Post on 28-Mar-2015
The Evolution of American Education
Jamestown (1607)
Plymouth (1620)
European Settlers
Jamestown (1607)
• Settlers were “gentleman” and fortune seekers
• Came to find riches - – gold, spices, furs
• Didn’t know farming, land was owned by the company
Plymouth (1620)
• Pilgrims came seeking religious freedom
• Some knowledge of farming
–No plows during the first 12 years
Education in Colonial America
• Apprenticeships
• Dame Schools
• Latin Grammar Schools
• Higher Education
Apprenticeships
• 1642 - Massachusetts Bay Colony law
• If children were notbeing educated properly, the town leaders wouldapprentice the child
• 1646 - Virginia passed similar law
Old Deluder Satan Act
• 1647 - Massachusetts
• Towns with 50 familieshad to have a teacherto teach reading andwriting
Old Deluder Satan Act
• Towns with 100 familieshad to establish a grammar school(college prep)
Latin Grammar Schools
• For the elite• Teachers were ministers
or transients• Curriculum
– Latin, Greek
• Rote memorization• Strict discipline
What is it?
What is it?
• A whipping post. These wereoutside the school house and students were tied to it to receive whippings.
Dame Schools
• Reading and writing was often taught in dame schools, especially for females. Dame schools were often conducted in kitchens. Students learned only the rudiments while thehomemaker worked.
Dame Schools
• Women were expected to stick to their knitting and not meddlein “such things as are proper for men, whose minds are stronger.”
Higher Education
• Colleges were established to train ministers and government leaders
• Some proficiency in Latin and Greek was needed for admission
• Curriculum emphasized classics and the liberal arts
• No sciences or practical subjects were taught
Our European Heritage
• Seven Liberal Arts
–Trivium
•Grammar
•Rhetoric
•Dialectic
More Liberal Arts
• Quadrivium•Arithmetic•Geometry•Astronomy•Music
Higher Education . . .
• Harvard - 1638• William and Mary - 1693• Yale - 1701• Princeton - 1746 (Presbyterian)• Columbia - 1754 (Episcopal)
Higher Education. . .
• Brown - 1764 (Baptist)
• Rutgers - 1766 (Dutch Reformed)
• Dartmouth - 1769 (Congregationalists)
Elementary Schools
• District School - one elementary school in a school district, New England origin, term is now obsolete
• Common School - a school, elementary or secondary, that was available to all students
Elementary Schools….
• Public School - An early term to differentiate between schools, P.S. 84
• Primary School - really refers to schools with grades 1, 2 and 3
Elementary Schools...
• Grammar School - A shortened form of Latin Grammar School, curriculum is limited
• Elementary School - What we have today
Advanced Schooling
• Lyceum
• Private Venture Schools
• Academy
• High Schools
Lyceum
• Generally, an adult education association operated at the community level
• Had meetings, offered regular courses by lectures, procured books, apparatus and collections
Lyceum
• Agriculture was often emphasized in the early 1800s
• By the mid 1800s thousands of Lyceums were in operation in the United States
• There was even a lyceum association
Private Venture Schools
• Practical matters were taught by individuals in their own house
• Subjects included surveying, navigation, accounting, mathematics, etc.– Similar to the dance, karate, computer, etc.
schools of today.
The Academy
• Ben Franklin’s idea - 1749
Franklin’s Academy
• Two Divisions
–English School
–Classical School
• Latin master had a title, English master none
Franklin’s Academy
• Latin master paid twice as much
• English master had twice as many students
Academies
• Private
• Primarily Classical
• Basically College Preparatory
• Evolved out of the Latin Grammar School
Academies
• Sometimes went by other names
–Institutes
–Seminary
High School
• Originally was terminal
• First High School - Boston - 1821
–Boys only, 12 years or older
High Schools
–Entrance examination required
–English, mathematics, science, history
High Schools, cont.
• Massachusetts Law of 1827–Towns with 500+ families
established high schools–United States History,
bookkeeping, algebra, geometry, surveying
Massachusetts
–Towns with 4000+ inhabitants also had to teach Latin, Greek, history, rhetoric & logic
Early Agricultural Schools
• Gardiner Lyceum (Maine) - 1821-1832
• Agricultural Seminary (Conn.) - 1824-1825
• These schools were boarding schools - didn’t survive long
Early Ag Schools
• Boston Asylum and Farm School - 1832– “the establishment of a farm school in
the country, where idle and morally exposed children of the city can be rescued from vice and danger”
Growth of Schools
0
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
7000
1800 1830 1860 1880 1900
Academy
High School
High School Attendance
The Awakening
• At the dawning of the 20th Century the public was disenchanted with public education– curriculum was still primarily classical– no relevancy to an agrarian society– no practical application– lecture and rote memorization
were extensively used
Early Schools
The Media
• Education is “as it was 60 years ago in our boyhood, so it is today in 99 out of 100 schools. Not a grain of progress that will help the country boy to a better understanding of the problem of agriculture.” - Hoard’s Dairyman, 1895
The Media
• We need to abandon “the cut-and-dried formula of a period when a man was ‘educated’ only when he knew Greek and Latin” - Wallace’s Farmer, 1908
The Awakening...
• In 1910 only 8.8% of all 17 year olds were high school graduates
• USDA, agricultural societies, farm publications and others demanded change in the educational system
The Awakening
• Many states started teaching agriculture
and home economics in the public schools in the early 1900s
• A state ruling in North Carolina in 1903 required agriculture to be taught in elementary schools
From 1910-1917the teaching of agriculture in schools was started in many
states
The Awakening
• The NC Legislature passed the Farm Life School Act in 1911
• Boarding schools were established where agriculture and home economics was taught
Farm Life School Curriculum
• Agricultural subjects were substituted for Latin
• All other traditional subjects were taught (literature, etc)
• School had to have a farm and adequate facilities
Cary Farm Life School
Students at Cary lived in this dormitory
Cary Farm Life SchoolThis student from Edgecombe County was a boarder.
Cary Farm Life School
• First year:– general principles of agriculture– farm carpentry– use of tools– construction of things needed on the farm
First Year
Second Year
• Field crops– different soils, fertilizers, cultivation– seed selection & testing
• Fruit growing– orchard location– setting trees, budding, grafting– pruning & marketing
Second Year
• Vegetable gardening– construct hotbeds– each student has a garden plot on farm– becomes familiar with the vegetables that
should be grown on the farm
Second Year
Third Year
• Livestock– different breeds & characteristics– feeding– livestock judging– breeding– dairying– poultry raising
Third Year
Fourth Year
• Soils– types– laying of terraces, drainage methods
• Farm Management– apply business methods to farming
• Rural Economics– marketing problems
Cary Farm Life School
Agricultural subjects onthe Report Card
Cary Farm Life School
The Poultry Co-Op was operated out of
the Cary Farm Life School.
A New Era in Agriculture
• The passage of the Smith-Hughes Act in 1917 provided federal funds to support the teaching of agriculture across the nation.