49 pages • 1 hour read
AviThe Secret School
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2001A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Background
Historical Context: One-Room Schoolhouse
One-room schoolhouses have been a part of America since the nation began. Nearly 200,000 were in use at the time of The Secret School; today, only 400 remain. (Ellis, Neenah. “One-Room Schools Holding on in Rural America.” NPR, 22 December 2005).
One-room education was widespread in remote, rural farming areas, where small and widely dispersed populations often didn’t have enough students for a multi-room school. In a single classroom, first through eighth graders sat together, receiving instruction from the same teacher.
During the 1800s and early 1900s in the US, eight years of schooling were considered enough for most children of farming families. High school was a luxury that farmers could dispense with: Their work didn’t require a lot of math, and reading was more of a hobby than a necessity.
Usually constructed from local materials, schoolhouses often were of a simple square shape, and the buildings sometimes served double duty as meeting places and churches. Sometimes the teacher also lived in the building. Separate privies for boys and girls were located outside. The children helped tote water and firewood and did other chores, and the teacher might cook a noontime meal on a stove that also heated the room.
Students used books called primers and readers. A reader teaches the basics of math, geography, or history; a primer is a book that teaches young children how to read. McGuffey Readers, primers popular in the US from the mid-1800s through 1960, appeared in six volumes, though most classrooms only possessed the first two. The books’ reading examples, taken from the works of famous authors and speakers, were also meant to teach public speaking, ethics, and personal values. The students in The Secret School make heavy use of their McGuffey’s.
Historical Context: Teaching as a Woman’s Profession
Until the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s, teaching was a career mainly limited to men, who taught boys the knowledge they’d need to manage business and trades. Girls, meanwhile, were taught household skills. As men began to take work in factories, a teacher shortage arose, and some civic leaders campaigned for women as replacements.
Luminaries such as Catharine Beecher—related to the Beecher family that included Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of the abolitionist novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin and sister of famous clergyman Henry Ward Beecher—argued that women are especially suited for teaching because they’re more compassionate and patient than men. Beecher also stressed that teaching gives women independence, pride of profession, and, as an “extension of mothering,” an alternative to raising a family. (LeQuire, Shelby. “The history of women as teachers.” The Western Journalist, 4 May 2016.)
From the mid-1800s onward in the US and Europe, teaching was a preferred career for women, who have dominated the field ever since. As of 2014, two-thirds of primary and secondary teachers in the US are women (LeQuire).
The protagonist of The Secret School, Ida, yearns to move past eighth grade, finish high school, and advance toward a career as a teacher. She finds herself in the vexing position of trying to keep the local schoolhouse open in a community with mixed feelings about it.
(For more information on one-room schooling, see the section “Further Reading & Resources” in this study guide.)
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