L’editrice La Scuola e l’educazione infantile ai primi del Novecento. Dalla rubrica per gli asili di «Scuola italiana moderna» alla nascita di «Pro Infantia» nel 1913

This paper explores the role played by the publisher La Scuola, over the first decade of its history (1904-1913), in the field of early childhood education. The first section offers an analysis of the cultural and educational backdrop against which prominent exponents of the contemporary Catholic movement decided, in 1893, to set up a journal for elementary school teachers, «Scuola Italiana Moderna», and, in 1904, to found the publishing house La Scuola. The second section scrutinises the contents of the journal. This line of research indicates that the Brescia-based editorial group was influenced by the newfound interest in early childhood that characterized the turn of the twentieth century. Indeed, beginning in the 1904-1905 school year, «Scuola Italiana Moderna» began to feature a column on the topic of kindergarten education. Such a move reflected the launching, at the beginning of the Giolittian era, of the secular association Unione per le educatrici d’infanzia (Unei) [National Union of Women Infant-School Teachers], and its mouthpiece «La Voce delle maestre d’asilo» [The Voice of Infant-School Teachers], first published in 1904. After illustrating the subject matter of this column over the period spanning 1904 and 1913, the paper proceeds to examine La Scuola’s decision in autumn 1913 to launch a dedicated journal for women infant school teachers, «Pro Infantia». The research presented here sheds light on a feature of «Scuola Italiana Moderna» that had not been the focus of any of the numerous existing studies on the journal: namely, the fact that a full ten years prior to the founding of «Pro Infantia», La Scuola had already felt urgently called to participate in the contemporary political and educational debates surrounding the issue of early childhood education.