The Reception of New Education in Spain by means of Manuals on the History of Education for Teacher Training Colleges (1898–1976)

The influence of the New Education Movement in Spain throughout the twentieth century is examined here because the reception of the educational ideas and the teaching practices of an avant‐garde international movement are of inherent interest in the history of education. Among the many routes such an introduction might take, the authors will look in detail at the specific case of manuals on the history of education for teacher training colleges: given the lack of media and travel facilities of the time, such manuals were the principal – and at times the only – means of knowing of the existence and the importance of the New Education Movement for primary‐school teachers, particularly during the first half of the twentieth century. Between 1898 and 1976, one can distinguish two significant periods, 1898–1939 and 1939–1976, and two different programmes in each of them. Two different types of history of education manuals within these periods were studied: principally, the textbooks written specifically on the subject by Spanish authors, almost all of whom were lecturers at teacher training colleges, but also manuals by foreign authors that had been translated into Spanish, a total of some 60 books. As some of them had second and third editions, more than 80 volumes were examined. First a straightforward bibliometric study was conducted to record the presence or absence of information related to the New Education Movement in each volume. Once these data had been gathered, the authors proceeded to a qualitative analysis. This approach was used in order to be faithful to the data and the way of thinking of the institutions represented. Also considered were the critique and the type experienced, the complete or incomplete conditions (taking into account, of course, the nature of the compendium of each manual), whether the author is strictly aware or not of the pedagogic and ideological influences of the book, of the capacity of synthesis in the presentation, of the half‐truths, etc. It is concluded that Spanish primary school teachers, at least during their initial training, had to wait several decades before being informed of the New Education Movement. Moreover, for political and ideological reasons, the first information they received was negative and portrayed these innovations as opposed to sacred patriotic and religious values and the correct way to educate children. Only in the 1960s did this movement and the different viewpoints associated with to it became an official subject in the history of education

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