Education did not become a big part of society …show more content…
One room school houses were the biggest schools they had before they started to create kindergarten, elementary, middle and high schools; and eventually colleges would come along. One room school houses were used all across the United States and actually educated the majority of the population. In 1869, these schools taught 64.7% of children between the ages of 5 to 18 year olds. By the time 1900, the one roomed school houses were teaching 71.9% of the population. One of the most known about one room school houses was in Waterford, Virginia in the 1880s. At this school, they studied and learned about reading, writing, penmanship, spelling, math, history, and geography. More specialized schools were slowly spreading throughout this time, but not many children attended these schools. Kindergarten was one of the specialized schools that started to spread through the nation, but by 1902, only 5% of 4 to 5 year olds really attended. Eventually, elementary schools were created, but they were used for experiments. They were trying to incorporate new ideas that someday would become the model for progressive education. In the elementary schools, they started to include intelligence and achievement tests and tried to give them more freedom. In kindergartens started to be based on German ideas, and high schools became accepted by the nation and would include academic and vocational instructions. High schools became one of …show more content…
The National Education Association (NEA) was formed in 1891. It was created to study and recommend changes for secondary school (high school) education in the US, and would eventually help improve the living and working conditions of the teachers. Charles W. Eliot became the first president of the NEA. All the members of the NEA were either principals, superintendents, and district and state education employees. The majority of these positions were held by men, which would put an unfair bias in the association because the majority of teachers were actually woman. Eliot’s goal through this association was to have a standard curriculum to allow all college-bound students the opportunity to have the same academic background as the other people at the colleges. It would help try and lessen the gap between normal school students and college teachers. Normal students were trained by teacher who had classroom experiences, whereas the college teachers were trained in “systematic and quantitative approaches.” Another thing the NEA did was organize three different committees: The Committee of Ten, The Committee of Fifteen, and The Committee on College Entrance Requirements. The Committee of Ten’s job was to study, reform, and unify high schools, academies, private and religious schools, and other