Konstantin Ushinsky

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Konstantin Ushinsky

Konstantin Dmitrievich Ushinsky (Russian: Константи́н Дми́триевич Уши́нский; Ukrainian: Костянти́н Дмитро́вич Уши́нський, romanized: Kostiantyn Dmytrovych Ushynskyi) (2 March [O.S. 19 February] 1823 – 3 January 1871 [O.S. 22 December]) was a Russian teacher and writer, credited as the founder of scientific pedagogy in the Russian Empire.[1][2][3][4]

Biography

Konstantin Ushinsky was born in

Moscow University.[2][6] From 1846 to 1849 he was a professor at the Demidov Lyceum in Yaroslavl but was forced to leave the position because of his liberal views.[3][6]

The unemployed Ushinsky earned money by literary work for the magazines Sovremennik and Biblioteka dlya Chteniya. After a year and a half he managed to get a position as a minor bureaucrat in the Department for Foreign Religions. Ushinsky referred to his job at the time as "the most boring position possible."[6]

In 1854 Ushinsky became a teacher of Russian Literature and Law at the Gatchina Orphanage (Gatchinsky Sirotsky Institut). In 1855-1859 he became the Inspector at the same institution.[2] There was a lucky incident during his inspectorship: he discovered two sealed-off bookcases untouched for more than twenty years, which held the library of Pestalozzi's pupil Hugel. This discovery strongly influenced Ushinsky's interest in theoretical pedagogy.[6]

In 1859-1862 Ushinsky was the Inspector of the Smolny Institute of Noble Maidens in Saint-Petersburg, In 1860-1862 he also worked as the Chief Editor of the Journal of the Department of Education (Zhurnal Ministerstva Narodnago Obrazovaniya).[3] Following a conflict with the Department of Education, Ushinsky was forced to go abroad to study school organizations in Switzerland, Germany, France, Belgium and Italy (1862-1867). The position was perceived by many as an honorary exile.[6]

At the end of his life Ushinsky mostly acted as a writer and publicist. Together with

universal education for both boys and girls.[4] Ushinsky was also an ardent promoter of the use of native language and integration of national traditions in schools, and opposed imperial prohibitions on Ukrainian in education.[4]

Ushinsky spent a lot of time and effort in debates over the most convenient ways to organize teachers' seminaries. He also wrote textbooks focused on teaching children how to read: Detski mir (Children's world), "the Russian equivalent of America's McGuffy Reader,"[7] and the primer Rodnoe slovo ([Our] native language, 1864), used in schools in Russian-ruled Ukraine[8][4] More than 10 million of Ushinsky's books, including 187 editions of Rodnoe slovo, were printed before the October Revolution.[6]

Ushinsky died in Odesa in 1870 and was buried in Kiev.[3]

Works

Ushinsky's magnum opus was his theoretical work The Human As a Subject of Education: Pedagogical Anthropology in three volumes, started in 1867.[6] In it he argued that the subject of education is a person, so it is impossible to achieve results in education without using the results of the "anthropological sciences": philosophy, political economy, history, literature, psychology, anatomy, physiology.[3] According to Ushinsky, "Pedagogical experience without science is equivalent to witchcraft in medicine."[6] Among his innovations was the new "Analytic-Synthetic Phonetic Method" for learning reading and writing, which is still the main method used in Russian schools.[3]

Memorials

Ushinsky on a 2023 stamp of Russia

Educational institutions named after Konstantin Ushinsky:

References

  1. ^ L.G. Guseva, "Konstantin Dmitrievich Ushinsky: The Founder of Scientific Pedagogy in the 19th Century Russia", History of Education & Children’s Literature, XIII, 1 (2018), pp. 479-491 (in English)
  2. ^ a b c Ushinsky article in Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary (in Russian)
  3. ^ a b c d e f Ushinsky article by Eduard Dneprov in Great Soviet Encyclopedia (in Russian)
  4. ^ a b c d "Ushinsky, Konstantin". Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine. 1993. Retrieved 2023-01-26.
  5. ^ Konstantin Ushinsky Archived 2007-09-29 at the Wayback Machine (in Russian).
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i The teacher of Russian teachers Archived 2007-01-27 at the Wayback Machine official site of Moscow University of Industry and Finance.
  7. ISBN 0-8101-1897-1
    ), p. 51.
  8. ^ Konstantin Ushinsky on peoples.ru encyclopedia (in Russian)

External links

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