Content area
Full Text
The nineteenth century American Kindergarten Movement was an education and social movement led by women. The creator of the kindergarten philosophy, Frederick Froebel, placed women at the center of his work, believing that women, in particular mothers, were divinely appointed to lead children. Like other women-led movements of the nineteenth century, the Kindergarten Movement provided women with a socially acceptable outlet for their skills. Women who led the Kindergarten Movement used it as a vehicle for creating networks to expand their work, to give direction and meaning to their lives, and to demonstrate and refine their leadership, organizational skills, and intellectual abilities.
Studying the Kindergarten Movement, particularly the work done in Chicago, provides us with an opportunity to view the complexities of "women's work" and the notions of gender, education for women, and separate spheres. The goal of the Kindergarten Movement in Chicago was three fold: To build upon Froebel's philosophy and methods to create the best educational experience possible for children; to make this new educational opportunity available to as many children as possible; and to empower mothers and young women to recognize and embrace the significance of their role in the lives of children.
This paper will focus on the leadership of Elizabeth Harrison (18491927), and Ruhah Crouse (1836-1915), kindergarten pioneers in Chicago whose work demonstrates the tensions between the public and private spheres. The Kindergarten Movement in general, and the Chicago branch in particular, will be examined as they provide a fresh lens for viewing women's work in education, one that stands in contrast to the typical historical portrayal of women as educational leaders. As Munro describes, "... the 'cult of domesticity' and its corollary, 'teaching as women's true profession,' suggested that women's role as educators, as knowers, was to be indirect, it was to represent influence, no actual power, and it was to be exerted through others and for others." (Munro 1998, 269).
CHICAGO, CIRCA 1880
When Elizabeth Harrison arrived in Chicago in the fall of 1879, she found a city rebounding from the Chicago Fire only eight years earlier. The fire had burned nearly 2000 acres of land, including most of the commercial areas. Eighteen thousand people, or six percent of its population, were left homeless and at least...