INTRODUCTION
"Education should have two objects: first, to give definite knowledge, reading and writing, language
and mathematics, and so on; secondly, to create those mental habits which will enable people to
acquire knowledge and form sound judgments for themselves."
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) Skeptical Essays, 1928
Religious Origins of Didactic Instruction
For thousands of years, the main purpose of education was to provide religious instruction.
Until the 20th century, there had been little other reason for education among the masses. The
privileged elite received special instruction in most cultures or national groups, but the masses
were involved in the hard labor of agriculture, warfare, building pyramids e.g. serving as
slaves and doing the thousands of other menial jobs that needed doing within the community.
In order to fill their niche in society, these masses needed muscle not intellect.
Priests have been the teachers, instructing the common man how to worship the gods. Their
job has been to encourage the peasants to serve the political, military, commercial and
religious elite. E.g. someone needed to grow the food to feed the privileged. Motivated by
hunger, the masses willingly grew crops. It took religious education, however, to convince the
peasants to support the church and state by giving them food. It also took religious education
to convince young men to offer their lives in defense of the church and state. The purpose of
religious instruction has been to convey church teachings. This was primarily accomplished
through didactic teaching methods. The pupil “learned the words of the catechism by heart”.
It was a ritual of memorizing words and repeating them by rote. There was “little reason for
expression of real thoughts and feelings”.
Until the middle of the 20th century, much of American education followed the same pattern
as religious instruction. Much of early American education was born out of the desire to
perpetuate religious beliefs. The method of religious instruction used was, and still is the
model for (and essentially has evolved into) didactic teacher-directed instruction, whereby an