The History of Education

Edited By: Robert Guisepi

Early Civilizations

With the gradual rise of more complex civilizations in the river valleys of Egypt and Babylonia,
knowledge became too complicated to transmit directly from person to person and from
generation to generation. To be able to function in complex societies, man needed some way of
accumulating, recording, and preserving his cultural heritage. So with the rise of trade,
government, and formal religion came the invention of writing, by about 3100 BC.
Because firsthand experience in everyday living could not teach such skills as writing and
reading, a place devoted exclusively to learning--the school--appeared. And with the school
appeared a group of adults specially designated as teachers--the scribes of the court and the
priests of the temple. The children were either in the vast majority who continued to learn
exclusively by an informal apprenticeship or the tiny minority who received formal schooling.
The method of learning was memorization, and the motivation was the fear of harsh physical
discipline. On an ancient Egyptian clay tablet discovered by archaeologists, a child had written:
"Thou didst beat me and knowledge entered my head."
Of the ancient peoples of the Middle East, the Jews were the most insistent that all children-regardless of class--be educated. In the 1st century AD, the historian Flavius Josephus wrote:
"We take most pains of all with the instruction of the children and esteem the observance of the
laws and the piety corresponding with them the most important affair of our whole life." The Jews
established elementary schools where boys from about 6 to 13 years of age probably learned
rudimentary mathematics and certainly learned reading and writing. The main concern was the
study of the first five books of the Old Testament--the Pentateuch--and the precepts of the oral
tradition that had grown up around them. At age 13, brighter boys could continue their studies as
disciples of a rabbi, the "master" or "teacher." So vital was the concept of instruction for the Jews
that the synagogues existed at least as much for education as for worship.
Ancient Greece
The Greek gods were much more down-to-earth and much less awesome than the remote gods of
the East. Because they were endowed with human qualities and often represented aspects of the
physical world--such as the sun, the moon, and the sea--they were closer to man and to the world
he lived in. The Greeks, therefore, could find spiritual satisfaction in the ordinary, everyday world.
They could develop a secular life free from the domination of a priesthood that exacted homage to
gods remote from everyday life. The goal of education in the Greek city-states was to prepare the
child for adult activities as a citizen. The nature of the city-states varied greatly, and this was also
true of the education they considered appropriate. The goal of education in Sparta, an

authoritarian, military city-state, was to produce soldier-citizens. On the other hand, the goal of
education in Athens, a democratic city-state, was to produce citizens trained in the arts of both
peace and war.
Sparta. The boys of Sparta were obliged to leave home at the age of 7 to join sternly disciplined
groups under the supervision of a hierarchy of officers. From age 7 to 18, they underwent an
increasingly severe course of training. They walked barefoot, slept on hard beds, and worked at
gymnastics and other physical activities such as running, jumping, javelin and discus throwing,
swimming, and hunting. They were subjected to strict discipline and harsh physical punishment;
indeed, they were taught to take pride in the amount of pain they could endure.
At 18, Spartan boys became military cadets and learned the arts of war. At 20, they joined the state
militia--a standing reserve force available for duty in time of emergency--in which they served until
they were 60 years old.
The typical Spartan may or may not have been able to read. But reading, writing, literature, and
the arts were considered unsuitable for the soldier-citizen and were therefore not part of his
education. Music and dancing were a part of that education, but only because they served military
ends.
Unlike the other Greek city-states, Sparta provided training for girls that went beyond the
domestic arts. The girls were not forced to leave home, but otherwise their training was similar to
that of the boys. They too learned to run, jump, throw the javelin and discus, and wrestle. The
Athenians apparently made sport of the physique prized in Spartan women, for in a comedy by the
Athenian playwright Aristophanes a character says to a Spartan girl:
How lovely thou art, how blooming thy skin, how rounded thy flesh! What a prize! Thou mightest
strangle a bull.
Athens. In Athens the ideal citizen was a person educated in the arts of both peace and war, and
this made both schools and exercise fields necessary. Other than requiring two years of military
training that began at age 18, the state left parents to educate their sons as they saw fit. The
schools were private, but the tuition was low enough so that even the poorest citizens could
afford to send their children for at least a few years.
Boys attended elementary school from the time they were about age 6 or 7 until they were 13 or
14. Part of their training was gymnastics. The younger boys learned to move gracefully, do
calisthenics, and play ball and other games. The older boys learned running, jumping, boxing,
wrestling, and discus and javelin throwing. The boys also learned to play the lyre and sing, to
count, and to read and write. But it was literature that was at the heart of their schooling. The
national epic poems of the Greeks--Homer's 'Odyssey' and 'Iliad'--were a vital part of the life of the
Athenian people. As soon as their pupils could write, the teachers dictated passages from Homer
for them to take down, memorize, and later act out. Teachers and pupils also discussed the feats
of the Greek heroes described by Homer. The education of mind, body, and aesthetic sense was,
according to Plato, so that the boys "may learn to be more gentle, and harmonious, and
rhythmical, and so more fitted for speech and action; for the life of man in every part has need of
harmony and rhythm."
At 13 or 14, the formal education of the poorer boys probably ended and was followed by
apprenticeship at a trade. The wealthier boys continued their education under the tutelage of
philosopher-teachers. Until about 390 BC there were no permanent schools and no formal
courses for such higher education. Socrates, for example, wandered around Athens, stopping
here or there to hold discussions with the people about all sorts of things pertaining to the
conduct of man's life. But gradually, as groups of students attached themselves to one teacher or

another, permanent schools were established. It was in such schools that Plato, Isocrates, and
Aristotle taught.
The boys who attended these schools fell into more or less two groups. Those who wanted
learning for its own sake studied with philosophers like Plato who taught such subjects as
geometry, astronomy, harmonics (the mathematical theory of music), and arithmetic. Those who
wanted training for public life studied with philosophers like Isocrates who taught primarily
oratory and rhetoric. In democratic Athens such training was appropriate and necessary because
power rested with the men who had the ability to persuade their fellow senators to act. Most
Athenian girls had a primarily domestic education. The most highly educated women were the
hetaerae, or courtesans, who attended special schools where they learned to be interesting
companions for the men who could afford to maintain them.
Ancient Rome
The military conquest of Greece by Rome in 146 BC resulted in the cultural conquest of Rome by
Greece. As the Roman poet Horace said, "Captive Greece took captive her rude conqueror and
brought the arts to Latium." Actually, Greek influence on Roman education had begun about a
century before the conquest. Originally, most if not all of the Roman boy's education took place at
home. If the father himself were educated, the boy would learn to read and would learn Roman
law, history, and customs. The father also saw to his son's physical training. When the boy was
older, he sometimes prepared himself for public life by a kind of apprenticeship to one of the
orators of the time. He thus learned the arts of oratory firsthand by listening to the debates in the
Senate and in the public forum. The element introduced into Roman education by the Greeks was
book learning.
When they were 6 or 7 years old, boys (and sometimes girls) of all classes could be sent by their
parents to the ludus publicus, the elementary school, where they studied reading, writing, and
counting. At age 12 or 13, the boys of the upper classes attended a "grammar" school where they
learned Latin or Greek or both and studied grammar and literature. Grammar consisted of the
study of declensions and conjugations and the analysis of verbal forms. Both Greek and Latin
literature were studied. The teacher would read the work and then lecture on it, while the students
took notes that they later memorized. At age 16, the boys who wanted training for public service
went on to study public speaking at the rhetoric schools.
The graded arrangement of schools established in Rome by the middle of the 1st century BC
ultimately spread throughout the Roman Empire. It continued until the fall of the empire in the 5th
century AD.
Although deeply influenced by Greek education, Roman education was nonetheless quite
different. For most Greeks, the end of education was to produce a good citizen, and a good citizen
meant a well-rounded individual. The goal of Roman education was the same, but for the Romans
a good citizen meant an effective speaker. The result was that they disregarded such
nonutilitarian Greek studies as science, philosophy, music, dancing, and gymnastics, basing their
education instead on literature and oratory. Even their study of literature, with its overemphasis
on the technicalities of grammar and its underemphasis on content, had the purpose of producing
good orators.
When the Roman Republic became an empire, in 31 BC, the school studies lost even their
practical value. For then it was not the orator in the Senate but the emperor who had the power.
Because of the emphasis on the technical study of language and literature and because the
language and literature studied represented the culture of a foreign people, Roman education was
remote from the real world and the interests of the schoolboys. Vigorous discipline was therefore

necessary to motivate them to study. And the Roman boys were not the last to suffer in this
situation. When the empire fell, the education that was originally intended to train orators for the
Roman Senate became the model for European education and dominated it until the 20th century.
The Romans also left the legacy of their language. For nearly a thousand years after the fall of the
empire, Latin continued to be the language spoken in commerce, public service, education, and
the Roman Catholic church. Most books written in Europe until about the year 1200 were written
in Latin.
The Middle Ages
The invading Germanic tribes that moved into the civilized world of the West and all but destroyed
ancient culture provided virtually no formal education for their young. In the early Middle Ages the
elaborate Roman school system had disappeared. Mankind in 5th-century Europe might well have
reverted almost to the level of primitive education had it not been for the medieval church, which
preserved what little Western learning had survived the collapse of the Roman Empire. In the
drafty, inhospitable corridors of church schools, the lamp of learning continued to burn low,
though it flickered badly.
Cathedral, monastic, and palace schools were operated by the clergy in parts of Western Europe.
Most students were future or present members of the clergy, though a few lay students were
trained to be clerks. Unlike the Greek and Roman schools, which sought to prepare men for this
life, the church schools sought to prepare men for life beyond the grave through the
contemplation of God during their life on Earth. The schools taught students to read Latin so that
they could copy and thereby preserve and perpetuate the writings of the Church Fathers.
Students learned the rudiments of mathematics so that they could calculate the dates of religious
festivals, and they practiced singing so that they could take part in church services.
Unlike the Greeks, who considered physical health a part of education, the church considered the
human body a part of the profane world and therefore something to be ignored or harshly
disciplined. The students attended schools that were dreary and cold, and physical activity was
severely repressed.
Schools were un-graded--a 6-year-old and a 16-year-old (or an adult for that matter) sometimes
sharing the same bench. Medieval education can be understood better if one realizes that for
thousands of years childhood as it is known today literally did not exist. No psychological
distinction was made between child and adult. The medieval school was not really intended for
children. Rather, it was a kind of vocational school for clerks and clergymen. A 7-year-old in the
Middle Ages became an integral part of the adult world, absorbing adult knowledge and doing a
man's work as best he could during what today would be the middle years of elementary
education. It was not until the 18th century that childhood was recognized; not until the 20th that
it began to be understood.
The 12th and 13th centuries, toward the end of the Middle Ages, saw the rise of the universities.
The university curriculum in about 1200 consisted of what were then called the seven liberal arts.
These were grouped into two divisions. The first was the preparatory trivium: grammar, rhetoric,
and logic. The second, more advanced division was the quadrivium: arithmetic, geometry, music,
and astronomy.
Like the Romans, the scholars of the Middle Ages took over the content of Greek education and
adapted it to their own culture. The traditional subjects were clouded with religious assumptions.
Astronomy, for example, was permeated by astrology, and arithmetic was full of mystical
meaning:

There are 22 sextarii in a bushel because God in the beginning made 22 works; there are 22
generations from Adam to Jacob; and 22 books of the Old Testament as far as Esther and 22
letters of the alphabet out of which the divine law is composed.
For the Middle Ages knowledge was an authoritative body of revealed truth. It was not for the
scholar to observe nature and to test, question, and discover truth for himself but to interpret and
expound accepted doctrines. Thus the medieval scholar might debate about how many angels
could stand on the head of a pin, but he did not question the existence of angels.
To the credit of medieval education, by the 12th century the education of women was no longer
ignored, though only a small percentage of girls actually attended schools. Most convents
educated women, as is shown by the famous letters of the French nun Heloise, who received a
classical education at the nunnery of Argenteuil before becoming its abbess. Early in the 12th
century, girls from noble families were enrolled at Notre Dame de Paris in the classes of the
French theologian and philosopher Peter Abelard
Medieval education had its problems. There were many dropouts; the influence of the church
sometimes drugged rather than enlivened the mind; and scholars were often expected to accept
the unreasoned and the unproved. Materials were few and poor. Many university libraries had
fewer than a hundred volumes. Because books were so scarce, lessons had to be dictated and
then memorized. Nevertheless, medieval schooling ended the long era of barbarism, launched the
careers of able men, and sharpened the minds and tongues of the thoughtful and ambitious
students.
For youngsters of the aristocracy in the Middle Ages of the 13th century, there was chivalric
education. This was a kind of secondary education that young men received while living in the
homes of nobles or at court. It included some poetry, national history, heraldry, manners and
customs, physical training, dancing, a little music, and battle skills. Chivalric, secular education
was governed by a code rather than a curriculum. Boys of the lower classes could learn a trade
through apprenticeship in a craftsman's shop.
The Renaissance
The essence of the Renaissance, which began in Italy in the 14th century and spread to northern
European countries in the 15th and 16th centuries, was a revolt against the narrowness and
otherworldliness of the Middle Ages. For inspiration the early Renaissance humanists turned to
the ideals expressed in the literature of ancient Greece. Like the Greeks, they wanted education to
develop man's intellectual, spiritual, and physical powers for the enrichment of life.
The actual content of the humanists' "liberal education" was not much different from that of
medieval education. To the seven liberal arts, the humanists added history and physical games
and exercises. Humanist education was primarily enlivened by the addition of Greek to the
curriculum and an emphasis on the content of Greek and Roman literature. After nearly a
thousand years grammar at last was studied not as an end in itself but because it gave access to
the vital content of literature. In keeping with their renewed interest in and respect for nature, the
humanists also gradually purged astronomy of many of the distortions of astrology.
Along with the changed attitudes toward the goals and the content of education, in a few
innovative schools, came the first signs of a change in attitude toward educational methods.
Rather than bitter medicine to be forced down the students' throats, education was to be exciting,
pleasant, and fun.
The school that most closely embodied these early Renaissance ideals was founded in Mantua,
Italy, in 1423 by Vittorino da Feltre. Even the name of his school, Casa Giocosa (Happy House),

broke with the medieval tradition of cheerless institutions in which grammar--along with Holy
Writ--was flogged into the learner's memory.
The school served children from age six to youths in their mid-twenties. The pupils studied
history, philosophy, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy, but the basis of the curriculum
was the study of Greek and Roman literature. Physical development was encouraged through
exercise and games.
The humanist ideal did not affect the lower classes, who remained as ignorant as they had been in
the Middle Ages. Its impact was appreciable, however, on the secondary education that was
provided for the upper classes. This is not to say that there was a proliferation of Happy Houses.
Unlike Vittorino's school, the other Latin grammar schools that introduced Greek and Roman
literature into the curriculum soon shifted the emphasis--as the Romans had done--from the study
of the content of the literature to the form of the language. The physical development so important
to the early humanist ideal of the well-rounded man found no place in the curriculum. Instead of
the joy of learning, there was harsh, repressive discipline.
The Reformation
The degeneration in practice of the early humanists' educational goals and methods continued
during the 16th-century Reformation and its aftermath. The religious conflict that dominated
men's thoughts also dominated the "humanistic" curriculum of the Protestant secondary schools.
The Protestants' need to defend their new religion resulted in the further sacrifice of "pagan"
content and more emphasis on drill in the mechanics of the Greek and Latin languages. In actual
practice, then, the humanistic ideal deteriorated into the narrowness and otherworldliness that the
original humanists had opposed.
The Protestants emphasized the need for universal education and established elementary
vernacular schools in Germany where the children of the poor could learn reading, writing, and
religion. This innovation was to have far-reaching effects on education in the Western world.
17th- and 18th-Century Europe
The vast majority of schools remained in a state of stagnation during the 17th and 18th centuries.
By and large, the teachers were incompetent and the discipline cruel. The learning methods were
drill and memorization of words, sentences, and facts that the children often did not understand.
Most members of the lower classes got no schooling whatsoever, and what some did get was at
the hands of teachers who often were themselves barely educated.
In the secondary Latin grammar schools and the universities the linguistic narrowness and
otherworldliness of classical studies persisted. By the 17th century the study of Latin removed
students even farther from real life than it had in the 16th, because Latin had ceased to be the
language of commerce or the exclusive language of religion. In the 17th century it also slowly
ceased to be even the exclusive language of scholarly discourse. Yet most humanist schools
made no provision for studying the vernacular and clung to Latin because it was thought to
"train" the mind. The scientific movement--with its skeptical, inquiring spirit--that began to
permeate the Western world in the 17th century was successfully barred from both the Catholic
and Protestant schools, which continued to emphasize classical linguistic studies.
Although the general state of education was retrogressive, there were some advanced educators
and philosophers. Their ideas about learning pointed toward the educational revolution of the
20th century.

The 17th century. One of the educational pioneers of great stature was John (Johann) Amos
Comenius (1592-1670). Effective education, Comenius insisted, must take into account the nature
of the child. His own observations of children led him to the conclusion that they were not
miniature adults. He characterized the schools, which treated them as if they were, as "the
slaughterhouses of minds" and "places where minds are fed on words." Comenius believed that
understanding comes "not in the mere learning the names of things, but in the actual perception
of the things themselves." Education should begin, therefore, with the child's observation of
actual objects or, if not the objects themselves, models or pictures of them. The practical result of
this theory was Comenius' 'Orbis Pictus' (The World in Pictures), the first--and for a long time the
only--textbook in the Western world that had illustrations for children to look at. Although the
ideas on which it was based were at first ridiculed, Comenius' book was widely used by children
for about 200 years.
In the 17th century philosophers, too, were beginning to develop theories of learning that
reflected the new scientific reliance on firsthand observation. One of the men whose theories had
the greatest impact on education was the English philosopher John Locke (1632-1704). According
to Locke (who did not originate the idea but gave impetus to it), the mind at birth is a blank tablet
(tabula rasa). That is, it has no innate, God-given knowledge. But it does have a number of powers
or faculties, such as perceiving, discriminating, comparing, thinking, and recalling. Locke
believed that knowledge comes when these faculties are exercised upon the raw material of sense
impressions received from objects in the external world. Once the mind has passively received
such sense impressions, its faculties go to work--discriminating among and comparing them,
sifting and sorting them until they take shape as "knowledge."
One aspect of Locke's theory--the notion that the mind is made up of "faculties"--was interpreted
to mean that the function of schooling was to "train" the various mental faculties. Latin and
mathematics, for example, were thought to be especially good for strengthening reason and
memory. This idea clung to educational practice well into the 20th century--long after "faculty"
psychology had been proved invalid.
The more significant aspect of the theory, in terms of educational reform, was the insistence upon
firsthand experience with its implicit protest against the mere book learning of the Middle Ages
and the humanists. If the raw material of knowledge comes from the impressions made upon the
mind by natural objects, then education cannot function without objects. Eventually, the effect of
this part of the theory was reflected in the introduction into the schools of pictures, models, field
trips, and other manifestations of education's increased respect for firsthand observation. By the
mid-19th century it had become fashionable to introduce into schools objects that provided
firsthand sense impressions and that filled out, supplemented, and gave interest to abstract book
learning. The materials and the methods of traditional book learning were not radically revised,
however, for another 75 years.
The 18th century. It was the delayed shock waves of the ideas of an 18th-century Frenchman that
were to crack the foundations of education in the 20th century and cause their virtual upheaval in
the United States. The man was Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78). The child, as Rousseau saw
him, unfolds or develops--intellectually, physically, and emotionally--much like a plant.
He believed, moreover, that the child is innately good but that all social institutions, including
schools, are evil, distorting the child into their own image. He doubted, therefore, that there
should be formal schools at all. Whether there were or not, however, he believed that the aim of
education should be the natural development of the learner.
Rousseau's observations and their educational ramifications were a complete reversal of the
educational theories and practices of the 1700s. The prevailing theory was that the child differs
from the adult in the quantity of his mind. The child, presumably, is born with the same, but
weaker, mental faculties as the adult. To bring his faculties up to an adult level, education must

cultivate them through exercise--that is, through drill and memorization. Rousseau, however,
believed that the child differs from the adult in the quality of his mind, which successively unfolds
in different stages of growth. "We are always looking for the man in the child," he said, "without
thinking what he is before he becomes a man."
"Children," observed Rousseau, "are always in motion: a sedentary life is injurious." From age 2
to 12, therefore, Rousseau envisioned the cultivation of the body and the senses, not the intellect.
When the youngster's intellect begins to develop, at about 12 to 15, he can begin the study of
such things as science and geography.
The study, however, should begin not with an organized body of abstract knowledge but with the
things that interest the child in the world around him. He must learn not by memorizing but by
firsthand experience. "He is not to learn science: he is to find it out for himself," Rousseau said.
Only when he is 15 should book learning begin. So much for the entire Latin school if one
accepted Rousseau.
Rousseau also attacked the teaching methods of his time. The theory of mental faculties
recognized no innate differences among children. It was thought that children are born with the
same faculties, and that the differences among them depend on their education--that is, on the
amount of "exercise" their faculties receive. For Rousseau such exercise stunts "the true gifts of
nature".
Since Rousseau believed that the child is innately good and that the aim of education should be
his natural development, there was little for the teacher to do except stand aside and watch.
Rousseau's overemphasis of the individuality and freedom of the child and his underemphasis of
the needs of the child as a social being represent a reaction against the repressive educational
practices of the time. Those who were influenced by Rousseau tried to create schools that would
provide a controlled environment in which natural growth could take place and at the same time
be guided by society in the person of the teacher.
Ironically, shortly after Rousseau's death Prussia became the first modern state to create a
centrally controlled school system. For more than a century it operated on principles almost
diametrically opposed to those of Rousseau.
Colonial America
While the schools that the colonists established in the 17th century in the New England, Southern,
and Middle colonies differed from one another, each reflected a concept of schooling that had
been left behind in Europe. Most poor children learned through apprenticeship and had no formal
schooling at all. Those who did go to elementary school were taught reading, writing, arithmetic,
and religion. Learning consisted of memorizing, which was stimulated by whipping. The
secondary school, attended by the wealthier children, was, as in most of Europe, the Latin
grammar school. The teachers were no better prepared, and perhaps less so, than the teachers in
Europe.
Harvard College, which traces its history to 1636, had as its primary purpose the training of Latin
school graduates for the ministry. Like most of the colleges in Europe, its curriculum was
humanist.
Most of the books used in the elementary and secondary schools were also used in Europe:
Bibles, psalters, Latin and Greek texts, Comenius' 'Orbis Pictus', and the hornbook, which was
widely used in England at the end of the 16th century. Not really a book at all, the hornbook was a
paddle-shaped board. A piece of parchment (and, later, paper) with the lesson written on it was
attached to the board and covered with a transparent sheet of horn to keep it clean.

The first "basic textbook"--'The New England Primer'--was America's own contribution to
education. Used from 1690 until the beginning of the 19th century, its purpose was to teach both
religion and reading. The child learning the letter a, for example, also learned that "In Adam's fall,
We sinned all."
As in Europe, then, the schools in the colonies were strongly influenced by religion. This was
particularly true of the schools in the New England area, which had been settled by Puritans and
other English religious dissenters. Like the Protestants of the Reformation, who established
vernacular elementary schools in Germany in the 16th century, the Puritans sought to make
education universal. They took the first steps toward government-supported universal education
in the colonies. In 1642 Puritan Massachusetts passed a law requiring that every child be taught to
read. And in 1647 it passed the "Old Deluder Satan Act," so named because its purpose was to
defeat Satan's attempts to keep men, through an inability to read, from the knowledge of the
Scriptures. The law required every town of 50 or more families to establish an elementary school
and every town of 100 or more families to maintain a grammar school as well.
Puritan or not, virtually all of the colonial schools had clear-cut moral purposes. Skills and
knowledge were considered important to the degree that they served religious ends and, of
course, "trained" the mind.
18th-Century United States
As the spirit of science, commercialism, secularism, and individualism quickened in the Western
world, education in the colonies was called upon to satisfy the practical needs of seamen,
merchants, artisans, and frontiersmen. The effect of these new developments on the curriculum in
American schools was more immediate and widespread than its effect in European schools.
Practical content was soon competing vigorously with religious concerns.
The academy that Benjamin Franklin helped found in 1751 was the first of a growing number of
secondary schools that sprang up in competition with the Latin schools. Franklin's academy
continued to offer the humanist-religious curriculum, but it also brought education closer to the
needs of everyday life by teaching such courses as history, geography, merchant accounts,
geometry, algebra, surveying, modern languages, navigation, and astronomy. By the mid-19th
century this new diversification in the curriculum characterized virtually all American secondary
education.
After the Revolutionary War new textbooks--mostly American histories and geographies--began to
appear. Often they were written with a strong nationalistic flavor. Also, beginning in 1783 'The New
England Primer' began to share its supremacy with what was to become an even more popular
schoolbook, Noah Webster's 'American Spelling Book'. This work standardized American spelling
and emancipated it from English spelling. It also exposed American schoolchildren to more than a
century of grueling drill. The speller was used until the end of the 19th century, but the stress on
spelling accuracy and the spelling-bee craze continued to grip the schools into the early years of
the 20th century.
19th-Century Europe
In the 19th century the spirit of nationalism grew strong in Europe and, with it, the belief in the
power of education to shape the future of nations as well as individuals. Other European
countries followed Prussia's example and eventually established national school systems. France
had one by the 1880s, and by the 1890s the primary schools in England were free and compulsory.

The attitude toward women, too, was slowly changing. By the last half of the 19th century both
France and Germany had established secondary schools for women. Only the most liberal
educators, however, entertained the notion of coeducation.
By and large, European elementary schools in the 19th century were much like those of the 16th,
17th, and 18th centuries. They were attended by children of the lower classes until, at the latest,
age 10 or 11, when schooling terminated for all but a few of the "brightest" among them. The usual
subjects were reading, writing, religion, and, if the teacher had mastered it himself, arithmetic. The
teacher was often poorly informed; frequently, he taught because he was unable to get any other
kind of work. School might still be held in apprentice shops, industrial plants, living rooms,
kitchens, or outdoor areas, though regular classrooms were becoming the rule. If the teacher
could maintain order at all, it was by bullying, beating, and ridiculing the children. Perhaps the
best description of the children who attended such schools is by the English novelist Charles
Dickens:
Pale and haggard faced, lank and bony figures, children with the countenances of old men. . . .
There was childhood with the light of its eyes quenched, its beauty gone, and its helplessness
alone remaining.
It is no wonder then that Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi's (1746-1827) school at Yverdon, Switzerland,
created international attention and attracted thousands of European and American visitors. What
they saw was a school for children--for real children, not miniature adults. They saw physically
active children--running, jumping, and playing. They saw small children learning the names of
numbers by counting real objects and preparing to learn reading by playing with letter blocks.
They saw older children engaged in object lessons--progressing in their study of geography from
observing the area around the school, to measuring it, making their own relief maps of it, and
finally seeing a professionally executed map of it.
This was the school and these were the methods developed by Pestalozzi in accordance with his
belief that the goal of education should be the natural development of the individual child, and
that educators should focus on the development of the child rather than on memorization of
subject matter that he was unable to understand. Pestalozzi's school also mirrored the idea that
learning begins with firsthand observation of an object and moves gradually toward the remote
and abstract realm of words and ideas. The teacher's job was to guide--not distort--the natural
growth of the child by selecting his experiences and then directing those experiences toward the
realm of ideas.
The German educator Friedrich Wilhelm Froebel (1782-1852) is the father of the
Kleinkinderbeschaftig-ungsanstalt (institution where small children are occupied). The name, too
long even for the Germans, quickly shrank to Kindergarten (garden for children).
Froebel wanted his school to be a garden where children unfolded as naturally as flowers. Like
Pestalozzi, with whom he had studied, he felt that natural development took place through selfactivity, activity springing from and sustained by the interests of the child himself. The
kindergarten provided the free environment in which such self-activity could take place.
It also provided the materials for self-activity. For example, blocks in different shapes and sizes
led the child to observe, compare and contrast, measure, and count. Materials for handwork--such
as drawing, coloring, modeling, and sewing--helped develop motor coordination and encourage
self-expression.
For another of Pestalozzi's admirers, the German philosopher and psychologist Johann Friedrich
Herbart (1776-1841), education was neither the training of faculties that exist ready-made in the
mind nor a natural unfolding from within. Education was instruction--literally a building into the

mind from the outside. The building blocks were the materials of instruction--the subject matter.
The builder was the teacher. The job of the teacher was to form the child's mind by building into it
the knowledge of man's cultural heritage through the teaching of such subjects as literature,
history, science, and mathematics. Since the individual mind was presumably formed by building
into it the products of the collective mind, methods of instruction were concerned wholly with how
this was to be done. Herbart's interest lay in determining how knowledge could be presented so
that it would be understood and therefore retained. He insisted that education must be based on
psychological knowledge of the child so that he could be instructed effectively.
The psychology on which Herbart based his teaching methods was later proved incorrect. His
systematized lesson plans, however, guiding the teacher in what he considered the proper
manner and sequence of presenting subject matter to pupils, were a real innovation in education.
By denying that the mind consists of inborn faculties that can be exercised on any kind of
material, Herbart drew the attention of educators to the subject matter itself, to the content of the
material. He took the emphasis off memorizing--at least in theory--and put it on understanding. He
also transformed the image of the teacher. No longer an ignorant bully beating knowledge into
children, the teacher became a person trained in effective methods of imparting knowledge. He
controlled the learning situation through psychological insight, not physical force. The teacher
inspired the child's "interest" in the material because he knew how to present it.
Before arriving at his own educational theory, Herbart had visited--and been impressed by-Pestalozzi's school in Switzerland. The teaching methods Herbart evolved represented an attempt
to create in the German schools the same joy of learning that animated Pestalozzi's school. That
is why he insisted on the need to study the child to determine his interests.
Herbart's educational goal was different from Pestalozzi's, however, and his teaching methods
created a different kind of school. Herbart was working within the framework of a state-controlled
school system. For him the goal of education was to create individuals who were part of the
sociopolitical community. While Pestalozzi emphasized the individuality that makes men distinct
from one another, Herbart emphasized their common cultural heritage. Herbart's school created
an intellectual environment, conducive to the child's absorption of formulated, authoritative
bodies of knowledge, while Pestalozzi's school created a physical environment, conducive to the
child's physical activity and firsthand learning experiences. While "interest" resided in the
physical activity that Pestalozzi's child engaged in and was to be encouraged for the sake of his
natural development, "interest" for Herbart's child was stimulated by the teacher for the purpose
of instruction. While Pestalozzi's teacher unobtrusively guided the natural development of the
individual child's innate powers, Herbart's teacher built knowledge into the child's mind through a
systematic method of instruction that was uniform for all pupils. Thus, the instruction in Europe
and the United States that was influenced by Herbart's theories was teacher- and curriculumcentered; that influenced by Pestalozzi, child-centered.
The concern of some educators in the late 19th century for the welfare and development of the
individual eventually began to encompass children previously considered ineducable. One of the
first to become interested in educating the mentally retarded, who were then called "idiot
children," was the Italian physician Maria Montessori (1870-1952). The techniques and materials
she devised for educating mentally retarded children were so effective that many learned to read
and write almost as well as normal children. While Italian educators wondered at the progress of
her pupils, Montessori wondered at the lack of progress of the normal children who attended
schools for the poor. She concluded that the educational techniques used in these schools stifled
development, whereas those that she had developed encouraged it.
In the early 1900s Montessori was put in charge of the Case dei Bambini (Children's Houses),
schools for 3- to 7-year-olds established in newly built tenement buildings in Rome. In these
schools she emphasized freedom and individual development. Her idea of freedom, however, was
a very special one. To be free, children must be as independent of other people as possible. So

they learned to perform everyday, practical tasks, such as dressing themselves and keeping their
schoolroom clean. They were also free to choose the materials they wanted to work with and the
places where they wanted to work. To make them as independent of the teacher as possible, the
children were given materials that allowed them to see and correct their own mistakes--such as
variously shaped pegs to be fitted into matching holes.
Like Froebel, Montessori believed in the value of self-activity, sense training through the handling
of physical objects, and the importance of the child's growth as an individual. For Montessori,
however, growth was primarily cognitive rather than emotional. In her schoolroom, self-activity
manifested itself mostly in contemplative self-absorption. In Froebel's schoolroom, it manifested
itself mostly in the robust physical and social activity of songs and games.
Because the development of cognition was a more specific goal for Montessori than for Froebel,
many of the physical objects she designed for the children led directly to such cognitive ends as
reading and writing. If a child wanted to learn to write, for example, he could begin by literally
getting the feel of the letters--running his hand over letters made of sandpaper. In this way, 4- and
5-year-olds learned to write, read, and count.
19th-Century United States
America came into its own educationally with the movement toward state-supported, secular free
schools for all children, which began in the 1820s with the common (elementary) school. The
movement gained impetus in 1837 when Massachusetts established a state board of education
and appointed the lawyer and politician Horace Mann (1796-1859) as its secretary. One of Mann's
many reforms was the improvement of the quality of teaching by the establishment of the first
public normal (teacher-training) schools in the United States. State after state followed
Massachusetts' example until by the end of the 19th century the common-school system was
firmly established. It was the first rung of what was to develop into the American educational
ladder.
After the common school had been accepted, people began to urge that higher education, too, be
tax supported. As early as 1821 the Boston School Committee established the English Classical
School (later the English High School), which was the first public secondary school in the United
States. By the end of the century, such secondary schools had begun to outnumber the private
academies.
The original purpose of the American high school was to allow all children to extend and enrich
their common-school education. With the establishment of the land-grant colleges after 1862, the
high school also became a preparation for college--the step by which students who had begun at
the lowest rung of the educational ladder might reach the highest. In 1873, when the kindergarten
became part of the St. Louis, Mo., school system, there was a hint that in time a lower rung might
be added.
America's educational ladder was unique. Where public school systems existed in European
countries such as France and Germany, they were dual systems. When a child of the lower and
middle classes finished his elementary schooling, he could go on to a vocational or technical
school. The upper-class child often did not attend the elementary school but was instead tutored
until he was about 9 years old and could enter a secondary school, generally a Latin grammar
school. The purpose of this school was to prepare him for the university, from which he might well
emerge as one of the potential leaders of his country. Instead of two separate and distinct
educational systems for separate and distinct classes, the United States provided one system
open to everyone.

As in mid-19th-century Europe, women were slowly gaining educational ground in the United
States. "Female academies" established by such pioneers as Emma Willard (1787-1870) and
Catharine Beecher (1800-78) prepared the way for secondary education for women. In 1861
Vassar--the first real college for women--was founded. Even earlier--in 1833--Oberlin College was
founded as a coeducational college, and in 1837 four women began to study there.
In the mid-19th century there was yet another change in education. The secondary-school
curriculum that had been slowly expanding since the founding of the academies in the mid-18th
century virtually exploded in the mid-19th.
A new society, complicated by the latest discoveries in the physical and biological sciences and
the rise of industrialism and capitalism, called for more and newer kinds of knowledge. By 1861 as
many as 73 subjects or branches thereof were being offered by the Massachusetts secondary
schools. People still believed that the mind could be "trained," but they now thought that science
could do a better job than could the classics. The result was a curriculum that was top-heavy with
scientific instruction.
The mid-19th-century knowledge explosion also modestly affected some of the common schools,
which expanded their curricula to include such courses as science and nature study. The content
of instruction in the common school, beyond which few students went, consisted of the material
in a relatively small number of books: assorted arithmetic, history, and geography texts,
Webster's 'American Spelling Book', and two new books that appeared in 1836--the 'First' and
'Second' in the series of 'McGuffey's Eclectic Readers'. Whereas 'The New England Primer'
admonished children against sin, the stories and poems in the readers pressed for the moral
virtues. Countless children were required to memorize such admonitions as "Work while you
work, play while you play. One thing each time, that is the way."
In the early days the common schools, like those in Europe, consisted of one room where one
teacher taught pupils ranging in age from 6 to about 13--and sometimes older. The teacher
instructed the children separately, not as a group. The good teacher had a strong right arm and an
unshakable determination to cram information into his pupils.
Once the fight to provide free education for all children had been substantially won, educators
turned their attention to the quality of that education. To find out more about learning and the
learning process, American normal schools looked to Europe. In the 1860s they discovered--and
for about 20 years were influenced by--Pestalozzi. The general effect on the common schools was
to shift the emphasis from memorization of abstract facts to the firsthand observation of real
objects.
Pestalozzi's diminishing influence roughly coincided with the rapid expansion of the cities. By the
1880s the United States was absorbing several million immigrants a year, a human flood that
created new problems for the common school. The question confronting educators was how to
impart the largest amount of information to the greatest number of children in the shortest
possible time. The goal of educators and the means through which they attained it were reflected
in the new schools they built and in the new teaching practices they adopted.
Expediency dictated, particularly in the cities, that the one-room common school be replaced by
larger schools. To make it easier and faster for one teacher to instruct many students, there had to
be as few differences between the children as possible. Since the most conspicuous difference
was age, children were grouped on this basis, and each group had a separate room. To
discourage physical activity that might disrupt discipline and interrupt the teaching process, to
encourage close attention to and absorption of the teacher's words, and to increase eye contact,
the seats were arranged in formal rows. For good measure, they frequently were bolted to the
floor.

It is not surprising, at about this time, when the goal of education was to expedite the transfer of
information to a large number of students, that the normal schools began to fall under the
influence of Herbart. The essence of his influence probably lay not so much in his carefully
evolved five-step lesson plan but in the basic idea of a lesson plan. Such a plan suggested the
possibility of evolving a systematic method of instruction that was the same for all pupils.
Perhaps Herbart's emphasis on the importance of motivating pupils to learn--whether through
presentation of the material or, failing that, through rewards and punishments--also influenced the
new teaching methods of the 1880s and 1890s.
The new methods, combined with the physical organization of the school, represented the
antithesis of Pestalozzi's belief that the child's innate powers should be allowed to unfold
naturally. Rather, the child must be lopped off or stretched to fit the procrustean curriculum bed.
Subjects were graded according to difficulty, assigned to certain years, and taught by a rigid daily
timetable. The amount of information that the child had absorbed through drill and memorization
was determined by how much could be extracted from him by examinations. Reward or
punishment came in the form of grades.
At the end of the 19th century the methods of presenting information had thus been streamlined.
The curriculum had been enlarged and brought closer to the concerns of everyday life. Book
learning had been supplemented somewhat by direct observation. And psychological flogging in
the form of grades had perhaps diminished the amount of physical flogging. In one respect,
however, the schools of the late 19th century were no different from those, say, of the Middle
Ages: they were still based on what adults thought children were or should be, not what they
really were.

Historical foundations of education

1. 1. HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONS OF EDUCATION By

Dr. Selin Nielsen
2. 2. 7000 BC 5000 BC Pre-literate societies (before
writing) Educational Goals: To teach survival skills,
teach group harmony Students: Children Instructional
Methods: Informal, children imitate adults Curriculum:
Practice hunting, fishing, songs, poems, dances.
Agents: Parents, tribal elders, religious leaders
Influence on education: Informal, transmission of skills
3. 3. China 3000 bc 1900 ad China Educational Goals:
Prepare elites to govern the empire according to
Confucian principles Students: Males of upper class
Instructional Methods: Memorization and recitation
Curriculum: Confucian classics Agents: Government
officials Influence on education: Written examinations
for civil service
4. 4. INDIA 3000 BC to present India Educational Goals:
To learn behavior and rituals based on Vedas
Students: Males of upper castes Instructional Methods:
Memorizing and interpreting sacred texts Curriculum:
Vedas and religious texts Agents: Brahmin priest
scholars Influence on education: Cultural transmission
and assimilation, spiritual detachment

5. 5. Egypt 3000 bc 300bc Egypt Educational Goals:

To prepare priests according to scribe for the empire
Students: Males of upper class Instructional Methods:
Memorization and copying texts Curriculum: Religious
or technical texts Agents: Priests and scribes
Influence on education: Restriction on educational
controls to priest elites
6. 6. Greek 1600 bc 300 bc Greece Educational
Goals: To cultivate civic responsibility Students: Male
children ages 7-20 Instructional Methods:
Memorization and recitation in primary schools, lecture,
discussion and dialog in higher schools Curriculum:
Athens: reading, writing, arithmetic, drama, poetry,
music. Sparta: Drill, military songs and tactics Agents:
Athens: private teachers, philosophers. Sparta: Military
teachers Influence on education: Athens: well rounded,
liberally educated person. Sparta: Concept of military
state.
7. 7. Roman 750 bc 450 ad Roman Educational Goals:
Develop civic responsibility for the empire,
administrative and military skills Students: Male
children ages 7-20 Instructional Methods:
Memorization and recitation in ludus; declamation in
rhetorical schools Curriculum: reading, writing,
arithmetic, law, philosophy Agents: Private schools and

teachers, schools of rhetoric Influence on education:

practical administrative skills, relate education to civic
responsibility
8. 8. Arabic 700 ad 1350 ad Arabic Educational Goals:
Cultivate religious commitment to Islamic beliefs;
expertise in mathematics, medicine and science
Students: Male children of upper class ages 7-20
Instructional Methods: Memorization and recitation in
primary schools, imitation and discussion in higher
schools Curriculum: Reading, writing, arithmetic,
religious literature, scientific studies Agents: Mosques,
court schools Influence on education: Arabic numerals
and computation, medicine and science materials
9. 9. Medieval 500 ad 1400 ad Medieval Educational
Goals: Develop religious commitment, knowledge, and
ritual; establish social order, prepare for appropriate
roles Students: Male children of upper class, girls and
women entering religious community ages 7-20
Instructional Methods: Memorization and recitation in
lower schools, text analysis discussion in higher
schools and universities Curriculum: Athens: reading,
writing, arithmetic, philosophy, theology, military and
chivalry Agents: Parish, chantry, cathedral schools,
universities, knighthood Influence on education:

structure and organization of the university,

institutionalization of knowledge
10.
10. Renaissance 1350 ad - 1500 Renaissance
Educational Goals: Cultivate humanist expert in Greek
and Latin classics; prepare people to serve dynastic
leaders Students: Male children of aristocracy and
upper class, ages 7-20 Instructional Methods:
Memorization and translation and analysis of Greek
and Roman classics. classical literature, poetry and
art. Curriculum: Latin and Greek classical literature,
poetry and art. Agents: Classical humanist educators
and schools like lycee, gymnasium and Latin school
Influence on education: Emphasis on literary
knowledge, excellence and style in classical literature,
two track system of schools
11.
11. Reformation 1500 ad 1600 ad Reformation
Educational Goals: Cultivate a commitment to a
particular religious denomination, and general literacy
Students: Boys and girls ages 7-12 in vernacular
schools, young men of upper class in humanist
schools Instructional Methods: Memorization drill,
indoctrination, catechetical instruction in vernacular
schools, translation and analysis of classical literature
in humanist schools Curriculum: Reading, writing,
arithmetic, catechism, religious concepts and rituals.

Latin and Greek theology Agents: Vernacular

elementary school for general public, classical schools
for upper class Influence on education: Commitment to
universal education to provide literacy for everyone;
origins of school systems, dual track school system
based on socio economic class and career goals
12.
12. View of human nature: Humans define
themselves by self- examination Philosophical
idealism, political conservatism Philosophy
SOCRATES Human beings need the order of a stable
society. People accept duties that come with their
station in life View of Human nature Developed
ethical system based on hierarchy.: human relations
and roles, emphasized order and stability Philosophy:
CONFUCIUSImportant educational theorists
13.
13. Humans have the power of rationality to guide
their conduct View of human nature: Realist, views
society based on realism and observation Philosophy
ARISTOTLE Humans can be classified on intellectual
capabilities View of human nature: Philosophical
idealist, social conservative, added intuition
Philosophy PLATOImportant educational theorists
14.
14. Humans have a soul and body View of
human nature Christian theology and Aristotelian
philosophy Philosophy: AQUINAS Only certain

people have capacity for leadership based on their

oratory skills View of human nature: Rhetorician,
oratory for personal gain and public service. Plays role
in child development Philosophy:
QUINTILIANImportant educational theorists
15.
15. Human nature is corrupt, weak, self-centered,
and in a state of rebellion from God View of human
nature Reformed theology by stressing faith and
individual conscience Philosophy: LUTHER Humans
are capable of great achievements and also profound
stupidity View of human nature Christian orientation,
educator as a social and intellectual critic Philosophy:
ERASMUSImportant educational theorists
16.
16. ANCIENT TURKS Alp concept was
widespread. Alp Human being: Defined as warrior,
wise, extroverted, nomad, gaining knowledge from
ancestors and old wise people. Oldest Turkish written
texts go back to a period before Islam In ancient Turks
(before Islam) there is no gender difference in
educating youngsters When Western Education is
being influenced by Christianity, the Eastern education
was being influenced by Islam. The God and
theology concepts encapsulated education In this
period, an absolute truth concept gained importance
and taught to people in a dogmatic way

17.
17. Ancient turks Turks accepted Islam in 10.
Century Medreses opened in Semerkant, Buhara,
Taskent, Kasgar Education was organized and
structured in these schools Subjects: Religion and
social studies were taught Agents: Farabi, Ibn-I Sina,
Biruni were some examples that were raised in these
institutions They synthesized philosophies from TurkIslam traditions, Ancient Greek and Rome philosophers
as well This period lasted for Gokturks, Uygurs,
Karahanlis, Selcuks, and Ottomans
18.
18. Eastern philosophers FARABI (870 950)
Philosophy: Base for human nature is knowledge.
Human mind can distinguish right from wrong through
wisdom. View of human nature The ultimate
knowledge is innate Educational philosophy
Distinguished teaching from education Teaching:
Reveal scientific knowledge and art Education: Create
theoretical virtues in society Education must be easy to
hard, simple to complex near to far
19.
19. Eastern philosophers IBN-I SINA (980
1037) Philosophy: Moral virtues are as important as
knowledge itself View of human nature Children are
innocent and clean from the start, should be taught
moral virtues from birth Educational philosophy
Children should be taught without pressure. Children

should be taught from ages 6-14 Agents: Should be

religious, honest, wise person that can recognize
childrens abilities
20.
20. Eastern philosophers BIRUNI (973 1051)
Philosophy: In order to love each other humans should
learn and respect each others language, religion,
traditions and thinking View of human nature
Humanist perspective Educational philosophy He was
expert in astronomy, physics, botanic, pharmacology,
geography Biruni believed scientific work should be
cleaned of magic, superstition and anything that
opposes logic.
21.
21. Selcuks period Medreses should have a
certain period of education Memorization as well as
discussions were methods used to teach Both religious
and vocational oriented education Moral virtues were
especially emphasized and taught as well as skills
Children were taught Islamic educational virtues:
Cleanliness, generosity, good will, and humility.
Famous names in this period include Mevlana
Celaladdin Rumi, Yunus Emre, Asik Pasa ve Haci
Bektasi Veli Poetry was an important part of education
and God and human love issues were the main
subjects

22.
22. Ottoman period Medreses were important
educational institutions and were developed further in
Ottoman period. Rich people as well as government
built medreses everywhere The structure was primary,
middle and high school They were free and boarding
schools Only sunni muslim males were accepted in
medreses, no girls were allowed The teachers were
called muderris Religious, philosophical subjects as
well as literature, science, math and languages were
taught Education was considered as a religious and
moral duty
23.
23. Structure of ottoman education 15. Century
Ottoman schools were divided into 2: Mektep and
Medrese Mektep: To train people to serve the palace,
government and military people These schools were
everywhere and trained workers for the empire These
are schools funded by foundations, the administration
was not central Fatih opened Enderun Palace school
which included talented children of non-muslim
families The language for education was Arabic, but
Turkish and Persian were also taught
24.
24. industrialization In England and al over
Europe after the French revolution, there is an
expansion of technology such as machinery that works
with petrol and steam Education was influenced by

these changes Factory workers came about In this

period, systems such as Socialism, Communism,
Liberalism and Capitalism started gaining popularity
The free thinking brought by the French revolution
combined with industrial revolution caused education to
take shape in this direction Education was needed by
large masses New philosophies came about:
Materialism, Socialism, Positivism etc.
25.
25. Theorists of this period Pestalozzi (17461827) Social Education: Learning through
experimentation, education is for everyone Herbart
(1776-1841) Educate, manage and discipline. The
purpose of education is to serve individual. Attention to
the individual. Frobel (1782-1852) Pre-school
education, emphasized that children should be
educated from 3-4 years. Founded kindergarten
Tolstoy (1828-1910) Education for freedom. Suggested
master apprentice relation for teacher-student. He was
extremely against physical punishment and memorizing
26.
26. Theorists of this period Marx and Engels
(1818-1883, 1829-1895) Socialist education
Education combined with material production Cognitive
and politechnical education Comte and Mill (17961857, 1806-1873) Pozitivist education Religious era
has ended, scientific era has started Math, astronomy,

physics, chemistry, biology, and sociology sciences

developed hierarchically
27.
27. Theorists of this period H. Spencer (18201903) Pragmatic and positivist education Pragmatic
and utilitarian evolution Cognitive, moral and physical
education as a whole F. Hegel (1770-1831) State
Education: Education must be relevant to culture State
can cultivate they type of person Nietzche (17881860) Irrational Education: Industrial revolution made
people mechanical. People must develop their special
abilities Evil and virtue is innate, what we learn is
limited Instead of institutionalizing, cultural education
28.
28. Theorists of this period J. Dewey (1859-1952)
Education for employment and life Education is life it is
not preparation for life Education teaches a child to
think through action Teacher must be a guide to
students not a dictator M. Montessori (1750-1952)
Sensory education Used mostly in early education
Learning through self discovery and interest
Uninterrupted play/work time, loosely structured
classrooms
29.
29. Ottoman education in 18th c. Between 17791839 a reform period in education First in military
education, military schools opened In 1824 II. Mahmut
made primary education mandatory Later middle and

high schools and higher education was formed (Rustiye

mekteplerie , Idadi, Sultani and Darulfunun) 1856
Islahat Fermani Primary education is mandatory
Rustiye must exist in places with 500 houses Idadiye
must exist in places with 100 houses Sultanis must
exist in cities Darulfunun (university) must exist in
Istanbul Male teacher and female teacher schools will
open Money will be collected from public for education
Education will be centralised
30.
30. Ottoman education in 18th c. Kanun-I Esasi
Mandated that education is for everyone There will be
no interference on religious education Education is
free for public II. Abdulhamit period After losing
Russian war, education gained importance Vocational
and art schools increased Increased freedom in press
Higher education for girls and girls started working in
government offices Pre-school education and
professional education
31.
31. In 1950s Skinner with his experiments in
education published education findings In 1930s and
40s in America universities took over research
activities In 1920s in America individual education
was emphasized, in the east socialist education was
popular (Marx influence) First time used education as
an independent field F. Bobbitt20. Century

education in europe and america Education in the

fields of psychology and sociology increased
Education started using the data from these fields
Education started being considered as a field
32.
32. 20. Century education in europe In 1960 and
1970 the theories of educational research peaked and
the discussion is education applied or theoretical
science formed 1957 is the birth of modern education
SPUTNIK!!! Especially in math and science United
States and Europe and Russia entered a competition
period Several projects formed to develop these fields
In 1970 Blooms Taxonomy came out as a reference for
learning for everyone Since 1980s constructivist,
multiple intelligence, brain based learning nd life based
humanist learning gained importance. Education
involves not only schools but throughout life LLL
33.
33. 20th century education in turkey Latin
Alphabet 1928 Latin alphabet accepted 1928-1942
Literacy increased rapidly John Dewey came to Turkey
and made recommendations based on Turkish peoples
culture, needs and characteristics Famous people
formed Turkish Education Mustafa Kemal Ataturk Atuf
Kansu Hasan Ali Yucel M. Emin Soysal Rasit Oymen
and others

34.
34. Latest developments Teacher education 1997
Educational faculties Education in post graduate
education Constructivist approach Multiple
intelligences Capital punishment banned at schools
2005 high schools became 4 years 12 years
mandatory education Education starts at 66 months
35.
35. End of hstoryfor now THANK YOU FOR
YOUR ATTENTION!