The intuitive teaching method and the educational policy of Benjamin Constant

Abstract

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.14244/19827199836

The purpose of this study was to investigate the innovations that emerged from debates about public instruction in the educational reform made by Benjamin Constant in the late Imperial and early Republican governments in Brazil. This study aims to understand, historically, the educational phenomenon of intuitive teaching in the educational policies of Benjamin Constant in Brazil. To this end, we sought to establish the educational concept that permeates the writings of the intuitive teaching method, in relation to their theoretical predictions, in order to emphasize the teaching model proposed by the politician for the organization of the national public school. The bibliographic search is based on the Ordinance 981 of 08 Nov 1890 (BRASIL, 1890), and on laws and regulations that advocated the educational reform by Benjamin Constant. The following works were also relevant sources used in this study: Machado (2002), Silva (2008), and Valdemarin (2004). In the Republican period, Benjamin Constant Botelho de Magalhães was responsible for continuing the Public Education Reform. However, the discussion of a reform that would define the application of modern methods in teaching didactics was necessary. Nowadays, this article assists the understanding of the reforms meant that Benjamin Constant to public education at the early Republican government in Brazil, besides the understanding of how these educational traces, together with the dissemination of the intuitive teaching method for all classes, designed the organizational structure of the present Brazilian school system.

Keywords: History of education. State and education, History of the  intuitive teaching method.