History of Education
Reading was the main subject taught in America’s first school in 1635 by the Puritans in Boston, with math, then known as ciphering and writing less important subjects on the curriculum. Harvard University, the first college in America opened its doors four years later.
The history of education in the United States began due to the Puritans total discontent with the British Church of England and its teachings and began fully to study the Bible. This exploration and interpretation of the Bible’s teachings was the spark that caused the first free school for all children to start.
In the American Experience in Education, Kay Kizer explains it was focus on conversion instead of repression and the principal of converting was based on learning. While the Puritans stressed, and urged and the need for higher learning, the history of education shows that everything was to follow the laws established in the Bible. Others, the country became more populated, disagreed.
In the mid-colonies, Ben Franklin and William Penn stressed education so other forms and ideas of religion could be explored. Through education, other ideas flourished and other denominations began to break away from the Puritan way of life.
As more colonies were established in the south, state-funded education became more common. Although it wasn’t until after the civil war that fully state-funded schools became part of America’s history of education.