From the German Schoolmaster's Psychology to the Psychology of the Child: Evolving Rationales for the Teaching of History in U.S. Schools in the 1890s

The rationale for teaching history proposed by most professional historians in the 1890s was based on faculty psychology—the theory that the mind was composed of mental faculties such as memory and will that could be strengthened like muscles. However, over the course of the decade this approach was gradually replaced by a functional approach to mind and society, which had roots in the new psychology of Wilhelm Wundt. This development was accompanied by a pedagogical shift in learning theory from an emphasis on exertion of the students’ will to engaging students’ interest. John Dewey, William James, and the American followers of German pedagogical theorist, Johann Frederich Herbart, directly challenged the faculty psychology of the German-inspired professional historians but still placed history at the center of their pedagogical schemes. As a result, history gained a central place in U.S. elementary and secondary curriculum during these years, but paradoxically the new psychology gradually eroded the influence of professional historians on the curriculum, because they failed to acknowledge these emerging pedagogical and psychological theories.