This document discusses the connection between phenomenology and pedagogy. It argues that education is a social and cultural process that transforms individuals rather than unfolding through nature. Phenomenology allows us to understand the lived experiences of students and perceive the "pathic knowledge" enacted through a teacher's "tact" - their disposition, attitude, and way of acting and being with students. Tact is developed through experience rather than strict planning and involves maintaining distance to allow student development while sensitively guiding the learning process.

1. Phenomenology & Pedagogy:
what’s the connection?
Norm Friesen
EDCP 585, March 4, 2015

2. M.J. Langeveld, 1983
• “human beings are not creatures of
necessity, but fundamentally open to
transformation.”
• Education is social & cultural; Does not
unfold through nature; occurs beyond it
• Education: “the resolve to bring into being
for the sake of this child and with the help
of this child, all that is essential to its being
human.”

3. There are many possibilities for the newborn
• These “possibilities arise from others, from our
contemporaries and predecessors.”
• Realizing one or more of these “…calls forth the
phenomenon of the helping relationship” between
adult and child…
• …which manifests itself in practical reasoning and
acting in a multitude of social forms, documents, and
institutional practices.”

4. These unreflected practices steer us toward…
• a reflective rethinking of this lifeworld, of this human
being, of this way of being in the world.
• The consequences of education become consequences
which are, or which are to become (for someone), the
lived experiences of the lifeworld.
• We need a way of studying the lifeworld, the helping
relationship of “pedagogy” and its lifeworld
consequences

5. Way of studying the lifeworld of pedagogy…
• In the West, this has been the lifeworld/human sciences
• To speak of the encounter does not mean that we meet
“others,” but it means that we meet “each other”
• phenomenology permits us an understanding of the lives
of those for whom we bear pedagogic responsibilities.
They did not ask for this life and, therefore, they are our
task, our life. (this life not “natural,” but our culture)

6. From lifeworld science to teacher practice
• Phenomenology can bring to our attention pathic
knowledge; it is:
• embodied,
• actional,
• relational,
• situational
• In the context of our pedagogic possibilities & re-
sponsibilities, this pathic knowledge is enacted as TACT

7. The mode of teacher action is tact
• A disposition; an attitude, a way of acting, a mood
• A way of being in the classroom and with students
• The OPPOSITE of: a set of instructions, only following a plan,
what is fully conscious
• Fills the gap between a plan, a lesson and its “execution”
• Comes about NOT through planning and preparation
(although these DO help), but through experience.

8. Herbart: Pedagogical Tact
“In other words, by reflection, reasoning, inquiry…
the educator must prepare not his future action in
individual cases so much as himself, his tone of
mind, his head as well as his heart, for correctly
receiving, apperceiving, feeling, and judging the
phenomena awaiting him and the situation in
which he may be placed. If he has, in anticipation,
indulged in extensive plans, the
practical circumstances will mock him.” (1804)

9. Herbart on Tact
• We must make it our business to free ourselves completely
from the influence of habit, from force of which a father is
inclined to repeat in his son the treatment he received from
his father;
• …a link intermediate between theory and practice. There is,
to wit, a certain tact, a quick judgment and decision, not
proceeding like routine, eternally uniform, but, on the other
band, unable to boast, as an absolutely thoroughgoing theory
should, that while retaining strict consistency with the rule, it
at the same time answers the true requirements of the
individual case.

10. Herbart…
• …inevitably tact occupies the place that theory leaves
vacant, and so becomes the immediate director of our
practice.
• One must tax not even one's memory to carry
constantly the innumerable details which will require
to be observed.

11. A literal & metaphorical POSITION (Herbart, 1804)
• Sage on the Stage: a lecturer or teacher; “directive …presentation”
• Guide on the Side: mentors, coaches, catalysts and guides (King, 1993)
• Leading from afar (Herbart, 1804):
• Well-timed, truthful and patient words
• strength of conduct at the right time
• Give the student security
• then dare calmly leave him to his own development...
• Often consists of holding back and waiting or maintaining a certain
distance so that the student may act for him- or herself.

12. Four expressions of pedagogical tact (Muth, 1962)
• Protection of the distance necessary in the pedagogical relation
• the binding character of teacher speech,
• the naturalness of teacher speech,
• the prevention of harm to the child.
Tact particular to instruction:
• situational confidence,
• dramaturgical capability,
• a gift for improvisation,
• Spontaneity: a willingness to engage in “free forms” of action.

13. “As I am apparently absorbed in completely practical
concerns at the front of the class, my glance is actually
gliding across the class, touching on each student.”
“A thousand perceptions influence me from the
borders of my conscious mind, and effect the
momentum and shape of the lesson. My questions and
answers, broadcast over all heads in the class, only
increases the number of half-conscious impressions
I have, and effect the logical development and
methodical presentation that is the center of my
awareness.” G. Kerschensteiner – 1921

14. Sources
• Herbart, J. F. (1802) Introductory Lecture to Students of
Pedagogy. http://blogs.ubc.ca/nfriesen/files/2015/03/Herbart-INTRODUCTORY-LECTURE-TO-
STUDENTS-IN-PEDAGOGY.pdf
• Kerschensteiner, G. (1921) Die Seele des Erziehers und das
Problem der Lehrerbildung
• Langeveld, M.J. (1982). Reflections on Phenomenology and
Pedagogy. http://ejournals.library.ualberta.ca/index.php/pandp/article/view/14870/11691
• Muth, H. (1962). Pedagogischer Takt.