This article is aimed at examining papers presented on the 2nd Congress of School Hygiene and Physiological Education held in Paris in 1905, as a result of the initiative of the Guild of Physicians and Families for School Hygiene. We aim at verifying the representations about childhood and education produced on the field of school hygiene in a period marked by intense social transformations, important reforms focused on the universalization of the elementary school, diffusion of ideals for the pedagogical renovation and modernization, as well as for the meaningful growth of concerns for childhood and children's protection and education. Therefore, we have selected papers that approach issues linked to the institutionalization of medical inspection of schools, and mechanisms of data collection obtained by means of individual students examination. The analysis of the papers presented in this forum highlights disputes that determined the project's constitution of a scientific pedagogy based on the knowledge of the laws that ruled child's development.
Childhood; School Hygiene; Pedagogy