Rise, fall, and resurrection of educational technologies: the curious case of Decroly in Spain

ABSTRACT

This article, delivered as one of two keynote lectures at the International Standing Conference for the History of Education (ISCHE) in Milan in September 2022, offers an example of an autosociobiographical approach to the history of education, in which the life story of the author is entangled with the collective movement of a generation of pedagogues, to capture “the lived dimension of History”, quoting the winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, Annie Ernaux. It describes the journey of the “centres of interest”, a pedagogical technology closely linked to the Belgian educational reformer and scientist Ovide Decroly, which evoked positive and negative emotions among the Spanish pedagogical explorers who visited Decroly Schools in the first decades of the twentieth century. This technology found its way into material school culture in Spain, grew into a veritable mania, but died an early death after the Spanish Civil War. It returned in a new guise, the “globalised didactic units”, thanks to textbooks written by the first post-war generations of pedagogues, who rediscovered Decroly’s ideas, and developed an emotional bond with these textbooks, and ‒ without knowing it ‒ also with their pre-war predecessors.

KEYWORDS:

• Decroly
• educational technology
• centres of interest
• globalised didactic units
• autosociobiographical approach

SUBJECT CLASSIFICATION CODES:

• Education
• history

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ The author borrowed the phrase “curious case” from the 2008 film “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, based on a short story by Scott Fitzgerald. Benjamin Button was born looking like an elderly man and died at the age of 84 but physically looking like a child. I find a parallelism with the evolution of the Decroly techniques in Spain, which were rejected in their origins because they evoked images of nineteenth-century classrooms in the first Spanish travellers to Brussels and presented 60 years later as the latest and most revolutionary educational reform.

² María del Mar del Pozo Andrés, “Channels by which the International Pedagogic Movement of the New School Spread Throughout Spain (1889–1936)”, in Conference Papers for the 9^th Session of the International Standing Conference for the History of Education, History of International Relations in Education, Volume 2, ed. Sandor Komlósi (Pécs: Janus Pannonius University, 1987), 101–17.

³ María del Mar del Pozo Andrés, “La Escuela Nueva en España: Crónica y semblanza de un mito”, Historia de la Educación. Revista Interuniversitaria 22–23 (2003–2004): 317–46.

⁴ María del Mar del Pozo Andrés, “Desde L’Ermitage a la Escuela Rural Española: Introducción, Difusión y Apropiación de los ‘Centros de Interés’ decrolyanos (1907–1936)”, Revista de Educación, no. Extraordinario (2007): 143–66; and Carlos Menguiano-Rodríguez and María del Mar del Pozo-Andrés, “Appropriating the New: Progressive Education and its (Re)constructions by Spanish schoolteachers”, Paedagogica Historica (2021). https://doi.org/10.1080/00309230.2021.1915346.

⁵ Rob Boddice, The History of Emotions (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2018); Barbara H. Rosenwein and Riccardo Cristiani, What is the History of Emotions? (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2018); Katie Barclay, Sharon Crozier-De Rosa, and Peter N. Stearns, Sources for the History of Emotions: A Guide (London: Routledge, 2020); and Bessie Dernikos, Nancy Lesko, Stephanie D. McCall, and Alyssa Niccolini, eds., Mapping the Affective Turn in Education: Theory, Research, and Pedagogy (London: Routledge, 2020).

⁶ David J. Murray and Bahar Farahmand, “Gestalt Theory and Evolutionary Psychology”, in Psychology: theoretical-historical perspectives, ed. Robert W. Rieber and Kurt Salzinger (Washington DC: American Psychological Association, 1998), 255–87; and Anna Kathryn Kendrick, Humanising Childhood in Early Twentieth-Century Spain (Cambridge: Legenda, 2020), 33–61. In the last book the connections between the Gestalt theory and the globalisation are clearly made. The author bases her arguments on an exhaustive Spanish psychological and pedagogical literature from the 1920s and 1930s.

⁷ Although the origin of the “centres of interest” goes back to Herbartianism, the term was used for the first time in North America. We can find reports from the early years of the twentieth century that refer to schools there organising their teaching of arts and crafts around broad themes called “centres of interest”. It was the Argentine pedagogue and feminist Ernestina López who introduced the term “centres of interest” in Spain in 1905, in an article that described an experience from the Hyannis School of Massachusetts. Ernestina A. López, “La enseñanza manual en los Estados Unidos”, La Escuela Moderna 15, no. 177 (1905): 852.

⁸ Key works about Decroly are: Marc Depaepe, Frank Simon, and Angelo Van Gorp, “The Canonization of Ovide Decroly as a ‘Saint’ of the New Education”, History of Education Quarterly 53, no. 2 (2003): 224–49; Angelo Van Gorp, Tussen mythe en wetenschap: Ovide Decroly (1871–1932) (Leuven: Acco, 2005); Sylvain Wagnon, Ovide Decroly, un pedagogue de l´Education nouvelle, 1871–1932 (Bruxelles: P.I.E. Peter Lang, 2013); and Marc Depaepe, Frank Simon, and Angelo Van Gorp, Ovide Decroly (1871–1932): Une approche atypique? (Kingston, Canada: Queen’s University, 2022).

⁹ Thomas Fallace, “Recapitulation Theory and the New Education: Race, Culture, Imperialism, and Pedagogy, 1894–1916”, Curriculum Inquiry 42, no. 4 (September 2012): 510–33; and Michael Hines and Thomas Fallace, “Pedagogical Progressivism and Black Education: A Historiographical Review, 1880–1957”, Review of Educational Research, 93, no. 3 (2023): 454–86.

¹⁰ Pierre Bovet, “Ovidio Decroly”, Boletín de la Institución Libre de Enseñanza LVI, no. 870 (1932): 289–91.

¹¹ The educationalist Georges Rouma had written several scientific works in collaboration with Decroly and could speak Spanish fluently because of his pedagogical relationship with Bolivia; Alexis Sluys, principal of a Demonstration School and a Teachers Training College in Brussels, shared several educational spaces with Decroly, enjoyed a close relationship with the Spanish progressive educators, and visited Spain on several occasions; Arthur Nyns and Nicolas Smelten were schoolteachers and headmasters of the Brussels schools numbers 7 and 10 – where Decroly was school doctor – and received Spanish visitors in these institutions as early as in 1902.

¹² Brussels, “Ángel Llorca diaries of his travel in France and Belgium (1910–1912)”, Ángel Llorca Archive (Madrid: Foundation Ángel Llorca), 19 July 1911.

¹³ Ángel Llorca García, La Escuela Primaria e Instituciones Complementarias de la Educación Popular en Francia, Bélgica, Suiza e Italia. Notas de viaje (Madrid: Lib. de los Sucesores de Hernando, 1912), 117–9.

¹⁴ In the official report presented by the first group of Spanish schoolteachers that visited the Decroly schools in July 1911 with a state grant, the concept “centres of interest” was mentioned. The authorship of this concept was attributed to Decroly, and they considered it as something very new; however, they had been informed by some Belgian pedagogues that a comparable system was applied in the schools of the city of Marcinelle. Junta para Ampliación de Estudios e Investigaciones Científicas, Excursiones pedagógicas al extranjero. Memoria correspondiente a los grupos de maestros organizados en los años 1911 y 1912 (Madrid: Est. Tip. De Fortanet, 1913), 26. Nevertheless, in several local newspapers’ articles published by these schoolteachers we can observe many more variations. Most of them did not yet identify the Decroly curriculum organisation with the idea of centres of interest, nor did they identify the concept with his name. Thereby, one of these educators had named and exemplified one centre of interest experiment by “Margueritte Jacobs”, presumably Marguerite Jacobs-Pauwels, and she was not presented as a follower of the Decroly method. José María Andreu, “Notas de visita a algunas Escuelas de Francia, Bélgica y Suiza”, El Magisterio Gerundense, 11 June 1913, 40.

Sidonio Pintado Arroyo was really the first and only schoolteacher to present the idea of centres of interest as something new and coined by Decroly. He was explaining them as yearly, monthly, or weekly periods of time in which a certain topic was developed by the children. He was also the first one to present Decroly as a “genius” and an “apostle”. His articles were published in several newspapers of the regions of Castilla and La Rioja between 1912 and 1915. See Sidonio Pintado, “Progresos pedagógicos. Institución del doctor Decroly”, El Norte de Castilla, 2 November 1913, 1.

¹⁵ Ricardo Campillo, “Una visita a la Escuela Decroly”, Revista de Pedagogía 34 (1924): 367.

¹⁶ Antonio Juan Onieva, Nuestro viaje de estudios al extranjero (Madrid: El Magisterio Español, 1926), 119.

¹⁷ Emilio Sotelo Rey, Por la Europa Pedagógica (Ávila: Suc. de A. Jiménez, 1913), 85–8.

¹⁸ Antonio Ballesteros, Las escuelas nuevas francesas y belgas (Madrid: Pub. de la Revista de Pedagogía, 1930), 85.

¹⁹ Diario del grupo de Inspectores e Inspectoras enviado por la Junta de Ampliación de Estudios a Francia y Bélgica en pensión de dos meses, París-Bruselas, Vol. II (Madrid: JAE, 1922), 98.

²⁰ Lorenzo Miralles, “Cuestiones Pedagógicas. La enseñanza en el extranjero. Algunas notas acerca de la enseñanza de las ciencias experimentales en la escuela primaria, en Francia, en Bélgica y en Inglaterra”, El Radical. Diario Republicano, 17 April 7, 1910, 1; Valentín Ferrero García, “Viaje pedagógico a Francia, Bélgica y Suiza. Notas” (29 November 1912), JAE Archive, F-36.

²¹ Brussels, “Ángel Llorca diaries of his travel in France and Belgium (1910–1912)”, Ángel Llorca Archive (Madrid: Foundation Ángel Llorca), 29 November 1912. .

²² Ll. [Ángel Llorca], “Desde Bélgica. Diario de una excursión de maestros e inspectores”, Desde la Escuela y para la Escuela 5, no. 118 (1921): 71.

²³ Campillo, “Una visita a la Escuela Decroly”, 367.

²⁴ Rodolfo Llopis, “El doctor Decroly en España”, El Sol, 13 April 1926, 2.

²⁵ Jacobo Orellana Garrido, “La difusión del método Decroly”, La Escuela Moderna 37, no. 387 (1923): 921–3.

²⁶ Eduardo Canto, “Desde Bélgica. Notas rápidas”, El Magisterio Español 62, no. 8124 (1928): 715.

²⁷ As a paradigmatic example of an “educational pilgrimage”, see the trip done by Decroly himself together with Raymond Buyse. Marc Depaepe and Lieven D’hulst with the collaboration of Maartje Theuninck (2011). An Educational Pilgrimage to the United States. Un pèlerinage psycho-pédagogique aux États-Unis.: Travel Diary of Raymond Buyse, 1922. Carnet de voyage de Raymond Buyse, 1922 (Louvain: Leuven University Press, 2011).

²⁸ L.H. [Luis Huerta], “Libros. Psicología aplicada a la educación”, Boletín de la Asociación de Maestros de las Escuelas Nacionales de Madrid 4, no. 13 (1934): 29.

²⁹ José Martínez Aguilar, “Decroly”, Las Provincias, 18 December 1928, 9.

³⁰ José Xandri Pich, Cuatro meses en Francia y Bélgica (Madrid: Tip. Encomienda, 1923), 147.

³¹ Cándido Solbes Oltra, “Estudio por el Maestro Nacional de la Escuela Jardín Altamira, Alicante” (15 March 1926), JAE Archive, S-92.

³² Jesús Revaque, “El Doctor Decroly”, El Cantábrico, 25 September 1932, 1.

³³ To understand these descriptions, see Depaepe, Simon, and Van Gorp, “The Canonization”, 224–49.

³⁴ Ángel Aniceto Gracia Morales, “Diario del Maestro de Borceguillas (Segovia), del viaje al extranjero del año 1924, pensionado por el Estado, después de disuelto el grupo a que pertenecía, dirigido por el Sr. Valls”, (23/24 July 1924), JAE Archive, G-167.

³⁵ Per Abbat, “Labor fecunda. Apostillas a una excursión astur”, La Voz de Asturias, 25 June 1926, 8.

³⁶ María Luisa Navarro de Luzuriaga, “Turismo Pedagógico. La Educación Nueva”, La Gaceta Literaria 1, no. 21 (1927): 4.

³⁷ De Coster, Depaepe, Simon and Van Gorp stated that Decroly “is sometimes called the ‘European Dewey’ in the United States” mentioning a book of 1929 in which this description is used. Tom De Coster, Marc Depaepe, Frank Simon and Angelo Van Gorp, “Dewey in Belgium: A libation for modernity? Coping with his presence and possible influence”, in Inventing the modern self and John Dewey: Modernities and the travelling of pragmatism in education, ed. Thomas S. Popkewitz (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 95. But in Spain this expression was used as well and at an earlier date; see Antonio Ballesteros, El Método Decroly (Madrid: Publicaciones de la Revista de Pedagogía, 1928), 20–1.

³⁸ Juan Canals Huguet, “La Escuela de Verano de Barcelona”, Escuelas de España 2, no. 22 (1935): 476.

³⁹ “Por los niños anormales”, La Libertad, 24 February 1928, 2.

⁴⁰ Epifania San Julián Sáizar, “Viaje de estudio al extranjero. V”, Suplemento a La Escuela Moderna 37, no. 3315 (1928): 1410.

⁴¹ Xandri, Cuatro meses, 165.

⁴² Manuel Díaz Rozas, “Diario de Viaje. Resumen de Trabajo” (30 May and 8 June, 1930), JAE Archive, D-41.

⁴³ Florentino Rodríguez y Rodríguez, El método Decroly (Madrid: Junta para Ampliación de Estudios e Investigaciones Científico, 1925), 318.

⁴⁴ There was a kind of competition between the Spanish Decrolyans to see who was going to publish the first works of Decroly in Spain. Pedro Rosselló was writing to him: “ça a été une joie et une deception en même temps d’apprendre que votre brochure avec monsieur Boon et que vous nous aviez promis pour notre collection de l’‘Asociación Española Instituto J.J. Rousseau’ était deja [sic] traduite en Espagnol … Vous n’avez pas quelque’autre petite brochure a publier a coté de celles de Mr. Claparède et Bovet deja [sic] parues?”, Pedro Rosselló to Ovide Decroly, Madrid, 20 March 1922, Centre d’Études Decrolyennes, Uccle (Belgium). The “brochure” mentioned by Pedro Rosselló was Vers l’École rénovée, published by Ovide Decroly and Gérard Boon in 1921 in Bruxelles and in 1922 in Madrid, from a translation made by Sidonio Pintado. Ovide Decroly and Gérard Boon, Hacia la Escuela renovada. Una primera etapa, trans. Sidonio Pintado (Madrid: La Lectura, 1922).

⁴⁵ He was also the first translator to Spanish of the pedagogical ideas of Decroly. Dr. Decroly and Mlle. Monchamp, La iniciación a la actividad intelectual y motriz por los juegos educativos. Contribución a la pedagogía de los niños y de los irregulares, trans. and ed. Jacobo Orellana Garrido (Madrid: Francisco Beltrán, 1919).

⁴⁶ He also translated several books about the Decroly method, the first of them a work of Gérard Boon, Essai d’application de la Méthode Decroly dans l’Enseignement primaire (1924), that includes some lectures of Decroly to the Belgian teachers. Gérard Boon, Aplicación del método Decroly a la enseñanza primaria y la instrucción obligatoria, trans. and ed. Rodolfo Tomás y Samper (Madrid: Francisco Beltrán, 1926). In the prologue Tomás y Samper had written an extensive account of the Decroly life and method, and he was worried that the Belgian doctor would be angry with him “par le stile si peu brillant que j’emploie en parlant de vous”, and that he was afraid that Decroly could understand because “vous lisez déjà l’espagnol”. Rodolfo Tomás y Samper to Ovide Decroly, 25 March 1926, Centre d’Études Decrolyennes, Uccle (Belgium).

⁴⁷ Sidonio Pintado Arroyo, Decroly. Biografía, ideas Pedagógicas, Bibliografía (Madrid: El Magisterio Español, 1924).

⁴⁸ Louis Dalhem, El método Decroly aplicado a la escuela, trans. and ed. Jacobo Orellana Garrido and Sidonio Pintado Arroyo (Madrid: La Lectura, 1924), 7. Dalhem’s book was based on experiments in Brussels schools and was considered a handbook for Decroly teachers.

⁴⁹ Ibid., 215–81. The objective of including this chapter was to encourage the Spanish schoolteachers to experiment with the Decroly method in their classrooms.

⁵⁰ He was also the translator of the famous book by Amélie Hamaïde about the Decroly method as she had applied it in the schools of Brussels prior to her l’Ermitage experience. Amélie Hamaïde, El método Decroly, trans. and ed. Sidonio Pintado Arroyo (Madrid: Francisco Beltrán, 1923).

⁵¹ Depaepe, Simon, and Van Gorp, “The Canonization”, 248.

⁵² Anna Rubiés to Ovide Decroly, Barcelona, 31 December 1927, Centre d’Études Decrolyennes, Uccle (Belgium).

⁵³ Ibid.

⁵⁴ They wrote the following books about their experience: Ana Rubiés, Aplicación del método Decroly a la enseñanza primaria (Madrid: Pub. de la Revista de Pedagogía, 1929); Ana Rubiés Monjonell, Experiencias didácticas (Madrid: Pub. de la Revista de Pedagogía, 1934); Ana Rubiés Monjonell, Lectura-escritura global. Cuatro años de experiencias (Barcelona: Bosch, 1938); Federico Doreste Betancor, Metodología de la lectura y la escritura (Madrid, Pub. de la Revista de Pedagogía, 1933).

⁵⁵ To know more about other ways of defining or using the notion of “Decrolyan”, see De Coster, Depaepe, Simon, and Van Gorp. “Dewey in Belgium”, 85–109; and Angelo Van Gorp, “‘Like air bricks on earth’: Notes on developing a research agenda regarding the post-war legacy of new education”, Espacio, Tiempo y Educación 7, no. 1 (2020), 7–25.

⁵⁶ José Xandri Pich, La vida en la Escuela. Ensayo de adaptación de un método científico de enseñanza. First Grade (Madrid: Yagües, 1928); José Xandri Pich, Los Centros de Interés. Second Grade and Third Grade, I and II (Madrid: Yagües, 1928); José Xandri Pich, Concentraciones. Fourth Grade and Fifth Grade I (Humanistics) and II (Sciences) (Madrid: Yagües, 1932).

⁵⁷ Ballesteros, El Método Decroly. In this book for the first time a brief report was presented about the practice of the Decroly method in the Spanish schools, although Ballesteros had warned the Belgian doctor that he had to “reduir au minimum celui des applications de la methode a l’Espagne [sic]” following publishers’ recommendations. Antonio Ballesteros to Ovide Decroly, Segovia, 31 December 1928, Centre d’Études Decrolyennes, Uccle (Belgium).

⁵⁸ Rodolfo Llopis, La pedagogía de Decroly: dos ensayos (Madrid: La Lectura, 1927). The newspapers repeatedly published the fake – and rather unbelievable ‒ news that Decroly himself was translating this book into French because he wished his pedagogical ideas to be known in the French-speaking countries through the interpretation made by Rodolfo Llopis. “Mañana en el Ateneo. Conferencia de Rodolfo Llopis”, El Luchador: diario republicano, 3 January 1928, 1.

⁵⁹ Rodolfo Llopis informed Decroly that he would carry out a tour through Uruguay, Argentina, Paraguay, and Brazil in the first months of 1930, and that he would be pleased to speak about the Decroly method. But he needed “un film de nouvelle education” and “votre fotographie signé avec dedicace pour moi [sic]”. The last item was required as a token of affection that could be used to show the closeness between Decroly and Llopis. Rodolfo Llopis to Ovide Decroly, Madrid, 2 January 1930, Centre d’Études Decrolyennes, Uccle (Belgium).

⁶⁰ Norberto Hernanz y Hernanz, “Memorias” (unpublished manuscript, n.d.), 101. Norberto García Hernanz Archive.

⁶¹ “Discours de Monsieur Langevin prononcé à la cérémonie commémorative en l’honneur du Docteur Decroly (Bruxelles, 2 juillet 1933)”, Pour l’Ère Nouvelle 12, no. 91 (1933): 220.

⁶² This person might have been Andréa (not Andrée) Jadoulle, head of the “Laboratoire de pédagogie et de psychologie”, founded in 1928 in Angleur (Liège).

⁶³ Amadeu Visa i Tristany, “L’assaig d’escola activa a l’escola d’Estiú”, Revista de Psicología i Pedagogía 3, no. 12 (1935): 392–7.

⁶⁴ The process of a Decrolyan schoolteacher becoming archivist is very well explained in Luis G. Bover, “De nuestro concurso. ¿Cómo vitalizar la Escuela e incorporar a ella las preocupaciones del pueblo?”, El Magisterio Español 67, no. 9091 (1933): 140–2.

⁶⁵ José María Fernández, “La prensa en la Escuela. Organización de un Archivo”, El Magisterio Español 66, no. 9075 (1932): 505.

⁶⁶ José María Fernández, “El fichero periodístico escolar”, Avante 8, no. 86 (1935): 157–60; and Mariano Horcajo, “Vivencias pedagógicas: El fichero de recortes”, Atenas 5, no. 39 (1934): 278–80.

⁶⁷ Fernando San Martín, “Un Archivo Escolar”, El Magisterio Español 66, no. 9063 (1932): 313–5.

⁶⁸ Julio Sánchez López, “El Archivo escolar y la Escuela activa”, El Magisterio Español 66, no. 9061 (1932): 281–4.

⁶⁹ Fernando San Martín, “El ‘diario de clases’ y manera práctica de llevarlo”, El Magisterio Cordobés 11, no. 256 (1934): 1–2; and Esteban Torrijos y Hortelano, “La enseñanza por el ‘recorte’”, El Magisterio Español 66, no. 9080 (1932): 597.

⁷⁰ José González Piquer, “Exposición escolar en Vinaroz”, Heraldo de Castellón, 20 July 1934, 1.

⁷¹ “Una Exposición escolar modelo”, El Magisterio Español 66, no. 9042 (1932): 502.

⁷² Santiago Hernández Ruiz, “Selección y desarrollo de las unidades didácticas”, in Metodología General de la Enseñanza, ed. Santiago Hernández Ruiz (México: Unión Tipográfica Editorial Hispano-Americana, 1949), 287.

⁷³ Santiago Hernández Ruiz, Psicopedagogía del interés. Estudio histórico, crítico, psicológico y pedagógico del concepto más importante de la pedagogía contemporánea (México: Unión Tipográfica Editorial Hispano-Americana, 1946), 151.

⁷⁴ Ibid., 150.

⁷⁵ Ibid., 151.

⁷⁶ Ibid., 153.

⁷⁷ Santiago Hernández, “Interés natural y artificial”, Avante 6, no. 58 (1933): 2.

⁷⁸ Ibid., 3.

⁷⁹ Review of the book by Ovide Decroly and Amélie Hamaïde, El cálculo y la medida en el primer año de la escuela Decroly, Escuelas de España 10 (1934): 44.

⁸⁰ Henry C. Morrison, The Practice of Teaching in the Secondary School (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1926).

⁸¹ Henry C. Morrison, La Práctica del Método en la Enseñanza Secundaria, trans. and ed. María Sánchez Arbós (Madrid: La Lectura, 1930). In the prologue she explained that she had got acquainted with the Morrison Plan through Miguel Catalán, a teacher of Physics in the Instituto-Escuela of Madrid, a progressive secondary school where he had successfully applied the method with the older students.

⁸² Kendrick, Humanising Childhood, 117.

⁸³ Rafael Verdier and Rafael Gutiérrez, “Del hacer en la Escuela. Una unidad de trabajo escolar. Andalucía”, Escuelas de España 3, no. 25 (1936): 12–29; and Rafael Verdier and Rafael Gutiérrez, “Del hacer en la Escuela. Una unidad de trabajo escolar. La Tierra”, Escuelas de España 3, no. 30 (1936): 251–71.

⁸⁴ Sadie Goggans, Units of Work and Centers of Interest in the Organization of the Elementary School Curriculum (New York: Teachers College Columbia University, 1940), 119.

⁸⁵ A short biography of the Decrolyans Sidonio Pintado, Federico Doreste, Anna Rubiés, José Xandri, Antonio Ballesteros and Rodolfo Llopis can be found in Juan Mainer Baqué, Inventores de sueños. Diccionario bioprofesional de pedagogos y didactas de Geografía e Historia hacia 1936 (Zaragoza: Institución “Fernando el Católico” – CSIC, 2009), 84–9, 188–9, 274–7, 284–8, 293–5, and 300–2. About Jacobo Orellana, see Carmen Orellana, Ante el silencio y la oscuridad (Antequera: ExLibric, 2020). About Rodolfo Tomás y Samper see José Moratinos Iglesias, El pensamiento pedagógico del alicantino Rodolfo Tomás y Samper (Alicante: Ayala, 1988).

⁸⁶ Jefe Provincial del SEM [Servicio Español del Magisterio], “Enseñanza y Magisterio. Una realización necesaria”, El Adelanto, 3 January 1945, 4. The SEM was the only Teachers’ Union in Francoist Spain, which all Spanish schoolteachers were obliged to join, and with selected leaders from the fascist party Falange.

⁸⁷ See José Quetglas Pastor, “Diario de Clase”, Mahón, 1940; María del Carmen Escribano, “Memoria de Prácticas de la Enseñanza”, La Puebla, 1940–1941; Carmen Eyaralar y Vives, “Memoria de Prácticas de Enseñanza”, Palma de Mallorca, 1944; Carlos Tur Marí, “Memoria que presenta el alumno Carlos Tur Marí sobre las Prácticas de Enseñanza, realizadas en la escuela unitaria n° 1 de Ibiza”, Ibiza, 1945, Pràctiques – Memòries, Magisteri Primàrio, Historical Archive of the Teachers Training College of Palma de Mallorca, University Archive of the UIB, 189, 190, 191.

⁸⁸ José Mª Pérez’s lesson plans, Pérez Santamaría Archive. See the context of this archive and examples of these lesson plans in Kira Mahamud and María José Martínez Ruiz-Funes, “Reconstructing the Life Histories of Spanish Primary School Teachers: A Novel Approach for the Study of the Teaching Profession and School Culture”, History of Education 43, no. 6 (2014): 793–819.

⁸⁹ María Coronación Andrés Muñoz, “Memoria”, and “Memoria de prácticas” (14 September 1942), Del Pozo Andrés Archive.

⁹⁰ Notes taken in Didactics class by student Alberto del Pozo Pardo. Course 1946–1947. Faculty of Philosophy and Humanistics (Section of Pedagogy), University of Madrid, Del Pozo Andrés Archive.

⁹¹ Arthur J. Jones, E.D. Grizzell, and Wren Jones Grinstead, El Sistema de unidades de trabajo escolar, trans. Domingo Tirado Benedí (México: Unión Tipográfica Editorial Hispano-Americana, 1946), 18–24. I have quoted from the original version in English. Arthur J. Jones, E.D. Grizzell, and Wren Jones Grinstead, Principles of Unit Construction (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1939), 15–6.

⁹² Santiago Hernández Ruiz and Domingo Tirado Benedí, La Ciencia de la Educación, 2nd ed. (México: Atlante, 1949), 453–4.

⁹³ Hernández, “Selección”, 267–309.

⁹⁴ J. Vicenta Arnal, “Las unidades didácticas en la enseñanza elemental de las Ciencias”, Bordón 5, no. 34 (1953): 166–74.

⁹⁵ Hernández, “Selección”, 269.

⁹⁶ Angéla Médici, L’Éducation Nouvelle, 3rd ed. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1948).

⁹⁷ María Coronación Andrés Muñoz, “Panorama y problemática de la Educación Nueva”, Consigna, July/August 1956, 8–10. This article, published in the journal of the Sección Femenina, the women’s section of the fascist Falange party, was based more on the ideas of Angéla Médici. It can be interpreted as a kind of rebellion against the dominant pedagogical discourse that she heard at the university. For instance, she rejected the Rousseaunian origin of the ideals of Decroly and Montessori, “as some people wanted”, but – following Médici – she claimed that they were moved by the educational concern to introduce new methods into the school based on the emotions and the psychological knowledge of the children.

⁹⁸ María del Mar del Pozo Andrés and J.F.A. Braster, “The Reinvention of the New Education Movement in the Franco Dictatorship (Spain, 1936–1976)”, Paedagogica Historica 42, no. 1–2 (2006): 122–6.

⁹⁹ Juan Manuel Moreno García, “Unidades didácticas, básicas y realistas”, Vida Escolar 7, no. 67 (1965): 3 and Juan Manuel Moreno García, “Introducción al estudio del concepto de ‘Unidad Didáctica,’” Vida Escolar 9, no. 93/94 (1967): 4.

¹⁰⁰ Arturo de la Orden, “Distinción entre Unidades Didácticas, Centros de Interés y otros conceptos afines”, Vida Escolar 9, no. 93/94 (1967): 15.

¹⁰¹ Un cursillista, “Profesorado de Educación General Básica. Se han celebrado Seminarios de Actualización”, El Eco de Canarias, 5 March 1971, 18.

¹⁰² Alejandro Manzanares, “Memorias de un Inspector. Una Semana Pedagógica”, Hoja del Lunes, 2 April 1973, 3.

¹⁰³ Jesús Asensi Díaz, “Memoria de un maestro. Memoria de la escuela”, Tendencias Pedagógicas 14 (2009): 47–9.

¹⁰⁴ David Tyack and William Tobin, “The ‘Grammar’ of Schooling: Why has it been so hard to change?”, American Educational Research Journal 31, no. 3 (1994): 453–79.

¹⁰⁵ I borrow this concept from the winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, Annie Ernaux. She has called her form of writing “autosociobiography”, which can be defined as the entanglement of her life story with the collective movement of a generation, in an attempt to capture “the lived dimension of History”. Annie Ernaux, The Years, trans. Alison L. Strayer (London: Fitzcarraldo Editions, 2018), 224.

¹⁰⁶ Alberto del Pozo Pardo and Mª Corona Andrés Muñoz, Vivimos 2°. Unidades Didácticas Globalizadas (Burgos: Hijos de Santiago Rodríguez, 1966); Alberto del Pozo Pardo and Mª Corona Andrés Muñoz, Nosotros y el Mundo (Naturaleza). Tercer Curso (Burgos: Hijos de Santiago Rodríguez, 1966); and Alberto del Pozo Pardo and Mª Corona Andrés Muñoz, Nosotros y el Mundo (Vida Social). Tercer Curso (Burgos: Hijos de Santiago Rodríguez, 1966).

¹⁰⁷ Mª Raquel Payá Ibars and Felipe G. Perles Martí, Cada Día. Geografía e Historia, 5° Curso (Burgos: Hijos de Santiago Rodríguez, 1968).

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María del Mar del Pozo Andrés

María del Mar del Pozo Andrés has been a lecturer in Theory and History of Education at the University of Alcalá (UAH) where she became a full professor in 2011. Since 2021 she is Director of the Antonio Molero Museum of Education (UAH). In 2021 she was elected as President of the Spanish Society for the History of Education (SEDHE). She has been a member of the Executive Committee of the International Standing Conference for the History of Education (ISCHE) (2006-2012). Her lines of research are history of urban education, reception and transfer of international educational currents (especially the New Education movement), the role of education in the construction of national identities, visual studies in education, history of women's education, and history of school culture. Her most recent book is: Frederik Herman, Sjaak Braster and Mª M. del Pozo Andrés (eds.), Exhibiting the Past. Public Histories of Education (Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2022).