Caroline Bishop

Caroline Garrison Bishop (18 October 1846 – 12 December 1929) was an English advocate for kindergartens. She co-ordinated the introduction of these ideas in London and later opened a college in Birmingham.

Life Bishop was born in Heavitree in 1846 to the Unitarian Reverend Francis Bishop and his first wife Lavinia (born Solly).

Her aunt was Charlotte Manning and her maternal grandfather was Isaac Solly. She was given the care of her stepbrother and stepsister after her mother died and her father remarried. Kindergarten-based education became of great interest and in 1873 Bishop was employed at £100 per year to establish a twelve-week course in Kindergarten "exercises". Bishop introduced her cousin Adelaide Manning to the Froebel Society and Adelaide later became the society's treasurer and honorary secretary. Bishop went to Berlin in 1881 Bishop was trained at the Pestalozzi-Fröbel house. The house had been started by Henriette Schrader-Breymann, who emphasized "learning by doing", the kindergarten value of play, using nature as a theme and normal domestic tasks. The appointment was temporary, as Bishop was just providing holiday cover. It was formed on the initiative of Julia Lloyd, of the Quaker ironmaster family. Lloyd had studied in Germany at the Pestalozzi-Froebel Haus and then returned to work with Caroline Bishop. The children grew their own vegetables, visited farms, and used their own hands to complete the whole process that turned their fleece from their pet lamb into knitted garments for their dollhouses. After World War I, the kindergarten was renamed a nursery school.

Legacy The Selly Oak Nursery School, which dates from the nursery school opened by Lloyd, Cadbury, and Bishop in 1904, is still in operation.