Sarmiento. Revista Galego-Portuguesa de Historia da Educación
Sarmiento. Revista Galego-Portuguesa de Historia da Educación is a yearly journal that is published by universities of A Coruna, Vigo and Santiago de Compostela. It was released as Sarmiento. Anuario galego de historia da educación until volume 20 (2016), and it adopts its new name in 2017. Published papers focus on whatever aspect of history of education in Galicia and Portugal, but this journal also accepts other of geographic field wider (Spain, the world lusófono, Europe, etc) from approaches (historical, economic, sociological and so on) that help to get a better knowledge and understanding of that one.
Universidade da Coruña, Universidade de Vigo, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela
Committed church and socio-community education in Galicia 1965-1985
Since the mid-sixties of the twentieth century, and as a consequence of the impulse provoked by the Second Vatican Council, occurred in Galicia, over the course of about twenty years, many initiatives in the field of social and community education promoted by the most dynamic and committed sectors of the Catholic Church. These were initiatives that were carried out, mainly, from a model of organization called "Christian communities of base", meaning by such small groups of people who shared faith within their daily life usually in depressed or marginal contexts both of rural Galicia and of urban emerging at the time of so-called developmentalism through relationships of mutual support, living their religious commitment on the margins of conventional orthodoxy.
Copyright (c) 2026 Xosé Manuel Malheiro Gutiérrez
Educational historical heritage in women: objective and sensitivities
Patrimonio histórico educativo en femenino: objetos y sensibilidades, constitutes a key reference work for the History of Education from a gender perspective. The volume proposes an innovative reading of educational heritage through material culture, combining historiographical analysis, critical reflection, and literary evocation. The chapters that compose the book form an atlas of sensibility that reveals, through multiple voices, how everyday objects -such as sewing kits, school textbooks, or toys- functioned as educational devices transmitting social, moral and identity-related values. The work makes visible the living and learning conditions of girls and women, denouncing their exclusion from official narratives and reclaiming memory as a tool for historical justice. Its interdisciplinary and museological approach contributes to redefining the concept of educational heritage, positioning it also as an affective and symbolic space. The book thus becomes an exercise in restoring women’s educational experience and an invitation to reconsider the History of Education from new interpretative frameworks
The seed of the Free Institution of Education
We are approaching the 150th anniversary of the creation of the Institution Libre d'Enseignement (almost in the nineties of its dissolution after the military coup) and there are always new research papers, such as the one presented here, that address some of the multiple aspects of this educational institution. And as stated in the Prologue, he comes to add to the «magma of books, scientific articles, pamphlets, summaries of conferences that make up his rich bank of manuals and productions on one of the most addressed topics by the scientific literature of the history of education, culture, philosophy, the Spanish politics of the contemporary age».
About three illustrious women: Rosalía de Castro, Concepción Arenal and Emilia Pardo Bazán; three illustrious men: Feijoo, Sarmiento and Vicente del Seixo; two events: the debates that took place on women’s education at the Ateneo de A Coruña in 1859 and at the Hispanic-Portuguese-American Pedagogical Congress held in Madrid in 1892, and two historical processes: women’s access to school and teachers; the author is shaping the discursive framework on the central thesis of the work: "The need to educate women was justified historically by considering their role as educating mothers." In the elaboration of the seven chapters that make up the book, professor #De Gabriel manages with fluency, rigor, relevance and even affection, the numerous and diverse sources used. Each chapter is an antidote to the fragmented, decontextualized, prescient and superficial content that abounds, and, in the face of the disrepute of knowledge, its intellectual ambition in the search for truth becomes evident.
The history of pedagogical museums in the early 20th century: an approach to the work of Benjamin R. Andrews
Benjamin R. Andrews was a professor of home economics for many years at Teachers College, Columbia University. However, he began as a doctoral student, charged with establishing its Educational Museum, utilising the collections and artefacts the institution had assembled from exhibitions organised in previous years. Andrews then wrote his doctoral dissertation on educational museums. For the first time, the United States conducted comparative research among these institutions, both within their context and globally. This paper analyses Andrews's figure, the academic setting in which he wrote his work and a selection of texts from the published book.
The school city of Corunna: a civil engagement between the useful education and the university campus
The aim of this study is to analyse the effort of the city of Corunna for having its own educational centres since the 17th century, which was reinforced in the second half of the 19th and first half of the 20th century, when the commercial and enlightened bourgeoisie demands spaces to locate the Nautical and the Business Schools, the Teachers’ Training School and the Secondary School, until consolidating the project of a School City. The qualitative methodology is based on the interpretation of technical reports, specialized literature and newspaper archives. It is concluded that the singular effort of Corunna to have educational centres adapted to the needs of a merchant and maritime city was prolonged for political and social-economic reasons and was consolidated with the model of a School City unique in its design and precedents; which, at present, struggles in a complex civic commitment between the useful education and the university campus.
Copyright (c) 2026 Vázquez Ramil; Porto Ucha
The Pedagogical congress of 1923 in Lugo through the press. Between the pedagogical and the ideological controversy
This work addresses the review of the genesis and development of the Pedagogical Congress held in the city of Lugo in october 1923, fundamentally based on documentary analysis of the press of the time. For this purpose, the general written press, especially the local press has been reviewed, as well as other specialized publications. The social and academic impact it had is examined, as well as the dissemination and treatment given to it in different publications. In this way its development and its social and academic impact are described.
State of schooling in Ortigueira (Galicia) in the 1920s through the school memoirs of its teachers
This article focuses on the analysis of the administrative reports on school life prepared by Ortega teachers in the mid-1920s—during the Primo de Rivera dictatorship. These are quite detailed reports referring to the schools of 17 localities regarding their teaching practices during the school year: reports that teachers were required to submit to the Local Boards and Primary Education Inspectorates. Their reports also include quantitative and qualitative data on their students and suggestions for improving education both within their own area and more generally. All of this provides a general overview of how education was conceived in rural areas of Galicia during this period and how teachers implemented it in their schools.
Copyright (c) 2026 José Manuel Suárez Sandomingo
A Strategy for extending schooling amongst urban populations: upper primary education, 1919-1926
The article is motivated by a series of questions, aiming to shed some light on the role played by upper primary schools during the period in which they operated (1919-1926). I will start, however, with the end of the experiment. That is, by the moment when the abandonment of this education sector was announced, some personalities from the educated elite are demonstrating in favor of remaining in it; they demand, above all, a bet on the technical sections. Subsequently, based on a set of empirical materials, I will seek to provide context for the opinions conveyed in the case of upper primary education. I will devote special attention to the definition of the school network of this sector of education (1920). For example, in considering the technical sections, has the network taken local realities into account? In the last section of the article I try to understand until point the higher primary education brought school and vocational training closer.
Copyright (c) 2026 Carlos Manique da Silva
School and childhood museums in Portugal and Galicia (report)
An informative tour on the existing museum resources in relation to the world of childhood and of schools in Portugal and Galicia. Different institutional realities and diverse social impulses are shown undertaken to enhance the material heritage that shapes the footprints of childhood and the schools.
Copyright (c) 2026 Carla Vilhena, Tomás Vallera, Antón Costa Rico
Museum, bodies and knowledge: from the margins of educational heritage to epistemic justice
The article proposes reading the Gabriela Mistral Museum of Education as a public device for knowledge production that opens audibility conditions for subjects historically silenced. Returning to Spivak’s question, "can the subaltern speak?" , shifts the emphasis from declarative participation to concrete regimes of voice, mediation and authorship. It does not "make talk", dismantles institutional ventriloquisms and fabricates documented enunciation scenes by listening, attribution and responsible archiving with traceability. From the experiences of the museum, it shows how bodies, objects and archives operate as critical devices that make embodied knowledge visible, replace subaltern trajectories, and enable a situated policy of epistemic justice. At the intersection of educational history, critical museology and memory pedagogy, it offers criteria and methods to reorient the role of educational museums in contexts of inequality. The contribution is verifiable: stabilizing procedures that prevent voice substitution and sustain discrete but replicable transformations.
Copyright (c) 2026 María isabel Orellana Rivera
Luigi Bombicci Scientific Didactic Museum in Bologna and the Italian Context
The attention of Italian educational historiography in recent focused on school materiality, and on didactic museums. Born in the late nineteenth century within the framework of European pedagogical positivism, they spread in Italy especially following the pedagogical trips of ministry officials abroad and the translation of foreign works particularly significant for the understanding of objective teaching, from which arose the opportunity for specific collections of objects for its implementation in school classrooms. This contribution will focus on the case of the circulating didactic museum established in the city of Bologna by the Society of Teachers of the Province of Bologna together with Luigi Bombicci, a professor of mineralogy at the University: born in 1884, it continues to exist today as a teaching classroom of the Municipality of Bologna, open to schools and the general public.
‘Luigi Bombicci’ circulating didactic museum.
﻿Museu de l’educació de Catalunya: a dream for the future
The Museu de l’Educació de Catalunya initiative is supported by more than 60 notable individuals and institutions from the education sector in Catalonia. The aim of the project is to preserve the educational heritage of Catalonia and to contribute to the development of education museums internationally by offering a uniquely Catalonian perspective on universal themes such as pedagogical innovation, bilingual education, cultural resistance and the construction of identities through education. The network structure of the museum makes it a museum of museums, and reflects the community-based, participatory approach at its core. In addition to preserving educational memory, the museum aims to build on the pedagogical project initiated by the pioneers of education in Catalonia to create an education system that is open to the world, innovative, inclusive, democratic and at the service of the people.
Promoter group of the Catalan education museum
Copyright (c) 2026 Grup impulsor del Museu de l’educació de Catalunya
School heritage in the Swiss canton of Vaud and its musealization: between memory, pedagogy and innovation
This article traces the history and development of educational heritage in the Swiss canton of Vaud and its school museum, inaugurated in 1901. The study explores the museum’s origins and development into the School History Documentation Centre, and the creation of the Vaud Foundation for Educational Heritage (FVPS) in 2000. The article analyses the current activities of the FVPS, which has evolved into a research centre, its role in the preservation, dissemination, and enhancement of educational heritage, and digital projects, such as the development of a unified portal to access heritage data and virtual learning environments for secondary education. The Vaud experience illustrates how local heritage can become a springboard for pedagogical and historical reflection on a larger scale.
Vaud Foundation for Educational Heritage
﻿Louis Jacques Brunet Natural History Museum: The historical, scientific, and cultural heritage of Pernambuco since 1855
Founded in 1855, the Louis Jacques Brunet Museum of Natural History is located at the School of Reference in Secondary Education Gymnasium Pernambucano (EREM Ginásio Pernambucano), on the banks of the river Capibaribe, in Recife. The museum houses a collection of approximately 7,000 items and is named after its founder, the French naturalist Louis Jacques Brunet, who taught Natural Sciences at the Pernambuco Gymnasium between 1855 and 1863. Contracted by the provincial government, Brunet organized a scientific collection for educational purposes, intended for the school museum of the institution. It is an important reference for researchers, students and the community in general, playing a fundamental role in the preservation and dissemination of the scientific heritage of the region of Pernambuco. It also stands out as the only natural history museum of the 19th century still in operation in the state, reaffirming its historical, scientific and cultural importance, both in the regional and national context.
Copyright (c) 2026 Maria Agrecia Oliveira & Virgínia Ávila
Every museum is a school; without museums, there can be no school: The educational experiences of the National Museum of Ancient Art in Portugal (1924-1964)
The National Museum of Ancient Art is one of the most important museums in Portugal and the repository of a trove of religious art and ornaments acquired following the dissolution of the monasteries in Portugal in 1834. This article examines the institution’s promotion as a centre of art studies from the 1920s onwards by the art historian and future director of the museum, João Couto. Couto was appointed director in 1938 and served for 24 years. Among other educational initiatives, he and the artist Madalena Cabral created the so-called Children’s Centre, which influenced the emergence of similar educational extension services at other museums in Portugal. The analysis examines the creation, expansion and consolidation of the Children’s Centre, from the beginning of Couto’s collaboration in 1924 to the end of his association with the museum in 1964.
The museums of education in Spain: A future for our past
The presence of education museums in Spain has increased greatly in recent years owing to thegrowing interest in historical-educational heritage. In Europe, education museums vary greatly in terms of both name and narrative. This article examines the cultural turn in educational historiography in Spain and the growing focus on material and non-material school objects. The study proposes a typology of museums in Spain, including their main characteristics, functions, narratives, activities and heritage focus. Finally, the analysis reflects on the future of these museums as a resource for teaching, research, transfer of knowledge to society, and educational and cultural innovation
Copyright (c) 2026 Paulí Dávila Balsera, Luis Mª Naya Garmendia
School heritage: Educational legacy in the spotlight or a marginal dimension of the musealization of everyday life?
Educational heritage is a recognized area of research among both historians and museologists. While many countries have a longstanding tradition of national pedagogical museums dating back to the 19th century, in countries such as Portugal, Spain, and Brazil, this initial wave of interest later receded and was only revived in the 1980s. This article explores the development of education museums, including the wide variety of institutional models and terminology, within the broader framework of the musealization of everyday life in contemporary societies, in which school culture plays a significant role. The study highlights the role of History of Education in preparing educators to value and preserve cultural heritage narratives, the limited involvement of central authorities, and grassroots initiatives by teachers to create school museums with the support of local communities and municipalities. The analysis centres on Portugal as a negative paradigm of the phenomenon, and draws comparisons with other countries.
Copyright (c) 2026 Margarida Louro Felgueiras
Since the beginning of the 20th century, a wide and diversified museum movement has developed in most Western countries, including the so-called National Pedagogical Museums. At first they were conceived as meeting, cataloguing and documentation centers, but also, as time went on, as centers for teacher training and dissemination of school legislative information and, in no small measure, didactic and display of furniture, technical resources, bibliographic and other issues related to formal education. In this way they aspired, in the words of their patrons, to become inspiring spaces for educational innovation.
Copyright (c) 2026 Antón Costa Rico, Carla Vilhena, Tomás Vallera
The mother educator: analysis of the psycho-pedagogical discourse on pre-school children in family education magazines (Portugal, 1945-1958)
This work aims to contribute to the understanding of the psycho-pedagogical discourse on pre-school children that circulated in Portugal in the 1940s and 1950s, through the analysis of speeches addressed to mothers, Speeches in two family education magazines - Os nosos Fillos e Saúde e Lar- . Our results show that there is concern about the way in which boys and girls are educated, as well as a belief that education for motherhood would be the solution to problems that mothers were concerned with. In this sense, information on child development is disseminated and mothers are advised on the strategies they could use to know and educate their children, lacking a scientific knowledge about the child and its education, functioning, magazines, as a vehicle for the dissemination of psycho-pedagogical discourse on childhood among Portuguese mothers.
Copyright (c) 2026 Sarmiento. Revista Galego-Portuguesa de Historia da Educación
A teaching memoir: ego-history and democratic education in Portugal
Our place in history is not necessarily that of hero or victim, winner or loser, agent or passive subject-witness. We exist in history as interdependent, interacting beings, contributing professionally and self-realising as people. Time, context, sociability and biography are fundamental aspects of these life stories. This brief ego-history of a teaching life that began in the historical-pedagogical framework existing prior to the Carnation Revolution in 1974 intersects with the vicissitudes and evolution of democratic education in Portugal.
History and education: a personal, selective recollection
This article reconstructs the author’s academic career in the field of History of Education from his training and entry into the profession in the 1960s and 70s up to the present day. The article begins by recalling the author’s early research in the sociology, politics and social history of education, before examining the thematic and paradigmatic diversity, intersectionality and perspectivism of his career as a whole. Finally, the author reflects on his evolution since retiring in 2013, and his recent work on the social history of education.
O Pelouro: a different education for life
O Pelouro in Caldelas de Tui (Pontevedra, Galicia) is an educational institution with a uniquely inclusive approach to education. Its commitment to psycho-pedagogical innovation and integration in collaboration with students’ families has proved a success for over forty years. The aim of this article is to analyse and reflect on the school’s innovative approach to education and its differentiated learning processes, which focus on the practical needs of each child and each child as an individual and creator of their own learning process
Sebastian Pena and the betrayals of memory
Sebastián Pena López (Tabeirós, A Estrada 1885-1971) was a seminarian and emigrant in his youth, a cultural and agrarian activist, a devout Catholic and committed republican, and a passionate, late-vocation teacher. He suffered reprisals and repression at the hands of the nationalist rebels during the Spanish Civil War and subsequently fell victim to the sad internal exile of a historical falsehood based on the confusion in popular memory of his surname with that of a murderous nationalist corporal.
High school education or technical training? Socio-educational strategies of students’ parents in Viana do Castelo (1888-1947)
Technical training was introduced into the educational landscape of Viana do Castelo in 1888 as an alternative to the academic model practised by the local high school, founded in 1853. This article examines the socio-professional distribution of students’ parents in relation to the educational strategy chosen for each child, including parents with children enrolled in both types of education. The study traces the evolution of parents’ choices over the course of three political regimes based on a series of detailed case studies. The research is based on a problematising comparative analysis of two mostly unpublished documentary sources: the enrolment books for each school, and the electoral register of the town.
Schulsozialarbeit: the historical development of school social work in Germany
While social education is gradually becoming more common in Spanish schools, in Germany it has been part of the education system since the 1960s. The aim of this article is to examine the German experience in this regard in order to learn from their successes as well as their mistakes. The study uses a qualitative content analysis of the literature in this area to trace the historical circumstances that led to the introduction of social education and the main features of the discipline. The article also examines the epistemological origins and evolution of school social work (Schulsozialarbeit). The results indicate a gradual overall increase in the professionalisation of social educators based, in particular, on the quality and effectiveness of their work.
A Portela transformed: pedagogy of place in a Santiago de Compostela townland
The aim of this article is to explore the history of a small rural community from the perspective of its pedagogical transformation between 1950 and the present. The study focuses on the townland of A Portela on the outskirts of Santiago de Compostela, examining the material and immaterial assets of that local community and the phenomena of depopulation and neoruralism. The article presents a study of the pedagogy of A Portela within a historical framework in which people live and learn together in a landscape that has been transformed by the encounter between different cultures, the passage of time, changes brought and wrought by new inhabitants, and the return of young people with family ties. The article shows how these transformations have modified the people’s ways of learning while at the same time preserving local memory.
A speech and two reports by the primary school inspector, Manuel Panero Martínez
Manuel Panero Martínez was a primary school inspector in the provinces of Zamora, Lugo, A Coruña and Toledo at the end of the nineteenth century. His writings provide valuable testimony on the situation of schools and teachers in Galicia at the time. This article reproduces a report by Panero Martínez on his visits to schools in Lugo, a speech he gave at the Regional Pedagogical Conference held in Pontevedra in 1887, and a report on a disciplinary case against a teacher from A Coruña.
Antón Costa Rico’s Galician translation of Ernesto Codignola’s Le scuola novo e i loro problemi revives this classic work of pedagogy for a new generation of readers and researchers. Codignola’s text, first published in 1946, revised by Aldo Visalberghi in 1962 and republished again in 1970, will be of great interest to anybody interested in educational renewal and highlights the connections between the New School movements of the twentieth century and recent currents in educational research. Costa Rico’s translation is published by Kalandraka as part of its Biblioteca de Pedagoxía collection
Twelve lives of teachers purged by the fascist authorities, these are those who are accepted in this work that closes a trilogy whose thread is the purification of the Spanish magisterium that begins in 1936 with the fascist uprising before the Spanish civil war. The project, by the hand of Professor Narciso de Gabriel, has been growing in recent years to shed light on that process of unfortunate memory.