By ETHAN HAUSER, the new york times
“Leadership tomorrow depends on how we educate our students today — especially in science, technology, engineering and math,” President Obama has declared. While the words may be new, the sentiment goes back a long way.
As Michael Wysession, an earth and planetary scientist at Washington University in St. Louis, wrote this year in the online edition of Scientific American. “Though we live in a thoroughly modern scientific world, our science education structure is now 120 years old.” The debate is nothing new, either; here and elsewhere in this issue are some historic highlights.
1860’s-1870’s — Teaching With Toys
Froebel Blocks.
Early American education takes many cues from older systems in Europe, particularly their emphasis on so-called project-based learning. One of the tools in use are Froebel Blocks, invented by Friedrich Fröbel (“the father of the modern kindergarten movement”), which teaches students basic math, including geometry, and building skills. Frank Lloyd Wright is said to have used these blocks and other Froebel toys as a child, playtime which may have influenced his Modernist architecture.
1893 — Classes for Changing Times
Library of Congress
Charles William Eliot
The National Education Association, through its Committee of Ten, issues a report that, in part, recommends the expansion of science education in elementary and secondary schools. The committee is headed by Charles Eliot, the president of Harvard University, who is also seen as largely responsible for bringing laboratory science to the university. Thought by many to be the formal beginnings of science and math education on the elementary and secondary levels, the report is spurred by America’s shift from an agrarian society to a more industrial one. The committee’s recommendations go on to persist through the 1930s, and some are still in practice today.
1940’s — Science on the Home Front
World War II refocuses much science education into fields like aviation, electricity and nuclear physics. In 1942 the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company sponsors its first Science Talent Search, a national fair now known as the Intel Science Talent Search that awards scholarship money for independent science projects by high school students. These fairs prove very popular, and now there are other fairs sponsored by Siemens and, most recently, Google.
1957 — The Sputnik Challenge
Russia launches the Sputnik 1 satellite, an event widely recognized as galvanizing. Deeply embarrassed at being beaten in the cold war space race, American leaders double financing for the National Science Foundation, which supports teacher training and curriculum development. Many new textbooks explicitly emphasize space exploration.
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