ABSTRACT
Harold Ordway Rugg was a professor of education at Teachers College, Columbia University, who developed an avant-garde social studies curriculum and textbook series in the 1920s and early 1930s. By the late 1930s and early 1940s, a great deal of controversy and criticism centered on social reconstructionism as loosely embodied in the Rugg “social science” program. Harold Rugg’s work and the textbook controversy he inspired are an important and especially relevant episode in curriculum history. Like many present-day reformers, Rugg wanted to create a curriculum that would lead to social transformation. Rugg created an avant-garde social studies program that was pedagogically advanced, instructive for those with an interest in teaching for social justice. He developed an approach to social studies instruction that integrated the social sciences and history in an issues-centered program focusing on understanding and social transformation. Rugg’s work was built on a thoughtful rationale that combined student interest with social worth, a powerful combination that has appeal.
