Page 16 - All About History - Issue 12-14

Education

Education across history

The work of
SOCRATES LAYS Archimedes is
still studied
DOWN A METHOD

GREECE 420 BCE
The creation of the Socratic method
by Athenian philosopher Socrates was
arguably one of the most important
developments in the field of education.
He created it in order to help tutor his
students on ethics, morals and the
sciences. The method involves the Archimedes masters maths
teacher asking the student a series of ITALY 200 BCE
questions about a subject. In answering One of the foremost inventors and educators of
the teacher’s questions with their own the 3rd century BCE was Archimedes of Syracuse,
answers and then those answers being a Greek polymath who gathered an international
analysed and debated, the student is reputation through his creation of objects such as the
Archimedes screw. While these mechanical devices
led naturally toward the conclusion of won him his reputation, in Syracuse he was better
the lesson. This method of teaching has known for his maths tuition and writings, with him
proved to be effective in helping people Socrates’ work is still highly influential publishing numerous works such as On The Sphere
memorise knowledge. to this day And The Cylinder and The Sand Reckoner.

Education timeline O The Platonic Academy is O Quintilian orates O Oxford blue
founded
Teaching at the
In a series of books
Plato establishes his own entitled The Institutes University of
O An oral tradition O Libraries get filled school, the Platonic Academy, in of Oratory, Roman Oxford begins,
The earliest forms of At around 2600 Athens. It is more rhetorician Marcus making it the
knowledge are passed BCE, dedicated of an exclusive Fabius Quintilianus oldest university
on orally from generation rooms inside academic club critiques the Roman in the English-
to generation, with Sumerian temples than a school, education system and speaking
information memorised are used to store with informal suggests how it can be world. It is still
in the form of songs and clay cuneiform gatherings improved, highlighting considered one of Oxford University is
stories within early tribal tablets en masse, instead of key books students the top universities world renowned
societies. 6000 BCE forming the first An early clay lessons. should read. 95 CE in the world. 1096 CE
libraries. 2600 BCE tablet 387 BCE Plato established
his own school
6000 BCE 3000 BCE 2000 BCE 1000 BCE 500 BCE 250 BCE 0 500 1000 1100 1200
O Symbolism develops O The alphabet is created O China establishes a school system O Education goes dark O Alcuin becomes
Hieroglyphics become The world’s oldest known During the Zhou Dynasty of ancient Thanks to a myriad of educator-in-chief
fully formed and alphabet, the proto- China (1046 to 256 BCE), five factors, including the fall of With centuries of religious
standardised in ancient sinaitic script, evolves national schools are established Rome and the dominance knowledge suppression,
Egypt. By 3400 from the hieroglyph in the capital city Pi Yong. of religious dogma, Emperor Charlemagne
BCE, fully developed system. Despite offering a These schools cater to the existing education systems calls upon Alcuin of York,
hieroglyphs are used Ancient Egyptian closer form of true writing aristocracy and teach the Six collapse, with learning a well-known English
to record knowledge hieroglyphics to hieroglyphic systems, it Arts (rites, music, archery, regressing everywhere scholar, to overhaul his
on stone and papyrus. does not catch on. charioteering, calligraphy and Archery was one of outside of religious kingdom’s poor education
3500 BCE 2000 BCE mathematics). 1046 BCE the Six Arts taught institutions. 500 CE system. 780 CE

A HIGHER DEGREE Gutenberg presses on
GERMANY 1450
OF LEARNING The invention of printing press by
Johannes Gutenberg in the mid-15th
ITALY 1200 century was absolutely critical in the
In the universities of medieval Europe, grand history of knowledge. Before,
educational faculties offered intermediate textbooks were handwritten and in
incredibly short supply, with only
bachelors degrees and final masters degrees. For aristocrats and religious scholars having
the final degrees the term ‘master of’ or ‘doctor access to them. After the press was
of’ were interchangeable right up until the Middle invented, books could be produced
Ages, where the higher faculties of theology, law cheaply en masse, so the average person
suddenly attained the potential access
and medicine received the doctor tag and the to a bank of knowledge their ancestors
basic faculty of arts the master tag. The current simply couldn’t have imagined. Since
A meeting of doctors of theology separation of masters and PhD degrees did not An early wooden printing press as pioneered then the textbook has been the dominant
form of educational literature worldwide.
at the University of Paris start to evolve until the 19th century. by Johannes Gutenberg

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