(CZ) Jan Svoboda — průkopník a tvořivý pokračovatel Komenského v době předbřeznové
(EN) Jan Svoboda – a Pioneer and Creative Follower of Commenius in the Pre-March Period

Svoboda’s Kindergarten is an important document of the beginning and developing pre-school and elementary school practice in the Czech lands as well as of the way in which the author followed Comenius and applied his principles in practice. The kindergarten at Hradek as designed for little children whose parents had to go to work away from their homes, but it was not a place where the children were just looked after, it was also a place where they received the most elementary schooling. Svoboda achieved this by an ingenious system of play on the one hand, and on the other hand by a planned extension of the children’s knowledge, whereby he gradually and organically supplemented and extended their education taking into account the possibilities of their age. He proceeded empirically from what the child knew from its immediate neighbourhood, adding further knowledge to this basis. Some subject-matter was supplemented with suitable nursery rhymes, and songs, drawing and games, and it was all connected in such a way as to make up a uniform and properly organized whole. Hand in hand with instruction went moral education, too: Svoboda did not use moralizing words and lectures, but the moral tendency always emerged inconspicuously from the subject-matter as its integral part; furthermore, the children under his guidance were led to take care of their health, the basic hygiene and were told how to avoid accidents. In this process of schooling, moral education and care for one’s health, which in Svoboda’s conception are merged so as to make up a uniform whole, Svoboda follows in the footsteps of Comenius, following and developing in practice especially those principles which Comenius laid down in his ≫Informatorium of the Nursery School≪. A number of analogies can be pointed out between the two writings: care for health and regimen, training for work through play, prompting the children to be moderate in their eating habits and clean, to be hard-working, obedient, polite, truthful, and cultivating* the principles of the child’s honour. Svoboda elaborated methodically what Comenius had outlined as a scheme. In full accord with Comenius’ ideas, Svoboda’s practice consists in supplying the child with fundamental knowledge about the realm of minerals, flora and fauna, with the necessary knowledge about human body, the child is trained in geometrical notions and ideas, in the knowledge of numbers, weights and measures. At the same time the children’s activities are under constant guidance, children are guided to work by play, their language is also being cultivated, they are taught to pronounce and express correctly what they understand. Svoboda’s process of schooling and education is characterized by perfect concentration of subject-matter and character training, such as recommended by Comenius. He always proceeds from a view, then he goes on, also visually, to extend factual knowledge, while systematically paying attention to inter-relations among things. Then he passes on to the moral lesson joined by a verse or song and followed by a game, which is always connected with the subject-matter covered. Jan Svoboda appears in his ≫Kindergarten ≪ as a creative follower of Comenius, being his first follower in the Czech lands after 150 years. He not only studied and understood all the ideas of Comenius, but he also put them in living practice. Under his influence the first Czech school of methodologists came into being. It included his younger collaborators as well as elementarists from Amerling’s Budeč. Even today his book is still vivid, interesting and useful.