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Title	The Mormon response to early progressive education, 1892-1920
Publication Type	dissertation
School or College	College of Education
Department	Educational Leadership & Policy
Author	Payne, Allan Dean
Date	1977
Description	This dissertation is an historical investigation of the Mormon response to progressive reform in Utah's schools between 1892 and 1920. It is limited to the educational thought and practice of church leaders and Mormon educators responsible for the church and public schools in Utah's three principal cities: Salt Lake City, Ogden, and Provo. More specifically, liThe Mormon Response to Early Progressive Education" examines the degree to which r1ormon educators and members of the hierarchy understood, rejected, adopted, or adapted progressive credo. Besides describing the historical facts and inferences associated with the Mormon response to the various strands of progressive education, this dissertation suggests explanations for the specific Mormon reactions. Considering its isolation from progressive centers in the Midwest and East and considering its relatively few professional educators at the century's turn, Mormonism enjoyed surprisingly frequent contacts with progressive education's brightest luminaries, including visits from Francis W. Parker, John Dewey, G. Stanley Hall, and William Wirt. The number of Mormon educators who studied in the Midwest and East, coupled with the eastern non-ttormon faculty members who taught at Utah's two leading normal schools, was equally impressive. The frequency and quality of these contacts helped initiate and sustain a progressive environment often praised by some of the nation's most perceptive educational observers. Practical education (manual training, vocational and industrial preparation, domestic arts and science) was widely accepted by members of the hierarchy and by professional educators as well. The child-his interests, needs, play, activity, hygiene and physical well-being-also became a focal point of education for Mormon educators and, to a lesser degree, for members of the hierarchy. Correlation of subjects and correlation of school and out-of-school experience figured prominently in the Mormon response to the new education. Finally, immediate, palliative social reform of the sort espoused by Jane Addams was not viewed as relevant for Utah society. Instead, the emphasis was placed upon community building and subjection of the physical environment as part of establishing the Kingdom of God on earth. Mormonism spawned numerous educators and programs reflecting what was most typical in progressive education during its formative years. Many educators in the church system and in the public schools were steeped in progressive theory, techniques, and aims. They applauded the valuable results of thoughtfully employed practical education, child-centeredness, and correlation; but they also realized that progressive education was (or underscored) a process of learning which emphasized creativity, self-expression, activity, observation, and experimentation. While members of the hierarchy could distinguish between traditional and progressive education, they did not always understand the mechanics; they were more impressed by results of the new education than by processes involved.
Type	Text
Publisher	University of Utah
Subject	Latter Day Saints -- Education
Dissertation Name	Doctor of Philosophy
Language	eng
Rights Management	© Allan Dean Payne
Format	application/pdf
Format Medium	application/pdf
ARK	ark:/87278/s61w0h8k
Setname	ir_etd
ID	1528016
Reference URL	https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s61w0h8k

Page Metadata

Title	Page 98
Format	application/pdf
Setname	ir_etd
ID	1528114
OCR Text	Show 89 Many Mormon educators and church leaders interested in educa- tion may have been drawn as only not to important an practical education because they means slaught of modernity. and traditional a education's emphasis ations, ideas, and formality reinforced reaffirmation of a on was practical education--formal necessary for Kingdom of God. are on or informal. erod books, memorization, recit- dying interest in practicalthe Practical education value of was colonizing, for subduing the desert, and for building the Brigham Young perhaps these sentiments. courses the gradually Throughout its early history, 10rmonism celebrated ity. ac In the late nineteenth century the value of labor, of manual training, of agriculture manual ing; as gradually disintegrating before were it of social, political, and economic commodation with mainstream America, but also earlier values which saw The better than anyone following passages from the Journal typified of Dis- representative of others that could be cited: Hy policy is to keep everybody busy in building up this kingdom; in building houses; in breaking up land; in setting out fruit and ornamental trees; in laying out fine gardens, pleasant walks, and beautiful groves; and in building academies, and other places of learning. There are hundreds of young men here who can go to school, which is far better than to waste their time. Study languages, get knowledge and understanding; and while doing this, get wisdom from God, and forget it not, and learn how to apply it, that you may do good with it all the days of your 1 i ves. An 1862 entry reads: Learn how to raise calves, chickens, lambs, Learn all you can. and all kinds of useful fowls and animals; learn how to till the ground to the best advantage for raising all useful products of the soil; and learn how to manufacture molasses and sugar from Raise flax, husbands, and let your wives learn the sugar-cane. to manufacture the linen.57 57Brigham Young, F. D. and S. W. Richards Journal of Discourses (Liverpool, 2:145 and 9:173). 1854-75) England:
Reference URL	https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s61w0h8k/1528114