Editing Amos Bronson Alcott (section)

===Experimental educator===
On September 22, 1834, Alcott opened a school of about 30 students, mostly from wealthy families.<ref name=Packer55>{{Harvnb|Packer|2007|p=55}}</ref> It was named the [[Temple School, Boston (1830s)|Temple School]] because classes were held at the [[Masonic Temple]] on Tremont Street in Boston.<ref name=Dahlstrand110>{{Harvnb|Dahlstrand|1982|p=110}}</ref> His assistant was [[Elizabeth Palmer Peabody]], later replaced by [[Margaret Fuller]]. [[Mary Peabody Mann]] served as a French instructor for a time.<ref name=Gura88>{{Harvnb|Gura|2007|p=88}}</ref> The school was briefly famous, and then infamous, because of Alcott's method of "discarding text-books and teaching by conversation", his questioning attitude toward the Bible, and his reception of "a colored girl" into his classes.<ref name="BDA1906">{{harvnb|Johnson|1906|p=68|ignore-err=yes}}</ref>

Before 1830, [[Primary school|primary]] and [[Secondary education|secondary]] teaching of writing consisted of rote drills in grammar, spelling, vocabulary, penmanship and transcription of adult texts. In that decade, however, progressive reformers such as Alcott, influenced by Pestalozzi, [[Friedrich Fröbel]], and [[Johann Friedrich Herbart]], began to advocate compositions based on students' own experiences. These reformers opposed beginning instruction with rules and preferred to have students learn to write by expressing their personal understanding of the events of their lives.

Alcott sought to develop instruction on the basis of self-analysis, with an emphasis on conversation and questioning rather than lecturing and drill. A similar interest in instructive conversation was shared by Abby May who, describing her idea of a family "post office" set up to curb potential domestic tension, said "I thought it would afford a daily opportunity for the children, indeed all of us, to interchange thought and sentiment".<ref>{{Harvnb|Francis|2010|p=122}}</ref>

Alongside writing and reading, Alcott gave lessons in "spiritual culture", which included interpretation of the [[Gospel]]s, and advocated ''object teaching'' in writing instruction.<ref>{{Cite book|title = American Journal of Education|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=hgkCAAAAYAAJ|publisher = Wait, Green, and Company|date = January 1, 1828|language = en|first1 = William|last1 = Russell|first2 = William Channing|last2 = Woodbridge|first3 = Amos Bronson|last3 = Alcott}}</ref> He even went so far as to decorate his schoolroom with visual elements he thought would inspire learning: paintings, books, comfortable furniture, and busts or portraits of [[Plato]], [[Socrates]], [[Jesus]], and William Ellery Channing.<ref name="Dahlstrand110" />

During this time, the Alcotts had another child. Born on June 24, 1835, she was named [[Elizabeth Sewall Alcott|Elizabeth Peabody Alcott]] in honor of the teaching assistant at the Temple School.<ref>{{Harvnb|Matteson|2007|pp=66–67}}</ref> By age three, however, her mother changed her name to Elizabeth ''Sewall'' Alcott, after her own mother,<ref>{{Harvnb|Reisen|2009|p=33}}</ref> perhaps because of the recent rupture between Bronson Alcott and Elizabeth Palmer Peabody.<ref>{{cite book|last= LaPlante|first = Eve|date=2012 |title= Marmee & Louisa|location= New York|publisher= Simon & Schuster|pages= 80–81|isbn= 978-1-4516-2066-5}}</ref>

[[File:Record of a School.JPG|thumb|''Record of a School'', a chronicle of Alcott's Temple School, was published in 1835.]]
In July 1835, Peabody published her account as an assistant to the Temple School as ''Record of a School: Exemplifying the General Principles of Spiritual Culture''.<ref name=Gura88/> While working on a second book, Alcott and Peabody had a falling out and ''Conversations with Children on the Gospels'' was prepared with help from Peabody's sister [[Sophia Peabody|Sophia]],<ref>{{Harvnb|Schreiner|2006|pp=49–50}}</ref> published at the end of December 1836.<ref name=Packer55/> Alcott's methods were not well received; many found his conversations on the Gospels close to blasphemous. For example, he asked students to question if Biblical miracles were literal and suggested that all people are part of God.<ref>{{Harvnb|Packer|2007|p=59}}</ref> In the ''[[Boston Daily Advertiser]]'', [[Nathan Hale (journalist)|Nathan Hale]] criticized Alcott's "flippant and off hand conversation" about serious topics from the [[Virgin birth of Jesus]] to [[circumcision]].<ref name=Gura89>{{Harvnb|Gura|2007|p=89}}</ref> [[Joseph T. Buckingham]] called Alcott "either insane or half-witted" and "an ignorant and presuming [[charlatan]]".<ref>{{Harvnb|Bedell|1980|pp=130–131}}</ref> The book did not sell well; a Boston lawyer bought 750 copies to use as waste paper.<ref>{{Harvnb|Baker|1996|p=184}}</ref>

The Temple School was widely denounced in the press. Reverend [[James Freeman Clarke]] was one of Alcott's few supporters and defended him against the harsh response from Boston periodicals.<ref>{{Harvnb|Packer|2007|p=97}}</ref> Alcott was rejected by most public opinion and, by the summer of 1837, he had only 11 students left and no assistant after Margaret Fuller moved to [[Providence, Rhode Island]].<ref>{{Harvnb|Dahlstrand|1982|p=143}}</ref> The controversy had caused many parents to remove their children and, as the school closed, Alcott became increasingly financially desperate.<ref name="BDA1906" /> Remaining steadfast to his pedagogy, a forerunner of [[progressive education|progressive]] and [[democratic school]]ing, he alienated parents in a later "parlor school" by admitting an [[African American]] child to the class, whom he then refused to expel in the face of protests.