Séminaire – Doctoral Interdisciplinaire d’histoire et philosophie des Sciences (DISc )

Thomas Berthod (SPHERE, UPCité) : Introduction

• Maya Raulot-Dinh (CHCSC – EST, Université Paris-Saclay) : The textbook, a source for understanding secondary physics teaching

Used by both teachers and students, the textbook as a medium for knowledge and methods, contributes to the acquisition of a scientific culture. At the crossroads of multiple injunctions – scientific, institu- tional and editorial – this pedagogical tool appears to be a rich source in the history of subjects teaching, functioning as an indicator of evo- lutions and continuities in several spheres. Although work has been carried out on physics in secondary education, it has mainly focused on an institutional approach, with little study of the precise content of teaching. This presentation aims at exploring the teaching of an elec- tricity lesson on Ohm’s law by making use of a micro-corpus of text- books (1910’s-1930’s). We will question the aims of science teaching as proposed by the 1902 reform of boys’ education and the 1897 pro- grams for girls’ education. This micro-corpus will be designed as a test-sample in an attempt to produce – in part – a global analysis grid that can eventually be applied to a substantial corpus of textbooks co- vering the 20th century.

• Agathe Rolland (LDAR, UPCité – LinX, Ecole Polytechnique) : Finding a group in a haystack

Group theory is a branch of abstract algebra which has been included in the program for the agrégation de mathématiques, one of the French exams to become a mathematics teacher in secondary school, in 1957. Although a cornerstone of French mathematics education, very little research has yet been conducted on the content of this exam. This presentation will explore the position occupied by group theory, in relation to other mathematical content, in jury reports bet- ween 1950 and 1990. The aim will be to grasp what kind of know- ledge the jury expected from future teachers, regarding a theory dee- med abstract and difficult by university students.

• Elisa Dalgalarrondo (SPHERE, Cité du Genre, UPCité) : Taking the entrance exa- mination to get access to the mathematics division of the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Jeunes Filles de Sèvres (1953-1959)

Until 1985, the French institution Ecole Normale Supérieure de Jeunes Filles de Sèvres offered a higher education training in mathematics for women who had passed the entrance examination. Each year during the 1950s, a few dozens of « young women » passed a very selective examination to enter this school and get access to a demanding training in mathematics. In this talk, I aim at questionning the processes of selection to enter higher education institutions as a way to understand the mathematical environment proposed in such a school. Who were the students selected by this exam? What did the students who didn’t pass it become? What were the requirements for these students? How were these exams organized? By focusing on jury reports, application files and examination subjects from 1953 to 1959, I intend to explore those questions.

• Clément Cartier (SPHERE – UPCité) : The Education of a 14th century Abbot: Ri- chard from Wallingford to Saint Albans (1292–1327)

Richard of Wallingford was born probably in 1292. Orphan at the age of 10, he was sent to Oxford by William of Kirkeby in 1309. He stu- died there untill 1327, with a small interruption between 1315 and 1318 when he was ordered priest in St Albans Abbey. After 15 years spent in the university, he finally became Abbot for this same Abbey, where he built an impressive clock that made his name for the follo- wing generations. How did his training prepare him to become the Ab- bot and clockmaker he was known to be? What did he learn in Ox- ford? What did he learn before that? How did he study? Armed with the limited sources available, let us try to follow the path of this blacksmith’s son, from his birth in Wallingford to his stays in Oxford, to shed light on how he came to build instruments and to write trea- tises about them, and to think about the historiography of education in ancient times.