Diferenças individuais : contribuições dos estudos de Alfred Binet para as reformas educacionais de Minas Gerais (1925-1940)

Abstract

The thesis analyses the circulation, in Minas Gerais, of studies about individual differences proposed in Alfred Binet, between 1925 and 1940. This period was marked by the teaching reform in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. In the 1920s and 1930s, the country meant to change itself based on education. In other to reach this objective, there were government efforts resulting in the creation of a training program for teachers and education technicians. Educational reforms were based on the Escola Nova movement, which sought to renew and structure the teachings and methods under a new way of conceiving the idea of “child”, their development and full adaptation to society. The study was based on Alfred Binet’s works, such as Psychologie Individuelle (1895), L'étude experimentale de l'inteligence (1903) and Les idées modernes sur les enfants (1909) and articles published in the Revista do Ensino de Minas Gerais. Theoretical references are the History of Sciences, in dialogue with the studies of educational press, and the concepts of intellectual (SIRINELLI, 2003), ant appropriation (CHARTIER, 2002). The results show that the Revista do Ensino, official periodical press in Minas Gerais for diffusing the principles of educational reform, contributed for the wide circulation of Binet and collaborator’s studies; specially his researches related to mental fatigue, the importance of hygiene and healthy eating, the mental orthopedic to “normal children” as well as for the “abnormal” ones. We found that these themes materialized in proposals for the individualization of teaching by organizing classes with same intellectual capacities. Teachers’ speeches, in the Revista do Ensino, reflect their believe in getting together students with the same capacities, with the “right” teacher, in order to make classes more interesting and productive for all. That could solve school system’s problems, and indicate the appropriation and the enthusiasm with the psychological scientific knowledge in production in that period.