The Common School
1830-1890
A Time of Unprecedented Change
Territorial expansion Dramatic Population Growth Civil War Industrialization Urbanization Social Reform
Jacksonian Democracy The era of the
Common Man Universal Manhood
Suffrage Local Control
A new Working Class Immigration Urbanization Industrialization
Social Problems Industrial revolution
Textile industry Lowell
Massachusetts Immigration
Potato famine in Ireland
Gap between classes
Reform Movements Abolition of
slavery Concord Mass. Henry Ward
Beecher
Reform Movements Women’s Suffrage
Susan B. Anthony Lucretia Mott The Grimke Sisters Elizabeth Cady
Stanton
Reform Movements Temperance
WCTU
Reform Movements Reform of
Prisons Mental
Institutions Dorothea Dix
Reform Movements Was the Goal . .
. Social Justice? Social Control? Both?
The Common School Movement
New England Beginnings Ralph Waldo Emerson Transcendentalism Every human has a
“Spark of the Divine” We have a moral
obligation to help others Education is
liberating
Monitorial (Lancasterian) System
Economical 1 teacher and up to
300 students Rote memorization Considered suitable
for working class children
Catherine Beecher and the Common School
Daughter of Henry Ward Beecher
Sister of Harriet Beecher Stowe
Founded Hartford Female
Seminary Western Institute for
Women
Horace Mann and the Common School
Horace Mann
First state Secretary of Education in Massachusetts
He was a reformer. Led the fight for:
Railroads Insane asylums
Horace Mann
In 1837 he ended his law practice and became Massachusett’s first Secretary of Education
Horace Mann
The state takes better The state takes better care of its livestock care of its livestock that it does of its that it does of its children.”children.”
Horace Mann
““Common schools would Common schools would serve all boys and girls and serve all boys and girls and teach a common body of teach a common body of knowledge that would give knowledge that would give each student an equal each student an equal chance in life.”chance in life.”
““It is a free school system that It is a free school system that knows no distinction of rich knows no distinction of rich and poor. . . It throws open and poor. . . It throws open its doors and spreads the its doors and spreads the table of its bounty for all table of its bounty for all children of the state.”children of the state.”
Horace Mann“ “ Education then, Education then,
beyond all other beyond all other devices of human devices of human origin, is the origin, is the equalizer of the equalizer of the conditions of men, conditions of men, the great balance the great balance wheel of the social wheel of the social machinery.”machinery.”
Henry Barnard and the Common School
First U. S. Commissioner of Education
His goal was for America to create: “Schools good enough for
the best and cheap enough for the poorest.”
Characteristics of the Common School
Funded by local property taxes
Available for all white children
No tuition charges Governed by local school
committees (boards) Regulated by the States
Opposition to common schools
A system funded by state tax dollars Irish Catholics
They were expected to attend schools that were anti-catholic
The Great School Debates Bishop John Hughes
We will not send our children where they will be trained without religion, lose respect for their parents and the faith of their fathers and come out turning up their noses at the name of Catholic. . . In a word, give us our just proportion of the common school fund.
The Great School Debates New York Herald
Once we admit that the Catholics have a right to a portion of the school fund, every other sect will have the same. . . We shall be convulsed with endless jarrings and quarrels about the distribution of it and little left for the public schools.”
The Parochial School Movement
The Kalamazoo Case
Jigsaw Activity Count off by 5 to form discussion
groups Discussion Group
1s with 1s; 2s with 2s, etc. Negotiate within your group so that each of
you is responsible for one of the readings Fifth annual report Eighth annual report Tenth annual report Twelfth annual report (A) Twelfth annual report (B)
Jigsaw Activity Expert Group
Discuss your article in your groupWhat are the main ideas?What will you “teach” in your Discussion Group?
Jigsaw Activity Return to your discussion group “Teach” the other members of your group about your articleEveryone take notes
What common themes did you notice?
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