Substantive education appeared at the end of 18 and the beginning of 19. The main representatives were German educator Herbart and British educator Spencer. According to the theory of substantive education, the main task of teaching is to teach students lifelong useful knowledge, and students' intelligence does not need special training and cultivation. Substantive education is based on associative psychology.

On the basis of positivism, British educator Spencer put forward the comparative value of knowledge in 1950s. He insisted on practical education, while attacking classicism and scholasticism in British education at that time, thinking that the development of general intelligence was secondary and emphasizing the practicality of courses and textbooks.

He linked his educational thoughts with the needs of bourgeois industrial development more directly than Herbart School. /kloc-for a long time after the mid-9th century, substantive education had a great influence on the teaching practice of primary and secondary schools in Europe and America.

Both substantive education theory and formal education theory belong to the early bourgeois teaching theory. In the process of historical development, both of them have studied and demonstrated some aspects of teaching content. However, there is one-sidedness in both knowledge transmission and ability training (see the theory of formal education).