One-Room School
Grade 3-7-A pictorial history of the one-room schoolhouse in the United States. Bial briefly discusses the emergence of public education in Massachusetts in 1647, and notes that the demands of rural life had an impact on the form of education on the frontier and led to the development of this type of facility throughout the country. The readable text describes a typical school day, the responsibilities of teachers, and some of the materials and textbooks available in the 1800s and early 1900s. Through a blend of historical black-and-white photographs and the author's own full-color shots, Bial shows the types of structures that served as schools. Although there is a certain sameness to the more recent pictures, they remind readers of just how ubiquitous these facilities once were. Most interesting are the glimpses provided of the inside of these buildings and the supplies that were used. The narrative is fairly straightforward, but the author has an undeniable fondness for this bygone bit of Americana. Pair this with Rosmarie Hausherr's One-Room School at Squabble Hollow (Four Winds, 1988; o.p.), which portrays a day in the life of a present-day school for a slightly younger audience.Linda Greengrass, Bank Street College Library, New York CityCopyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.