Abstract
The "New School" in Interwar Czechoslovakia in Zlín - Ideas, Protagonists, Places deals with interwar school reform as an issue in the context of Zlín, a "company town" determined by the development and needs of the Baťa Shoemaking Company. This "new Zlín" became a "social laboratory" where, through planned, rationalized production and the use of modern technology and scientific research it should have been possible to create "new industrial man".
This study is divided into two parts. The first part consists of three chapters that put school reform in interwar Czechoslovakia into the wider framework of "life reform" and societal reform (first chapter).
Subsequently, the roots of school reform in the Czech pedagogical discussion before 1914 and in the years 1918-1928 are referenced. The importance of positivism and the empirical pedagogy tradition ("Child Study") in the Czech pedagogical discussion for the reform of the school curriculum after 1929 is also observed (second chapter).
Last but not least, the starting points of the school reform in Zlín are observed within the context of rationalism and scientific management (third chapter). The second part analyzes the pedagogical starting points of the Zlín experimental schools and their pedagogical principles of reform - individualizing teaching and learning, differentiating pupils into groups, interconnecting subjects (interdisciplinarity), using active learning methods, and using the project method.
Furthermore, pedagogical tools supporting the development of school democracy - such as pupils' self-government, school gatherings, clubs or workshops, a student magazine, social assistance of pupils to their classmates, as well as the cooperation between the experimental school, parents and the wider community - are analyzed (fourth and fifth chapters). In conclusion, the study reflects on how Baťa's company's interests were served in public education and deals with the pedagogical autonomy of the educational reform program in the experimental schools belonging to this "city of reform".