidated. (44) It may be that some liberating insights and sharpened questions may emerge not merely from a better balanced account of the final years of the system but also from a study of the whole period when schools and teachers played a significant part in the training of teachers.

The significance of any such approach to understanding and addressing contemporary issues is highlighted by the current national inquiry into the quality and adequacy of teacher training courses in Australia, the eighth term of reference of which states 'Examine the role and input of schools and their staff in the preparation of trainee teachers'. (45) Two current proposals to remedy shortages of adequately trained teachers indicate that school-based training is likely to feature strongly in response to this. On 20 June, 2005, The Advertiser, now Adelaide's only newspaper, under bold page 1 headlines Many new teachers 'underqualified' [and] Out of their depth, reported that in a submission to the inquiry, the Australian Secondary Principals' Association had recommended 'the implementation of teacher internships' and that funding for teaching the practice of teaching 'be stripped from universities and given to schools'. The Centre for Independent Studies, in a report headed 'Good teachers where they are needed' (46) took the internship idea a step further by proposing that certain secondary and rural shortages could be solved by schools recruiting from recent graduates and allowing them to undertake paid teaching duties while they gained all their teaching qualifications in a school-based program, a permanent approach, unlike the temporary expedients employed by Dr Fenner to manage similar shortages.

Conclusion

In March 1966, A.W. Jones, Superintendent of Recruiting and Training, noted that the junior teacher system had in the previous year 'ended without a murmur from any quarter; it has passed unnoticed and almost unsung'. (47) This is not unexpected in view of the legacy of criticism from 1943/45 and the lingering end to the system over the twenty years that it continued to be of some use to the Department. The research set out to see if there could be another side to the very negative way the system emerged from the Inquiry of 1942-1945 by introducing an element of balance noticeably absent then. The Polish sociologist Chalasinski believed that 'the use of memoirs reunites history and sociology' (48) and in this case the combination of the methods of the historian and the sociologist has shown to be a useful one for both disciplines. While certain aspects of the junior teacher system are very rightly left 'unsung', it seems that it, over even the longer period, is worthy of being noticed for what it reveals about aspects of enduring concern in teacher training. It seems, too, that memoirs can do much to provide for a richer and more balanced account of aspects of educational history by adding something of a greater sense of reality and human personality to what are too often merely the bare bones of documents.

(1) The Education Inquiry Committee was set up late in 1942: South Australian Parliamentary Papers (SAPP), 1942, no. 26, p. 97. See also C. Thiele, Grains of Mustard Seed, Education Department of South Australia, 1975, pp. 200-201 for details of the concerns about education that led to the setting up of the Inquiry.

(2) This material was collected in 1942 and published in the South Australian Teachers Journal (SATJ) 22 September, 1943, pp. 7-9.

(3) Evidence Book, Education Inquiry Committee, Government Records Group 18/172, pp. 366-837.

(4) SAPP, 1945, no. 15, p. 14.

(5) A. McGuire, 'Pupil teachers and junior teachers in South Australian schools 1873 to 1965: An historical and humanistic sociological analysis', Ph.D thesis, University of Adelaide, 1999.

(6) See for example T.J. Lovat and C. Mackenzie, 'The Role of the 'Teacher' Coming of Age?', Discussion Paper, Australian Council of Deans of Education, June, 2003, pp. 18-19.

(7) Report of the National Inquiry into Education, Australian Government Publishing Services, 1980, p. 251

(8) B.K. Hyams, Teacher Preparation in Australia: a history of its development from 1850 to 1900, Hawthorn, Victoria, ACER, 1979, p. 109.

(9) SAJT, May 1942, p. 13.

(10) SAJT, September 1942, p. 6. The response was published in full and labeled by the Union as 'weaker than water'.

(11) Minute Book, Education Inquiry Committee, Notes for 13/6/1944, Government Records Group, 18/171

(12) Brief rounds of teaching generally consisted of one week of practical teaching in each of the three school terms.

(13) SAPP, 1921, vol. 2, no. 44, pp. 21-23.

(14) M. Stanford, The Nature of Historical Knowledge, Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1987, p. 11.

(15) P. Cunningham and P. Gardner, Becoming Teachers: texts and testimonies, 1907-1950, London, Woburn Press, 2004, p. 1X.

(16) A. Tucker, Our Knowledge of the Past: a philosophy of historiography, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 261

(17) M. Welsh, 'Methodological perspectives on researching recent policy documents in Australian schools', History of Education Review, vol. 32, no. 2, 2003, p. 1.

(18) These are from 340 memoirs from 1921 to 1965, the first collection of which was in response to an advertisement in the Education Gazette of 1989, followed by telephone calls and advertisements in country newspapers between 1990 and 1993. Many first contacts put me in touch with others.

(19) D. MacCullough, Reformation: Europe's house divided 1490-1700, London, Allen Lane, 2003, p. 703.

(20) M. Secombe and J. Zajda (eds.), J.J. Smolicz on Education and Culture, James Nicholas Publishers, 1999, p. 162.

(21) J.J. Smolicz and M.J. Secombe, The Australian School through Children's Eyes, Melbourne University Press, 1981, p. 2.

(22) Secombe and Zajda, J.J. Smolicz, p. 284

(23) Secombe and Zajda, J.J. Smolicz, p. 301

(24) See for example.Welsh, 'Methodological perspectives', pp. 3-5

(25) Smolicz and Secombe, The Australian School, pp. 26-28

(26) M. Vick, 'Teacher training in Adelaide 1900-1950: a light and hazy vision', Proceedings of the Thirtieth Annual Conference, Australian and New Zealand History of Education Society, Annual Conference, Adelaide, vol. 1, p. 356.

(27) G. McCulloch and W. Richardson, Historical Research in Educational Settings, Buckingham, Open University, 2000, pp. 13-16. They acknowledge the influence of John Keeves, editor of the 1988 and 1997 editions of Educational Research Methodology: an international handbook in relation to discussion on 'humanistic' and 'critical theory' research.

(28) McCulloch and Richardson, Historical Research, p. 77.

(29) McCulloch and Richardson, Historical Research, p. 119.

(30) J. Hanan, 'Women, history and power', in D. Richardson and V. Robinson (eds.), Introducing Women's Studies, MacMillan Press, London, 1993, p. 306.

(31) C. Campbell and G. Sherington, 'Whatever happened to the history of Education?', Proceedings of the Thirtieth Annual Conference, Australian and New Zealand History of Education Society, Annual Conference, Adelaide, 2001, p. 51.

(32) Some poignant reflections were revealed about financial problems, expensive and unsatisfactory board, limited contact with home, reduced social life and lack of support within the school. Females faced particular financial problems as equal pay was not introduced for them until after 1943. They also tended to be burdened down with additional duties such as sewing, music and rhythm and a few even faced unwanted advances from older males within the school community.

(33) This extract was published in the SATJ 22 September 1943.

(34) This extract is from McGuire, 'Pupil teachers and junior teachers', p. 414.

(35) McGuire, 'Pupil teachers and junior teachers', p. 705.

(36) Campbell and Sherington, 'Whatever happened to the history of Education?', p. 56

(37) R.V. Sweeney, 'The contribution of history of education to educational studies', ANZES Journal, vols 1-4, 1972/5, p. 2.

(38) P. Miller, Long Division: state schooling in South Australian Society, Netley, S.A., Wakefield Press, 1986, p. xv.

(39) Lovat and Mackenzie, 'The role of the teacher', pp. 18-19.

(40) N. Bennett and C. Carre (eds.), Learning to Teach, London, Routledge, 1993, p. 219.

(41) 'The shape of teacher education, some proposals': report of the National Board of Employment, Education and Training, Canberra: AGPS Press, 1990, Clause 3.2.4

(42) L. Tickle, Learning Teaching, Teaching Teaching: a study of partnerships in teacher education, London, Falmer Press, 1987, p. 2.

(43) See for example Commission of Enquiry of 1881 (SAPP, 1883-4, no. 27A); Annual Conferences of the S.A. Teachers' Union of 1898 & 1899 (SAEGS); Annual Report of the Director of Education, 1908 (SAPP, no. 44, 1909) & 1921 (SAPP, no. 44, 1921) and the Royal Commission into Education of 1911 (SAPP, 1912, no. 27).

(44) SAPP, 1945, no. 15, pp. 14-16.

(45) The inquiry was launched by the Minister of Education on 17 February, 2005, Parliament of Australia, House of Representatives--House News of 27/6/2005.

(46) J. Buckingham, Issue Analysis No. 64, Centre for Independent Studies, 19/10/2005, p. 1.

(47) SAEG, Supplement, March, 1966.

(48) Secombe and Zajda, J.J. Smolicz, p. 304 where they also indicate that Chalasinski is regarded as 'the father of memoir sociology'.

Dr. Anthony McGuire is a former Assistant Director of Education (Curriculum) in the South Australian Education Department. In retirement he has been researching aspects of the apprentice-type training systems used in South Australia between 1875 and 1965 from historical and humanistic sociological perspectives. His particular interest is in how memoirs from within a humanistic sociological framework can be used to provide for better balanced accounts of aspects of educational history.

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Junior teachers in primary schools 1942 (33)

Grades taught all             Number               Lessons
the time                                           a day

1. I, II & III                7 + 6 + 7 = 20       all day

2. I, II & III                9 + 7 + 1 = 17       all day

3. I, II                      10 + 14 = 24         all day

4. I, II & III                12 + 5 + 12 = 29     all day

5. I, II, sub-intermediate    10 + 13 + 1 = 24     all day

Grades taught all                                   No. of
the time                      Other duties         grades taught

1. I, II & III                sewing whole              3+
                              school, rhythm
                              all girls domestic
                              arts upper girls
                              Singing upper
                              scholars

2. I, II & III                IV history,               3+
                              sewing, singing
                              upper school

3. I, II                      III & IV history,         2+
                              admission register
                              sewing III - VII

4. I, II & III                sewing, singing,          3+
                              IV for history

5. I, II, sub-intermediate    sports                    2

Grades taught all                                  Board
the time

1. I, II & III                                      17         6

2. I, II & III                                      19         6

3. I, II

4. I, II & III                                      18         0

5. I, II, sub-intermediate               1           0         0

Former junior teachers in primary schools 1940-1943 (34)

        M/F    Age      School    Main
                        level     grades

1       F      17.11      LH      1 - 11
2       F       16.9      L       1 - 111
3       M      16.11      LH      1 - 1V
4       M       17.2      LH      1 - 11
5       M       17.3      LH      1 - 111

        Nos    Sole/    Lessons
               shared   per day

1        20    Sole     All day
2        20    Sole     All day
3        18    Sole     All day
4        -     Sole     All day
5        12    Sole     All day

        Other                               No. of
        duties                              grades

1       Domestic Arts/Sewing to V1 & V11      2+
2       Exercises & Sewing/Craft              3+
3       Drum/Fife Band                        4
4       + some Gr. 111                        2+
5       Nil                                   3

Respondents' assessments of levels of success (35)

                              1920 - 1930     1930s

Respondents                       32           114
% of all Junior Teachers          10            16
Very Successful (%)               21            19
Successful (Qualified) (%)         9             6
Moderately Successful (%)         64            60
Some Success (%)                  94            85
Failure (%)                        0             2
Other (%)                          6            13

                              1940 - 1945   1946 - 1950

Respondents                       91            52
% of all Junior Teachers          15            13
Very Successful (%)               12            30
Successful (Qualified) (%)        21            19
Moderately Successful (%)         56            28
Some Success (%)                  89            77
Failure (%)                        4             6
Other (%)                          7            17

                              1951 - 1964

Respondents                       62
% of all Junior Teachers           9
Very Successful (%)               35
Successful (Qualified) (%)         5
Moderately Successful (%)         35
Some Success (%)                  75
Failure (%)                        2
Other (%)                         23