Imagining and re-imagining; transformation at the tipping points of social change.
I am so fortunate to be surrounded by learned and respected colleagues. One, in particular, is dear friend, Sue Martin. The following guest blog speaks directly to the subject near and dear to those passionate about the needs of children. Years have passed since the MacMillan sisters spoke of the essential needs of children - particularly those entering child caring situations. We continue to advocate for the rights and needs of children of all ages. We know you will be very interested in Sue Martin's guest blog. Please read and feel free to share. We have to continue to fight the 'good fight.' No giving up.
“How do we prioritize in this crisis, between the needs of our community vs. the needs of our children?” It is nothing short of astounding to me that this conversation was one had with the McMillan sisters over a hundred years ago, because in so many ways it is exactly the same one we are having today in 2020.
In the article below, Sue Martin expertly parallels the similarities and outlines the desperate need to put children first when handling this unprecedented situation. —Erica Mills, June 26, 2020
Sue Martin
Sue recently retired as a college professor of early childhood education in Toronto, Canada. She trained as a Froebel teacher in London, England, where she worked as a nursery/infant teacher, and then lectured at an Further Education college. She was the education editor at Nursery World. Sue is the author of several early-years text books.
Context
“Policies and decisions concerning children ultimately derive from conceptions of childhood.” —Arlene Skolnick
The COVID-19 pandemic makes us, parents and professionals alike, worried about our children. But in the past, how did people come forward in times of crisis to address the specific needs of particular children, families and communities. And how does this influence the ongoing discussions about re-imagining the early years?
Let’s look back over a hundred years to the McMillan sisters. They offer us an interesting model because theirs was generated as a response to a social crisis (poverty and its detrimental impact on education) which, while not the same as ours, has interesting parallels. They understood that meeting the needs of the child was essential before any meaningful education could occur.
The social historian Steedman determined that there was a ‘reconceptualization of childhood’ going on in Britain in the late nineteenth and early 20thcenturies, as people began to look at children somewhat differently, with a shift away from using children for their labour to childhood as a special time of life. Steedman’s biography on Margaret McMillan explains that her innovative theory of childhood saw children as symbols of hope for a better future for the working classes. “Modern childhood” is the term Hendrick (1997 p.14) uses to describe this period.
The McMillan Sisters
The McMillan sisters were born in New York State of parents who had emigrated from Scotland. Their father died, as well as a sister; and their mother, who had suffered scarlet fever, decided to return to Inverness with her two girls, where they were schooled.They were influenced by their grandparents, and Christian socialist speakers. For a while they based their efforts in Bradford, visiting homes of the poor and devising ways to improve the physical health and intellectual welfare of children in slums. They started campaigns to end slums and improve schools in Bradford, including bathrooms, and offering free school meals. In London this work continued along with political activism that led to the 1906 Provision of School Meals Act. Two years later they opened the country’s first school clinics in Bow, and then Deptford. These offered health and hygiene supports including dental care, breathing and posture help, surgical aid, attention to fleas, and a night camp where children could wash their dirty clothes.
Their Christian socialism galvanized them to improve the lives of children and families. Poverty, malnutrition, poor living conditions,
and a wretched life trajectory, made education a low priority. But improving the lives of working class children was a rising social concern: “A healthy working class child was precious in a way that had not been seen before” (Hendrick p48) In 1918 LEAs were mandated to ensure that all children were medically inspected in school clinics, and their physical health was monitored.
The McMillans mixed with influential people, including leaders of the new political Left, education leaders and medical officers. This was essential to the financial and political support for their new ventures. Through today’s lens they might be seen as having been patronizing, yet they brought about improvements for children that were not merely theories or policies.
“Every teacher is a discoverer. Everyone is an inventor, an improver of methods, or he is a mere journeyman, not a master.” (McMillan p13) suggested Margaret McMillan. Mellor makes the interesting point that Margaret McMillan “did not take as her pattern any earlier or contemporary type of school.”(p.29) but used small groups, and her innovative ideas of purpose built shelters for 35-50 children, amongst other design features to bring about her vision. In 1950 Mellor wrote that change and modification will continue to be necessary, anticipating “The new school looks different, sounds different, feels different… [They] are demonstrating the truth that Life educates” (p.30)
“The best classroom and the richest cupboard is roofed only by the sky,” claimed Margaret McMillan. Their Open-Air Nursery and Training Centre for staff was opened in Deptford in 1914. We can imagine the climate at the start of WW1 with more women left alone to bring up children in challenging circumstances. What the McMillans tried to do amounted to providing transformational experience, in extremely difficult times. They were not merely offering traditional schooling, as others had done, or care, that dealt with physical needs of the child.
Outside spaces were thought to offer the best possible opportunity to maximize healthy growth and development. They experimented with different models of open-air nurseries and ‘camps’ (a kind of sleep-over opportunity) for older children. The ‘shelters’ at the nursery were what we might think of as separate units, with a playroom and bathroom, but children could move between them at will. The entire nursery could have several hundred children enrolled at any one time. It was not a school or childcare centre in today’s sense, but an entirely different way of meeting needs for children in a broader age range than ‘nursery’ might be currently defined. When Rachel McMillan died in 1917, the school was named after her, and a modified nursery exists today.
Influences
Whitbread (1972) describes the McMillans’ theories as following the utopian and developmentalist Owen tradition. Margaret McMillan, a spiritualist, had studied Steiner, as did many in the Arts and Crafts Movement of the times, and thought she had much in common with him. Steiner expressed enthusiasm for the McMillans, and discussed their ideas about the power of the imagination. Montessori had been influenced by Itard and Seguin for reasons similar to Margaret’s intrigue, but Montessori’s perspective wasn’t as influential.
“She [Margaret McMillan] had made extensive trips abroad to observe the experimental work of other educationalists and had extensively studied the work and writings of Fredrich Froebel and Edouard Seguin among others.” (McMillan Legacy Group, 1999, p. 28). Seguin’s work with children who had disabilities caught her imagination Margaret McMillan, particularly because of his utopian socialist ideals.
Liebovitch (2019) suggests that Margaret McMillan (1860 – 1931) was strongly influenced by a Froebelian view of childhood, which opposed the Victorian strictness of being seen and not heard. She valued “the years of great opportunity” (McMillan1900, p.3). Froebel had opened the first outdoor kindergartens, and his structured play provided opportunities for children to become in-tune with nature. His view was both spiritual and practical, but pre-dated progressive thinking that focused more on pragmatic developmental views that enabled children to be directors of their own play (Bruce 1987, p.16).
Margaret’s views were shaped by the curative, spiritual, nature-embedded, moral, aesthetic, Christian, developmental, and health and hygiene, strands of thinking. Interestingly, the sisters’ focus on helping children living in poverty, and social justice, did not mean that they thought that otherchildren would not benefit from nursery education.
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References and further reading
Bruce, T. (1987). Early Childhood Education. London: Hodder Education.
Froebel, F. (1826). Education of Man. Courier Corporation reprint 2012.
Hendrick, H.(1997). Children, childhood and English society. Cambridge University Press.
Liebovich, B. (2019). Margaret McMillan’s Contributions to Cultures of Childhood.
Educational Studies Department, Goldsmiths University of London.
Liebovich, B. (2018). TheMcMillan Sisters, The Roots of the Open-Nursery, and Breaking the Cycle of Poverty. Social & Education History, vol. 7, no. 1.
McMillan, M. (1930). The Nursery School. London: J. M. Dent & Sons
McMillan Legacy Group (1999). The children can’t wait: The McMillan
Sisters and the birth of nursery education. London: Deptford Forum
Publishing Ltd.
Mellor, M. (1950). Education through experience in the infant school years.Oxford: Blackwell.
Skolnick, A.(1975). The limits of childhood: Conceptions of child development and social context. 39 Law and Contemporary Problems, 38-77.
Steedman, C. 1990. Childhood, Culture and Class in Britain: Margaret McMillan 1860–1931. London: Virago Press.
Whitbread, N. (1972). The evolution of the nursery-infant school. London: Routledge.
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