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Pillars of the Republic is a pioneering study of common-school development in the years before the Civil War. Public acceptance of state school systems, Kaestle argues, was encouraged by the people's commitment to republican government, by their trust in Protestant values, and by the development of capitalism. The author also examines the opposition to the Founding Fathers' educational ideas and shows what effects these had on our school system.
Aims to shed new light on the issue of literacy in America, providing a social history that broadens the definition of literacy, considering who was reading what, under what circumstances and for what purposes. The book assesses trends in Americans' reading abilities and reading habits.
This volume consists of twenty six autobiographical essays by leading historians of American education which document the enormous variety of paths taken to get into this field. A companion to earlier volumes on philosophy of education and curriculum studies, the historians in this volume reflect a wide variety of interests that underlay accomplishment in this scholarly field. They come from diverse backgrounds that have animated their scholarly careers in compelling ways. Readers in any variety of educational or historical study should learn from this volume how unplanned careers can still result in highly successful sets of accomplishments. That realization is a tribute both to the individual contributors and to the great attractiveness of educational history to committed scholars of various backgrounds and orientations.
Written tests to evaluate students were a radical and controversial innovation when American educators began adopting them in the 1800s. Testing quickly became a key factor in the political battles during this period that gave birth to America's modern public school system. William J. Reese offers a richly detailed history of an educational revolution that has so far been only partially told. Single-classroom schools were the norm throughout the United States at the turn of the nineteenth century. Pupils demonstrated their knowledge by rote recitation of lessons and were often assessed according to criteria of behavior and discipline having little to do with academics. Convinced of the inade...
This text is a companion volume to the four-part PBS documentary series of the same name. Essays by five historians of American education examine the history of the American public school system, from colonial times to the present. They consider a variety of issues faced by educators, parents, politicians and voters over the decades, including state versus local control, educating non-English speakers, specialized vocational tracks, approaches to school integration, the use of intelligence and standardized tests to assess academic potential, the challenges to providing the same quality of education to districts of varying socio-economic levels. Serious writing, but accessible to general readers interested in public education. c. Book News Inc.
Many Americans view today's problems in education as an unprecedented crisis brought on by contemporary social ills. In Learning from the Past a group of distinguished educational historians and scholars of public policy reminds us that many of our current difficulties – as well as recent reform efforts – have important historical antecedents. What can we learn, they ask, from nineteenth century efforts to promote early childhood education, or debates in the 1920s about universal secondary education, or the curriculum reforms of the 1950s? Reflecting a variety of intellectual and disciplinary orientations, the contributors to this volume examine major changes in educational development and reform and consider how such changes have been implemented in the past. They address questions of governance, equity and multiculturalism, curriculum standards, school choice, and a variety of other issues. Policy makers and other school reformers, they conclude, would do well to investigate the past in order to appreciate the implications of the present reform initiatives.
This collection of original essays examines the history of American education as it has developed as a field since the 1970s and moves into a post-revisionist era and looks forward to possible new directions for the future. Contributors take a comprehensive approach, beginning with colonial education and spanning to modern day, while also looking at various aspects of education, from higher education, to curriculum, to the manifestation of social inequality in education. The essays speak to historians, educational researchers, policy makers and others seeking fresh perspectives on questions related to the historical development of schooling in the United States.
Beginning with revolutionary changes effected in tiny frontier schools in the late 19th century, and going up to early 21st century comprehensive high schools, this volume presents a choronological account of specific reform efforts in the US - exposing the successes and roots of many failures.
"This work explains how a failed school-reform system, championed by a delusional narcissist, ended up creating modern urban public education in the US in the early 1800s"--