RITES ABOUT THE SENSITIVE: THE EXAMS AT THE MODERN SCHOOL IN BARCELONA

ABSTRACT:

I analyze in the present paper a set of prescriptions regarding the use of exams, which were implemented in the experience of the Modern School at Barcelona (1901-1906), during the first decade of the 20th century. Cited as current ritual among the scholar experiences at the time, even being attributed the character of innovation by education renovator intellectuals, I verify how it took place such procedure in the Modern School based on the analytical orientations of Ivor Goodson about the Social History of Curriculum. For the goals of this research, I mobilize a set of records about the exams extracted from the Boletín de la Escuela Moderna (1901-1906), official body of the aforementioned school. However, several other types of documentation compose the corpus of references for the analysis such as pedagogical magazines, iconography, journals etc. Throughout the analysis, I observe the methods of how the exams were mobilized regarding the formation of infancy, especially, as a procedure capable of educating their sensibilities.

Keywords:
History of the Curriculum; History of the Senses and Sensibilities; Modernity; Modern School at Barcelona; Anarchism

RESUMO:

Analiso no presente artigo um conjunto de prescrições referentes à prática dos exames, que foram implementados na experiência da Escola Moderna de Barcelona (1901-1906), na primeira década do século XX. Cotado como ritual corrente entre as experiências escolares à época, sendo, inclusive, atribuído a ele o caráter de inovação por intelectuais renovadores da educação, verifico como sucedeu tal procedimento na Escola Moderna a partir das orientações analíticas de Ivor Goodson sobre a História Social do Currículo. Para os fins desta investigação, mobilizo um conjunto de registros sobre os exames extraídos no Boletín de la Escuela Moderna (1901-1906), órgão oficial da referida escola; porém, diversos outros tipos de documentação compõem o corpus de fontes para as análises, tais como revistas pedagógicas, iconografias, periódicos etc. No percurso das análises, observo os modos como foram mobilizados os exames com vistas à formação da infância, especialmente como procedimento capaz de educar suas sensibilidades.

Palavras-chave:
História do Currículo; História da Educação dos Sentidos e das Sensibilidades; Modernidade; Escola Moderna de Barcelona; Anarquismo

RESUMEN:

En este artículo analizo un conjunto de prescripciones relacionadas con la práctica de exámenes, que se implementaron en la experiencia de la Escuela Moderna de Barcelona (1901-1906), en la primera década del siglo XX. Comprendido como un ritual rutinero entre las prácticas escolares de la época, incluso se le atribuyó el carácter de innovación por parte de los intelectuales de la educación, verifico cómo sucedió este procedimiento en la Escuela Moderna a partir de las orientaciones analíticas de Ivor Goodson sobre la Historia Social del Currículo. Para efectos de esta investigación, movilizo un conjunto de registros de los exámenes extraídos del Boletín de la Escuela Moderna (1901-1906), órgano oficial de la referida escuela, pero varios otros tipos de documentación componen el corpus de fuentes para análisis, como: revistas pedagógicas, iconografías, periódicos etc. En el transcurso del análisis, observo las formas en que se movilizaron los exámenes con miras a la formación de la infancia, en especial, como un procedimiento capaz de educar sus sensibilidades.

Palabras clave:
Historia del Currículum; Historia de la Educación de los Sentidos y de las Sensibilidades; Modernidad; Escuela Moderna de Barcelona; Anarquismo

INTRODUCTION

In Europe, in the course of the 19th century and in the passage to the 20th century, different intellectuals, politicians and pedagogues invested in the thesis that an improvement in the population's education (understood here as the expansion of access to the schooling experience) would imply the "progress" of the nation. Still, such premise referred to the process of educational modernization, identified in the rationalization and in the technical and technological evolution of artifacts, devices, methods, theories and practices aimed at the pedagogical field, which would provide the stimulus to the industrialization, the increase in the economic development and the improvement of the political system (ESCOLANO, 1997). The aphorism of "progress", so usual among the social reformers at that time, was sustained under the aegis of the elevation of the people's culture, so that this would be the driving force for this project of the new world (HOBSBAWM, 2019).

In face of this fact, the light thrown on the school unveiled its problems and delays that, in effect, accentuated the need for changes in this institution to meet the imperatives of modernity and not to hinder the advances imagined by these reformers. The transformations and supposed innovative measures were largely stimulated in the school in the mentioned period, being possible to find among its main actions: the use of school manuals, desks and appropriate furniture for the school environment; the emergence of the intuitive method; the prohibition of physical punishment; the organization of schools in series or grades; the coeducation of the genders; and the implementation of school examinations (SOUZA, 1998). A process that insinuated to be universal, since the school in modernity built an apparently common liturgy, a shared model that instituted procedures to be reproduced in the daily school life - which allows us to underline that the same occurred in a similar way in the Spanish context regarding the educational modernization process (BAÑUELOS, 1997, p. 116; VIÑAO, 2001). Thus, the purpose of this research was to capture this modernizing vogue from the analysis of the celebration of the exams in the Modern School of Barcelona (1901-1906)².

By understanding that in this background rhetoric and practices about the school circulated that were guided by the conceptions of pedagogical renewal at that time, the Modern School reveals itself as an institution with a different characteristic, namely: it was recognized as an anarchist school, it kept in its staff collaborators and teachers associated to the Spanish anarcho-syndicalist movement, and its founder Francisco Ferrer y Guardia (1859-1909) had his predilections for the doctrine (PRADO DA SILVA, 2021). Therefore, identified this political dimension in that school, I focus on analyzing the ways in which the prescriptions about the exams were mobilized, in contrast to the reference of the context in which it was located, as well as investigating its performance in practice from this procedure, in order to observe the pedagogical intentionalities, ruptures and continuities between the experiences, the projections and the context.

Although many studies, to some extent, have been dedicated to the topic (SOUZA, 1998; SOUZA, 2000; SOUZA, 2006; TEIVE, 2009; VEIGA, 2009; BOTO, 2014; KROP, 2015; PIÑAS, 2020; ROCHA; GOUVEA, 2021), even dealing with the same object of analysis - the Modern School in Barcelona (LEUTPRECHT, 2018) -, the notion about this procedure has contracted some inaccuracies, hence it seemed fundamental to me to define what I understand school exams to be³. I assume here that the exam was a ritual used in the school of modernity with the purpose of measuring the evolution of the faculties of the schoolchildren, since the model of graduated school required from the action of the pedagogical agents a procedure that "proved" that the child had acquired the necessary knowledge, which would have to be mobilized to give him continuity in the school trajectory that he would undertake through the other grades established by the educational systems.

Therefore, pedagogical agents developed criteria to be measured that could provide tangible "proof" of the child's abilities. These criteria could be either of an intellectual order - the basis of the theoretical content transmitted in the classroom - or physical, moral and behavioural. This way, the exams were used in a varied way, a polysemic and multipurpose procedure which was guided by a diversity of evaluative instruments, a docimological experience which sought ways to measure the pedagogical aims of the school evaluating the results obtained in the educational process from instruments based on pre-established parameters and which were anchored in tests, processes of classification and selection of the schoolchildren, as well as in the preparation of the teachers to agree on such practices.

As the examination is a pressing procedure of schooling and an element present in what we conventionally call Curriculum, I am guided by the reflections of Ivor Goodson (1997, 2008, 2012) on the Social History of the Curriculum. The author points out that

The curriculum is a product forged in culture and as such is in an eminent process of negotiation and tension at different social levels, among which, it should be highlighted, the pre-established production of the curriculum, the power games that influence its final construction, to finally consolidate it as a school parameter and be practiced in everyday school. The latter is a level of reproduction and confrontation that submits the curriculum to the challenge of being implemented in the educational process. Therefore, the analysis between the written curriculum and the curriculum as classroom activity emerges as an indelible gesture (GOODSON, 1997, p. 20).

Goodson suggests, roughly speaking, that the analyses about the school curriculum should be divided in three parts: 1 - a verification about the theme in the context and its political debate in the unofficial sphere; 2 - an analysis of the written curriculum, what is projected virtually through prescriptions and theoretical conceptions; and 3 - the investigation of what was practiced in the daily school life. Following the mentioned orientations, in the first part of the paper I make a digression on the debate around the exams in the Spanish context, in order to clarify how the uses of the exam in a specific context and time occurred; afterwards, I make an investigation about the prescriptions of the exams in the Modern School in Barcelona through the orientations of its director, Clemence Jacquinet, and, finally, I verify what was being practiced by the pedagogical agents of this school experience. Thus, for these analyses, I gathered a set of prescriptions and exam records extracted from the official organ of the Modern School, Boletín de la Escuela Moderna de Barcelona (1901-1906), as well as from other periodicals and pedagogical magazines that circulated, in the passage from the 19th to the 20th century, in Spain.

DISCONTINUITIES AND WEAKNESSES IN THE USE OF EXAMINATIONS

Among the different consortiums that discussed and promoted projects of pedagogical modernization in schools in the last quarter of the 19th century, I highlight the Congreso Pedagógico Hispano-Americano that took place in Madrid in 1892. That event - unlike the first National Pedagogical Congress of 1882 in the country - had a broad international membership, bringing together intellectuals, educators, teachers, military, doctors, engineers, among others, from different European countries⁴. Among the collaborators of the Congress was Manuel Bartolomeo Cossío, member of the Institución Libre de Enseñanza (ILE) ⁵. An illustrious personage among the intellectuals who reformed education at that time, Cossío had influence and recognition in the field, given that he had made numerous trips around Europe (especially England), seeking contacts with other intellectuals and pedagogues, in order to discover new pedagogical experiences that could be implemented in ILE and disseminated throughout Spain (URTAZA, 2007). Taking advantage of this easy access to his peers, Cossío explored a special theme in that Congress, which, apparently for lack of space and relevance for the organizers, could not be exposed in the official sections and included in the concluding minutes. In this way, the pedagogue prepared a questionnaire that was given to the international delegates about the examinations and the progression of students in the different grades in the official schools in their respective countries⁶. The answers and reflections on this questionnaire were published by Cossío himself years later in the Boletín de la Institución Libre de Enseñanza - BILE. Here I underline some of the data he collected.

At the opening of the questionnaire, Cossío asked, "Are there examinations to pass from one grade to another in primary education (in your countries)?" (COSSÍO, 1894a, p. 5). The French delegate said he was sorry he could not give a concrete answer, "because the great diversity of examinations of all kinds in (primary) education makes it impossible to explain in a few words how each one proceeds". The Belgian representative, Alexis Sluys (Director of the Ecole Normale de Bruxelles), stated that there were indeed examinations in primary education in his country, so that these schools were organized into three grades (primary, higher and normal) and that the advancement level of the child from one grade to another was by examination. The delegates from Austria and Germany pointed out that there were examinations, but that "such examinations are a mere formality and have no decisive participation" because it was the teachers themselves who decided the advancement level of the students (COSSÍO, 1894a, p. 5-6).

The flexibility in the use of these exams in the primary schools of these countries draws attention, sometimes being obligatory for the promotion of children to the other grades, sometimes being a decision of the teacher himself, with no need for ratification by inspectors or other State officials. This laxity is confirmed by the second question: "Is the teacher's approval enough for (the student) to progress, without the need for examinations?", to which most delegates replied that it was up to the teacher to decide on student promotion⁷ (COSSÍO, 1894b, pp. 334-335). In view of this information, it can be seen that the exams could even be used as a ritual required for the child to "prove" the minimum competence and capacity to be explored in the next stages of school life. It is safe to say that this exclusive decision of the teacher allowed a variety of types of examinations - something confirmed by the French delegate - as well as of criteria to judge the "approval" of the children, since there was no general guidance for the official schools in these countries. This "simple formalism" regarding the uses of examinations, as suggested by some delegates, suggests that their fragility was a characteristic feature of the debates on this procedure at the time. There was no conviction about its use and the ways in which it should be used.

Thus, one should take into consideration the notes extracted from this collection of information from Cossío, revealing the mismatch between the implementation of examinations as a procedure that would confer the progression of students in the different grades of the primary education. However, it is the response of the English delegates, still in the first question, that gives characteristic details of this procedure, which the other delegates did not highlight. One of the delegates, Mr. Oscar Browning, professor at Cambridge University and director of the Educational Review, clarified beforehand that the English educational system was quite different from the Spanish, even stating that there was no educational system in his country, since all teaching was private and only primary education was organized by the State. According to him, the primary education in England was organized into seven grades (or classes), established by an Act of Parliament and

School grants are awarded by payment by results, by which the advancement level process of the pupil from one class to another is ascertained and presided over by the official inspectors, without the presence of the teachers on the board. It is a very ingrained understanding amongst of the people of England that a school examination is more an examination of the teachers than of their pupils, and in it is very perceptible the sporting aspect of our race. It is often said of school pupils who undergo an examination as if it were a trophy for the teacher; as if he were presenting horses for an equestrian contest. Too much effusiveness is the capital vice of our educational system (COSSÍO, 1894a, p. 6, author's emphasis).

Professor Browning reported important facts about examinations in his country. First, he revealed that State bodies were more present in the daily life of the primary schools; in particular, (official) school inspectors were in charge of examinations and judging the promotion of children in the seven grades established by the Act. This shows a greater diligence of the official bodies compared to the other reports gathered in the questionnaire, although this rationalization of educational procedures allows us to suppose the search for a greater efficiency in the control of the advancement level of the students in the official schools. However, other concerns emerge that are crystallized in the descriptions of the English teacher. This control in examinations also came from a selective choice of schools that would benefit from resources for expansion and maintenance. The schools that achieved a better performance (better results) in the examinations would receive a larger amount of grants, that is, there was a direct relationship between the classification obtained by the school and the amount of resources to which it was entitled.

The English delegate's analogy comparing school examinations in England to sport was not by chance. The principles of competition and competitivity became the basis of the use of examinations whose purpose was not only to measure the knowledge of the children but to identify which schools would be rewarded with State grants. This is no small thing, for, as Professor Browning denounced, exams were consolidated as a school ritual with an end in itself. The students were trained to have better results in the exams in order to get highlights and praise; that is, the teachers prepared their students as "horses in an equestrian contest" to compete and then be exposed as distinguished and superior children. At least according to the English teacher, "the capital vice of the educational system" of his country was grounded on the vanity that the exams aroused in all those involved in the pedagogical process, both teachers and students. In this way, the English professor warned that the reason for the exams was the economic guarantee given to the schools with the students who obtained the best results. For him, the exploitation of these emulation strategies distorted the central concern on which teachers and State bodies should focus: the assimilation of knowledge by the child.

However, this debate was not new, and this was already being claimed by Bartolomeo Cossío years before the Congress. In the opening of the paper "Supresión de los exámenes en las Escuelas Normales", also published in BILE, Cossío set the tone of the criticism that would be carried in his reflections under the statement that: "Conceptions of several sorts justify the need to suppress the end-of-course examinations in all educational establishments and especially in the Normal Schools" (COSSÍO, 1890, p. 369). The pretext for this opposition to the exams was, strictly speaking, in the academic reductionism that they provoked, because such procedure was concentrated in a specific moment of the school year, obliterating all the development depredated in the educational process throughout the year. Besides, the exams had the particularity of examining only intellectual and theoretical knowledge, neglecting, in the words of the Spanish pedagogue, "the vocation, the character conditions, the morality" (COSSÍO, 1890, p. 369). In Cossío's conception, the moral dimensions should also be taken by the teachers' value judgement, and only they would have the competence and the accumulation of knowledge, after a certain time of observation of the children, to make such a judgement. In this way, a moralizing concern is noted, according to which the teachers should pay attention to the students' behaviours and conducts, in order to establish which and how certain behaviours needed to be consolidated in the daily school life.

The inadequacy of the examinations was reiterated in the criticism of the English delegates at the Congress, since their central problem was that they were an end in themselves. On this consideration, Cossío stated that the

The result of this preference given to the always adventurous and chance success of an exam over the normal work of the whole course is that the efforts of pupils and teachers converge on the preparation of that act (the exams), training the former in the art of coming out of it 'lucidly'. Examinations are 'the concern of families and pupils' ... which has been constituted as the true end of education. Examinations were not set to prove studies, but on the contrary, these were set for the examination (COSSÍO, 1890, p. 370).

Cossío's rejection of exams was based on the argument that the way they were being used made them the final purpose of education, that which would justify the pedagogical process and give credibility to the teacher's action. As an innovative feature, the exams were not intended to evaluate the content learned by the child, but the ritual itself would provide the status that the school in modernity desired, that is, the image of a modern and rational institution, which forged tangible and measurable procedures to judge the evolution (or not) of the students. The exams assumed, then, this aspect of the rationalization of the school in modernity, something in vogue and justified by the ambience at that time.

Circumscribed to the Spanish context, the adoption of exams and tests with the aim of measuring students' knowledge and verifying the possibility of their promotion to higher grades of the academic stratum ended up being a practice driven by the model of organization of the educational system adopted throughout the final years of the 19th century and early 20th century. This model observed in Spain, serial or graded school, had three academic degrees: primera enseñanza, segunda enseñanza or bachillerato and the higher or university course. During the 19th and 20th centuries, it was customary for students from the primera enseñanza who wished to enter the bachillerato course to sit exams, with an examining board judging their knowledge of those subjects traditionally known as theoretical (History, Geography, Chemistry, Physics, etc.).

However, this was not a recurrent practice in the grade of primera enseñanza: for the passage of the student through its levels (párvulos, medio and superior), it was up to the teacher to make the decisions, without the compulsory approval of the students in tests, being practically inexistent this practice in primera enseñanza (VIÑAO, 2004, p. 136). This inconsistency, which was present in the process of promotion of students, as stated by the historian Viñao (2004), gave rise to different debates in Spain, especially in organized groups, such as teachers and professors.

In a long debate that lasted into the first decade of the 20th century, about the permanence or not of public examinations for the entry of schoolchildren to the bachillerato, the "Asociación de Catedráticos de Madrid", in an assembly, deliberated that

Examinations are absolutely necessary: at the entrance of the pupils to judge their sufficiency and determine their attitude towards the second degree of education they wish to undertake; at the end of the study of each subject, even if it is divided into several courses, to declare them sufficiently instructed in it; and at the end of the bachillerato. To assess whether or not he is sufficiently prepared to receive a title that enables him to follow a career or to give the end of his instruction in the knowledge of general culture, essential for anyone who wants to consider himself regularly cultured (LA EDUCACION, 1904, p. 1, emphasis added).

Although this conviction on the part of some associations and class societies in relation to the uses of exams was apparent, this was not the keynote at the time, and the uncertainties in relation to the uses of this pedagogical procedure were something present in the Spanish experiences. As Viñao (2004) points out, this lack of expertise in the Spanish educational system allowed flexibility in the use or not of exams as a method of advancement level of pupils.

This legal vacuum had allowed the teaching centers a wide margin of maneuver in what was possible in the absence of examinations and in their process of advancing the level on the basis of the teacher's daily evaluation, with the establishment, especially in the higher schools of the cities and in some private colleges, of a whole system, more or less ritualized, of examinations and modes of advancement (p. 137).

Cossío, in his previously mentioned criticisms, argued that this flexibility in examinations would be fundamental, since the evaluation should not be made at specific times and on determined contents, but throughout the school year by teachers, observing all the abilities of the child (COSSÍO, 1890, p. 369).

Henceforth, examining the students would also constitute a procedure to either reward or punish them, to exalt the good students in order to rectify those who were undesirable examples. Those students who had exemplary results in their examinations were to be highlighted, which can be seen in the educational periodical "Juventud Ilustrada", published in Barcelona, which set aside a section of its magazine to encourage and reward the "little intellectuals" of the Spanish nation, placing their photos, as an honor, in the pages of the magazine. This is how the editors explained it:

CONFIDENT that we can serve as a noble stimulus to our small intellectuals, and as a reward due to those who with their dedication have managed to place themselves first in our teaching centers, we will publish in the pages of the MAGAZINE the portraits of the most outstanding students that the teaching establishments of all the provinces of Spain have.

If we succeed in arousing the emulation of those who will be the men of tomorrow and contribute to their progress, we will have achieved our purpose for the benefit of the national culture (JUVENTUD ILUSTRADA, 1905, p. 3, emphasis added).

By the excerpt above, it is possible to see the attempt, through the exams and the disclosure of the children's photographs in the pedagogical magazine, to stimulate a certain model of child and student, the "outstanding student", in whom all the other students should be inspired and from him to practice this "good" example. This is a portrait of the school in modernity, because "the history of modern schooling corresponds to a slow process of organization of styles and routines that make up, in its own way, a specific and characteristic way of transmission of knowledge, moral values and ways of acting" (BOTO, 2014, p. 103). The school, in modernity, has adopted different ways to reinforce knowledge and customs in children, ways that have become subtle and can be perceived in these pedagogical instruments.

Figure 1
Published images of students in Juventud Ilustrada magazine

This was a commonplace in school experiences, a way to praise the virtues of students, something that was not restricted to publications in journals and magazines, since the schools developed their own strategies to reward children, for example: banners with the photographs or tributes framed the photographs of exemplary students (PIÑAS, 2020, p. 311). Such practices were widely used as a way to preserve the good school model. Maintaining order and the discipline in school environments was a recurring concern among educators. In this way, the function of putting the child under judgment would be the teacher, and this task was not only recommended, but it was considered paramount so that those with better or worse habits could be evaluated, in order to maintain a good conduct in the classroom and a greater efficiency of the educational process.

Although discontinuous and fragile, examinations were pushed forward, serving as a procedure to measure the intellectual, physical and moral faculties of schoolchildren, while being tangible "proof" that the child had reached the appropriate level to compete for the other grades in his or her school career. At the same time, examinations became methods of negotiation to establish discipline and good conduct among students: those who obtained good marks were to stand out, rewarded with pictures in magazines or school banners, while students with undesirable behaviour and insufficient abilities were punished with low marks and were absent from these "boards of outstanding students". The intention was, through these procedures, to modify the children's behaviour, a true education of sensibilities. This was not unusual for that time, and this way of operating becomes even more evident when we come across the prescriptions of the director of the Modern School, Clemence Jacquinet.

EXAMINING TO CHANGE THE HABITS OF SCHOOLCHILDREN

Now, as the lack of agreement on the use of school exams is noticeable, or even, as Viñao says, as this "legal vacuum" in the consolidation of exams is patent, this fact was fertile ground for the flexibilization of this ritual, allowing schools to take the method that best suited them. The Modern School, on the other hand, on different occasions in its Bulletin, wanted to make it clear that it did not adopt exam practices, and this was reiterated by its founder Francisco Ferrer y Guardia. Thus, he explained that "we did not want to create a new inequality and, therefore, (...) there was neither prize nor punishment, nor examinations in which students would be proud of the 'excellent' grade, while the regulars would be content with the vulgar 'approved' grade and the unfortunate would suffer reproach and be despised as incapable" (FERRER Y GUARDIA, 2013 &!91;1907&!93;, p. 85). At least in the dimension of the prescribed, Ferrer y Guardia did not coadunava with the use of examinations for the approval of students for other series of enseñanza primária in the Modern School (Párvulos, Clase elementar 1, Clase elementar 2 and Curso medio⁸), using his own model for its advancement⁹. According to him, examinations were pedagogical procedures that could stimulate certain undesirable feelings in children, such as unhappiness, selfishness and vanity.

From examinations, nothing good is taken and on the contrary, the principle of evil is received in the pupil... the moral elements which initiate in the consciousness of the child, that immoral act qualified as examination, are: the maddening vanity of the highly prized; the erosive envy and humiliation, obstacle to good actions, of the less capable; and in some, and in all, the dawning of most of the feelings which form the matrix of egoism (FERRER Y GUARDIA, 2013 &!91;1907&!93;, p. 88).

But despite what Ferrer y Guardia said about examinations in the Modern School in Barcelona, its first headmistress Clemence Jacquinet prescribed various guidelines for teachers on how they should examine students in order to judge their competences. It was not the formal procedures, the "classic" exams, with examination board and tests - instruments that were practically a rite of passage in some graduate schools at that time - the mechanisms that the Modern School used in its dynamics, because it established its own procedure under the prescriptions of its headmistress. According to Jacquinet (1901a, p. 8), to observe in a methodical way the children's behaviour and their participation in the school work was fundamental, since it would be through these observations that the teacher should plan his/her classes. For this reason,

… it is important to know how to discern a first impression, to note down carefully the observations of all kinds that arise in the first days of class and to establish the characteristic of each disciple, in order to be able to direct the best action on them. These observations, which in the course of (the pupils') development are ratified or modified, have a twofold purpose

1º To guide the teacher in his/her class;

2º To teach him/her to rectify his/her first judgement and to be mistrustful of hasty opinions (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 8).

Jacquinet also made a long prescription about exams:

We will repeat here what has already been said in class, namely: the purpose of examinations is not to test the merit of the teacher or to flatter our disciples who have brilliant answers and a baggage of knowledge more or less substantial and well consolidated. No, the examination is for the teacher to judge what the pupils have assimilated in the course of the term, especially that which relates to their intelligence: Have they learnt to observe? Have they begun to make deductions from their observations? Do they manifest a taste for study, that is to say, ... is there any branch of knowledge in which they show a positive curiosity?

This is what should clearly appear in the interrogation of the person who examines the disciples. Consequently, to be able to give an exact account of the intellectual state of the disciples it is convenient in the first place that the examination is not elaborated previously, wasting ten or fifteen days planning an interrogation that serves only momentarily to verify memorization and obstructs the faculties of judgement &!91;of the disciples&!93; (JACQUINET, 1902a, p. 75, emphasis added).

It can be seen that Clemence Jacquinet is very close to Cossío's position in what concerns the examination and the ways of its use. The examinations could not be an end in themselves; neither should there be a formality as to the day of their application, nor their use as a tangible proof of the child's abilities. For the headmistress, examinations were to provide data on the purposes stipulated for education in the Modern School. Therefore, the inquiry served as a beacon and was fundamental to verify if the teachers had been able to forge the free spirit and the capacity of observation and to stimulate the curiosity of the children in the studies worked on, if they had reached what the headmistress wanted as a pedagogical goal. Moreover, the examinations, in the intentions of headmistress Jacquinet, revealed themselves as a guide for the actions of teachers, a diagnostic tool that would allow the teacher to elaborate his actions. This information was obtained from a precise and methodical observation of the teacher.

It is important to highlight this rationalization of the school in the modernity of childhood. The concerns of the teachers were not only anchored in the fact of having to transmit certain knowledge to the students, but the reason for this rationalization of the school was the ways from which the pedagogical agents invested in its organization. There was a clear disposition to establish parameters of childhood (and of students) in which, through this methodical evaluation, students were fitted into various models. In this way, the school in modernity sought to standardize the children in categories, in order to homogenize the school environments under the pretext of seeking a better efficiency in the learning process, which allows to verify an influence of psychological studies driven in the course of the second half of the 19th century, which divided the levels of child development based on age (GOUVÊA, 2008). This selectivity, according to the thinking in vogue, would allow the teacher to better appropriate the evolution of students, thus making a more rigorous examination that would provide more information for their pedagogical interventions.

The reflexes of this logic on the examinations are observable when we notice that their use was part of this process of selection and classification of the children, in order to group them in intellectual levels (and probably age levels), as suggested by Jacquinet.

Regarding the studies, we had the intention of dedicating the month of September to the examination of the pupils before classifying them, but only one day was enough for us to note our complete ignorance and (therefore) the classification ..., is all about the intellectual degree of development that we have found in each child. (JACQUINET, 1901b, p. 9).

Apparently, in the first year of the Modern School, the teachers carried out the examinations of the students every week, observing them and checking the progress of the students, comparing their observations with those of the previous weeks. These examinations were published monthly in the section "Observaciones" and "Memoria de los estudios" (JACQUINET, 1901b, p. 8-10; JACQUINET, 1901c, p. 23-24; JACQUINET, 1901d, p. 35; JACQUINET, 1902b, p. 46-48). As illustrated by Jacquinet on this procedure,

The impression we had of the pupils in the first week of class and the mood they manifested were generally satisfactory.

Today we must examine whether the following two weeks confirm our observations, whether they confirm the progress (of the pupils) or whether we must modify our first impressions (JACQUINET, 1901b, p. 9).

However, this examination should also start from two other questions: "1. Do we succeed in establishing discipline in the class, leaving the disciples free? If not, what are the methods we use? In this passage, there is another purpose for the exams, beyond that initial questioning with the aim of investigating the apprehension of knowledge and the awakening of the "scientific spirit": there was also an interest in the discipline of the students; examining the children presupposed, moreover, to evaluate their behaviour. The school assumes the position of moral regulator and promoter of new habits in childhood, not only focused on the transmission of scientific knowledge. It is curious that the answer to the first question raised by Jacquinet is a true treatise in defense of the discipline and authority of the teacher in the process of formation of these children. This highlights the dilemmas of the Modern School in Barcelona, which found itself in a dubious territory, wanting, on the one hand, insistently to spread the importance of an education by/for freedom, and, on the other, unveiling its disciplinary intentions with the justification that they would be a necessary evil for the improvement of the formative process of the children. As a rule, two dimensions present in the pedagogical theories at that time, and that Jacquinet herself denounced their inconsistencies and incoherence between the theoretical prospections of the educational renovators and the pragmatism of the reality in the school environment.

To the first question we shall reply that experience has once more shown the great distance that exists between theory and practice; liberal education is excellent on condition that it is carried out with discernment; if one really wants children to become free, one must begin by making them understand and know their duties, and to accept the discipline of work (JACQUINET, 1901b, p. 9).

Although there were some notes on examinations and interrogations aimed at measuring the "intelligence" of the children, everything indicates that in this first phase of the Modern School in Barcelona, the period when Jacquinet was in the leadership (1901-1902), the concerns inherent to the examinations of the students agglutinated behavioral and disciplinary criteria¹⁰. Nevertheless, Clemence Jacquinet, with the intention of guiding the teachers for this type of examination, prescribed a long orientation in the Boletín as to the profile of the students, their "nature" and “character”.

At the prescriptive level, the behavioral criteria are concatenated, framing the students in groups of specific "character", with the clear purpose of educating the wills of the students to a projection rationalized by the headmistress, a subtle form of change of the sensibilities of the students from the performance of the teachers. The students were classified in four categories: "the indifferent, the impulsive, the reflective and the sensitive" (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 6). The prescriptions of the headmistress have their outlines under the discipline and the good conduct in the classroom:

The indifferent, who are neither good nor bad pupils, unfortunately, are the great majority of the school public: they are the docile ones, who go with the flow. If the class is attractive and is led by a few select pupils who lead the others by a good example, the indifferent ones will be good pupils; they will fulfil their obligations, they will not disturb and all their school time will be a peaceful moment. (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 6).

The indifferent pupil is valued when he/she is "orderly", " fulfilling the obligations" and "docile"; however, this pupil, susceptible to be easily persuaded by "bad examples", could become a danger, as pointed out by Jacquinet:

But on the contrary, if they are in contact with colleagues who disagree with duty, they will constitute the crowd of admirers who applaud or imitate all evil.

The indifferent do not know how to want or to do anything on their own; they are the most foul plague of a School, as they will later be the most dangerous part of Society. (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 6).

It is perceivable that the guidelines focused on the order and execution of the tasks in the classroom; even if we do not see the ideal behaviour that the students should incorporate in the understanding of the headmistress, we can infer the attitudes that should not be reproduced - for example, the student being in "disagreement with the duty". Therefore, it was essential for the headmistress that the student was in accordance with the school values such as probity, modesty, decorum, as well as being focused on schoolwork.

But what seems more astonishing is the identification of this category of students with the lack of autonomy, characterizing them as a "plague" for the school and an "evil" for society. Therefore, it seems that the Modern School wanted to stimulate the students' autonomy, to act by themselves and by the will of their own interests; however, in parallel, the headmistress identified customs that should not be practiced and invested in regulating this autonomy. Thus, she acted sometimes regulating behaviours that the students should incorporate so that order was maintained in the classroom, and sometimes manifesting her interest in stimulating the students' own will. Apparently, these interests are ambivalent, which would probably lead us to consider conflicting intentions. However, the headmistress provides us with other indications of the rationalization of the students' exams, clarifying this stance:

The impulsives, very different from the former, follow the movements of a very lively imagination, and are subject to all impulses, to all the demands of pleasure. They are, in general, sincere but unreflective natures, who are never concerned more than with the present moment; but it must be acknowledged that for them even the most arid work may constitute a passing diversion. Their characteristic is inconstancy.

The impulsive person forgets his duty in order to give himself wholly to the game that attracts him. Then, when the pleasure is over, he perceives the consequences of his distraction, and, as he is good and not lacking in self-respect, he fears the deserved repression, and thinks only of avoiding it; then, very often, he resorts to 'troublesome' excuses, thus, after a day's recess, he invariably complains of a severe headache which, according to him, is due to the lesson forgotten (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 6).

It is evident that the headmistress wanted to project behaviour towards what was considered "the right thing", which configured "good" and "correct" attitudes. Thus, impulsive pupils had to be controlled: their irrational impulses in search of pleasure had to be moderated. Excesses had to be regulated for "good" behaviour and "order" to be maintained, besides, logically, keeping the student concentrated on his/her homework. The students who forgot their lessons by being involved in these excesses of fun were considered lazy and should be conditioned to other habits more in line with the school of modernity: habits of a child committed to work, self-centred and moderate in his/her behaviour. Again, in some categories, a moral regulation of the schoolchildren is observed.

The reflective natures are the least frequent, and this is easily seen in the case of children. These pupils need more than all others a well-understood moral education; for nothing is easier, if the family does not fulfil its mission well from the beginning, to modify the most precious dispositions of the intelligence in the most perverse sentiments (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 7).

The headmistress added that her guidelines formulated for this category were established by an ethical dimension. We can ascertain this fact when we observe in the prescription a rhetoric that condemned the students who, taking advantage of their intellectual advantages, practiced cheating, lying and dissimulation. The arbitrary will of a child should be controlled, because this autonomy could attack the moral values and the feelings that the Modern School wanted to enhance in the child. Joy, happiness and pleasure were to be stimulated, but never when they were conquered in such a way as to harm the austerity and good discipline of the classroom, as well as bring harm to other students.

The reflective ones are, unfortunately, the group of hypocrites. For one child whose privileged intelligence manifests itself prematurely and gives generous and abundant results, there will be found fifty in whom all the faculties of attention and reflection will be directed in order to enjoy every possible pleasure, even at the expense of others. The swindle seems to them an act of skill, the enjoyment of which they savour with satisfaction, both for what they achieve, and for the conviction they acquire of their superiority over their companions, and even over the teacher whom they mock, because they consider him ridiculous (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 7).

Nevertheless, in the headmistress' prescription, there were those behaviours that were valued, but not declared as ideal. They appeared as qualities that should be highlighted, an idealism about childhood, presenting the child as a fragile, untouchable and defenseless being. This conception was adopted, for example, with the "sensitive children", who, according to the headmistress, needed a kind and caring intervention from the teacher, in order to gain their trust, emphasizing the good things the child did, stimulating them to do their work in class.

Sensitive children are numerous, and their sensitivity manifests itself in very varied ways. These children are predominantly of a delicate, sometimes sickly, organism. Some are lively and excessive in all their actions; others are dreamy and self-centred; others, lastly, are excessively timid, and feeling themselves strangers in the midst of their companions, are generally,regarded as fools by those who have no desire to know them. Sensitive children need, more than others, to confide in one who will be their guide, because their heart is ready to open to anyone who shows them kindness. It is necessary to observe them, to point out their good qualities, to show them much affection, because this is the only atmosphere in which they will develop and be able to learn the way in which their sensibility will be useful to the general good, while at the same time preventing them from straying into objects unworthy of their attention (JACQUINET, 1901a, p. 7).

All Jacquinet's clarification is in line with the recurrent discourses at that time, i. e., a concern to verify the levels of knowledge and assimilation of scientific knowledge reached by the students, parallel to the attempt to scrutinise the moral and behavioral dimension of childhood, in order to fit the child into a category, implementing new habits and customs based on this idealized childhood model. Despite Ferrer y Guardia's denial of its practices, as previously mentioned, the exams were widely used, and, as we will see in the following, the moralizing content of this practice in the Modern School in Barcelona becomes even more evident.

EXAMINATIONS AND SENSITIVITIES

Even if the records of the examinations are scattered and irregular in this first phase of the Modern School, which is even the period in which one finds the largest number of such records, they give an account of Clemence Jacquinet's efforts in trying to establish a paradigm of examinations to be reproduced by the teachers. However, these same records left a trace that allows us to deduce that these exams were not carried out in the way Jacquinet wanted. The determination of certain practices in the Modern School was not an exclusive decision of Jacquinet; this choice was also shared with the other teachers. The non-observance of the headmistress's orientations was highlighted by Jacquinet herself in an article in the Boletín:

We repeat: we have made a mistake when we do not operate on the spur of the moment.

For a headmistress, all extraneous considerations for the good of her pupils must be rejected.

We therefore beg the teachers of the School to understand our intentions and put them into practice as indicated (JACQUINET, 1902a, p. 75).

The headmistress wanted to get away from the formalities of the classic examinations practiced in other school experiences, but, probably due to pressure or lack of options, she gave up her flexible examinations and developed a type of examination aimed at her main concern, the children's behavior. In this sense, the examinations did not use the categories defined by Jacquinet (indifferent, impulsive, reflective and sensitive); however, the behavioral characteristics of these categories were associated with the children's names. The "Personal Notes of the Pupils" are data that show how the pupils' examinations were carried out. We verify that, in the classroom performance, the examination takes contours of moralization and adequacy of the students to a school routine desired by the headmaster. Grades were attributed accompanied by a qualitative description of the behaviour, which characterized the students between "good" and "bad", and/or described recommendations on how to behave.

Box 1
Students' Personal Notes

Box 1
continuation

Besides this one, another occurrence allows a study of how the exams were mobilized in daily school life. The following passage shows the publicisation of behaviours considered inappropriate and practiced by certain students, who have their names and their misdeeds exposed in the Boletín.

The students Antonio Capdevila, Pedro de José and Dolores Alfágeme should have more willpower. Intellectually they only sleep and this is the cause that does not put them at the level of the other classmates. Dolores Valls, Daniel Compte, Marina Canibell, Manuel Moles, Mauri Montoro, Genoveva Padrós, do well, but from time to time they are distracted. (JACQUINET, 1902c, p. 82).

We realize how relevant Clemence Jacquinet made these characteristics evoked as conspicuous to modern life. In spite of this society of intense advances and progress, by which the experiences passed quickly, as well as the industrialization and modernization processes that occurred in a fast way, impacting the life of the population, this school experience could not have as prospect children "not very applied", "distracted", "lazy", that "work little", "inconvenient" etc. Simultaneously, Jacquinet stressed the good examples that should be imitated: children of "good conduct", "intelligent" and "applied", for example. We see that these characteristics of the students are catalogued together with their grades, a notable evidence of the intention to classify and hierarchise the students into "better" and "worse" and, thus, to distinguish the conducts that should be imitated and those that should be corrected.

The procedure of examining and classifying the students in grades, framing them in better and worse, giving qualitative descriptions linked to morals and behaviour, intended to change the students' sensibilities based on examples to be taken as ideal; such method was inserted in a usual model of school of that period. Boto (2014) provokes us to think about this when he states that: "Saying that the school teaches principles and attitudes also means considering that, from the educational point of view, teaching starts from written texts, but registers, beyond that, the meaning of exemplarity as a fundamental code" (p. 105).

These examples could be stimulated through another strategy. Just as photographs of the students were published in order to praise the good students of the schools in Barcelona, as mentioned above, the Modern School in Barcelona acted in the same way, publishing photographs of the classes with the names of the students and their behaviour and level of commitment to school work, as we can see in the following images:

Figure 2
Image of clases Elementar 2 and Párvulos ¹¹

Figure 3
Picture of the clases Elementar 1 ¹²

Figure 4
Picture of the clases Curso Medio ¹³

Clearly, the Modern School intended to use these images as an emulation strategy for the children to seek a better commitment with the activities and, consequently, to instil this idealised childhood model. The hypothesis that explains such procedure is that it was believed that the exhibition could contribute to the correction of bad behaviour, either by publicly embarrassing the student or by notifying the family.

With the departure of the headmistress Clemence Jacquinet in the second year of the course (1902-1903), the Modern School modified its procedures and began to hold examinations with oral presentations and written work (epistolaries) at the end of the school year, at least for the older pupils in the Clase Superior (9-12 years old¹⁴), as stated in its Boletín.

On Sunday 28th, a solemn session was held to mark the end of the school year. can be compared with the examinations that the schools normally celebrate at that time.

Students of the different sessions (classes) read quite original works, some chosen to be published in this BOLETÍN, which caused admiration from the audience. (BOLETÍN, 1903b, p. 106).

In the following issue, the referred students' writings were published, only the excerpts, to provide the reading public with the educational parameters and knowledge that were being disseminated in that experience. At first, the article insists that the Modern School did not practice this exam procedure for the progression of the students in the defined school grades, even making public some denunciations against this school practice. However, even if he tried to deny it by insisting, what was being held was an event to verify the knowledge of the students in that specific moment, serving as a rite of passage and marking the end of a cycle and the beginning of a new formative journey.

It seems that this would be an important procedure for the Modern School, since, from these exams, the School selected excerpts to be disseminated as "models of thoughts of the good students". I highlight only one of the excerpts: "A Nation or State, in order to be civilized", said a 12 year old student, "must suppress the following”:

1st Co-existence of the poor and the rich, and as a consequence, exploitation.

2º The militarism, a method of destruction used by some nations against others, due to the poor organization of society.

3º Inequality, which allows some to rule and command and forces others to humiliate and obey.

4º Money, which makes the rich subjugate the poor. (BOLETÍN, 1903c, p. 1-2).

One notices that, at that moment, there was a change in the focus of the exams in the Modern School, with less concern with the conduct and behaviour of the students, to then focus on ideological questions. In the previous passage, traces of anarchist ideology are evident in the student's thought, which are revealed in his anti-militarist and anti-capitalist criticisms. And this is not by chance, because many of the textbooks used by the Modern School emphasized in their contents anti-authoritarian principles coming from the anarchism (anti-capitalism, anti-militarism, anti-clericalism, etc.), as some studies have already shown (MURO, 2009; PRADO DA SILVA, 2021). This shows what was being valued as to the content to be assimilated by the students at that moment. This ritual of exams with oral presentations and epistolaries lasted until the closing of the Modern School (1906), serving as the final event of the school years (BOLETÍN, 1903d, p. 37-39; BOLETÍN, 1904, p. 1-5; BOLETÍN, 1905, p. 1-3).

FINAL CONSIDERATIONS

Therefore, with this change in the Modern School, it is verified that the study about school exams reveals the hierarchization of knowledge, showing what the school institution in modernity intended to teach childhood, launched as primordial in its educational project. Looking into the issue of the exams made it possible to extract what was fundamental to the pedagogical agents for the formation of this idealized childhood; and, when observing the exam practices at the Modern School in Barcelona, this becomes apparent, being clearly perceptible the selectivity of those virtues or knowledge that were underlined in the records about the exams published in the Boletín. This fact shows that the Modern School took different positions regarding the use of the exams, mainly about what it wanted the children to learn from their studies: at one time there was a greater concern with order and discipline in the school environment, at another it was concerned with transmitting critical, ideological knowledge, notably of anarchist inspiration (anti-capitalist, anti-militarist, etc.), which the children should assimilate. The Modern School showed itself faithful to what it believed to be the purposes of its education: to break with the capitalist ideals and all the ideology that exalted the institutions considered by it as authoritarian, such as the State and the Catholic Church. These exams were a good parameter, for they showed what the Modern School believed to be the ideal of its teaching, which contents and knowledge the students should acquire, which thoughts should be appropriated by the other students, etc.

Faced with the disciplinary concerns apparent in the sources, I see a certain pragmatism of Jacquinet, in the sense that the orderly and disciplined model of childhood, idealized by her, would favour the "school efficiency", since the child would be willing to concentrate on school work, resulting in a greater assimilation of the knowledge transmitted. Whether it was right or not, the practice of exams in the Modern School in Barcelona reveals an evident power game between teachers, as well as between teachers and students. As for the latter, certainly, the sources do not allow us to uncover their acts of resistance and disagreement with such procedures; however, it was possible to verify that the fragility of the uses of the exams by that time was such that the teachers themselves felt at ease to break with the guidelines of the director Jacquinet and stipulate their own evaluative rituals. These uncertainties and flexibilities leave an important question to think about when we look at schooling experiences and movements of innovation and pedagogical reform throughout history: were these procedures invoked as modern, new or innovative, regardless of the order - theoretical or practical - transformations that brought improvements to the different pedagogical models that had been disseminated? Certainly we cannot answer this question hastily, so it is a pertinent question to be asked when we face our investigations about the History of Curriculum.

In view of the above, we can state that the examination was a record of daily school life and reveals the level to which the groups and subgroups of the pedagogical agents intended to reach with the educational process they stipulated. Examination gave what (to whom) was being measured a certain degree of importance. For that, it was necessary to select what was important to be measured, to provide value judgement on what was being measured, to finally categorize and classify it in a hierarchical way. But also, with the examinations, there was a direct action on the bodies, on the ways according to which childhood should behave. In short, the examination was used both as a way of categorizing and classifying the students and as an instrument of regulation, with the intention of modifying the children's behaviour or reinforcing those considered appropriate.

Preprint

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1590/SciELOPreprints.2605

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• SOUZA, Rosa Fátima de. Inovação educacional no século XIX: a construção do currículo da escola primária no Brasil. Cadernos CEDES 20, n. 51p. 9-28, 2000. Disponível em:https://doi.org/10.1590/S0101-32622000000200002 Acesso em: São Paulo: Editora UNESP Fundação
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• SOUZA, Rosa Fátima de. Templos de civilização: a implantação da escola primária graduada no Estado de São Paulo, 1890-1910. 1 ed.São Paulo: Editora UNESP Fundação, 1998.
• TEIVE, Gladys Mary Ghizoni. Grupo escolar e produção do sujeito moderno: um estudo sobre o currículo e a cultura escolar dos primeiros grupos escolares catarinenses (1911-1935). Revista História da Educação, v. 13, n. 29, p. 57-77, 2009. Disponível em:Disponível em:https://seer.ufrgs.br/asphe/article/view/28927/pdf Acesso em: 07 jul. 2021.
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• 2
  In this paper, I propose to analyse, in a deeper way, a little explored dimension of the experience of the Barcelona Modern School and that concerns its daily school life. Therefore, I will not focus on clarifying the history of this educational project, the main actors who contributed to its implementation, the general assumptions that underpinned its pedagogical practices, etc. However, I will leave some important references that deal significantly with the history of the Modern School in Barcelona and its founder, Francisco Ferrer y Guardia. See: Solà I Gussinyer (1978); Muro (2009); Gonçalves (2009); Velázquez Vicente; Viñao (2010); Cappelletti (2012); Prado da Silva (2015).
• 3
  As an example, Michel Foucault, in "Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison" (2013), approaches the subject and states that: "The examination combines both the techniques of the hierarchy that watches and those of the sanction that normalizes. It is a normalising look, a surveillance that allows to qualify, classify and punish. It establishes a visibility over individuals through which they are differentiated and punished. This is why, in all devices of discipline, the examination is extremely ritualised" (p. 146). And he adds, warning: "But who will make the most general, the most vague, the most decisive history of the 'examination' - its rituals, its methods, its characters and roles, its games of questions and answers, its systems of notation and classification? It is that in this minute technique a whole domain of knowledge and a whole kind of power are involved. [...] But does not its own technology, that small operative scheme so widespread (from psychiatry to pedagogy, from the diagnosis of illnesses to the hiring of labour), that familiar process of examination, implement, within a single mechanism, power relations which allow knowledge to be obtained and constituted?" (FOUCAULT, 2013, p. 146). Some of the aforementioned studies are based on Foucault's analysis. The French philosopher is an important reference for the theoretical foundation of investigations on the theme. However, I understand that a more dialectical approach is fundamental, because it would be limiting to reduce the exam practices as being only a process of punishment, domination and/or control device, as some have emphasized. I have tried to show throughout the article, through an empirical investigation of the prescriptions and practices of the examinations, that their uses were also intended to award, dignify and commend the students; a negative as well as a positive dimension emerges from the examinations, becoming a sophisticated strategy for the transformation of sensibilities. For this reason, I emphasise empirical research, in order to understand the notion of the examination and the ways in which it was operationalised, through sources originating in that context, in which the Modern School in Barcelona was immersed.
• 4
  This congress, when compared to the previous one in 1882, had an important repercussion. It was able to congregate, according to the official minutes, 2,292 participants. The event was attended by delegations from 16 American and European countries. Among the main topics discussed were debates on the problems and measures of educational innovation in Primera Enseñanza, as well as strategies for the expansion of female education. It is also worth noting that the Congress was organised by El Fomento de las Artes, an important workers' association in Madrid, together with intellectuals and pedagogues, of which I would highlight the name of Rafael Labra, at the time Rector of the Free Institution of Education, being the president of the Congress; and Pedro Alcántara Garcia, who was director of the pedagogical periodical La Escuela Moderna (1891-1934) and diffuser of Frobelian ideas in the country, who acted as president of conclusion of the event's acts. To learn more, see: Poza (2007).
• 5
  The Institución Libre de Enseñanza was one of the main educational references in the last quarter of the 19th century and spearheaded the pedagogical renewal movement in Spain. Founded in 1876 by a group of professors expelled from the University of Madrid, it was consolidated as a project that endorsed pedagogical innovation policies, besides being a faithful propagandist of the "New Pedagogy" and diffuser of school experiences around the world through its Boletín de la Institución Libre de Enseñaza (BILE). See: Jimenez-Landi (1996).
• 6
  The Cossío systematized a questionnaire with ten questions answered by the delegates of the different countries; nevertheless, it is important to clarify that there was more than one member in the delegation of the countries present, namely: France, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Netherlands, England, Scotland, Sweden, Russia, Italy and Portugal. For this reason, depending on the delegation, there may be more than one answer in the questions prepared by the pedagogue. In any case, I will explore only those that are of interest to the reflections that I am undertaking in this research; however, it is possible to access this questionnaire published in two issues of BILE (COSSÍO, 1894a, 1894b).
• 7
  Those delegates who responded that the decision was not the exclusive preserve of the teachers were those from Switzerland, Italy, Russia, and one of the English delegates. The case of the English delegation underlines the fact that the uses of examinations were an extremely fragile procedure at that time. The delegates themselves were not convinced of their use, they lacked information about school experiences in their own countries, and contradictions in their answers became apparent - and this was frequent not only with the English, but also with other delegations. This can be explained perhaps because some of the delegates were not primary school teachers; most of them were directors of Normal Schools (teacher training colleges) or university professors, which justifies the lack of information on the part of these representatives.
• 8
  These were the grades, series or clases that divided the primera enseñanza in the Modern School in Barcelona.
• 9
  This becomes clearer when we analyse the exams over the school years and observe that the mobility of students (advancement or retrogression) through the grades of the primeira enseñanza occurred independently of the end of the school year; ie, there were transfers of children to other grades in the course of the school year. This has been the case with students Ramón Girones, Manuel Monés, Antonio Capdevilla, José Valls and Gustavo Sainz in the first year of their course (1901-1902), all transferred in the transition from April to May. It is important to note that the school years in Spain began in October and ended in June, which allows us to confirm that these pupils were transferred to other classes without taking into account the end of the school year, making us assume that this mobility of children between grades was independent of the end-of-course examinations (BOLETÍN, 1902a, p. 75-76; BOLETÍN, 1902b, p. 82).
• 10
  In fact, discipline and good behaviour were fundamental criteria for the headmistress Clemence Jacquinet, given that, in the same article, she explained that one of the pupils was expelled from the Modern School for indiscipline: "Unfortunately we cannot gloss over this fact. Our first month in class was also hallmarked by an act of severity: the expulsion of a pupil. The measure, though severe and painful, was necessary" (JACQUINET, 1901b, p. 9).
• 11
  “They are advanced in their studies: Aurora Fontecha, María Molinas, A; Amorós, F. Abad, Marina Montoliu, Miguel Pons, J. Sainz, Ramón Gironés, Abrahán Petit. They apply: Virgilio García, Joaquina Torres, Daniel García, Carmen Arenys, Mariano García, María Goytia, Aurea Canibell. Not as applicable: Vicente García, Mercedes Pons, Juan Armengol, Enedina Petit
• 12
  ¹² "On good behavior: A. Solana, Ida Montoro, Juan Cebamanos, Yaroslawa Turka, José Goytía, F. Alfagemes, E. Lasausa, Andrés García, Jaime Creus, E. Tormo, José Berché, Ismael Petit. Students below the minimum standard required: D. Soulé, A. Abad, F. Badía, J. Tormo, A. Amador, María Ruiz, T. Closa, J. Garriga, G. Sainz, Carmen Pons, José Valls, Micaela Pons, C. Reales".
• 13
  “The pupils Mario García, Enriqueta Ortega, Pedro Ortega, María Ruizcapilla, Enrique Reales, Manuel Moles, José Boyer and Juan Carmany satisfactorily completed their lessons. Marina Canibell, Genoveva Padrós, Dolores Valls, Daniel Compte, Manri Montoro and Pedro de José also worked, but not as hard as the aforementioned co-educators. As for Dolores Pons, Rosa Pons, Antonio Capdevila, Francisco Costa and Dolores Alfageme, we recommend a little more application. We reiterate to the most capable and high energy students to help their less intelligent and above all weak-willed friends”.
• 14
  These events were attended by older students, from 13 to 16 years old. I suppose that they were students in teacher training, a degree that the Modern School had developed since the first year of school, in 1901.

• Note: The translation of this article into English was funded by the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Minas Gerais - FAPEMIG - through the program of supporting the publication of institutional scientific journals.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  22 July 2022
• Date of issue
  2022

History

• Received
  30 Aug 2021
• Accepted
  03 Feb 2022