Proponents of Special Education

Jean Marc Gaspard Itard (1774-1838)

French physician and educator Jean Marc Gaspard Itard was one of the earliest teachers to
argue that special teaching methods could be effective in educating disabled children. Between
1801 and 1805, Itard used systematic techniques to teach a boy, named Victor, how to
communicate with others and how to perform daily living skills, such as dressing himself.

Eduard Seguin (1812-1880)

In 1848 French psychologist Eduard Séguin, who had studied with Itard, immigrated to the United States
and developed several influential guidelines for educating children with special needs (ex. Mental
retardation). Seguin’s education programs stressed the importance of developing independence and
self-reliance in disabled students by presenting them with a combination of physical and intellectual
tasks.

Maria Montessori (1870-1952)

Montessori education is a flow experience; it builds on the continuing self-construction of the child—
daily, weekly, yearly— for the duration of the program. Although Montessori schools are divided into
multi-age classrooms: parent infant (ages 0 to 3) preschool (ages 3 to 6) lower and upper elementary
(ages 6 to 9 and 9 to 12) middle school (ages 12 to 14).The prepared environments introduce an
uninterrupted series of learning passages, a continuum. The "prepared environment" is Maria
Montessori's concept that the environment can be designed to facilitate maximum independent learning
and exploration by the child.

Ovide Decroly (1871-1932)

“The school will be located wherever is the nature, wherever life is, wherever the work is". In 1901,
Decroly founded a school for children with mild disabilities (behavioral disorders, learning disabilities,
light mental retardation). He gradually invented his pedagogy. In 1907, he founded a school for
“ordinary” children with the same pedagogy.

Dr. Anne Moore (1910)

“My study of the situation in New York convinces me (1) that the horrors attendant upon
feeblemindedness have in no way been exaggerated; (2) that the condition is neither circumscribed or
local: . . . (3) that there is a crying need for concerted action toward control of the situation. “ Realize
that the feebleminded are a menace to our present day civilization and that the problem of caring for
them can no longer be safely ignored. They agree that the defect is often hereditary and incurable, that
it leads to poverty, degeneracy, crime and disease.”
Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)
Rousseau publishes his Emile, a book about the education of children. According to Rousseau, learning
should happen in agreement with a child’s cognitive speed, with minimal outer stimuli from society,
which is known for praising social roles, and wealth. This idea of teaching children in their own pace set
the ground for many educators (Johnston).

Charles Michel L’Epeé

He was one of the pioneers in the 18th century in what concerns the education of the disabled. In 1760
he founded the first public school for people with disabilities in France. He was concerned with language
and phonetics being taught in a different way as a tool for the education of deaf and blind students.

Valentin Haüy
He founded the “Institution Nationale des Jeunes Aveugles” in 1784, which is recognized as the first
school in the world for the education of blind people. Haüy was inspired by many people: Rousseau,
L’Epeé, and Madame Von Paradis, who was blind, and helped him develop the methods used in the
school. Using these methods, Haüy was able to educate a blind boy who later became a teacher in the
same school (Safford 38-46)

Rev. Thomas Gallaudet

Gallaudet implemented the first school for the deaf in 1817. The school was called American Asylum for
the Education of the Deaf and Dumb, and it is nowadays the American School for the Deaf.

Samuel Gridley Howe

Howe was interested in the education of blind students, and in 1829 founded the first school for blind
children in the United States. The school nowadays is called the Perkins School for the blind, and it is
located in Massachusetts. Howe also was the founder of the Massachusetts School for Idiotic and
Feebleminded children in 1848.