Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic:
Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic:
A Brief History of Educating Children in Britain
A Brief History of Educating Children in Britain
Embedded Files
The education of children has a long history. Archeological examples of children's school work have been found on Greek and Roman pottery fragments, Mesopotamian clay tablets, and have even been recovered from scraps of Egyptian papyrus. However, for much of human history a child's education took place in the home, under the direction of parents or household staff. Formal educational institutions like schools, formal pedagogical practices, curricula, and textbooks, and even the concept of mandatory education for children are all relatively modern concepts in education. Read on to learn about the history of educating children as told through examples from different genres of children's literature held by the Mount Royal University Archives and Special Collections.
A depiction of students attending a dame's school from H8.T84 1896 - History of the horn-book by Andrew W. Tuer.
Educating the Poor:
Educating the Poor:
Training schools, Dame Schools, and Sunday Schools
Training schools, Dame Schools, and Sunday Schools
In Britain, the Industrial Revolution (1760-1840) caused profound changes in the workforce, leading to transformative shifts in the educational system. Technological advancements in manufacturing during this period prompted a mass migration of workers, relocating vast numbers of people from rural areas to urban centers to take part in factory employment. An early consequence of this migration was the establishment of training schools exclusively aimed at instructing lower-class citizens in the technical skills required to operate and maintain factory machinery. Although these schools primarily focused on career-oriented technical skills rather than general education, they marked a significant milestone as the first instances of formal education offered to many low and middle-class families. Unfortunately, training school education was not required for all manufacturing jobs and many young children were put to work in dangerous conditions with as little as a few hours of training.
Dame schools, charity schools, and Sunday schools were informal educational institutions aimed at providing education to children from impoverished and middle-class backgrounds. Dame schools were operated privately and charged a nominal fee for educating children. Typically, these schools were small-scale establishments managed by local women, known as "dames," who often lacked formal education or teaching qualifications. The primary focus of instruction in dame schools focused on 'the three Rs'— reading, writing, and arithmetic. Additional education for girls included practical domestic skills such as sewing, knitting, and spinning. It is important to note that dame schools operated independently and without regulation, with each school determining its own hours, curriculum, and teaching methods. Charity schools and Sunday schools were operated by local churches and assumed a similar role to dame schools in providing education for primarily working class children. These institutions not only imparted a rudimentary knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic, but also included religious instruction and provided much-needed childcare for parents working in manufacturing jobs.
An Early Educational Text for Children:
An Early Educational Text for Children:
The English Mother's Catechism for her Children: Containing Those Things Most Necessary to be Known at an Early Age by the Rev. T. Clark.
The English Mother's Catechism for her Children: Containing Those Things Most Necessary to be Known at an Early Age by the Rev. T. Clark.
Our copy of The English Mother's Catechism is an instructional pamphlet comes from a bound collection of nursery rhymes, chapbooks, and children's stories (PR973.M57). Originally published in 1822 by the author John Galt, under the pseudonym the Reverend T. Clark, it was reprinted many times - this copy is an eighteenth edition published in 1834. The English Mother's Catechism takes the form of an instructional pamphlet, complementing another educational tool, The English Primer. Structured as a series of questions and answers akin to a Christian catechism, its purpose was to provide parents and children with an instructional resource encompassing a diverse range of subjects, including: numbers and arithmetic, telling time, days of the week, months and seasons, celestial bodies, agriculture and farming, gardening, metals and minerals, geography, and practical items utilized in domestic settings.
Descriptions and illustrations of a windmill and watermill, and the farming activities of mowing, hay-making, milking, and butter churning.
A description of the value of coins, and the faces of a clock and compass.
Illustrations of ploughing, harrowing, sowing, reaping, thrashing, wheat, barley, oats, and rye.
An explanation of counting, numbers, and multiplication tables
Descriptions and illustrations of wool-combing, sheep-shearing, gardening, and feeding farm animals.
Image of a governess teaching children in their home from the frontispiece of LB41.H67 1822 - Advice to parents and tutors : for conducting the education of children by W. Jillard Hort, 1822
Educating the Wealthy:
The Governess
Children from wealthy, upper class families typically received their education within their own households, overseen by a specialized household staff member known as a governess. Governesses held the responsibility of educating girls from the ages of five to eighteen, as well as providing foundational education for young boys until they transitioned to formal schooling. Much like the educational provision for children from less privileged backgrounds, a governess was expected to teach the fundamental "three Rs," as well as a broad range of additional subjects, including history, geography, and foreign languages. Given their refined upbringing, governesses were also anticipated to serve as companions to their female charges, teaching them the expected pastimes of young ladies, such as playing the piano, dancing, engaging in needlework, and drawing. Additionally, governesses often assumed the responsibility of moral education for the children under their care, reading from the Bible, supervising prayers, and exemplifying models of modest and virtuous behavior.
Despite possessing a higher level of formal education than teachers at dame or charity schools, governesses faced precarious employment and received meager compensation. Typically, a governess worked in exchange for room and board along with a modest annual salary. As children grew older and no longer required her services, a governess had to seek new positions, leading to a transient professional life. Most governesses were unmarried, educated, middle-class women who, due to various circumstances, found themselves in the unfortunate position of needing to work to support themselves or their families. Since it would have been deemed degrading for a lady of their social standing to work alongside working-class women in shops or factories, teaching often became the only viable means of livelihood available to them. Occupying an ambiguous position between that of a regular servant and a fully integrated family member, a governess lived on the periphery of established society. Unlike teachers in dame schools, governesses had some teaching standards to adhere to, as outlined in published guidebooks that provided instruction on the subjects they should teach and guidance on managing relationships with employers.
Top: Title page and frontispiece from the fictional story The Governess, or, The Little Female Academy by Mrs. Mary Martha Sherwood, 1820 - PR5449.S4.G68 1820
In the hierarchical society of early 19th century Britain, the governess held a notable and distinctive role. As educated, self-reliant women employed beyond the confines of their homes, governesses defied conventional notions of womanhood. The governess figure became increasingly prominent in British literature during the mid-nineteenth century, primarily due to their exceptional social position. This allowed authors to create characters who could engage in activities and relationships not accessible to other women, providing a blank canvas for exploration and narrative development.
Left: The title and contents pages from LB41.H67 1822 - Advice to Parents and Tutors: for Conducting the Education of Children by W. Jillard Hort, 1822. As seen from the table on contents, a child's education included a program of studies in areas such as religious ideals, memory, judgment, and the cultivation of mental faculties.
The quote "Spare the rod and spoil the child" reflects the prevalent use of corporal punishment as a widely accepted method of disciplining children in the early history of education. However, when analyzing oral histories through statistical analysis, students often described punishments as either 'light' or 'strict but fair'. It was only when punishments were perceived as sadistic or arbitrary that they were deemed traumatic. The accompanying image is sourced from H8.T84 1896 - History of the horn-book by Andrew W. Tuer.
The Education Act
The Education Act
The late Victorian period (1837-1901) witnessed significant transformations in the field of childhood education, marked by the implementation of pivotal reforms. Notably, there was a concerted effort to establish and standardize a national educational framework. In 1862, the government introduced a payments by results policy, which tied financial support for schools to the outcomes of students' standardized test scores. The primary objective of this policy was to establish quantifiable benchmarks for children's education and to assess the attainment of a minimum educational standard. However, the implementation of the program resulted in a narrow focus on a limited range of knowledge and skills. The curriculum that emerged from this initiative heavily emphasized reading, writing, and arithmetic, relying predominantly on repetitive memorization as the primary teaching method. As a consequence, modern scholars often characterize this approach as stifling to genuine learning. While students excelled in reciting memorized facts, they were afforded little opportunity for independent or critical thinking. Although the policy successfully increased the number of children receiving formal education, it inadvertently fostered a system that prioritized achieving only the bare minimum level of education, rather than fostering avenues for intellectual expansion. The negative effects of the payments by results policy were mitigated to some extent by the 1870 Education Act, and the policy was officially abandoned in 1890.
Highlighted in The Governess, or, The Little Female Academy by Mrs. Mary Martha Sherwood (PR5449.S4.G68 1820) is an advertisement promoting a small private school that operates from the author's residence. The advertisement indicates a yearly cost ranging from 80 to 100 guineas, encompassing full room and board as well as a comprehensive education. In today's currency, this amount is approximately equivalent to only $2000 to $2500.
The 1870 Education Act brought about the establishment of a network of school boards entrusted with the responsibility of constructing and managing schools. While the act allowed for the continued operation of "voluntary" schools such as church or charity schools, its primary aim was to expand access to education in previously underserved areas. Subsequent amendments to the Education Act introduced further changes to standardize elementary education. For instance, the 1876 amendment imposed stricter regulations on school attendance and aimed to curtail child labor. Another amendment in 1880 introduced universal compulsory education, leading to the closure of dame schools and imposing legal obligations on local authorities to enforce school attendance through bylaws. The age at which school attendance ceased to be compulsory was gradually raised from ten in 1880, to eleven in 1893, and fourteen in 1918. Another significant amendment in 1891 rendered elementary education free, thereby removing many of the barriers to education faced by underprivileged families.
Published September 27, 2023 by Sade Dunn, Public Service Archives and Special Collections Assistant.
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