PDF hosted at the Radboud Repository of the Radboud University Nijmegen The following full text is a publisher's version. For additional information about this publication click this link. http://hdl.handle.net/2066/148760 Please be advised that this information was generated on 2018-07-07 and may be subject to change. CECIL KEDDIE AND ABBOTSHOLME J.H.G.I.GIESBERS CECIL REDDIE AND ABBOTSHOLME A Forgotten Pioneer and his Creation Promotor: PROF. DR. S. STRASSER CECIL REDDIE AND ABBOTSHOLME A FORGOTTEN PIONEER AND HIS CREATION PROEFSCHRIFT TER VERKRIJGING VAN DE GRAAD VAN DOCTOR IN DE SOCIALE WETENSCHAPPEN AAN DE KATHOLIEKE UNIVERSITEIT TE NUMEGEN, OP GEZAG VAN DE RECTOR MAGNIFICUS DR. CH. M. A. KUYPER, HOOGLERAAR IN DE FACULTEIT DER WISKUNDE EN NATUURWETENSCHAPPEN VOLGENS BESLUIT VAN DE SENAAT IN HET OPENBAAR TE VERDEDIGEN OP DONDERDAG 21 MEI 1970, DES NAMIDDAGS TE 4 UUR. DOOR JOHANNES HENDRIKUS GERARDUS IGNATIUS GIESBERS GEBOREN TE NUMEGEN Druk: Centrale Drukkerij N.V., Nijmegen. TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction 9 Chapter I: Life and Personality. Section 1: The Age 12 Section 2: Family Background and Childhood: 1858-1872. 20 Section 3: Public School Pupil: 1872-1878 .... 22 Section 4: University Student in Scotland and Germany: 1878-1885 24 Section 5: Schoolmaster: 1885-1889 26 Section 6: Headmaster of Abbotsholme: 1889-1927 . 29 Section 7: A Prophet's Evening of Life: 1927-1932 . 44 Section 8: Cecil Reddie: A Bundle of Contradictions . 46 Chapter II: Influences. Section 9: John Ruskin 56 Section 10: Thomas Carlyle 59 Section 11 : Edward Carpenter and The Fellowship of the New Life 61 Section 12: Edward Maitland and Theosophy .... 65 Section 13: Johann Friedrich Herbart and Wilhelm Rein. 69 Section 14: Public Schools 74 Section 15: Reddie, England, Germany: a three-cornered affair 81 Chapter III: Central Themes in Reddie's Educational Thinking. Section 16: A New School; 1889 85 Section 17: The Revised Prospectus; 1894 88 Section 18: Answers to the Royal Committee on Secondary Education; 1894 90 Section 19: A Short Sketch; 1898 92 Section 20: An Educational Atlas; 1900 94 Section 21: Abbotsholme; 1900 97 Section 22: John Bull and two other papers on Education; 1901 99 Section 23: Is Abbotsholme an Experiment?; 1902 . 104 Section 24: How should we educate our Directing Classes?; 1909 104 Section 25: From the Abbotsholme Liturgy; 1910 ... 107 Section26: Prospectus; 1910 Ill Section 27: The Public Schools and the Empire; 1914 . 112 Chapter IV: Practice. Section 28: Pupils 115 Section 29: Masters 117 Section 30: Time-Table 118 Section 31: Discipline 119 Section 32: Curriculum and Methods 121 Section 33: Sexual Education 123 Section 34: Health and Hygiene 126 Section 35: Co-education 127 Section 36: Religious and Moral Education . 129 Section 37: Sport and Handicraft 137 Section 38: Contemporary Opinions 138 Chapter V: Abbotsholme and Educational Innovation. Section 39: Reddie - The New Education - The New School. 142 Section 40: What the New Education means at Abbotsholme . 147 Section 41: Colonisation 148 Chapter VI: Summing Up. Section 42: Abbotsholme: School for the Directing Classes . 156 Section 43: Abbotsholme: New School 157 Section 44: Abbotsholme: Rural Educative Home . 160 Section 45: Abbotsholme: Pedagogic Laboratory . 162 Section 46: Critical Remarks 163 Section 47: Conclusion 167 Summary 169 Bibliography . 172 Index of names . 180 Aan mijn ouders. Aan mijn vrouw en kinderen. INTRODUCTION The New School Abbotsholme, Derbyshire, A Modem Public School, on approved and original lines, for boys of the Directing Classes. Headmaster: Cecil Reddie, Fettes College; B. Sc. Edinburgh 1882; Ph. D. (magna cum laude) Göttingen 1884; Fettes Exhibitioner 1878; Hope Prize Scholar Edin­ burgh 1880; Lecturer on Chemistry at Fettes College 1885-1887; Assistant Master at Clifton College 1887-1888; Lecturer on the Scottish University Extension 1888; Headmaster of Abbotsholme since 1889. This description of school and headmaster can be found on the title-page of the 1910 School prospectus. Immediately a number of questions arise. What sort of school was a New School; how far was it modem; what were its educa­ tional principles and were they really original; what school population is meant by boys of the Directing Classes; and above all, who was this Cecil Reddie, who introduced himself so elaborately to the reader? This last question is partially answered in a recent work on unorthodoxy in education when the writer says: "If any one man should be named as the origi­ nator of the twentieth-century innovation in English education it is Cecil Red- die, the founder of Abbotsholme, but... he has seldom been given this recogni­ tion in England." * Nor abroad, one is inclined to add. That is the raison d'être of this study, the thesis of which is that Dr. Reddie was an educational pioneer who, by founding Abbotsholme, became the father of the international New School Movement. Starting from a position of protest against Victorian Public Schools, he became the progenitor of what is often termed Progressive Education. His aim was "to help, in a humble comer, the creation of a nobler Englishman, to organise a nobler Engjish-speaking Empire, to aid the Ascent of Man."2 As Dr. Reddie saw it, the only way to realise this grand ideal was by creating a New School, where a New Man would be educated. A radical reformation in education would bring about a renaissance of nation, empire, even mankind. This biting critic of Britain and Things British, - this indefatigable fighter against the very powerful social and educational influence of that unique insti­ tution, the Public School, - this proud creator of an innovating school, Abbots­ holme, - this headstrong franc-tireur in the green pastures of education, has 1 STEWART, W.: The Educational Innovators, II, London 1968, p. 243. 2 REDDIE, C: Abbotsholme, London 1900, p. X. Referred to hereafter as: Abbotsholme. 9 been very much neglected. He is truly a forgotten pioneer and the principal reason for this was Cecil Reddie himself. From the biographical first chapter he will emerge as a single-minded mon­ arch who ruled over his microcosm Abbotsholme with an iron hand; a doctri­ naire, undemocratic, proud despot who wanted to direct everything, dominate everybody; an autocratic egotist who had too great a faith in centralisation. When he left the school in 1927, Abbotsholme had no more than two pupils and ruin stared the school in the face. A failure? Yes. A second-rate figure? By no means. Cecil Reddie has largely fallen into oblivion because his is the proverbial case of the wrong man with the right ideas. His rigid character, his lack of tact and diplomacy, his imperious cast of mind prevented him from becoming a well-loved educational preacher. His way of expressing ideas provoked negative reactions. Too many people who struck up a superficial and occasional acquaintance with him dismissed him as an unsympathetic figure, an inconsistent teacher-innovator who did not practise what he preached, a dangerous unpatriotic crank who was not worth listening to. In this way the good was rejected with the bad. Apart from the fact that one should not make Reddie out worse than he is, and in Chapter I it will be seen that the medal of his personality had another much more attractive side, one should be careful not to identify the man and his ideas. Reddie's ideas should not be embalmed because of their originator's personality; they still have cur­ rent use and value. His views on religion and moral education, sexual instruc­ tion, co-operation instead of competition, understanding instead of cramming, the doubtful value of book-learning, curricular reform, the Public School fetish of games, and the importance of manual work - to mention only some of the educational ideas which will be discussed in this study - these views are still relevant to anyone who thinks about education and instruction. Many people consider what is past dead and obsolescent, something that was useful at the time but that should be relegated to dusty archives and the atten­ tion of unpractical, unworldly hisorians. Such a caricature should be rejected, not out of mere reverence for the past, not out of uncritical and blind admira­ tion for Reddie and what he stood for, but because he can contribute important elements to modem educational discourse. Because his ideas and ideals are still part of our educational discussions they are meaningful material. This convic­ tion of unpractical, unworldly historians. Such a caricature should be rejected, holme, the outcome of which is this study. An attempt to inflate an unsuccessful, provincial, cranky English pedagogue not worth reconsidering? No. A serious effort to let Reddie appear before the footlights? Yes, because it is deserved by a man whom Ferrière called "Grand fondateur des Ecoles Nouvelles."3 Coming from the founder of the Interna­ tional Bureau of New Schools, this tribute may indicate at the outset Reddie's 3 FERRIÈRE, Α.: Projet d'Education Nouvelle, Saint-Blaise 1909, (presentation inscription). 10 place in the New School Movement, a place which will be further justified in Chapters IV and V. As far as possible Reddie will be allowed to speak for himself. At first sight this may seem open to criticism. To put it bluntly, how far can one trust a man when he puts pen to paper? Too many writers of memoirs, politicians and journalists argue thus: If my views are to be published they had better be the sort of things the public likes to hear. The result of this attitude was well de­ scribed in an article in the T.L.S.: "Frankness gives way to performance, posi- üveness to qualification. The effect on the wider audience is more important than the objective disposal of business."4 In Chapter III of this study a number of Reddie's publications will provide a theoretical foundation for his practical work.