Pere Verges: School and Gamification in the Early 20th Century

The pedagogue Pere Verges is a symbol of the New School in Catalonia. His model, which was focused on the students' interests, was aligned with the modernized school, in contrast with purely memorization-based education. It thus focused on autonomy and the child's self-management of the entire learning process. The pedagogue found play useful in guiding students towards this educational philosophy. Hence his gamified use of education. Based on the ideas of deschooling and liquid pedagogy, this study reflects on and questions the meaning solely of the child's freedom that Verges promoted based on this environment. Using a methodology based on the analysis of different texts by the pedagogue and his students, we examine the ludic value of the model and study its educational possibilities. The research is based on an in-depth analysis of secondary sources related to way play is treated in education. The results show the high motivation of the proposal and the fostering of certain values worth bearing in mind when incorporating ludic-competitive and student-managed models into the 21st-century school.