This book defines and galvanizes a new approach to education through refocusing it on human relations. Following on the heels of lackluster accountability- and choice-based reforms, this approach suggests that meaningful educational change depends on recognition that relations between students and teachers and among students are critically important. Stakeholders must create intentional policies and practices that allow the relational side of education to flourish. Focusing on the PK-12 educational system, Pedagogy of Relation provides support for the claim that relations are the basis for successful learning—that education is a profoundly social activity—and to push educational reform in a new direction.
Introduction Part I: The Dark Matter of Education Part II: Educational Relations Part III: The Pedagogy of Relation Part IV: Post-Reform Education Conclusion
Biography
Alexander M. Sidorkin is Dean of the College of Education at California State University Sacramento, USA.
"Alexander Sidorkin offers a bold and original take on the state of education today. Why do education reforms and innovations so often disappoint? he asks. Because they neglect the essence of education: that it is a fundamentally relational and not a means-ends endeavor. This challenging book explores the question of relationality, what it is, and why it is essential, both because relations between teachers and students, and among students, are basic to learning, and because fostering relations with others is itself a central aim of learning. Sidorkin provides specific strategies for what he calls "a pedagogy of relations." This book is sure to make you think."
Nicholas C. Burbules, Gutgsell Professor of Education Policy, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA
"Alexander Sidorkin’s Pedagogy of Relation needs to be read, especially now. He shows us where schools should go. Schools, Sidorkin proves, will not get better unless they focus on relationships. He documents how schools have tried too long to "improve"—yet they haven’t! Schools have tried too long to ready students for an economy that no longer exists. If schools focus more on relation, it will be good for education and good for the economy to come. Sidorkin’s book is international in scope and refreshingly philosophical in its approach."
Charles Bingham, Simon Fraser University, Canada
"This book is perfect for an airplane, comfortable chair, the beach or quiet spot on the grass in the quad. It draws on a wide range of sources from several disciplines and makes a strong case for re-centering education on human relation. This volume questions the last two decades of education reform and moves away from its narrow data-driven policy and false forms of accountability. Will you accept its call for a relational turn in education to redefine education and address its endemic problems?"
Julian Vasquez Heilig, Dean and Professor of Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation, University of Kentucky, USA
"In this immensely readable book, Sidorkin presents clear and compelling reasons for turning education towards the relation, its core root. Sidorkin deftly discards educational cliches and moribund assumptions like reformism and job-readiness without messianic triumphalism or apocalyptic threats. The pedagogical relation emerges as both a counterproposal for our times and as a fundamental theory of education for all times."
Samuel D. Rocha, Associate Professor of Educational Studies, University of British Columbia, Canada
