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“Their little wooden bricks”: a history of the material culture of kindergarten in the United States

2010; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 47; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00309230.2010.513688

1477-674X

Larry Prochner,

Historical Education Studies Worldwide

Abstract This article explores the material culture of kindergarten in the United States in relation to the production and consumption of materials and kindergarten theory and pedagogy. The focus is on Friedrich Froebel's building gifts as they were manufactured and sold by the Milton Bradley Company from 1869 to 1939. A review of trade catalogues over the 70‐year period found that the gifts were available along with larger blocks and materials supporting progressive pedagogies. The presence of items in the catalogues supporting different and conflicting ideas is explained as a reflection of the enduring popularity of a conservative kindergarten pedagogy aligned with Froebel's original ideas. Keywords: kindergartencurriculumFroebelpreschoolmaterial culture Notes 1 David Goyder, A Manual of the System of Instruction Pursued at the Infant school, Meadow Street, Bristol, 4th ed. (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green, 1821), 105. 2 Keri Dehli, "They Rule by Sympathy: The Feminization of Pedagogy," Canadian Journal of Sociology/Cahiers Canadiens de Sociologie 19, no. 2 (1994): 209. 3 Barbara Beatty, Preschool Education in America: The Culture of Young Children from the Colonial Era to the Present (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1995); Michael Shapiro, Child's Garden: The Kindergarten Movement from Froebel to Dewey (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1983); Evelyn Weber, The Kindergarten: Its Encounter with Educational Thought in America (New York: Teachers College Press, 1969). 4 Luella Palmer, "The Relation between the Ideal and the Practical in the Kindergarten Programme," The Elementary School Teacher 9, no. 1 (1908): 26. 5 C. Stephen White, Greta G. Fein, Brenda H. Manning, and Anne Daniel, "The Thematic Unit: Old Hat or New Shoes?," in Early Education and Care, and Reconceptualizing Play, ed. Stuart Reifel and Mac H. Brown (New York: JAI), 209. 6 William Reese, "The Origins of Progressive Education," History of Education Quarterly 41, no. 1 (2001): 1–24. 7 Beatty, Preschool Education in America; Shapiro, Child's Garden; Weber, Kindergarten. 8 Norman Brosterman, Inventing Kindergarten (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1997); Jane Read, "Free Play with Froebel: Use and Abuse of Progressive Pedagogy in London's Infant Schools, 1870–c.1904," Paedagogica Historica 42, no. 3 (2006): 299–323. 9 Read, "Free Play with Froebel," 300. 10 Martin Lawn, "Designing Teaching: The Classroom as Technology," in Silences and Images: The Social History of the Classroom, ed. Ian Grosvenor, Martin Lawn, and Kate Rousmaniere (New York: Peter Lang, 1999), 81–2. 11 Kindergartners were kindergarten teachers. 12 Waltraut Hartmann and Gilles Brougère, "Toy Culture in Preschool Education and Children's Toy Preferences," in Toys, Games, and Media, ed. Jeffrey Goldstein, David Buckingham, and Gilles Brougère (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2004), 50. 13 For a discussion of online auctions and historical research see Molly McCarthy, "Consuming History," Common‐Place: The Interactive Journal of Early American Life 1, no. 2 (2001), Available from http://www.common-place.org/. 15 Mary Mann and Elizabeth Peabody, Moral Culture of Infancy, and Kindergarten Guide (Boston: T.O.H.P. Burnham, 1863), 12. 14 Johann Ronge and Bertha Ronge, A Practical Guide to the English Kindergarten, 18th ed. (London: A.N. Myers, c.1890). 16 Francis Walker, ed., International Exhibition 1876, Reports and Awards, vol. 8 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1880), 78. 17 "International Copyright Law," American Literary Gazette, September 15, 1869, 292. 18 James Shea, It's All in the Game (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1960). 19 "Kindergarten," American Educational Monthly 6 (1868): 390. 20 Edward Wiebé, The Paradise of Childhood: A Manual for Self‐Instruction in Friedrich Froebel's Educational Principles, and a Practical Guide to Kinder‐gartners (Springfield, MA: Milton Bradley Co., 1869), iii. Wiebé acknowledged that Paradise of Childhood was based on several German‐language guides, including those of Marenholtz, Morgenstern, Goldammer and Froebel. The plates were reprinted from Hermann Goldammer's Der Kindergarten. Handbuch der Fröbel'schen Erziehungsmethode, Spielgaben und Beschäftigungen, published in Berlin the same year. 21 Elizabeth Peabody, "Letter of Miss E.P. Peabody," in Kindergarten and Child Culture Papers, ed. Henry Bernard (Hartford, CT: Office of Barnard's American Journal of Education, 1884), 15. 22 "Training the Infants," New York Times, April 1, 1880, 2. 23 Edward Weibe, The Paradise of Childhood: A Manual for Self‐Instruction in Friedrich Froeble's Education Principles (Springfield, MA: Milton & Bradley Co., 1869), 3; Shea, It's All in the Game. 24 MBC, Bradley's Games, Toys, Industrial Amusements and Novelties (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1881/1882), 44. 26 MBC, Bradley's Catalogue of Games, Toys, and Novelties (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1883/1884), 49. 25 Shea, It's All in the Game. 27 MBC, Bradley's Games, Toys, Industrial Amusements and Novelties, 44. 28 United States Office of Education, Report of the Commissioner of Education for the year 1881 (Government Printing Office, Washington: Government Printing Office, 1883), 135. 29 Beatty, Preschool Education in America, 101; Meika Baader, "Froebel and the Rise of Educational Theory in the United States," Studies in Philosophy and Education 23 (2004): 427–44. 30 Shea, It's All in the Game; "Price Fixing Found on Crayons and Chalk," New York Times, February 3, 1938, 30; "Corporate Reports," New York Times, June 29, 1934, 36; "Income Increased by Loan Company," New York Times, February 7, 1936, 32; "Demands Sit‐downers Get Out," New York Times, May 14, 1937, 11; Strike to Show Strength," New York Times, May 13, 1937, 4. 31 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material and School Aids (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1891), introduction, unpaginated. 32 Guides by Ronge and Ronge, Mann and Peabody, and Kraus‐Boelte and Kraus all included a catalogue of items for sale. 33 Catherine C. DuCharme, "Early Kindergarten Periodicals in the United States." ERIC Reproduction Number ED391594. 34 MBC, Bradley's Games, Toys, Industrial Amusements and Novelties, 44. 35 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material (1891), introduction. 36 Larry Cuban, Teachers and Machines: The Classroom Use of Technology since 1920 (New York: Teachers College Press, 1986). 37 Shea, It's All in the Game, 133. 38 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material and School Aids (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1894), 19. 39 Ibid., 25. 40 Ibid., 4. 41 William N. Hailmann, Primary Methods: A Complete and Methodical Presentation of the Use of Kindergarten Material in the Work of the Primary School (New York: A.S. Barnes and Co., 1887), 73. 42 Kate Douglas Wiggin and Nora Archibald Smith, Froebel's Gifts (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1895), 35. 43 MBC, Catalogue of Games and Home Amusements (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1873–74), 24, cited in Brosterman, Inventing Kindergarten, 41. 44 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material and School Aids (Springfield, MA: Milton Bradley Co., 1904), 32, http://vlp.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/library/data/lit28491. 45 Ibid. 46 Dorothy W. Hewes, "Early Childhood Commercial Exhibit Controversies: 1890 and 1990," (paper presented at the annual meeting of the National Association for the Education of Young Children, Washington, DC, November 16, 1990). ERIC Reproduction Number ED330431. 47 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material (1891), 4. 48 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material (1904), 3. 49 Minnie M. Glidden, "Educational Appliance," United States Patent Office, Patent no. 595455 (1896). 50 Specification Covering Manual Arts, Household Arts, Retarded Classes, Kindergartens, and Art Classes, April 1, 1920, Kindergarten File, Accession no. 84.1.560, Edmonton Public Schools Archives and Museum. Each package contained 12 mats. 51 Milton Bradley, "Kindergarten Table," United States Patent Office, Patent no. 418437 (1889), 1. 52 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material (1894), 38; Hewes, "Early Childhood Commercial Exhibit Controversies," 6. 53 International Kindergarten Union (IKU), The Kindergarten: Reports of the Committee of Nineteen on the Theory and Practice of the Kindergarten (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1913), ix. The IKU (from 1930 called the Association for Childhood Education International) was established in 1892, with the aim to promulgate kindergarten education in the United States. 54 Ibid., x. 55 G. Stanley Hall, Educational Problems, vol. 1 (New York: D. Appleton and Co, 1911), 15. 56 Ibid., 7. 57 Ibid., 123. 58 Agnes Snyder, Dauntless Women in Childhood Education, 1856–1931 (Washington, DC: Association for Childhood Education International, 1972), 183. 59 M. Franklin, "Meanings of Play in the Developmental‐Interaction Tradition," in Revisiting a Progressive Pedagogy: The Developmental‐Interaction Approach, ed. N. Nager and E.K. Shapiro (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2000), 47–72. 60 Agnes Burke, Edna V. Hughes, Edith U. Conard, Mary E. Rankin, Alice Dalgliesh, Alice G. Thorn, and Charlotte G. Garrison, A Conduct Curriculum for the Kindergarten and First Grade (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1923); Charlotte G. Garrison, Permanent Play Materials for Young Children (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1926); Charlotte Gano Garrison, Emma Dickson Sheehy, and Alice Dalgliesh, The Horace Mann Kindergarten for Five‐year‐old Children (New York: Teachers College, 1937); Jean Lee Hunt, A Catalogue of Play Equipment (New York: Bureau of Educational Experiments, 1918); E.I. Salisbury, An Activity Curriculum for the Kindergarten and Primary Grades (San Francisco: Harr Wagner, 1924); Subcommittee on Curriculum of the Bureau of Education Committee of the International Kindergarten Union, "The Kindergarten Curriculum," United States Bureau of Education, Bulletin, no. 16 (1919). 61 Schoenhut Co., Schoenhut's Illustrated Catalogue: Nursery, Kindergarten, Primary Grade Supplies (Philadelphia: The A. Schoenhut Co., 1930), cover. 62 Ibid., 14. 63 Burke et al., Conduct Curriculum, 22–3. 64 Large versions of the Stabuilt blocks suitable for constructing play houses were later developed, called Giant Sta‐Put Building Blocks. See Edna C. Schumacher, Building with Blocks (unpublished MSc in Education thesis, New Jersey State Teachers College, Newark, 1952), 3. 65 James McKeen Cattell, "Psychological Notes," Science 4, no. 88 (1896): 307. 66 Brosterman, Inventing Kindergarten, 90. 67 Hunt, Catalogue of Play Equipment, 37. 68 Ibid., 32. 69 Harriet Johnson, The Art of Block Building (orig. pub. 1933), in The Block Book, ed. Elisabeth S. Hirsch (Washington: National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1984), 18–19. 70 Item present in the 1904 MBC catalogue, but not in 1900. Catalogues between 1900 and 1904 were not reviewed. 71 Carolyn Bailey and Clara Lewis, Daily Program of Gift and Occupation Work (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1904), preface, unpaginated. 72 MBC, Bradley's School Supplies (Philadelphia: MBC, 1930), 47. 73 MBC, Bradley's Kindergarten Material and School Supplies (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1907), 53; William Forbush, The Manual of Play (Philadelphia: George W. Jacobs and Co., 1914). 74 MBC, Bradley's School Materials and Books (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1920), 19. 75 MBC, Bradley's School Materials and Books (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1927), 79. 76 "Trace Building Blocks" (advertisement), American Childhood 16, no. 3 (1930): 62. 77 Louise Farwell, "Reactions of Kindergarten, First‐Grade and Second‐Grade Children to Constructive Play Materials," Genetic Psychology Monographs 8, nos. 5–6 (1930): 431–561. The rods may have been a problematic feature of the Hill Blocks. In a later version called the Patty Hill Type Blocks offered by toy company Creative Playthings in the early 1950s, the rods were replaced by a nut and bolt. See Schumacher, Building with Blocks, 49. 78 MBC, Bradley's School Materials and Books (1927), 80. 79 Ibid. 80 Mary Dabney Davis, "Nursery–Kindergarten–Primary Education in 1924–1926," Bureau of Education, Bulletin, no. 28 (1927): 3. 81 Arthur Gesell, The Preschool Child from the Standpoint of Public Hygiene and Education (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1923); Bird T. Baldwin, The Psychology of the Preschool Child (New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1924). 82 MBC, Bradley's School Supplies, 25. 83 MBC, Bradley's Pre‐school Educational Playthings (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1934), 2. 84 MBC, Bradley's School Supplies, 66. 85 Catherine MacKenzie, "Children and Parents," New York Times, April 23, 1939, 43. 86 Ibid. 87 Christian Warren, Brush with Death: A Social History of Lead Poisoning (Baltimore: John Hopkins Press, 2001). 88 MBC, Bradley's School Materials (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1939). 89 MBC, The Bradley Catalogue for Teachers (Springfield, MA: MBC, 1933). 90 Shea, It's All in the Game. 94 Davis, General Practice in Kindergarten Education, 44. 91 Alice Temple, Survey of the Kindergartens of Richmond, Indiana (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1917). 92 Almira Winchester, "Kindergarten Education," in Biennial Survey of Education, 1916–1918, ed. United States Bureau of Education (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1918), 349. 93 Mary Dabney Davis, General Practice in Kindergarten Education in the United States (Washington, DC: National Education Association, 1925). 95 Farwell, "Reactions of Kindergarten, First‐Grade and Second‐Grade Children." 96 Evelyn Weber, Early Childhood Education: Perspectives on Change (Worthington, OH: Charles A. Jones, 1970), 8. 97 Weber, Kindergarten, 69–70. 98 Margaret A. Trace, Block Building: A Practical Guide for Mothers and Teachers (Springfield, IL: Milton Bradley Co., 1928), 20. 102 Fulmer, Use of Kindergarten Gifts, 7. 99 Grace Fulmer, The Use of Kindergarten Gifts (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1918). 100 "Publications Received," review of Grace Fulmer, The Use of Kindergarten Gifts, Journal of Educational Psychology 9, no. 9 (1918): 531. 101 Quoted in "Must Adhere to Froebel," The Globe (Toronto), April 22, 1905, 9. 103 Garrison et al., Horace Mann Kindergarten, 114. 104 Dom Cavallo, "From Perfection to Habit: Moral Training in the American Kindergarten, 1860–1920," History of Education Quarterly 16, no. 2 (1976): 150.