New England Colonies

dual-track school system The

traditional European pattern of separate primary schools for the masses and preparatory and secondary schools for males in the upper socioeconomic classes. Latin grammar school A

preparatory school of the colonial era that emphasized Latin and Greek languages and studies required for college admission. privately owned properties; they were open to those who needed them for places to live and for shelter. For the Europeans, natural resources could be privately owned and developed, or exploited, for sustenance but also for wealth and profit.

The European colonists came from many ethnic and language backgrounds. The French established settlements in Canada and the Mississippi Valley; the Spanish in Mexico, Florida, and the Southwest; the Dutch in New Netherlands, now New York State; and the English in the original thirteen colonies that became the United States after the Revolutionary War. The English, who defeated the Dutch and the French, had the most pervasive impact on colonial American politics, society, and education.

The colonists at first re-created the socioeconomic-class–based dual-track school system that they had known in Europe. Boys and girls, especially in the New England colonies, attended primary schools where they learned reading, writing, arithmetic, and religion. Boys from the more privileged classes attended Latin grammar schools, which prepared them in the Latin and Greek languages and literatures needed for admission to colonial colleges. (For the origins of the dual-track school system, see Chapter 3, The World Origins of American Education.)

5-1a new england colonies

The New England colonies of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire were a crucible for the development of American educational ideas and institutions. Massachusetts enacted the first formal education laws in British North America. (See Overview 5.1 for significant events in American education.)

The English settlers in Massachusetts believed that a literate people who knew God’s commandments as preached by their Puritan ministers could resist the devil’s temptations. Following their Protestant injunction to read the Bible, the churchcontrolled schools emphasized reading, writing, arithmetic, and religion.

Following John Calvin’s theology, Puritan schools were guided by interpenetrating economic and religious purposes. According to the Calvinist work ethic, good Puritans were to be responsible citizens and productive businessmen and farmers who attended church, read the Bible, and worked diligently. Puritan teachers stressed values of punctuality, honesty, obedience to authority, and hard work. American education continues to emphasize the relationship between education and economic productivity, asserting that individuals with more schooling earn more money than those with less schooling.

Child depravity The concept of child depravity shaped the Puritan child-rearing and educational practices. Children were regarded as depraved, or at least, inclined to evil. Children’s play was seen as idleness and children’s talk as gibberish. Following the adage, “Spare the rod and spoil the child,” Puritan teachers relied on firm discipline and corporal punishment to manage their classes. At home, children were to help with household and farm chores. Revisit Chapter 4, Pioneers of Teaching and Learning, to see how Comenius, Rousseau, Pestalozzi, and Froebel opposed the doctrine of child depravity.

“Old deluder Satan” Believing that a literate people would be a Godly people, the Puritan settlers established schools soon after their arrival in Massachusetts. In 1642, the Massachusetts General Court, the colony’s legislative body, enacted a law requiring parents and guardians to ensure that children in their care learned to read and understand the principles of religion and the commonwealth’s laws. In 1647, the General Court enacted the “Old Deluder Satan” Act, a law intended to outwit Satan, whom the Puritans believed deceived ignorant people into sinning. The law required every town of fifty or more families to appoint a reading and writing teacher. Towns of one hundred or more families were to employ a Latin teacher to prepare young men to enter Harvard College.