General description

In the 1930s and 1940s the transition of British children from infancy to school was the subject of intertwined power struggles involving men and women and progressive and traditional educators, the Board of Education, local education authorities and organisations such as the Nursery School Association to name but a few.  While the majority of children spent most of their pre-school years at home, children aged from two to six could be enrolled in purpose-built ‘nursery schools’ and educated according to Froebelian and Montessorian principles.  They also attended infant and elementary schools from the age of three to six: Some were subject to traditional instruction in a ‘babyroom’ and others experienced progressive education in a ‘nursery class’. While Lillian de Lissa, Principal of Gipsy Hill Training College (GHTC) for nursery and infant teachers and Chair of the Nursery School Association, had much to say about the various educational institutions that catered young children in the transition years, her former student, Dorothy Walker, experienced the tensions and challenges first-hand in her work as a teacher and then head teacher in the 1940s.

Focus

Using a feminist framework, the main objective of this paper is to explore some tensions pertaining to the transition of British children from infancy to school as played out in de Lissa and Walker’s careers in the 1930s and 1940s.  

The first section explores de Lissa’s work at GHTC and her advocacy for the nursery school movement. She was a key member of the NSA from its foundation in 1923 and Chair from 1929-1938. Besides presenting at its twice-yearly conferences, she participated in publicity campaigns, deputations to government inquiries and negotiations with other organisations. The NSA also published three of her speeches as pamphlets, thereby indicating the alignment of her progressive, child-centred ideals with the nursery school movement. De Lissa’s publications provide a comprehensive overview of transition issues.

After training at GHTC from 1928-1930, Walker spent her teaching career in Birmingham. The second section of the paper discusses Walker’s training under de Lissa’s leadership and then her early work as a teacher of young children in the transition years. During this period her new ideas and practices rubbed against the old traditions advocated by male head teachers, especially when she ‘tried to point out that the Infant technique is different from any other’.

Walker won the position as head teacher of St Peters Infant School in January 1940. The final part of the paper focuses on her work in war-time Birmingham until her marriage in September 1944. Walker dealt deftly with multiple challenges to her progressive approach from conservative male school inspectors, education authorities, the head teacher of St Peters Junior School and her colleagues. Furthermore, there are many synergies with de Lissa’s assessment of the issues facing progressive early childhood educators.

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