War Pedagogy in the German Primary School Classroom During the First World War

Abstract

This article considers how German children were shaped by war pedagogy during the first few years of the First World War, such that they came to passionately embrace the nation and the war cause. Before the war, teachers and educational administrators did not promote the instruction of militant nationalism, but focused upon cultivating the hard-working and dutiful citize­n; furthermore, the methods of teaching were traditional and thus emphasized rote learning and the authority of the instructor. Once the war began, however, this practice changed — particularly in the cities. Educational methods were brought into line with the demands of reformers who urged child- centred learning, and the subjects of study now included the war itself. Boys and girls studied war maps, went on excursions, discussed newspaper accounts of battles, celebrated heroes like Hindenburg, and participated in volunteer activities to help the war. Even the physical environment of the classroom changed, from an empty drabness to rooms festooned with maps, photographs of airplanes, zeppelins, submarines, and drawings of battle.

Keywords:

• children
• Imperial Germany
• war pedagogy
• history of education
• First World War

Notes

1 This article was made possible by the generous support of the Social Sciences and Research Council of Canada. For information on how the German classroom changed during the war, see the masterful recent study by Andrew Donson, Youth in the Fatherless Land: War Pedagogy, Nationalism, and Authority in Germany, 1914–1918 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010), p. 62.

2 Donson, p. 62.

3 Eberhard Demm, ‘Deutschlands Kinder im Ersten Weltkrieg: Zwischen Propaganda und Sozialfürsorge’, in Militärgeschichtliche Zeitschrift, 60 (2001) Heft 1, 55.

4 Arbeitsgruppe ‘Lehrer und Krieg’, eds, Lehrer helfen siegen. Kriegspädagogik im Kaiserreich mit Beiträgen zur NS Kriegspädagogik (Berlin, 1987), p. 8; Donson, p. 12.

5 See Peter Fritzsche, Germans into Nazis (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1998).

6 Christine Holzkamp, ‘Lehrerinnen im Ersten Weltkrieg: Frauen helfen siegen — warum?’, Lehrer helfen siegen, pp. 31–34.

7 Robert Whalen, Bitter Wounds: German Victims of the Great War, 1914–1939 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1984), pp. 77–78.

8 Whalen, pp. 79–80.

9 Donson, pp. 45–52.

10 See, for example, Max Lobsien, Unsere Zwölfjährigen und der Krieg (Leipzig: 1916); Theodor Schiebuhr, Kriegspädagogik (Langensalza, 1916).

11 Adolf Matthias, Wie erziehen wir unseren Sohn Benjamin (Munich, 1896; rpt 1911). See also Carolyn Kay, ‘How Should We Raise Our Son Benjamin? Advice Literature for Mothers in Early Twentieth-Century Germany’, in Dirk Schumann, ed., Raising Citizens in ‘The Century of the Child’, The United States and German Central Europe in Comparative Perspective (New York: Berghahn, 2010), pp. 105–21.

12 Adolf Matthias, Krieg und Schule (Leipzig, 1915), p. 13.

13 Matthias, Krieg und Schule, p. 5.

14 The German idea that the war was being fought for Kultur or civilization is explored in Modris Eksteins’ seminal work The Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Birth of the Modern Age (Boston: Lester & Orpen Dennys, 1989).

15 Matthias, Krieg und Schule, p. 13.

16 Matthias, Krieg und Schule, p. 19.

17 Ellen Key, The Century of the Child (New York, 1909).

18 Matthias, Krieg und Schule, p. 23.

19 Matthias, Krieg und Schule, p. 23.

20 Andrea Meissner, Die Nationalisierung der Volksschule. Geschichtspolitik im Niederen Schulwesen Preußens und des deutschsprachigen Österreich 1866 bis 1933/38 (Berlin: Dunker & Humblott, 2009), p. 141.

21 Donson, pp. 60–61.

22 Demm, p. 53; Rainer Bendick, Kriegserwartung und Kriegserfahrung. Der Erste Weltkrieg in deutschen und französischen Schulgeschichtsbüchern (Pfaffenweiler, 1999), p. 168. Bendick argues that new teaching plans were developed in some schools, to focus upon the war as a significant break in Germany’s history.

23 Meissner, pp. 132–33.

24 Meissner, p. 133. See also N. Haller, Kleines Geschichtsbüchlein über den Weltkrieg 1914/16 nebst Kriegserzählungen für die Mittelstufe der Volksschule (Trier, 1916), pp. 1–2.

25 Zentralinstitut für Erziehung und Unterricht, Schule und Krieg: Sonderausstellung (Berlin, 1915). The exhibition began on 21 March 1915.

26 See, for example, ‘Die Kriegsführung der Kinder: Zur Austellung Schule und Krieg’, Berliner Tagesblatt, 14 August 1915.

27 Zentralinstitut, Schule und Krieg, pp. 5–6.

28 Zentralinstitut, Schule und Krieg, pp. 5–6.

29 Zentralinstitut, Schule und Krieg, p. 26.

30 Zentralinstitut, Schule und Krieg, p. 27.

31 Zentralinstitut, Schule und Krieg, p. 27.

32 Zentralinstitut, Schule und Krieg, pp. 13–38.

33 William Stern, ed., Jugendliches Seelenleben und Krieg (Leipzig, 1915), p. iii. This publication was a special edition for William Stern and Otto Lipmann, eds, Die Zeitschrift für angewandte Psychologie und psychologische Sammelforschung.

34 Christine Holzkamp, ‘Der blinde Fleck: Psychologische Forschung im Ersten Weltkrieg’, in Lehrer Helfen Siegen, p. 92.

35 Alfred Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze von Kindern und Jugendlichen über Kriegsthema’, in Stern, Jugendliches Seelenleben, p. 119.

36 Holzkamp, p. 92. For a contemporary analysis of the positive feelings often associated with war, see Chris Hedges, War is a Force that Gives us Meaning (New York: Public Affairs, 2002).

37 Holzkamp, p. 93.

38 Quoted in Alfred Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze von Kindern und Jugendlichen über Kriegsthema’, pp. 88 and 89.

39 Quoted in Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze’, p. 91.

40 Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze’, p. 90.

41 A selection of wartime literature for boys includes W. Planck, Haltet aus im Sturmgebraus. Bilder aus dem groβen Kriege 1914–15 (Nürnberg, 1915); Wilhelm Kotzde, Die Musik kommt! Bilder aus dem Soldatenleben (Mainz, 1916); Patriotisches Bilderbuch (Wien, 1914); Gustav Schlipköter, ed., Fürs teure Vaterland. Ein Kriegslesebuch für die deutsche Jugend (Elberfeld, 1915); Wilhelm Müller-Rüdersdorf, Deutschland über alles! 1914–15 Kriegslesebuch für Schule und Haus (München, 1915); Heinrich Werdenfels, Unsere Feldgrauen in Feindesland (Berlin, 1915); Georg Dennler, Mein Vaterland. Aus Sturm und Drang ein Hochgesang (Jena, 1915); and Viel Feind, viel Ehr! 1914–1916 (Duisburg,1916).

42 Donson, p. 83.

43 Quoted in Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze’, p. 92.

44 On the popularity of Hindenburg, see Anna von der Goltz, The Hindenburg Myth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).

45 Quoted in Hans Floerke, ed., Die Kinder und der Krieg: Aussprüche, Taten, Opfer und Bilder (München: 1915).

46 Quoted in Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze’, p. 80.

47 Quoted in Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze’, p. 81.

48 Quoted in Mann, ‘Freie Aufsätze’, p. 87.

49 Fr. Lembke and H. Sohnrey, eds, Fürs Vaterland: Kriegslesebuch für deutsche Schulen (Berlin, 1916), p. 255.

50 Lembke, pp. 10–11.

51 Theodor Schiebuhr, Kriegspädagogik (Langensalza, 1916), p. 4.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Carolyn Kay

Carolyn Kay is a History Professor at Trent University in Ontario, Canada. She received her PhD from Yale University (under the direction of Peter Gay) in 1994, her MPhil from Oxford University in 1983, and her BA from the University of Toronto in 1980. Her publications include the book Art and the German Bourgeoisie (University of Toronto Press, 2002), and ‘German War Literature for Children, 1914–1918’, in Children and War, ed. Helga Embacher et al., (Helion & Company Ltd, 2013), 137–151). She is currently at work on a project on the impact of World War I upon German children.

Correspondence to: Carolyn Kay. Email: [email protected]