Visions of Childhood: Influential Models from Locke to Spock

Throughout history certain theories of childhood have influenced the way we have understood, cared for, and educated our young. These theories form the bases of our attitudes toward children, and underpin our popular childrearing pracitces. Yet they have passed through history fort eh most part unexamined. In Visions of Childhood, the authors unveil the central and often surprising notions that have shaped our conceptions of childhood in the Western world.

Bringing the skills of the historian and philosopher to bear, the authors examine those visions of the child that have become the most influential including the work of Locke, Rousseau, Freud, Piaget, Marx, and Dewey. In probing these ideas, the authors trace the development of a variety of identifiable models, including the environmentalist, the atomistic, and the deterministic.

Visions of Childhood is an ideal primary or supplementary text for courses in child development and psychology, early childhood education, philosophy of education, and other foundations courses. It will be a valuable resource to historians, philosophers, and inservice practitioners as well.

“It is provocative in its analysis of theories of education and it challenges readers to carefully examine their own assumptions about the child, child development and child­rearing.”
—Children Today