Claire GALLAGHER, Georgian Court University, U.S.A

Most Americans can trace their roots through Ellis Island, one of the most important elements in the “peopling of America” and the formation of the fabric of American society. From 1852 to 1954, over 12 million “aliens”, as they were known, were processed, detained, or denied access to the United States at this port of entry, among them a large number of children of all ages, either those who were detained or those who were waiting for someone to clear the way for their parents’ entrance to the country. Although the number of children on Ellis Island varied, their population was typically large. As such, this presented an opportunity for a variety of philanthropic organizations to establish a school where the children could be introduced to America and be prepared to be “good citizens.” A collaborative of US Government approved organizations including churches and other religiously affiliated groups, the Red Cross, the American Library Association, the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, and others, found an unused space near the baggage room and began to teach the young people, focusing on literacy. The challenge was designing a methodology that would reach such a wide range of ages of children who were extremely transient and who had no common language. Although the stated goal was to create “good citizens”, the subversive side of the instruction was to use the platform as a way to infuse the instruction with religious messages and long-lasting sensibilities that would influence voting in the children’s political futures, and, it was hoped, that of the adults around them. As the control of the school changed from one philanthropic group to another, so did the undercurrent of the instruction. The foundation of the instruction for all groups was the pedagogy of Froebel, but the message was specific to the definition of “citizenship” to which the teacher subscribed. This paper will use the existing documentation, almost exclusively photographs and primary documents from the archives of the organizations associated with the schools on Ellis Island, to describe the schools, the students and teachers, the spaces for instruction, the pedagogy and instruction, and the underlying messages transmitted to the children and young people in order to make them “good citizens”.

British children and imperial citizenship in the age of reform

Kathryn GLEADLE, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

This paper will explore the ways in which British children functioned as political agents in the period 1780-1860. It will focus, in particular, upon the construction of their self-identities as imperial agents, closely implicated in global questions of colonial rule. It will demonstrate, for example, that middle-class children were perceived to have a key role to play in certain aspects of the anti-slavery campaign. This applied particularly to the sugar boycott of West-Indian produced sugar. The close study of family letters and diaries has revealed that in numerous families, children were perceived as having independent political sensitivities on the slavery question. Many parents recorded their pride that their offspring had encouraged them to abstain from sugar. As one fond aunt noted in her diary in 1792, ‘the little people were the first to do it’. The paper will consider the nature of children’s involvement in family-based antislavery politics (such as consumer boycotts) as well as their public activities in campaigning on behalf of the abolitionist cause. This includes an examination of juvenile involvement in critical elections, parliamentary petitioning, and the composition of juvenilia. It will consider the political structures and family cultures which enabled children to act (and to be seen ) as unilateral agents, capable of making significant contributions to colonial debates and policies. In exploring this activity the paper will draw upon recent literatures on the political socialisation of children. In place of older models in which children were often viewed as the passive recipients of educational processes, it will draw on those theorists who point to the active role of individuals within socialisation. McDevitt and Chaffee for example, formulate a revisionist model of ‘trickle up influence’. Here, rather than conceptualising politicisation as an inert model of downwards transmission, children are perceived as acting agents in their own right, whose views and actions are capable of significantly affecting the outlook of their parents. Children’s proactive response to this particular campaign indicate that political socialisation was not a steady or continuous process, but could be subject to the ebb and flow of current affairs and debates. It is important to incorporate, therefore, a more ‘events-driven’ analysis, as Sears and Valentino have put it. This facilitates an analysis which is sensitive to the salience of a multiplicity of factors and agencies, including the varying impact of media external to the family.

Influences internationales sur l'émergence de la diversité culturelle dans le système éducatif brésilien au 20ème siècle

En raison du rôle décisif joué par les organisations internationales et les chercheurs travaillant dans de multiples contextes nationaux, le thème de la diversité culturelle et ethnique a été l’objet d’un processus continu d’internationalisation. Le Brésil constitue à ce propos un cas intéressant à analyser dans la mesure où cette problématique occupe une place centrale dans les débats scientifiques et politiques. Cette communication analysera les influences internationales qui se sont déployées au Brésil tout au long du 20ème siècle pour orienter le débat sur la gestion de la diversité culturelle et ethnique dans la société et à l’école. Dans ce contexte, la diversité culturelle a eu constamment différentes connotations, caractérisées par un mélange d’arguments disparates. L’identité nationale brésilienne complexe et ambiguë est marquée à la fois par l’idée de l’hybridation ethnique mais aussi par l’imposition par l’ethnocentrisme et par le colonialisme des valeurs culturelles européennes.

A “longue durée” internationalization filter: the case of John Dewey’s reception in different socio-political settings in late 19th and 20th Centuries Spain

Using theoretical frames on internationalization and reception/transfer developed in systems theory (Luhmann, 1981), comparative education (Schriewer and Martinez, 2003) and intellectual history (Burke, 1995; Putnam, 1993), is it possible to conceive educational systems as self-referential and selective in their “externalization” (Luhmann, 1981) towards history or environment, including international educational systems. Therefore, self-referential systemic logic opposes globalization trends as proposed by Developmental, World-System and Dependencia theories or also “transnational cultural environment” as proposed in Neo Institutionalist theories (Meyer and Ramirez, 2000). For self preservation (Selbsterhaltung) systems control the received inputs establishing “Schleusen” or filters that accommodate them to the shared and resistant conceptions and habits that, institutionalized, are central in shaping fields of knowledge or “academic culture” (Ringer, 1992:13). Therefore, these “vieilles attitudes de penser et d'agir, de cadres résistants, durs à mourir, parfois contre toute logique” (Braudel, 1958:733) limit transfer and model internationalization. Using as example the reception of John Dewey’s work (Bruno-Jofre and Schriewer, 2011; Bruno-Jofre, Johnston and Jover, 2010; Schriewer and Martinez, 2004; Nubiola, 2001) in different Spanish socio-political-educational groups (Krausists and Institutionists, Neo-Catholics, Members of the Madrid School of Philosophy, the group Escuelas de Espana, Falangists, Aperturistas, Post-Conciliar catechetical movements, Socialists and Anarchists) from the end of the 19th Century and throughout 20th Century, the presentation explores the value of the analysis of reception processes for discovering these “longue durée” academic cultures. On the other side, internal differentiation (Ausdifferenzierung) processes create the conditions of possibility for change. In the case of Spain the presentation explores the resilience of Natural Law ideas shaping educational culture throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, and also processes of vertical (higher and lower pedagogy) and horizontal (social education and popular catechesis from pedagogy,) that introduced some incremental changes in this culture.

Historians of Education on Progressive Education: The United States and England

William WRAGA, University of Georgia, U.S.A.

Progressive education is widely understood among scholars as an international phenomenon. While histories of the origins, exchange, dissemination, and adaptation of “new education” ideas and practices are numerous (e.g., Rohrs & Lenhart, 1995), historiographical comparisons of academic interpretations of progressive education are rare but potentially useful for understanding progressivism. This paper compares the ways historians of education in the US interpret progressive education to the ways historians of education in England interpret progressivism. This paper first documents interpretations of progressive education advanced by US and English education historians, and then speculates as to why differences of representation exist. Interpretations of progressive education by US and English historians of education are documented by analyzing two main sources: 1) treatment of progressive education in general histories of education in the US and England (e.g., Reese, 2005; Jones, 2003), and 2) treatment of progressivism in histories of progressive education in each country (e.g., Selleck, 1972; Ravitch, 2000). This analysis finds a strain of antagonism toward progressive education in history of education scholarship in the US, which often results in misrepresentations of the historical record, and which does not seem to have a counterpart in England; indeed, English historians of education seem relatively sympathetic, though not uncritical, of progressive education. These findings are possibly explained by the residual influence of traditional academic attacks on US progressive education in the 1950s that were validated for education historians in Bernard Bailyn’s (1960) famous interpretation of the historiography of education in the US, an interest in the US of paradoxes of school reform inspired by so-called revisionist scholarship, and by a separation in England of historians of education in departments of education often committed to progressive practices from “academic” historians in history departments, the latter of whom have historically been critical of history of education scholarship (Richardson, 1999) and even of progressive education. Explaining these biases in historical scholarship, however, may not be as important as controlling them. The history of progressive education internationally is replete with examples of exchange and transfer, including between the US and England. Perhaps further exchange between English and US historians of education on interpretations of progressive education can foster more nuanced interpretations of progressivism.

Educational Thought and Practice of Mustafa Satı Bey in the Context of New Education Movement

Filiz MESECI GIORGETTI, Istanbul University, Turkey

During the Second Constitutional Period of Ottoman Empire (1908-1918), for the first time educational and instructional issues were discussed extensively and educational developments in other countries began to be closely monitored by the educational intellectuals. During this period, the New School Movement and New Schools spreading in Europe had been the focus of interest for the Ottoman educators. Discourses and concepts of the New School Movement such as child's abilities and interests, natural activities were totally new for the educators in the Ottoman Empire. Among these educators, Mustafa Sâtı Bey (Sâtı-El-Husri) (1880-1968) was one of the most remarkable figures of the Second Constitutional period. It can be said that Mustafa Sâtı Bey was a leading representative in Ottoman’s New Education Movement in the early twentieth century. Satı Bey was a pioneer and innovator in pedagogical application in The Second Constitutional Period of Ottoman Empire. He directed the first Teacher's Training College of Ottoman Empire and in this college he established the first Practice School for teachers, he was also the editor of the most prestigious educational journal (Tedrisat-ı İbtidaiye Mecmuası) of the period. He founded his own private school, New School, in 1915 in Istanbul. He made educational research trips to various countries as Italy, Germany, Switzerland, France, Belgium, England and Romania. In this trips he visited open-air schools, children's sanatoriums, and especially the schools applying Montessori method. He was deeply influenced by Western New Education Movement thought and practice. All these trips were very effective in shaping the principles and applications of the Practice School and his New School. The purpose of this study is to examine Satı Bey’s educational thought and practice in the context of the New Education Movement. In order to achieve this purpose, answers of the following questions will be searched: Did Sâtı Bey share the same definition of the common New Education concepts with other New Education Movement members in Europe? What were the differences and similarities in terms of educational aims, activities and teaching methods between his applications in the Practice School, his private New School and new schools in Europe? Besides being a practitioner, did he make original contributions to New School Movement? In order to achieve this purpose, Satı Bey's educational practices in the Practice School and in his New School will be examined in depth through his articles and archive documents. Satı Bey wrote many articles about his sample lessons and teaching methods applied in the Practice School and in his New School. Main sources of this study are these articles. In addition, educators of the period who wrote about Satı Bey’s educational applications will be used as the source. Also archive materials of the Ottoman State, official papers and other documentary sources will be gathered and analyzed.

Circulation, appropriation and dissemination of pedagogical ideas of the New School Movement in the twentieth century: an analysis from the clash between "tradition" and "modernity" in Fernando de Azevedo

Merilin BALDAN, Federal University of São Carlos, Brazil; Alessandra ARCE HAI, Federal University of São Carlos, Brazil; Marc DEPAEPE, U.K. Leuven, Belgique

The theoretical study has as its object the pedagogical ideas in circulation among the XIX-XX century, more specifically caught in the clash between "tradition" and “modernity”. The study of the pedagogical ideas of renewal during this period shows wide circulation and dissemination around the world, and in Brazil, a strong movement of appropriation and incorporation of these ideas, especially by the triad Fernando de Azevedo, Lourenço Filho and Anísio Teixeira. In our research, we make a cut in production of Fernando de Azevedo, whose individual works and collections that he edited represent a source of study of the internationalization process of renovating ideas and, in particular, the acquainted with in the educational field. The theoretical reference used in this study refer to the individual works of Fernando de Azevedo as a primary and secondary sources that allow us to understand this movement of the New Schools in Brazil and other countries, among which we highlight: Azevedo, Monarch, Valdemarin, Saviani, Depaepe, Le Goff. The methodological procedures are guided work in the history of educational ideas, under which point the following categories of analysis advocated by Saviani (2007): the concrete character of the history of education, the prospect of long during, investigation analytic-synthetic of sources, the articulation between the universal and the singular and, finally, the principle of current historical research. The aim of the research gained to understand the relationship between the "traditional" and "modern" in the work of Fernando de Azevedo; and establishes specific aims as the appropriation of pedagogical ideas present in the international renewal movement and how international these authors were appropriate and ones to become known in Brazilian education. Partial results have shown how the clash between "tradition" and "modernity" were present during XIX-XXth cent., both in politics and in the educational field, we present the whole time in revival thinking. The educational thought of Fernando de Azevedo brings this polarization in their personal reflections, given the context in which Brazilian society and education were passing, as the concern and mobilization of international authors in the clash between traditional pedagogy and renovation pedagogy of new schools.

The New Education Fellowship and the internationalization of new education in the 20th century

Steffi KOSLOWSKI, Sachsenwaldschule, Reinbek, Germany

"Reform pedagogy" is usually described from the point of view of national movements of education, its international scope being largely admitted or reduced to singular facets. Moreover, traditional historiographies tend to highlight Anglo-American and eurocentristic approaches, whereas concepts and developments beyond these realms are only partially included. While Maria Montessori, Peter Petersen or John Dewey, for example, are recognized as main protagonists, Rabindranath Tagore’s Shantiniketan or Gandhi’s concept of livelong learning are largely omitted (Seitz, 2002). This highly selective perception does not do justice to the complexity of the situation at that time. The New Education Fellowship is proof of an international educational network combining reform-oriented actors and forces at an organizational as well as discursive level. When Beatrice Ensor, together with Adolphe Ferrière and Elisabeth Rotten, initiated the New Education Fellowship in 1921, they entered a well-established European discourse on reconstruction of education. The dichotomy between “old” and “new” in education was a topic widely discussed in the context of the emerging modern school systems (Oelkers, 2005, p. 93). After the First World War this terminology of reconstruction was not only continued but reinforced. Ensor’s question whether the war could have happened if education had been different is no coincidence at that time (WEF Tape 8, 1970). The extensive demand for renewal was the primary reason for the success of this first and most influental organisation in the field of reform pedagogy (Oelkers, 1998, p. 464), the New Education Fellowship. Operating on the basis of national sections, the Fellowship quickly evolved into a global educational network whose aim it was to promote what was called “new education”. As a loose association it connected lay enthusiasts for educational reform with major figures in the developing disciplines of psychology and education, such as Carl Gustav Jung, Jean Piaget, John Dewey and Robert Ulich (Brehony, 2004, p. 733). Through several international congress that attracted up to 2000 enthusiasts from more than 50 European and non-European states, the New Fellowship was able to exert influence on the public educational discourse. Cooperative projects with the Progressive Education Association or in conjunction with UNESCO were initiated to scientifically examine the “new education” to supply evidence for the necessity of its implementation. Using the method of historical contextualization as defined by Pocock and Skinner, a critical analysis of the New Education Fellowship provides answers to the following questions: What was the specific role of this organisation in the creation of educational networks in the beginning of the 20th century? In what way and with what objectives did the Fellowship participate in the discourse of new education? What were supportive and restrictive forces in its development?