With the Revolution, French considerations on pedagogical mobility undergo a radical change of orientation. From 1789 and for the next decade and a half, the idea that educational travel should be an individual endeavour seem to disappear almost entirely from public debates. In the eyes of revolutionary zeal, individual travel can seem suspicious, and justified only if carried out with the aim of developing the nation. Thus, when Girondin politician Brissot de Warville publishes his American travels (narrating a trip undertaken before the outbreak of the Revolution), he opens his Preface with a disclaimer: while he acknowledges that this is not a time for travel and travelogues, he indicates he decided to publish his own because of the immediate and important lessons that the new France can learn, as it is taking shape, from the American experience.

However, while individual travel is decried in this period, we witness the emergence of a series of programmes introducing various forms of educational travelling practices that can be described as ‘collective’. It is tempting to interpret this important switch as a manifestation, within this particular field, of the general orientation of contemporary French pedagogical discourse, with its increased emphasis on public education. However, the scope of this sudden interest in collective mobility probably goes beyond this. The emergence of these forms of travel, forms that we are tempted to call forerunners of our modern ‘school trips’, is at the confluence of several traditions, ambitions and even necessities. This chapter will argue that, in more than one respect, collective travel at this time was also the continuation of pre-1789 practices – de facto practices that were not discussed in prescriptive discourses or otherwise. At the same time, it is certainly regrettable that works on the ‘art of travel’ have so far systematically avoided discussing any programmes and regulations for collective practices, denying any continuity between early modern arts of travel and many Revolutionary (and post-Revolutionary) ideas on travel. There is no valid reason for these programmes to be excluded from the corpus of ars apodemica.

This chapter will first address two pre-Revolutionary elements leading to the emergence of collective educational travel practices during the Revolutionary period: the question of school holiday activities, emerging mostly from practices in Jesuit collèges, and the tradition of educational promenades.