Abstract
(Fe) The laboratory for pedagogy situated 36 Rue Grange-aux-Belles, in the tenth district of Paris, provides all the information needed to run classes of retarded pupils. It is open to primary school teachers and to all those who want to learn practically how to measure the level of education and of the intellectual level for admission to classes designed for improvement. It also provides educational consultations for parents of children struggling with the learning process.
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Notes
- 1.
When one compares Vaney’s description here, it is quite clear that he uses the terminology in a quite different empirical direction than Binet (see quotations before from Modern Ideas about Children). As it would be historically incorrect to “adapt” Vaney’s text to Binet, Vaney’s version is kept here. Binet was much less pejorative in his attitude regarding the children.
- 2.
TN: Édouard Séguin (1812, Clamecy, France—1880, New York, USA) physician and pedagogue also known as “Idiots’ Teacher”.
- 3.
TN: Bicètre and Salpetrière were two mental institutions in Paris (see footnote 11).
- 4.
See footnote 29.
- 5.
TN: Jules Ferry’s laws (1882) made the public school mandatory for all children male or female from 6 to 13 years old.
- 6.
Sollier, “Idiot and Imbecile’s Psychology”, Paris, Alcan.
- 7.
TN: “lesson de choses”: Object teaching. It is a theory in education developed at the end of the 19th century (Oswego movement). The student was supposed to acquire an abstract idea or concept from a real object. It is based on the “intuitive method”.
- 8.
Binet and Simon, Abnormal Children, p. 39.
- 9.
Binet, “Modern Ideas about Children”, p. 284.
- 10.
NT: The process of loading a gun in the 18th century was tedious with many steps involved. Vaney here probably suggests to divide any activity into very small steps.
- 11.
For example, here the studied letters in the 1st lesson of a brand new method: t, e, ê, é, è.
- 12.
NT: Actually, in French rules for the helping verb “to have” are complicated with several exceptions.
- 13.
TN: “Voilà the lesson!”.
- 14.
See TN 21.
- 15.
TN: Actually, in the A. Binet’s time it was something really unusual. They were the first existing slide shows also called the “magic lantern”.
- 16.
A. Binet: “Modern Ideas about Children”, p. 154.
- 17.
TN: The ronde-bosse is a process of sculpture where the material to sculpt is on a separated base.
- 18.
TN: It was the situation at the time of A. Binet. In 1944 the French National Education, implemented a program based on a cycle of 3 academic years where students could learn a profession, and be “industry ready”.
- 19.
TN: Vaney use the French adjective “gauche”. The meaning of this adjective in Vaney’s text could not be read in any consulted bilingual dictionary. However, this adjective exists in the spoken language of French speaking machinists. It is a surface based on a three dimensional geometry.
- 20.
Author’s comment: There was a long standing tradition in France of teaching geometry by stone cutting, developed and introduced by Gaspard Monge (see Lawrence 2015). Probably Vaney is indirectly referring to this. He is clearly underestimating the effects of such teaching. It lays the foundations of scientific concepts with hapts and enacts (see for example Siemsen and Reschke 2013).
- 21.
TN: The title of Binet is “Control of Education”. The concept of control in English includes an action which doesn’t exist in the French idea.
- 22.
TN: The translation of the control card is not done, because considered like not relevant.
- 23.
TN: This school is the one for boys only. Therefore there is no graph for girls’ progresses.
- 24.
TN: brand of pencils with different types of qualities for people studying graphic arts and still existing today.
- 25.
TN: no reference or description found for this kind of chalk.
- 26.
TN: Vaney refers to the book of Jean-Marie Guyau (1854–1888) “Preparatory Year for Current Reading, Moral, and Usual Knowledge” Paris, A. Collin, 1884, 216 p. Jean-Marie Guyau was a French philosopher and moralist influenced by stoicism. His writings also influenced Friedrich Nietzsche. Guyau wrote a couple of scholarly books.
- 27.
TN: The town of Epinal in France has the reputation to produce idealistic and artistic religious images.
- 28.
TN: Soldier in a French army corps formed with men coming from North Africa, and having a special uniform.
- 29.
TN: Famous French monument, and tomb of the Unknown Fallen Soldier, Place de l’Étoile, in Paris.
- 30.
TN: French monument made to celebrate the battle of Austerlitz and Napoleon victory (1805).
- 31.
TN: The number of syllables in English does not match the one in French.
- 32.
TN: Vaney writes “students raise their right hand”. During the first part of the 20th century the French educational system was forcing left handed children to write with their right hand. Generally, left handed people were discriminated.
- 33.
TN: Vaney uses an indefinite pronoun at the beginning of this sentence. Therefore, it is not clear who writes the number and the grade. It can be either the student or the teacher. The following sentence suggests it is the student, since the teacher double check results.
- 34.
TN: Weights in cast iron and weights in brass did not have the same shape.
- 35.
TN: Order of the syllable and word.
- 36.
TN: Game developing manual and movement coordination skills by tossing a disk on another disk or a target.
- 37.
TN: Vaney does not specify what is this activity or game. However, it is possible that the game used a crossbow or a fake gun or rifle, propelling a stick of wood with sucker pat at its extremity. The propulsion is given by releasing a compressed spring with the trigger and the “arrow” becomes stuck by suction on a smooth target.
References
Lawrence, S. (2015). Capital G for Geometry: Masonic lore and the history of geometry. In: S. Lawrence & M. McCartney (Eds.), Mathematicians & their Gods (pp. 167–190). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Siemsen, H., & Reschke, C. H. (2013). Can one learn to think like Drucker? Lessons in personality and management education. Management Research Review, 36(8), 767–787.
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Siemsen, H., Testelin, J., Martin-Hansen, L., Siemsen, K.H., Andrieu, B., Fèvre, JM. (2017). Historical Article by Binet and Vaney. In: Transforming IQ into “Orthopédie Mentale“. SpringerBriefs in Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51994-4_2
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