On the history of developmental education: characteristics of the main concepts
This article attempts to examine, from a systems-anthropological perspective, the fundamental concepts of developmental education, which have defined three main directions in the development of both Russian and global education: natural, free, and rational child development through learning. The direction of natural development is represented by the concepts of I.G. Pestalozzi and I.N. Ostretsov; free development – by John Dewey and O.S. Gazman – A.V. Khutorskoy; the theory and methodology of rational development is examined based on the works of V.V. Davydov, V.V. Repkin and D.B. Elkonin. Based on a deep historical and theoretical analysis, it was concluded that, ultimately, domestic approaches to developmental education for the general school system proved unsuitable and, in their substantive development, a dead end, precisely because they contradicted the basic anthropological principles of child development.
While nobody left any comments to this publication.
You can be first.
Davydov, V. V. (1996), Teoriya razvivayushchego obucheniya [Theory of developmental learning], INTOR, Moscow, Russia (in Russ.).
Dewey, J. (1922), Shkoly budushchego [Schools of the Future], translated by Landsberg, R., Rabotnik prosveshcheniya, Moscow, USSR (in Russ.).
Elkonin, D. B. (1976), Kak uchit detey chitat, [How to teach children to read], Znaniye, Moscow, USSR (in Russ.).
Gazman, O. S. (1996), “Pedagogy of Freedom: The Path to a Humanistic Civilization of the 21st Century,” New Values of Education: NVE, Krylova, N. (ed.), Moscow, issue 6, 10-37 (in Russ.).
Khutorskoy, A. V. (2011), “School of Free Development”, Vestnik Instituta obrazovaniya cheloveka [Bulletin of the Institute of Human Education], 1, (in Russ.), available at: https://eidos-institute.ru/upload/journal/2011/Eidos-Vestnik2011-118-Khutorskoy.pdf?ysclid=mn8e6fsdqz405976121 (Accessed 10 October 2025)
Leontiev, A. A. (2003), "Educational program "School 2100"", Obrazovatelnaya sistema «Shkola 2100». Pedagogika zdravogo smysla [Educational system "School 2100". Pedagogy of common sense], collection of materials, Leontiev, A. A. (scientific editor), Russian Academy of Education, Moscow, Russia 130-131 (in Russ.).
Leontiev, A. A. (1997), “Our place in the system of developmental education”, «Shkola 2000…»: Kontseptsiya i programmy nepreryvnykh kursov dlya obshcheobrazovatelnoy shkoly, [“School 2000…”: Concept and programs of continuous courses for comprehensive schools], BALLAS, Moscow, Russia, issue 1, 18-20 (in Russ.).
Ostretsov, I. N. (2002), Vvedeniye v filosofiyu nenasilstvennogo razvitiya [Introduction to the Philosophy of Nonviolent Development], Complex, Rostov-on-Don, Russia (in Russ.).
Pestalozzi, I. G. (1989), in: Comenius, J. A., Locke, J., Rousseau, J.-J. and Pestalozzi, I. G., Pedagogicheskoye naslediye [Pedagogical Heritage], comp. by Klarin, V. M. and Dzhurinsky, A. N., Pedagogika, Moscow, Russia, 298-390 (in Russ.). EDN: VZGZBB
Repkin, V. V. (1999), “Formation of educational activity in primary school age”, Nachalnaya shkola [Primary School], 7, 19-24 (in Russ.).
Rubinstein, S. L. (1957), Bytiye i soznaniye: O meste psikhicheskogo vo vseobshchey vzaimosvyazi yavleniy materialnogo mira [Being and Consciousness: On the Place of the Psychic in the General Interrelation of the Phenomena of the Material World], Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Moscow, USSR (in Russ.).
Shtets, А. A. (2025), “Russian concepts of developmental learning of initial writing in the first half of the twentieth century”, Research Result. Social Studies and Humanities, 11 (1), 58-74, DOI: 10.18413/2408-932X-2025-11-1-0-6
Shtets А.A. (2023), “Developmental education in Russian alphabet literature of the 19th century”, Research Result. Social Studies and Humanities, 10 (1), 29-39, DOI: 10.18413/2408-932X-2024-10-1-0-3.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1934), Myshleniye i rech: psikhologicheskiye issledovaniya [Thinking and speech: psychological studies], Kolbanovsky, V. (ed.), Sotsekgiz, Moscow, Leningrad, USSR (in Russ.).