Este texto analisa o uso do espaço e de objetos escolares no ensino da Geografia a partir da perspectiva de Carlos Delgado de Carvalho. Para esse mestre, de formação francesa, adepto das teorias de Ratzel, apresentar o Brasil através dessa disciplina era uma missão cívica. Para tal, idealizou gabinetes nos quais recursos científicos foram utilizados para romper com os métodos de ensino de seu tempo, que se baseavam no verbalismo. O estudo dessa arquitetura e de seus objetos, a partir de uma perspectiva etnográfica, revela características da cultura material escolar da década de 1930.

This article examines the use of space and school objects for the teaching of Geography, based on Carlos Delgado de Carvalho's perspective. According to this lecturer, who had a French academic background and followed the theories developed by Ratzel, it was a civic mission to present Brazil through Geography. With this purpose in mind, he projected chambers where scientific resources were used to promote a rupture with teaching methods adopted by his contemporaries, which were grounded on verbalism. The study of this architecture and its objects, when carried out from an ethnographic perspective, discloses characteristics of the material culture adopted by schools in the 1930's.