Collection of School Equipment and Paraphernalia

The Collection of School Equipment and Paraphernalia has existed as a separate Museum collection since 2011. It contains more than 1,500 items created between the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the twenty-first century. These include school furniture (desks, chairs, teacher’s desks, cupboards), school bells, school flags, school bags, signet-rings from old schools and teaching and pedagogical associations, school awards and medals, school uniforms, badges, personal belongings of teachers and other objects testifying to school life in the past two centuries.

The Collection is also heterogeneous with respect to the different nature of the items, their dimensions and materials of which they were made, as well as their intended purpose. Items have been collected through donations or purchases from various manufacturers of school equipment, from schools and other teaching, pedagogical and cultural institutions and associations, as well as from individuals, including eminent teachers, pedagogues and children’s authors.

The Collection of School Equipment and Paraphernalia therefore has an historical, educational and partly artistic significance and is a valuable source for studying the history of the school system. As it also continually collects contemporary items, it has a documentary function as well. The Collection also provides materials necessary for reconstructing the atmosphere of classrooms characteristic of specific periods in the development of education – from the old classroom of the nineteenth century to the application of first computers in education and the first computerised classroom in Croatia.

Sanja Nekić, MA
Senior Curator and Archivist