The pedagogical relation refers to special kind of personal relationship between adult and child or adult or student for the sake of the child or student. The pedagogical relation is described by Hermann Nohl, Klaus Mollenhauer, and others in the Northern European human science pedagogical tradition. It has been discussed more recently in English by Max van Manen, Norm Friesen, Tone Saevi and others..
In the pedagogical relation, adult and child encounter each other in ways that are different from other relationships (e.g., friendship)
In a text from 1933, educationist Herman Nohl describes the pedagogical relation as a relationship between a particular stance of the educator in relationship to the one being educated (educand):
This basic stance … is decisively characterized by the fact that its perspective is unconditionally that of the educand. This means that its task is not to draw the child towards … specific, predetermined, objective goals that it might see … [in] the state, the church, the law, the economy, and also not of a [political] party or worldview. Instead, it sees its goal in the subject and his/her physical and personal realization or unfolding (körperlich-geistige Entfaltung). That this child here comes to his life’s purpose (Lebensziel), that is [its] … autonomous and inalienable task. (p. 152)— Herman Nohl
The pedagogical relation, finally, has as its interest not necessarily the "success" of the student, but rather their "subjectivation"--their becoming a subject, a person, something that is to be pursued as an end in itself.
Biesta, G. (2012). No education without hesitation: Exploring the limits of educational relations. Keynote address to the Society for the Philosophy of Education. Philosophy of Education. Retrieved from
Friesen, N. (2017). The pedagogical relation past and present: experience, subjectivity and failure. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 49(6), 743-756.
Nohl, H. (1933/2019). The Pedagogical Relation and the Community of Formation. Unpublished translation by Norm Friesen and Sophia Zedlitz.
Original source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedagogical relation.
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