Stones, E. 1922–2005

(Edgar Stones)

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born October 19, 1922, in Rotherham, Yorkshire, England; died September 27, 2005, in Birmingham, England. Psychologist, educator, and author. Stones was a leader in the field of educational psychology, or psychopedagogy. The son of poor parents, he pursued his education by entering the Royal Air Force in 1937, hoping to study engineering. Upon leaving the military in 1948, he attended the University of Sheffield through a contract with the Ministry of Education—the Ministry paid for his tuition in exchange for his agreeing to teach at state schools for five years. After completing a B.A. in 1951 and a Dip.Ed. the next year, he worked as a teacher while completing a master's degree in history at Sheffield. This was followed by a diploma in educational psychology in 1958 from the University of Manchester. Stones entered this particular discipline of psychology after becoming skeptical about the way intelligence quotas (I.Q.'s) were tested and measured by the education system. He believed that a person's I.Q. is not a definitive, unchanging measurement; intelligence can be profoundly altered by the quality of one's education over time, and thus he came to believe that teaching methods and the education of teachers is vitally important. While lecturing at the University of Birmingham from 1964 to 1972, Stones began publishing books that are now regarded as seminal in the field, including Introduction to Educational Psychology (1966) and Learning and Teaching: A Programmed Introduction (1968). Stones began teaching at the University of Liverpool in 1972, and he was later named professor of education and director of the Institute of Education. He also founded the Journal of Education for Teaching in 1973 and the British Education Research Association in 1975. The journal and organization became leading outlets for scholarly discussion on psychopedagogy. Stones was also a prominent voice in criticizing government policies concerning the education of teachers in Great Britain. After retiring from teaching in 1982, he became director of the Colleges of Education Research Group, which influenced the curricula at colleges of education across Great Britain. Beginning in 1984, Stones was also honorary senior fellow at the Institute of Advanced Research in the Humanities at the University of Birmingham. Honored in 1998 with an award for distinguished contribution for the teaching of psychology by the British Psychological Society, Stones authored other books, including Psychopedagogy: Psychological Theory and the Practice of Teaching (1979) and Quality Teaching: A Sample of Classes (1991).

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PERIODICALS

Independent (London, England), October 18, 2005.