Pedagogy

PEDAGOGY. - From παῖς = child and ἄγωγὴ = the action of leading by the hand (Lat. manuductio), it is the science and art of education.

I. PEDAGOGY AS A SCIENCE

Education is, first and foremost, a fact; or better, a complex of facts and processes that imply a becoming, a continuous actualization, a movement toward a goal, which is the development in man of all that perfection entailed by his rational nature, his powers, and faculties. It therefore concerns all activities through which this development may be achieved, and especially the action of the educator upon the educand. This characteristic of becoming, of process or development, is proper to every form of the educational moment: for the intellect, there will be the unfolding of the mind, that is, of knowledge, culture, and instruction; for the will, the acquisition of self-mastery, good habits, and inner energies; for aesthetics, the formation of artistic and poetic sense and taste; for the body, the harmonious development of the organism.

However, leaving this entire series of activities to themselves and to the spontaneity of instincts or inclinations would amount to sowing confusion where harmony should prevail, to accumulating facts of every sort without connecting them in such a way as to derive consequences and laws that guide the choice of the many means available for their realization. Indeed, it would amount to denying the very innate tendency of reason, which is to establish an end and then study the most suitable means and methods to achieve II. Therefore, even in the educational field, a theory is necessary—one that scientifically gathers and defines, compares in their aspects, and interconnects in a continuous series the historical and psychological factual data and other elements concerning education; that derives the intrinsic laws of facts or the superior exigencies to which facts are subject, in order to direct the educational effort toward the goal to be reached, that is, the complete perfection of man as man. Thus, a well-organized theory, that is, a science, will emerge.

Furthermore, the human individual is a rational being; therefore, his activity, whatever it may be, can always be reduced to rational principles. The same applies to intellectual and practical habits. Hence, the educational fact, in all its extent and value, can be studied in a rational and systematic manner and thus constitute a science of education.

In explaining and applying its theories and norms, this science must take into account the various factors that contribute to influencing the development and formation of the child and the young person. These factors, reducible to five, constitute as many parts or subdivisions of pedagogy: 1) the educator, with his qualities, rights, and duties, his formation and maturity; 2) the educand, with his natural physical, intellectual, and moral dispositions, with the particular laws according to which the individual faculties develop in the different periods of his life, with the more or less active voluntariness of his cooperation, with his physical and moral deficiencies and defects; 3) the end, which moves the educator to his work and is constituted by a fixed, moral element (to ensure that the educand becomes good, cultured, and happy; the καλοκαγαθία of the Greeks) and by a variable element according to different types and studies of culture (ideal of physical strength, personal valor, political art, etc.). Here it must also be noted that in the present order of Providence, the end or ideal cannot be restricted to the natural order but transcends it and rises to the supernatural order. It is no longer sufficient, therefore, merely to adorn and refine the soul with culture, but it is also necessary to save it for eternal life and the beatific vision of God; 4) the environment: geographical and domestic (heredity, example, abnormalities, etc.), social (degree of civilization, legislation, etc.), scholastic (day school, boarding school, university, etc.), companions and relationships (mixed schools or coeducation, etc.); 5) educational activity: in general (body, sensitive, intellectual, volitive life); in particular (reading, composition, calculation); special means and expedients (rewards, punishments, emulation, stimulants, etc.).

The question arises as to which genre of science pedagogy belongs. V: there are, in fact, theoretical or speculative sciences that subject their object only to intellectual study (e.g., mathematics) and practical and operative sciences that, while subjecting their object to study, also aim to produce determined effects in it (e.g., engineering, medicine, in which the speculative process aims to build a bridge, a house, or to heal a sick person). Now, pedagogy is precisely a practical or poetic science because it aims to produce in the educand determined intellectual and practical habits, which are externalized in determined attitudes.

II. PEDAGOGY AS ART

Pedagogy is not only a science but also essentially an art. Indeed, it possesses the elements of art: 1) the formation in the artist’s mind of an idea; in this specific case: the formation in the educator’s mind of the idea of morality or science, to which they wish to lead the pupil; 2) the realization of this idea, translating it into determined habits and acts. In this process, beyond prolonged study, extensive experience, and perhaps a more or less abundant harvest of errors, the educator’s intuitive genius (the "clinical eye") may come into play—quick and sure in grasping a factual situation and assessing its value; devices and means that variously shape their personality and adapt to the ever-varying personality of the pupil, who may be more or less receptive, more or less active in exploiting what they receive. Just as it occurs with the artist—architect, painter, poet—faced with a villa to build, a scene to depict, an event or sentiment to express, so too with the educator, who must cooperate in shaping a character, forming a man, a father, a citizen. Moreover, if one reflects on the value and importance of the ultimate goal of the entire educational process, and how knowledge may prove useless or even harmful when it fails to produce good and advance perfection, one cannot but admit that pedagogy is essentially an art. It may therefore be said that, as a science, pedagogy studies and codifies educational processes; while, as an art, it translates them into action in pursuit of its end.

III. RELATIONS BETWEEN PEDAGOGY AND PHILOSOPHY

From what has been outlined, it follows that pedagogy cannot in any way ignore or neglect philosophy. The learner, in fact, is not merely the object upon which to work, but also and above all the subject upon whom the educative activity is exercised, insofar as it is necessary to awaken in him the spiritual activism of intelligence and will, of self-consciousness and self-mastery. The world in which he lives, his social and religious relations, the moral level of his conscience, the end to be achieved—all these touch upon and evoke a multiplicity of problems that are proper to philosophy: the problem of being and knowing, of God, of the world, of living beings, of the soul, of conduct, of sociality. Pedagogy must therefore borrow from metaphysics, gnoseology, aesthetics, deontology, and ethics, and especially from rational and experimental psychology, all those notions and explanations that enable it to apply the necessary means to carry out its particular educative processes.

It must indeed be affirmed that pedagogy is a fruit that sprouts from the branch of a philosophical system; and that it is therefore absurd to undertake a critical examination of the various pedagogical orientations while prescinding from the different philosophical systems from which they take their starting point. Nor can one understand the pedagogical thought of a thinker except in function of his philosophy. Depending, in fact, on the answers we give to these questions—Is life entirely enclosed within the sphere of matter and earth? Do higher values exist, the values of the spirit? Is the soul immortal? Is there, above contingent beings, an Absolute Being, a Transcendent, from whom all proceeds and to whom all converges?—the substratum of the educative work and its orientations and applications will differ. Thus, we speak of a positive, idealist, actualist, pragmatist pedagogy, etc.

All this, however, cannot in any way lead—as the actualist theory would have it—to the identity of philosophy and pedagogy, which instead have their own formal object and are clearly distinct. Philosophy abstracts from every particular object or fact and considers only what is proper to reality as such, being qua being; it considers the transcendental properties of being (the true, the beautiful, the good) or the objects that constitute the real (nature, spirit, God). Pedagogy, on the other hand, considers the concrete individual; it studies how he may conquer knowledge, form his own personality, developing the exigencies of his universal human nature while at the same time addressing the individual, overcoming the difficulties and obstacles connected with his particular psychophysical structure, with his different age, the various historical forms of culture, and the exigencies of the different social communities to which he belongs (family, State, Church). To confuse and identify education with the dialectical process of becoming (which one does not even know to be development, let alone progress) of the Absolute Spirit swallows up and dissolves the rich and manifold content of the educative work into a mystical and perpetually identical act of identification—not, I say, of the educator with the learner, but of the Spirit with itself (cf. G. Vidari, Elementi di p., II, Milano 1924, p. 4 ff.).

Pedagogy also has relations with the other sciences (e.g., with the physical and natural sciences); but in all circumstances, it will appropriate their contributions, infusing into them, whenever it applies them, a new breath of life, in relation to the individual exigencies of the subject and the particular problems to be resolved. Its work in this will always be like gathering wood to place on the fire, without ever confusing the wood with the spark of its own fire, which will transform it into flame.

IV. RELATIONS BETWEEN PEDAGOGY AND THEOLOGY

Pedagogy must maintain a wholly particular relationship with theology. Since the human soul is naturally religious and reason suffices to demonstrate the dependence of every creature upon God, and thus the duty to direct every effort toward Him, pedagogy cannot ignore the religious element without ceasing to be the science of a totalitarian education of man. And since there is only one true religion, the Catholic, which, in addition to truths of the natural order, contains others that are suprarational and revealed (the elevation of man to the status of adopted child of God, original sin with all its humiliating and painful consequences, the Sacraments and their efficacy), it follows that true, perfect, and complete pedagogy can only be grafted onto the truths and morality taught by the Catholic religion.

V. OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY OF PEDAGOGY

Like all other arts, pedagogy has historically undergone a development that, for greater clarity, can be divided into three phases: 1) empirical, when the education of the human individual adopts, without much reflection, those means suggested by common sense—whether true or presumed—habit, and tradition; 2) preceptistic, when the progress and increasing complexity of individual and social life, along with the consequent division of labor, lead to the formation of specialized individuals (teachers) who practice the educational art by formulating maxims and precepts to guide the educator; 3) scientific, when pedagogy constructs and organizes into a true scientific system the rational principles directing the art of education. These phases, however, should not always be understood in a strictly successive historical sense.

1. Primitive, Traditional Era

Among primitive peoples, education takes on very simple and utilitarian forms, limited as it is to elements aimed at satisfying material necessities: food, clothing, shelter, and protection. Thus: the manufacture of tools, weaving, handling of weapons, care and exploitation of flocks, agricultural work. This, however, while preparing for life, necessarily develops—through the need for defense and the overcoming of adversities and dangers—extraordinary sensory acuity (sight, hearing, smell), great tenacity of memory (parental lists, legends, traditions to be passed down), a lively imagination (mythological explanations of natural forces, appeals to mysterious powers), and a great capacity for reflection. There are no schools in the proper sense, but very often special constructions where children can gather. Although the moral sense may sometimes be blunted, their conscience still recognizes the value of certain obligations and norms of good conduct (worship of the deity, of ancestors, sense of honor, fidelity to one's word, obedience to authority). Very often, children are educated in courage and the contempt of pain and death through bloody and cruel experiments. In particular, the transition from childhood to adolescence is marked by special practices and rites (segregation from the rest of the tribe, abstinence from certain foods, various trials, initiation into life, circumcision), which aim at moral formation for future life and future family and social relations (v. FAMIGLIA; INIZIAZIONE; PRIMITIVI).

To a no longer primitive but still traditional era may be attributed the ancient Eastern peoples, who sought to transmit a body of knowledge constituting a kind of scientific treasure, generally considered as received by divine revelation, in which they saw the wisdom and foundation of individual and social happiness. Within this common framework, profound differences are noted: among the Hebrew people, a religious traditionalism prevails, which regards the sacred books of the Bible as the treasure of all science and moral virtue; in Brahminical India, there is a traditionalism that might be called philological, possessing a religious core of knowledge that is elaborated literarily; in Egypt, a scientific traditionalism prevails, which, around the Hermetic books forming its religious tradition, constructs a scientific encyclopedia; China, which does not admit the character of revelation in the entirety of its traditions, founds upon them its teaching and political organization. From this era, we have inherited the sacred books of the Hebrews, which, together with the New Testament, form the fundamental material of our religious teaching; the grammatical elements of India, which inspired modern grammars; the numeration that later came to be called Arabic; the Phoenician script; the mathematics of the Egyptians; the astronomy of the Babylonians.

2. Greco-Roman Humanistic Era

However, pedagogy as a science does not appear until the Greco-Roman world. The characteristic of Greek paideia was the harmonious intellectual, moral, and physical culture of the individual with a view to continuous progress for the good of the city-state, aiming to form a perfect body (harmony of forms, agility, strength) and a mind cultivated in all subjects concerning the Muses (hence the name "music"). For physical education, there were gymnasiums and public games (Olympic, Isthmian, Pythian, and Nemean), to which the finest of Greece flocked to reward and celebrate with songs what was considered a exquisite fruit of paideia; for intellectual and moral education, there were poetry (especially Homer and Hesiod), drama, dance, eloquence, and music proper. In Sparta, education, more imbued with rigid discipline, strength, and boldness, was a function of the State, which exercised it through a "paidonomos," assisted by correctors or mastigophoroi (armed with whips); in Athens, by contrast, education, more free, aristocratic, broad, and serene, was left to private initiative. It was there that scientific pedagogy arose; first treated in philosophical schools as part of political science (politeia), then in gymnasiums, governed by a gymnasiarch, which, from being gymnasiums for gymnastics, song, recitations of poems, and lectures, transformed into true academies and centers of every kind of culture. Among the celebrated pedagogues, one may recall: Pythagoras with his esoteric and exoteric teaching and his table of operations; Socrates, who gave his name to the heuristic (or Socratic) method, suited to keeping attention alive and sharpening the activity of the intellect, and which he compared to a spiritual "maieutics" (the art of the midwife), because it stimulated the pupil to discover the treasures hidden in the depths of the mind; Plato, disciple of Socrates,

Pedagogy (from παῖς = child and ἄγωγὴ = the act of leading by the hand) in ancient Greece found its first systematic expression in the Sophists, who, though often criticized for their relativism, were the first to make education a profession and to introduce the concept of a general culture (ἐγκύκλιος παιδεία). Socrates, with his heuristic (or Socratic) method designed to keep attention alert and sharpen the mind's activity, compared it to a "maieutic" (the art of the midwife) of the spirit, as it stimulated the pupil to discover the treasures hidden in the depths of the mind. Plato, a disciple of Socrates, starting from the unitary concept of political society, held that education should be in the hands of public authority and outlined a curriculum that was followed until the Middle Ages and, in substance, until our own days. Xenophon, another disciple of Socrates, left in his Oeconomicus the first treatise on female education. Aristotle, educator of Alexander the Great and the greatest philosopher, in his Politics limited the state's intervention in education and advocated a program encompassing literature, music, grammar, gymnastics, and drawing. In Greece, the "encyclopedia" (ἐγκύκλιος παιδεία = circle of general culture) also emerged, which in its full development included the philosophical sciences (grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic), the mathematical sciences (arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy), and the philosophical sciences (metaphysics, psychology, and theology).

The ancient Romans always held family education in high esteem. Cato the Censor considered it more important to attend to his son's education at home than to participate in Senate sessions (Plutarch, Cato maior, ch. 20), and the finest praise for a Roman matron was: "casta fuit, domum servavit, lanam fecit." The ideal was dominated by the mos maiorum, and the goal was Roman virtus; instruction held less weight, and the Laws of the Twelve Tables sufficed as a subject of study. Nevertheless, from the earliest times, the principle of communal education was practiced. However, the school was held in some room or shop, or even outdoors, under some little-frequented portico or at street crossings (in trivia, hence the name scholae triviales), and teaching was entrusted to masters (Indimagistri or litteratores), generally slaves or freedmen. Their low status did not prevent some from becoming worthy of memory (cf. Suetonius, De claris grammaticis) and receiving notable remuneration. Yet during the Republican period, Roman pedagogy did not emerge from its empirical phase; indeed, the Senate and censors opposed the introduction of Greek schools (cf. Suetonius, De claris rethoribus, ch. 1), and it was not until Quintilian that the first official professor was hailed. Nevertheless, even before him, there were figures of distinguished pedagogues: Cato wrote a kind of encyclopedia, Origines, for his son; Cicero, also for his son, the three books De officiis; Varro left a school encyclopedia, Disciplinae; Seneca many moral and practical philosophical works: De ira, De clementia, De vita beata, and Letters to Lucilius. The true pedagogical text is Quintilian's De institutione oratoria, where, with the famous definition of the orator—Vir bonus dicendi peritus—he demonstrates his intent to place moral education at the foundation of professional training. Others who may be cited include Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Plutarch—who, though Greek, exerted a profound influence on the Romans with his treatise On Education and the Parallel Lives—and Martianus Capella, who in De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii outlined the curriculum followed throughout the Middle Ages: the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, dialectic) and the quadrivium (arithmetic, music, geometry, astronomy).

3. Patristic and Monastic Era. The coming of Jesus Christ brought salutary and effective innovations to the field of pedagogy. The idea of God as Father, the dignity of man elevated by Grace to the state of an adopted child of God, the meaning of life that is no longer merely human but becomes divine, interiority that gives true value to human actions regardless of external appearances or the judgments of others, universal brotherhood that destroys the unnatural barriers of distinctions and privileges, the one and indissoluble family, and the supernatural means bestowed—all renewed education in its deepest spirit (v. GESÙ CRISTO, V. Il pedagogo divino). The Fathers, especially the Greek ones, sought to incorporate into the treasures of Christianity those inherited from Hellenic culture. In Alexandria, the school was transformed into a true scientific and Christian university (Didaskaleion), where Clement of Alexandria, successor to its founder St. Pantaenus, wrote the first work of Christian pedagogy: The Pedagogue. For Clement, pedagogy is like a medicine for the soul, a θεοσβεία or religiosity that teaches the service of God through the acquisition and practice of virtues and intellectual culture, even if based on pagan classics.

St. Basil is to be remembered for his Homily XXII on the usefulness that can be derived from reading pagan authors; St. Jerome for his two pedagogical letters, one to Leta on the education of little Paula and the other to Gaudentius for the child Pacatula. A particularly significant value is held by the pedagogical works of St. Augustine: in De magistro, he expounds his theory of the interiority of knowledge. It might seem that without the teacher's word there is no instruction; instead, the word is but a sound, an external sign, and a stimulus for the pupil to seek within himself its truth, by the divine light of the Word that speaks within. Every instruction is therefore essentially self-instruction. In De catechizandis rudibus, the teacher's educational work acquires its non-negligible function, for the pupil's progress depends on the teacher's didactic gifts. In De ordine, he justifies the teaching of the liberal arts, useful for the search for truth and the defense of Christianity; in De musica, he expounds the importance and educational efficacy of art, insofar as it is beauty and an ascent to supreme beauty.

Monasticism (v. MONACHESIMO), with the flourishing of monasteries scattered throughout the East and the West, proved to be the heir and vigilant guardian of the cultural treasures of antiquity, preserving them amid the ruins left by the barbarian invasions and standing, amid that general dissolution of ancient civilization, as centers—if not always the only ones, certainly the principal and most sought-after—of culture. And it was monks who took upon themselves the task of instructing and civilizing the uncultured invaders who were to become the founders of the new European nationalities. In monasteries, in addition to the hours devoted to prayer and manual labor necessary to provide for the needs of monks and guests, there were also hours dedicated to study, the transcription of codices, and the translation of authors. Furthermore, there were internal schools for future monks and external schools for the laity, both with the full program of the liberal arts and exact sciences, as well as abbatial schools, in which the best students, after common courses, specialized in certain subjects. Alongside monastic schools, presbyterial, parochial, and episcopal schools arose—or rather, continued—and also communal or corporate schools, maintained by municipalities or specific guilds.

The Carolingian era marked a true reform and a better, broader, and more complete organization of studies, giving rise to the "Palatine Academy," to which the most learned and renowned monks from Italy, France, and England were attracted: Alcuin, Rabanus Maurus, Paulus Warnefridus (nicknamed "the Deacon"), Theodulf, and Peter of Pisa. In imitation of the Palatine Academy, others arose at Osnabrück for Greek and Latin, at Metz and Soissons for music and chant. At the same time, disorganized parochial schools were revived, education was extended to freemen and serfs without distinction, and school attendance was made compulsory.

Naturally, all this led to the composition of numerous textbooks, commentaries, and extracts, not only, but also of pedagogy (pedagogia) proper, as the art of teaching and educating. Among the pedagogues of this period, the following should be noted: St. Patrick, founder of the school of Armagh; Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus, founder of the Vivarium near Squillace and author of a treatise for the study of Sacred Scripture and the seven liberal arts: Institutiones divinarum et saecularium litterarum; St. Benedict, founder of the Benedictines and of the schools attached to monasteries; St. Gregory the Great for the school of sacred chant and music; St. Columbanus, founder, among others, of the monastery of Bobbio; St. Isidore of Seville, promoter of schools for the education of the invading Vandals and author of an encyclopedic summary of all knowledge: Origines sive Ethymologiae; St. Bede the Venerable, with more than eighty writings on the arts and sciences; Alcuin, principal animator of the Carolingian renaissance and author of school texts; St. Boniface, apostle of Germany and founder of the monastery of Fulda; Rabanus Maurus with his encyclopedia De universo.

Nor was the education of women neglected, for alongside male monastic schools arose female ones for girls not destined for the cloister, in which, in addition to elementary school subjects, singing, embroidery, instrumental music, and painting were taught; for noble girls, notions of astronomy, falconry, dice and chess, and practical medicine were added. In some monasteries, higher studies were also offered: all nuns knew Latin, and girls learned the seven liberal arts. The nun Bertila (6th century), of the monastery of Chelles, taught Sacred Scripture with acclaim; St. Lioba was an authority in the subjects of the trivium and quadrivium; Roswitha composed comedies in the manner of Terence; St. Hildegard left writings on all subjects from mysticism to physics and astronomy.

To this era also belongs chivalric education, a school of devotion to one’s duty; its principal virtues were moderation and self-control, love for God and the Church, delicate and respectful love for women, courage in arms, defense of the weak, fidelity, and a lofty sense of love. Externally: decorum, nobility of manner, dignity, all summed up in the term "courtesy."

St. The Period of the Communes and Universities. — With the 12th and 13th centuries, the center of life and culture shifted markedly from monasteries to the city, which was evolving into a commune. In urban settings, a greater rational curiosity, a greater freedom of inquiry and opinion among teachers and students, was noted; the Crusades, broader exchanges between East and West, and a more complete knowledge of Greek philosophers through Arab commentaries increasingly heightened the thirst for knowledge, which monastic and episcopal schools could no longer satisfy. Thus arose the universities. Their origins varied: for some, they were the same earlier schools that expanded their field and method of study and took on an independent character; for others, they were new institutions. These higher institutes of learning were called Studium or Studium generale, and they had their corporations of teachers and students (universitas magistrorum and universitas scholarium), as well as "colleges" for foreign students, first in the form of hospices and later as true boarding schools under strict discipline. In Italy, the most illustrious universities were those of Bologna, Padua, Naples, and Pavia; abroad: the Sorbonne in Paris and the two English ones at Oxford and Cambridge. Their number, thanks to the interest of princes and the Church, grew rapidly; by the end of the 14th century, more than one hundred and twenty were counted. The degrees that could be obtained were three: baccalaureate, license, and doctorate; the teaching method was twofold: the lectio or exposition of doctrine, and the disputatio or defense and attack around a question.

In this period, pedagogy (pedagogia) focused particularly either on the education of princes, as in Vincent of Beauvais, educator of the sons of Louis IX (De educatione regalium), and Giles of Rome (De regimine principum), or on the education of students, as in Alexander of Villedieu (Doctrinale), Eberhard of Béthune (De Graecismis), John of Garland (Morale scholarium, Dictionarium), the pseudo-Boethius (De disciplina scholarium), Denis the Carthusian (De vita, moribus et eruditione scholasticorum), and Jean Gerson (De pueris ad Christum trahendis). The only one who truly addressed a pedagogical-didactic problem with full awareness was St. Thomas Aquinas in his De magistro (Quaestiones disputatae: quaestio 11ᵃ) and in his article: Utrum unus homo possit alium docere (Sum. theol., 1ᵃ, q. 117, a. 1). In the first work, recalling Augustine’s theory of the "divine light," which is the interior teacher, he explains it by identifying it with the "light of reason," given by God to man, by which it can be said in a certain sense that God is the interior and principal teacher. But while St. Augustine essentially emphasized the moment of self-education, St. Thomas introduces and requires hetero-education as well, which is the modern theory of the bipolarity of the educational fact. In the second work, St. Thomas answers the question of whether knowing a science well is sufficient to teach it well; he responds that it is not enough, but that the teacher must also possess a special technical skill to maintain attention and, above all, to make truth intelligible.

5. Period of Humanism. — With the advent of Humanism and the Renaissance, the detachment from the medieval mentality deepens. A true spirit of rebellion seeks to sweep away, in the realm of reason, the "scientific" value of Sacred Scripture, Scholasticism, and Aristotle; there is a repugnance toward the staticism of the ipse dixit, which persisted in schools; a culture is desired that is not only Christian but also, indeed predominantly, human, one that revives all the values contained in one’s own natural and spiritual reality. The authors of antiquity are to be explored and exploited in their entirety, beyond scholastic disputes, so as to feel the contact with those great figures who had known how to unite the beauty of style with the celebration of life’s beauties, the art of governance, and conquest. In essence, the aim was to assert the primacy of the "self," to achieve greater autonomy. Consequently, in pedagogy (p.) the concept of education as an aesthetic norm of beautiful harmony and eurhythmic order prevailed over that of a norm of moral discipline. Man was thus educated more for the realization of an ideal of beauty and artistic composure than for the formation of character. While these ideas led some astray, there were nonetheless Christian pedagogues who, while embracing the best, deepest, and freest classical culture—then in great vogue—did not neglect moral values, and above all religious ones, so necessary to education. Among these: Giovanni Dominici (Regola del governo di cura famigliare), Pier Paolo Vergerio (De ingenuis moribus ac liberalibus studiis adolescentiae), Maffeo Vegio (De educatione liberorum clarisque eorum moribus), Guarino Guarini with his boarding school in Ferrara, Vittorino da Feltre with his "joyous house," Enea Silvio Piccolomini, later Pope Pius II (De educatione liberorum), Cardinal Jacopo Sadoleto (De liberis recte instituendis), Matteo Palmieri (Della vita civile), Leon Battista Alberti (De iciarchia, Della famiglia), Baldassarre Castiglione (Il Cortigiano), Tommaso Moro (Utopia), Ludovico Vives (De disciplinis). It is worth noting how, between the two extreme tendencies of the time—the naturalistic sensibility of Lorenzo Valla, the Epicurean hedonism of Pietro Pomponazzi, and the rigidity of De Dominici and Savonarola—the intermediate position prevailed, wittily affirmed by St. Bernardino da Siena: young people do well to study "el Ciccarone" to learn the language, but they must also have "santo Girolamo barba canuta" as their teacher. Against the excessive bookishness and the phenomenon of Ciceromania, derived from Humanism, rose Erasmus of Rotterdam, François Rabelais, and Michel de Montaigne.

6. Period of Catholic Reform and the Protestant "Reformation." — With the Protestant "Reformation," a more theological form of Humanism prevailed out of necessity for propaganda and counter-propaganda. On the Protestant side, this was represented by Philipp Melanchthon and Johann Sturm, while on the Catholic side, it was embodied by the great teaching religious orders and their principles and theories, followed with enthusiasm and discernment. Consider, for example, the Ratio Studiorum of the Jesuits, with its commentators: Sacchini, Perpignan, Possevino, Jouvancy, and others; the restorative work of St. Charles Borromeo and Della educazione cristiana e politica dei figliuoli by Silvio Antoniano; the foundations of St. Philip Neri with the Oratory; of St. Joseph Calasanz with the Piarists; of St. Jerome Emiliani with the Somaschi; of St. Anthony Mary Zaccaria with the Barnabites; of St. Peter Fourier, St. Francis de Sales, and Mary Ward with the English Ladies.

The current of realism (instigated by a more intense and profound study of nature, the experimental and inductive method proclaimed by Francis Bacon and Galileo Galilei, and the still-vibrant reaction against the last gasps of decadent Scholasticism) gave rise, alongside the social realism—composed of reality and utopia—of Tommaso Campanella’s Città del Sole, among Protestants: Wolfgang Ratke and especially Johann Amos Comenius with his Didactica magna, Janua linguarum reserata, and Orbis pictus rerum sensualium. His program, outlined in the subtitle of the Didactica magna, is to provide all (cities, villages, communities, youth of both sexes) with all knowledge, including the method by which teachers teach less and students learn more. Alongside theories of undeniable novelty and practicality (the law of gradation of subjects, the cyclical method, the alphabetic method in place of the intuitive method), Comenius has the flaw of easily leading to an encyclopedic scientism, against which reacted August Francke with his pietism, partly exaggerated, and John Locke with his disciplinary realism (The Conduct of the Understanding): the task of education is not to perfect young people in one or another science, but to open and dispose their minds so as to make them capable of any science to which they may apply themselves. Among the Jansenists, realism provoked the reaction of Port-Royal and their "little schools"; among Catholics, it gave rise to St. John Baptist de la Salle with his Brothers of the Christian Schools, Bossuet, and Fénelon.

7. Modern Period. — From this point onward, the dependence of pedagogical theories on the philosophical theories that came into vogue becomes increasingly evident. Thus, as a result of the Enlightenment, we have: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Emile) and Johann Bernhard Basedow with his philanthropism, A. Genovesi, G. Filangieri, Gian Rinaldo Carli, and others; in a reactive sense: Cardinal Sigismondo Gerdil. In more or less overt dependence on Kantian criticism and idealist philosophy, especially after the Hegelian period: Johann Gottlieb Fichte (Addresses to the German Nation), Friedrich Wilhelm Schelling (Lectures on the Method of Academic Study), Jean Paul Richter (Levana), Heinrich Pestalozzi with his schools, Friedrich Fröbel (The Education of Man); in a reactive sense: Father Grégoire Girard (Plan for the Education of All Switzerland) and Albertine Necker de Saussure (Progressive Education). With the return to realism and the prevalence of psychological studies, we have Johann Friedrich Herbart (General Pedagogy Derived from the Aim of Education).

In the period of the Risorgimento, pedagogical currents aimed to form a new consciousness by aligning education with national life and highlighting the intimate connection between educational renewal and political and civil renewal. The following may be cited: V. Romagnosi; the mutual instruction schools of Andrew Bell and Joseph Lancaster; Ferrante Aporti with his Asylums and Provincial Method Schools; Antonio Rosmini (Essay on the Unity of Education, Catechism Arranged According to the Order of Ideas); Vincenzo Gioberti, Raffaele Lambruschini (The Guide to Education, On Education, etc.); Gino Capponi (Fragments on Education), Niccolò Tommaseo (On Education); Giovanni Antonio Rayneri, Domenico Berti, Giuseppe Allievo. A distinguished and unique place is deserved by St. Giovanni Bosco, with his institutions, his perfect understanding of the pupil, the completeness of his education, and his preventive method.

The positive current sought to introduce into pedagogy the positive method of inquiry proper to the natural sciences and claimed that pedagogy, in constructing its theories, should rely solely on natural investigations, setting aside anything that smacked of tradition, dogma, or truth not verifiable through experience. It denied, neglected, or combated spiritual problems, religious beliefs, metaphysical doctrines, and refashioned everything according to the process of physical and natural formation. Among its authors: Auguste Comte (Discours sur l'ensemble du positivisme), Herbert Spencer with evolutionism, Jeremy Bentham with utilitarianism; in Italy: Roberto Ardigò, Aristide Gabelli, Cesare Lombroso and his criminalist school; in a materialist sense, Karl Marx and his successors, who accentuated class struggle and irreligion.

Positivism provoked a strong intellectualist reaction with a neo-Hegelian background, led by Bertrando Spaventa, Benedetto Croce, Giovanni Gentile, and Giuseppe Lombardo Radice. Additionally, there emerged various currents stemming from William James's pragmatism, Wilhelm Wundt's psychologism, and Henri Bergson's intuitionism.

8. The New School. — The contemporary movement in pedagogy has developed in such a remarkable flourishing that it is spoken of as a "Copernican revolution" in the educational field. The central point of this revolution lies in the fact that the child has moved to the center of pedagogical activity, while the teacher has shifted to the periphery, in the sense that the teacher will know the child, place themselves at their service, but not substitute for them; they will awaken life without replacing II.
The new school is also commonly called the "active school," as it aims to encompass all those pedagogical experiences that start from the consideration of spontaneity, interest, collaboration, functionality, sociability, and recognize and stimulate in the child a spontaneous effort of self-formation, an immanent vital impulse that, when well assisted and directed, provides greater empowerment of the spirit. However, not all the philosophical presuppositions from which it starts are acceptable (e.g., the biogenetic law, the original goodness of the child), nor are all didactic implementations to be approved (e.g., coeducation, religious neutrality, the sole appeal, for the ethical part, to the pupil's moral conscience, civic, national, and humanitarian sentiment).

The new school is implemented in various forms, the principal ones being: a) in Italy: the "Model Kindergarten" of sisters Rosa and Carolina Agazzi; the "Children's House" of Maria Montessori; the "Serene School of Agno" by Maria Boschetti-Alberti; b) in England: the "Abbotsholme School" of Cecil Reddie; the "Bedales School" of J. Haden Badley; the "Klearsley School" of E. F. O'Neil; c) in Germany: the "Ilsenburg School" of E. Lietz and the creation of "hearths"; the "Odenwald School" of P. Geheeb; the "Wickersdorf School" of G. Wyneken; d) in France: the "École des Roches" of E. Demolins and G. Bertier; "Teamwork" by R. Cousinet; e) in Belgium: the O. Decroly method or "laboratory-school"; f) in Switzerland: the methods of A. Ferrière and E. Devaud with centers of interest; g) in America: the "projects" method of J. Dewey and W. H. Kilpatrick; the Dalton method of E. Parkhurst; the Winnetka system of C. Washburne, etc.; to which should be added the "City-Schools" of E. Codignola and the "Boys' Towns" of E. J. Flanagan (v. ATTIVISMO). Now another movement is taking shape: having overcome the school centered on the teacher and the curriculum, there is a tendency to also overcome the school centered on the pupil, arriving at a school that, taking into account the merits and undeniable contributions of both systems, goes beyond, placing its center in love (cf. A. Agazzi, Oltre la scuola attiva, in Paedagogium, 10 [1948-49], pp. 28-35).