The History of Education Part 101

[11] The development of scientific training for nursing, begun by the Germans near the end of their wars with Napoleon, is another example of the creation of a new profession through the application of science. This was carried to new levels by Miss Florence Nightingale, who began work in London, in 1860, after her experiences in the Crimean War of 1854-56, and has been greatly improved since 1870 as a result of the new medical knowledge and methods which have come in since that time. The provision of training for nurses, and the certification of doctors and nurses for practice, are other new developments in the field of state education.

Similarly is the training and certification of dentists, veterinarians, and pharmacists, all of which are nineteenth-century additions.

[12] The work of the Rockefeller Foundation, an American Foundation organized to promote "the well-being of mankind throughout the world," in spending millions to provide China with a modern system of western medical education and hospital service, is perhaps the greatest example of a scientifically organized service ever tendered by the people of one nation to those of another.

[13] "Large-scale production, extreme division of labor, and the all- conquering march of the machine, have practically driven out the apprentices.h.i.+p system through which, in a simpler age, young helpers were taught, not simply the technique of some single process, but the 'arts and mysteries of a craft' as well. The journeyman and the artisan have given way to an army of machine workers, performing over and over one small process at one machine, turning out one small part of the finished article, and knowing nothing about the business beyond their narrow and limited task." (_Report of the Commission on National Aid to Vocational Education_, vol. i, pp. 19-20.)

[14] "In no country will you find the problem taken up in so thorough a manner; in no country will you find an attempt made to cover, by means of industrial schools, the occupations of everyone, from the lowly laborer to the director of the great manufacturing establishment. The State provided industrial training for every person who will be better off with it than without it. No occupation is too humble to receive the attention of the German authorities; and the opinion prevails there that science and art have a place in every occupation known to man." (Cooley, E. G., in _Report to the Commercial Club of Chicago_, 1912.)

[15] For example, the foreign trade of Germany, in 1880, was $31 per capita of the total population, and that of the United States was $32.

Thirty years later, in 1910, Germany's foreign trade had increased to $62 per capita, and that of the United States to only $37.

[16] Chiefly raw products--a prodigal waste of natural resources. What every nation should do is to work up its raw products at home, and sell finished goods rather than raw products--"sell brains, rather than materials." (R. 370.)

[17] The first trade school in the United States was established privately, in New York City, in 1881. By 1900 some half-dozen had been similarly established in different parts of the country. In 1902 a trade school for girls was founded in New York City, which did pioneer work. In 1906 Ma.s.sachusetts created a State commission on Industrial Education, and later provided for the creation of industrial schools. In 1907 Wisconsin enacted the first trade-school law, and New York State followed in 1909.

[18] Germany before 1914 formed an interesting contrast to such conditions. There few untrained youths were to be found, and the nation, before 1914, was rapidly moving toward universal vocational education.

[19] As ill.u.s.trative of the general character of the vocations to be trained for, a few of the more common ones may be mentioned:

_In agriculture_: The work of general farming, orcharding, dairying, poultry-raising, truck gardening, horticulture, bee culture, and stock-raising.

_In the trades and industries_: The work of the carpenter, mason, baker, stonecutter, electrician, plumber, machinist, toolmaker, engineer, miner, painter, typesetter, linotype operator, shoecutter and laster, tailor, garment maker, straw-hat maker, weaver, and glove maker.

_In commerce and commercial pursuits_: The work of the bookkeeper, clerk, stenographer, typist, auditor, and accountant.

_In home economics_: The work of the diet.i.tian, cook and housemaid, inst.i.tution manager, and household decorator.

[10] "The snail's pace at which the race has moved toward humanitarianism is indicated by Payne's estimate (p. 6) that the race is perhaps two hundred and forty thousand years old, civilized man a few hundred years old, and a humanitarianism large enough to have any real concern in any organized fas.h.i.+on for the protection of children scarcely fifty years old.

The fact that organizations in great number, laws, penalties, and constant vigilance are still everywhere needed to secure for children their inherent rights is evidence enough that we have still a long way to go before we reach the golden age." (Waddel, C. W., _An Introduction to Child Psychology_, p. 5.)

[21] "As late as 1840 children of ten to fifteen years of age and younger were driven by merciless overseers for ten, twelve, sixteen, even twenty hours a day in the lace mills. Fed the coa.r.s.est food, in ways more disgusting than those of the boarding schools described by d.i.c.kens, they slept, when they had opportunity, often in relays, in beds that were constantly occupied. They lived and toiled, day and night, in the din and noise, filth and stench, of the factory that coined their life's blood into gold for their exploiters. Sometimes with chains about their ankles, to prevent their attempts to escape, they labored until epidemics, disease, or premature death brought welcome relief from a slavery that was forbidden by law for negro slaves in the colonies." (Payne, G. H., _The Child in Human Progress_.)

[22] An exception to this statement is to be found in the work of the Pedagogical Seminars, organized in the German universities in the second decade of the nineteenth century, which were intended for the professional training of German university students for teaching in the German secondary schools. (See footnote 1, page 573.)

[23] When the first teachers' training-school in America was opened at Concord, Vermont, by the Reverend Samuel R. Hall, in 1823, it included, besides a three-year academy-type academic course, practice teaching in a rural school in winter, and some lectures on the "Art of Teaching."

Without a professional book to guide him, and relying only upon his experience as a teacher, Hall tried to tell his pupils how to organize and manage a school. To make clear his ideas he wrote out a series of _Lectures on School-keeping_, which some friends induced him to publish.

This, the first professional book in English issued in America for teachers, appeared in 1829.

[24] _Geschichte der Padagogik vom Wiederaufbluhen kla.s.sicher Studien bis auf unsere Zeit_. Vols. I and II, 1843; vol. III, 1847; vol. IV, 1855.

Much of this was translated into other languages. Barnard's _American Journal of Education_, begun in 1855, published a translation of much of von Raumer's work for American readers.

[25] In 1876 S. S. Laurie (1829-1909) was elected to one of the first chairs in education in Great Britain, that of "Professor of the Theory, History, and Practice of Education" in the University of Edinburgh.

[26] Probably the first lectures on Pedagogy given in any American college were given in 1832, in what is now New York University. From 1850 to 1855 the city superintendent of schools of Providence, Rhode Island, was Professor of Didactics, in Brown University. In 1860 a course of lectures on the "Philosophy of Education, School Economy, and the Teaching Art" was given to the seniors of the University of Michigan. In 1873 a Professors.h.i.+p of Philosophy and Education was established in the University of Iowa. This was the first permanent chair created in America.

In 1879 a Department of the Science and Art of Teaching was created at the University of Michigan. In 1881 a Department of Pedagogy was created at the University of Wisconsin, and in 1884 similar departments at the University of North Carolina and at Johns Hopkins University.

[27] In education, as in other lines of work, the statement of Richard H.

Quick that the distinctive function of a university is not action, but thought, has been exemplified.