Grace Hollenberg
T00524488
Hist 3510-01
October 2, 2017
Research Proposal
How did compulsory schooling affect the home lives of urban and rural families?
No matter where you are in Canada, the family is often what life revolves around. Looking at the history of children’s roles in and around the home, they play a substantial role whether home is in the city or on a farm. The implementation of compulsory schooling had different effects on rural and urban families but in both cases they had large impacts on family dynamics.
This paper will look at how compulsory schooling inflicted change within the home and what compulsory schooling meant for the family economy in both rural and urban settings. As well, this paper will address the changing roles of children and the benefits of schools compulsory attendance. The following sources all contribute in finding how schooling affected lives in urban and rural homes. What we find is that children went from being wage contributors to being prepared for future economic prosperity through education. The value of education eventually increases in all parts of Canada through labor laws and mentality of how children are viewed. The shift from exploiting children workers to protecting them is clear. Their roles in and around the home are becoming more and more defined and life is revolving more around the clock.
Bullen, John, “Hidden Workers: Child Labour and the Family Economy in Late Nineteenth-Century Urban Ontario.” Labour/Le Travail (Fall1986): 163-87.
- This article is useful in determining what compulsory schooling meant for urban families. As many families required every member to contribute to the family economy, whether it was a wage or completing domestic duties. This article discusses the dangers of industry work and the exploitation women and children faced in pursuit of economic stability. This article shows the inner conflict children endured with school not offering any tangible gains while employment did. The labor market increased value of education for working class children and in turn made it something worth while for children to receive. This article sheds light onto the factors that influenced urban families and their views on public schooling.
Clubine, Christopher, “Motherhood and Public Schooling in Victorian Toronto,” in Sara Burke and Patrice Milewski (Eds.), Schooling in Transition: Readings in the Canadian History of Education, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012: 126-139
- This article argues that Toronto parents were supportive in their childrens education and that compulsory schooling restructured families and the individual roles played within it. These arguments will be helpful in contributing to my paper as it supplies multiple examples of situations in which schools mandatory attendance shifted expectations and roles of children at home. Clubine shows the readers how childhood had become a time to be ‘controlled, monitored and supervised’ by adults and that a childs behavior reflected his mothers ability to complete her motherly duties. This shifted things at home as mothers now had to have their children fed, washed, and at school on time. Where previously, these tasks may be completed through out the day. Not only were these tasks needing to be done on time for school, a spotlight was now shining down as other adults caring for her children assessed the degree of quality in which her children are prepared. Clubine contributes factors that may have kept children from school, whether it was to work at a job and contribute to a wage to the family economy or if the child simply refused to attend, accompanied by the consequences associated with each. This article is key in contributing domestic changes that came with compulsory schooling.
Cochrane, Jean. “Children on the Farm.” Beaver 72, no. 4 (Agust 1992): 12. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed October 2, 2017).
- Through the use of personal experiences from several Canadians, this magazine gives insight into the daily lives of children on rural Canadian farms in the late 19th Children were helping around the house as toddlers and their responsibilities increased with age. Whether they were plowing, caring for animals, or helping in the kitchen, they were beside their parents, sharing the constant strenuous effort to build a living. This being said, many parents were anxious for their children to get an education. This allows the audience to see that even into the late 19th century the importance of education and the opportunities it might bring were something many were aspiring to.
McIntosh, Robert. “The Boys in the Nova Scotian Coal Mines: 1873-1923,” in Sara Burke and Patrice Milewski (Eds.), Schooling in Transition: Readings in the Canadian History of Education, Toronto: University of Toronoto Press, 2012: 126-139.
- This article discusses the economic importance of child workers and how these views clashed with new social attitudes. Boys working in coal mines was beneficial for both employees and employers. However the change in definition of a ‘child’ changed the manner in which parents raised their children. These changes accompanied with the concern for childhood education was reflected in school and mine legislation. This article allows readers to see how the new social standards for children effected the family economy and protected children.
Robertson, Ian Ross. “Reform, Literacy, and the Lease: The Prince Edward Island Free Education Act of 1852.” in Sara Burke and Patrice Milewski (Eds.), Schooling in Transition: Readings in the Canadian History of Education, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012: 56-71
- This article questions motives for free education and supplies several possibilities. From preparing the population for an industrial revolution to moulding the population so that they are unreceptive to potential dangers of radicals. Elements of truth are intertwined in all these possibilities and there is no doubt that this was a time of reform. This article describes the school system as underdeveloped and chaotic and yet the drive for free public education continued. In rural settings the combination of leasehold as the predominant form of land tenure, the lack of faith in the legal system / profession, and the chaotic way in which settlement had proceeded combined to create a uniquely urgent need for literacy. This article will be useful in determining what compulsory schooling meant for rural farmers.
Robeson, Virginia R., and Patick Douglas. 1977. Upper Canada in the 1830’s. n.p. : Toronto : Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, 1977., 1977. Thompson Rivers University Catalog, EBSCOhost (accessed October 4, 2017).
- The perspective of a school master in the 1830’s gives us a first hand look into what schooling meant and how surrounding families dealt with its presence. The school master discusses attendance and the parents participation in their children’s educations. This primary source will be useful in determining the attitudes of parents towards schooling even before it was mandatory. Within this piece, we see ideas of enforcing enrollment and the proper training for teachers who were to provide the public with their service.
Sager, Eric W. “Women Teachers in Canada, 1881-1901 in Sara Burke and Patrice Milewski (Eds.), Schooling in Transition: Readings in the Canadian History of Education, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012: 140-165.
- Sager discusses how between 1881- 1901 more parents were beginning to see schooling as a future investment in ‘economical competency’ for their children. This brought added pressure to build schools to provide future prospects and employment opportunities for both boys and girls. This view of schooling allows the reader to interpret the stress for parents to provide for their children and their ever changing roles. Sager continues with mature farms, which, by themselves were unable to provide for all of the farmers children. This added further reason for children to be educated. This shows the reader the shift in the family economy, where a wage was once most crucial for family survival, an education started to become more valuable.