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TURNING PEDAGOGY INTO A SCIENCE: TEACHERS AND PSYCHOLOGISTS IN
LATE IMPERIAL RUSSIA
By Andy Byford
Presented by Tim Schultz and Christy Cazzola
Historiography
Andy Byford is a Lecturer in Russian at the University of Durham in the UK. He has a BA in French and Russian, a MA in Comparative Literature, and a PHD in Russian. His research has focused primarily on the History of Education within the context of Late Imperial Russia. He describes his ongoing research project in this field as “an original case study in the social history of the human sciences and professions in the distinctive context of late 19th and early 20th century Russia, a period of rapid modernization, socio-political restructuring, and cataclysmic revolutionary upheaval”
Relation to the Textbook:
“Agrarian reforms of the 1860’s, followed by the push to industrialize in the 1890’s –went hand in hand with equally fundamental changes in the fabric of Russian society itself”
“One thing was certain: it was no longer by any means clear that children would comfortably follow the vocation and status of their parents; a new generation had its own way to find, and a school or university education could be the key to a different path in life.”
Pedagogical Implementations: A Debate!
SPECIALIZATION THEORY
This was in many ways the dominant system prior to the period of reform. In this system, teaching of various subjects was undertaken by people who had been trained in that specific field.
This a new notion that gained favor during this period. Advocates proposed that children and their development were a unique field that required special theory and unique training to understand and guide.
Problems in Education
Discussion Question: What problems did the Empire face that made it so difficult to systematically implement educational reform?
Education and Industrialization
Discussion Question: How does the problem of modernizing education relate to the industrial and agrarian transformations that we discussed last week?
The Central Government and Educational Reform
Discussion Question: We have seen that throughout this period, the Central Government involved itself directly with both industrialization and agrarian reforms. Why do you suppose that the government took a relatively hands-off position regarding Education?
Questions?
