education under Lenin

Question 1

education was seen as crucial in building a socialist society. What did Lenin set up? what did this provide?

Answer 1

The commissariat of the Enlightenment
this provided free education at all levels in coeducational schools

Question 2

what old system was abolished and what was it replaced with?

Answer 2

the old secondary gimnazii were abolished
replaced by new secondary schools which combined general education and vocational training = at both primary and secondary level traditional learning was combined with physical work

Question 3

during the 1920s, most schools abolished?
Why?

Answer 3

abolished textbooks and examinations
largely because there were insufficient textbooks written within a communist framework

Question 4

what was permitted and what was banned?

Answer 4

• a fair amount of freedom, creativity and individualism was permitted
• physical punishment was banned

Question 5

Each child was to receive ?

Answer 5

9 years of free, universal education

Question 6

Lenin did not believe that education should be ?

Answer 6

‘politically neutral’ , aim to combine education and political propaganda

Question 7

the 1919 party programme defined schools as ?

Answer 7

‘an instrument for the communist transformation of society’
even learning alphabets could carry a political message: e.g
A= all power to the soviets
B=bolsheviks
simple rhymes spelt out the achievements of soviet power

Question 8

pupils were to be cleansed of ?

Answer 8

‘bourgeois’ ideas

Question 9

schools were placed under?

Answer 9

The commissariat for Enlightenment, head of the commissariat was Lunacharsky

Question 10

Lunacharsky was interested in?

Answer 10

progressive Western teaching ideas e.g the importance of work and play

Question 11

between 1919-1920 schools were encouraged to do what under Lunacharsky?

Answer 11

encouraged to follow a more liberal line focusing on the development of the child’s personality

Question 12

The authority of teachers were?

Answer 12

authority of teachers= reduced
they were designed as ‘school worker’ who shared administrative control with committees drawn from older pupils and factory workers

Question 13

Teachers were forbidden to?

Answer 13

discipline pupils
set homework and examinations

Question 14

on the whole the new school system?

Answer 14

failed

Question 15

the vast majority of teachers were not communist.
How many in primary schools were communist?

Answer 15

3.1% in primary schools

Question 16

the vast majority of teachers were not communist.
How many in secondary schools were communist?

Answer 16

5.5 %

Question 17

teachers in primary and secondary schools had a poor understanding of?
This meant teaching?

Answer 17

progressive methods and did not know what to expect of them
this meant teaching went on as much as it had done before the revolution , only worse because teacher had lost their authority

Question 18

As a result of the failures of the more liberal approach what happened? What was introduced in 1921?

Answer 18

the more liberal approach was abandoned and more traditional methods restored with the introduction of the NEP in 1921

Question 19

Under the NEP, financial pressures meant that?

Answer 19

the idea of universal schooling had to be abandoned , many children left school

Question 20

by 1923 the numbers of schools and pupils were?

Answer 20

barely half the totals of two years earlier

Question 21

schools did not have?

Answer 21

proper resources and the teachers were very badly paid
1925= teachers received a fraction of an industrial worker’s pay
-lasting legacy of failing standards and failure of authority in many schools