LOMBARDO RADICE, GIUSEPPE. — Pedagogist, born in Catania on 28 June 1879, died near Cortina d'Ampezzo on 16 August 1938. At first a teacher in secondary schools, from 1911 to 1922 he held the chair of pedagogy at the University of Catania. In 1923–24 he was summoned by G. Gentile to the General Directorate of elementary schools, collaborating in their reform and drawing up their new curricula. From 1924 until his death he taught pedagogy at the Istituto Superiore di Magistero, now the Faculty of Magistero, in Rome.
He embraced teaching as a mission; he was the advocate of a “serene” school which, respecting the spontaneity and freedom of the child, would be capable of directing him toward the veneration of country, family, and religion. Although he moved within the orbit of Gentilian thought (the spirit understood as the creator of its own world, the unity of teacher and pupil, culture as the overcoming of every methodical system), he displayed a more discerning sensitivity which, through contact with the school, enabled him to grasp more fully
the child’s soul and world in all their essence. Hence that sense of humanitas which pervades all his work.
He directed three periodicals on pedagogy: Nuovi doveri (1907–11), Rassegna di pedagogia politica e scolastica (1912–13), L'educazione nazionale (1919–33), and wrote numerous articles in various periodicals, as well as works of value, including: Il concetto dell'educazione e le leggi della formazione spirituale (Palermo 1910); Lezioni di didattica e ricordi di esperienza magistrale (there 1915); L'ideale educativo e la scuola nazionale. Lezioni di pedagogia generale (there 1916); Athena fanciulla. Scienza e poesia della scuola serena (Firenze 1925); Saggi critici didattici (Torino 1927); Orientamenti pedagogici per la scuola italiana (there 1931).