One Room Schoolhouse Education

From movies and nostalgia we get think of education in a one room schoolhouse as great education...it was not.  Imagine yourself being a first term teacher meeting a class of 28 students with 7 children between the ages of 5 and 7, 13 children between the ages of 10-14, 4 students between the ages of 15-20 and 4 more between the ages of 20-29!  Some can read, most can not, or read at several levels below their age.

Attendance is casual.  Parents see the need for work on the farm far more necessary than education, so attending school on a regular basis is both irregular and unpredictable.  Parents are the first to criticize you and the older students give you trouble.

Few frontier teacher lasted more than 2 years in these classrooms.  The majority of the community saw them as unnecessary , overpaid, and a burden on the family in whose home they resided.  A teacher had no privacy, no possessions, and were not allowed any contact with a single man, let alone a marriage proposal.


Would you want to teach??

Next time - the duties of a 1800s teacher.