X. EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATIONS. PREFACE. THE history of associations for the establishment of schools and the advancement of education in this country-or the assent of several persons to a common method of accomplishing a specific educational purpose-begins with a subscription commenced by the Chaplain of the Royal James, (Rev. M. Copeland,) on her arrival from the East Indies, in 1621, towards the erection of a Free School-or an Endowed Grammar School, in Charles City, Virginia. The first school in New England was probably started in the same way—that is, by a subscription by "the richer inhabitants of the town of Boston on the 22d of August, 1636," "towards the maintenance of a free schoolmaster for the youth with us." The free schoole in Roxburie," designated by Cotton Mather as the Schola illustris, was established by an agreement or association of a portion of the inhabitants who joined in an act or agreement binding the subscribers and their estates to the extent of their subscription, "to erect a free . schoole" "for the education of their children in Literature to fit them for the publicke service both in Churche and Commonwealthe in succeeding ages." Nearly all that class of schools now known as Grammar Schools, Academies and Seminaries, except the Town, or Public High Schools, were originally established on the principle of association. So was it with nearly every College in the country. The ten persons selected by the synod of the churches in Connecticut in 1698 from the principal ministers of the Colony to found, erect, and govern a "School of the Church," met and formed themselves into a society and agreed to found a college in the Colony; and for this purpose each of the Trustees at a subsequent meeting brought a number of books and presented them to the association, using words to this effect, as he laid them on the table: "I give these books for founding a college in Connecticut," "wherein," as afterwards declared, "youth shall be instructed in all parts of learning to qualify them for public employment in church and civil state." 1 Although the Common School generally was established by act of legislation-as in Connecticut and Massachusetts-to exclude from every family that "barbarism as would allow in its midst a single child unable to read the Holy Word of God and the good laws of the Colony," those of Philadelphia and New York originated in voluntary associations of benevolent and patriotic individuals. Nearly all professional schools for law, theology, and medicine, and every institution intended to provide for the exceptional classes -such as orphans, infants, juvenile offenders, deaf mutes, blind, imbecile children, or to introduce new methods, such as the monitorial, manual labor, and infant-originated in societies. All of those educational enterprises, in which the religious element constitutes the leading object, such as the Sunday-School, the publication and dissemination of the Bible and religious books, have been carried on through voluntary associations. The earliest movement for the advancement of education generally in the United States, through an association, originated in Boston in 1826, but did not take shape till some years later, although the object was partially attained through the agency of Lyceums, which were established for other purposes as well, in the same year. In the lectures and other exercises of the Lyceum, wherever established, the condition and improvement of schools-the school-house, studies, books, apparatus, methods of instruction and discipline, the professional training of teachers, and the whole field of school legis. lation and administration, were fully and widely discussed. Out of the popular agitation already begun, but fostered by the Lyceum movement, originated, about the year 1830, many special school conventions and associations for the advancement of education, especially in the public schools. Most of these associations, having accomplished their purposes as a sort of scaffolding for the building up of a better public opinion, and of a better system of school legislation, have given way to new organizations founded on the same principle of the assent of many individuals to a common method of accomplishing special purposes. The history and condition of these various associations, both those which have accomplished their purpose, and those which are still in operation, having for their field the Nation or the State, will be herein briefly set forth. To understand the condition of the schools, and of the popular estimate of education as it was about the beginning of this century, we introduce a series of articles which appeared in the Journal of Education, composed mainly of letters descriptive of the schools as they were sixty and seventy years ago, by individuals who were pupils and teachers in the same. PROPOSALS FOR FORMING A SOCIETY OF EDUCATION IN 1826. The following Proposals was addressed to many teachers and known friends of education for their consideration, Sept., 1826: THE establishment of a society for any of the numerous objects connected with human improvement, is a thing of so common occurrence, as hardly to call for apology or explanation. In the present state of the public mind with regard to the subject of education, in particular, prefatory discussion seems unnecessary. The conviction appears to be universal that the happiness of individuals and of society is dependent, to a great extent, on the information, the discipline, and the habits, which are imparted by physical, intellectual, and nioral exercise, regulated by good instruction. Some of the considerations, however, which seem most strongly to urge the measure now proposed, are entitled to particular attention. The progress of improvement in education has not hitherto been duly aided by combined and concentrated effort,-by mutual understanding and efficient cooperation. That this advantage is highly desirable needs not to be inculcated on any one who has attentively observed the operations or the progress of the religious and philanthropic institutions of the day. The piety and benevolence of separate individuals might have done much for the happiness of man, but could never have achieved the magnificent result of translating the Scriptures into the languages of so many nations, nor that of turning a whole people from the rites of idolatry, or the habits of barbarism. It is matter of regret that, whilst the zeal of thousands has been made to meet on so many other objects, and push them onward to brilliant success, no such union has hitherto been attempted in the great cause of education. Here and there we have had an excellent school-book, an eminent instructor, a vigilant and faithful school-committee, a distinguished institution, a memorable endowment, or a local arrangement, which has justly immortalized its projectors. But there has not been any attempt made to offer, to the country at large, the benefits likely to result from an association of men eminent and active in literature, in science, and in public life; from an extensive interchange of views on the part of instructors or from an enlightened and harmonious concurrence in a uniform set of books fitted to become the vehicles of instruction, and rendered as perfect as the united judgment of literary men and of teachers could make them. School-committees have labored industriously, indeed, but from the want of a proper channel of communication, they have not acted in concert. Endowments have, in not a few instances, been conferred with so little judgment as to become disadvantageous rather than beneficial; and town and State policy in regard to education has, though admirable in its temporary results and its restricted sphere, been so cramped in respect to time and place, as to lose much of its proper influence. A society such as is proposed would, in all probability, do away these and similar impediments to the career of improvement, and prove a powerful engine in accelerating the intellectual progress and elevating the character of the nation. 1. As the earliest stages of education require, from their prospective importance as well as their natural place, the peculiar attention of parents and teachers, the proposed society would direct its attention to every thing which might seem likely to aid parents in the domestic education of their offspring, or in the establishment of schools for infants. 2. Another object of the society would be to aid instructors in the discharge of their duties. So much has recently been written and so well on this subject, that it seems to require but little discussion here. Let it suffice to say, that every effort would be made which might seem likely to be of service to teachers, whether by the training of youth with reference to the business of teaching, by instituting lectures on the various branches of education, by suggesting methods of teaching these branches, by using, in a word, every means of imparting a facility in communicating knowledge and in directing the youthful mind, so as to furnish instructors with the best attainable knowledge and the best possible qualifications in the branches which they might wish to teach. A school or college for teachers, though an excellent and a practicable object, can not be put into operation in a day, nor by any single act of legislation, nor by the solitary efforts of any individual. If there is a season for every thing under the sun, there must be, in this undertaking, an incipient stage of comparative feebleness and doubt and experiment and hazard, which, however, will no doubt give place to a day of ample success, in an unparalleled amount of private and public good. The only questions are, Where shall this undertaking be cominenced-when?-and by whom? Should a simultaneous movement to effect this great object be made, as in all probability it will in New York, in Connectient, and in Massachusetts, and perhaps in other States, such a society as is now proposed might contribute valuable services to the measures which might be adopted for this purpose. The society ought not to restrict its attention to instructors of any order, but should endeavor to embrace the services and the duties of all, from the lowest to the highest in the scale of advancement; and the mutual understanding and the universal co-operation thus secured in the business of instruction would probably be one of the greatest advantages resulting from this society. 3. An object of vast importance in the formation of a society such as is contemplated would be the collecting of a library of useful works on education. The members of the society would, by means of such assistance, proceed more intelligently and efficiently in the prosecution of their views; and if the library were made to comprise copies of every accessible school-book, American or European, it would furnish its readers with the means of valuable and extensive improvement in their respective branches of instruction. The advantage thus afforded would be equally serviceable to such of the society as might be employed in aiding teachers by lectures or otherwise, and to those teachers themselves. 4. A subject closely connected with the preceding would be the improvement of school-books. It is a thing not merely convenient or advantageous to education, and to the character of our national literature, that there should be a uniformity in school-books throughout the country; this subject possesses a political value, which reaches even to the union by which we are constituted a powerful and independent nation. Local peculiarities of sentiment and undue attachments to local custom are the results, in a great measure, of education. We do not surely lay ourselves open to the imputation of being sanguine when we venture say, that a national uniformity in plans of instruction and in school-books would furnish a bond of common sentiment and feeling stronger than any that could be produced by any other means, in the season of early life. The precise extent to which this desirable improvement might be carried would, of course, depend, in some degree, on the feelings of individuals no less than on those of any society. But every rational and proper effort would no doubt be made to render such arrangement agreeable to the views and wishes of instructors and of the authors of school-books throughout the United States. 5. In the present early stage of this business it is thought better not to multiply or extend observations, but to leave details for a more matured stage of procedure. A useful guide to particular regulations is accessible in Count de Lasteyrie's Nouveau Systeme d'Education. See that pamphlet, or the translation of part of it, given in the appendix to Dr. Griscom's Mutual Instruction. Another useful guide will be found in Jullien's Esquisse d'un Ouvrage sur Education Comparee. 6. The vastly desirable benefit of complete and harmonious co-operation would require that several, if not all, of the large towns and cities in the United States should contain a central committee for managing the concerns of such a society; as auxiliaries to which and modeled on the same plan, professional men and teachers, as well as other persons interested in education, and capable of promoting it, might associate themselves in every town or convenient vicinity. A corresponding member from every such association, and one or more from a central committee, might, with great ease and dispatch, conduct all the business of the proposed society in any one State; and a similar arrangement on the great scale might complete the organization of the society for the United States. The whole affair offers nothing either complicated or troublesome; all that is wanted is a sufficiency of zeal and enterprise to commence and of perseverance to sustain the undertaking. For an idea of the good likely to be accomplished by a society for the improvement of education, reference may be made to the proceedings of the French Society of Education, or to the present condition of the primary schools of Holland, which have attained to that condition through the efforts of a society duly impressed with the value of education, and vigorously devoting themselves to its improvement. The result of that society's labors has been nothing short of an intellectual and moral regeneration in the sphere of its action, accomplished, too, in the brief space of thirty years. Mention might here be made also of the British and Foreign School Society which has done so much for the dissemination of improved instruction at home and abroad; and which has rendered the benefits of education as accessible to the people of England, as they have been or are to those of Scotland, of New England, or of Holland. We might mention, too, the Infant School Society as an institution which is dispensing the blessings of early instruction and moral refinement among the youngest class of British population. The above moderate Proposals should be read in connection with the Contents and Index of the History of Educational Associations (National and State) in the United States in 1864. 848 pages. NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATIONS; An Account of Conventions and Societies for the Improvement of Schools and the Promotion of Education in the United States, with Biographical Sketches of their Founders and Presidents, and an Introduction on Schools and Teachers prior to 1800. Republished from Barnard's American Journal of Education. 400 pages. Price, $2.50, in paper cover, and' without Portraits. Illustrated Edition, with at least 25 Portraits, in Cloth Binding, $3.50. CONTENTS. NATIONAL AND STATE EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATIONS, INTRODUCTION,........................ SCHOOLS AND TEACHERS IN THE UNITED STATES PRIOR TO 1800,. EDUCATIONAL BIOGRAPHY,..... I. The Original Free School of New England,.. Mastership of Ezekiel Cheever-1638-1708,.. The Free School of New Haven, Ipswich, and Boston,. First Free School in Virginia, in 1621,.. First Free School in Roxbury and Salem,... School Days of Rev. John Barnard-1689,.. School Days of Rev. Benjamin Coleman, D. D.-1678,. Coote's English Schoolmaster,..... Cheever's Latin Accidence,... Rev. Cotton Mather, D. D.-Discourse on Cheever,. Note. The Town Free School of Dorchester,.. School Regulations, School-Books, and School-Houses as they were,.. The Royal Primer-New England Primer-The Horn-Book-The Child's Guide,....... View of School-Houses and their Apparatus,....... The Schools of Boston from 1783 to 1800, from a Memoir of Caleb Bingham,. Condition of Public Schools in Boston in 1784,. Institution of the Double-Headed System,. Prohibition of Private Schools,..... First Appointment of a School Committee in 1792, School-Books-Head-masters-Course of Study.. Page. 1-864 1-138 7 11 13 13 15 16 17 23 26 27 28 33 39 40 41 52 53 55 56 58 59 61 65 School-Books of Noah Webster and Caleb Bingham,... II. Schools and Academies, prior to 1800, described mainly by their Pupils and Teachers,... 69 1. Letter from Noah Webster, LL. D.,..... Letter from Heman Humphrey, D. D.,..... Letter from Hon. Joseph Buckingham,........ Letter from Eliphalet Nott, D.D.,. Recollections of the District-School, by Peter Parley, (S. G. Goodrich,). The New England Country School in 1794-a Poem,. 2. Letter from Hon. Salem Town, LL. D.,.. Letter from Hon. Josiah Quincy, Senior, LL. D.,.. Letter from William Darlington, M. D.,..... The Schools of Philadelphia, by "Lang Syne,”. The Schools of Boston in 1780, from the Memoranda of a Pupil,. The Schools of Roston in 1800, by Edward Everett,. An Old Field School and Academy in Virginia in 1801,. Condition of Schools in Delaware, by Robert Coram,. 69 71 75 81 82 90 91 93 97 99 102 103 105 107 108 Popular Ignorance and Free Schools in South Carolina, by Gen. Marion,... Barring-Out-a Georgia School Scene,..... 3. Condition of Schools in North Carolina-Experience of C. Caldwell, M. D.,.......... 109 1. Letter from Jeremiah Day, D. D., LL. D.,..... Letter from Hon. Willard Hall,.. School-house and School of my Boyhood, by A. Bronson Alcott,. School Reminiscence, by Henry Ward Beecher,...... 5. Reminiscences of Female Education prior to 1800, by "Senex," 119 121 126 127 130 135 137 |