Chapter 5 - American Education: European Heritage and Colonial Experience

After reading Chapter 5, I was completely...speechless. There was so much information that it was hard to retain the most important parts. Personally, I find history really boring and hard to remember all the different aspects. The biggest thing I learned in this chapter was that our education today has evolved a lot and has come a long way since the "Ancient Societies". There are a lot of different, yet important, people who influenced education in many ways and at many different times in history. For example, Socrates (Education in Ancient Societies), Thomas Aquinas (Education in the Middle Ages), John Calvin (Education During the Reformation), Friedrich Frobel (Later European Educational Thought), and many, many more. I found out what a bunch of new terms meant, such as: humanism, naturalism, hornbook, dame schools, and many others as well. Another interesting point is that Christianity (or religion in general) had a huge impact on education and society. The five steps that Johann Herbart followed to plan his classes (preparation, presentation, association, generalization, application) are still very similar to the way we plan our classes now a days. The first education laws were that selectmen from each town had to go around in houses and check up on the children, make sure their parents are teaching them what they are supposed to be taught. Girls could attend dame schools, but most of them received very minimal education. There is a lot more information given in this chapter, it is hard to narrow it down. Overall, after having read this chapter, I feel a lot more educated on the history of our education today.

~Dano~