<p>This paper analyzes various attempts at integrated education, with the main focus on the period from 1918 to 1931 in the Soviet Union. At this time the full force of a totalitarian state was employed in the attempt to teach in a precisely “integrated” manner, with the use of so-called “complexes,” which were regarded as having a direct connection to real life. Mathematics educators put forward many objections against this approach, but their criticisms remained unheard by the reigning powers until there arose a need for the effective implementation of the project of industrialization. At that point, complexification (integration) was declared to be a left-leaning unrealistic fantasy. This paper also touches on the question of how the most gifted schoolchildren were educated under such conditions. In the author’s view, a historical approach makes it possible to see certain phenomena and problems that are relevant to contemporary debates.</p>