Abstract
Education as a deliberate activity and purposive process necessarily involves mediation, in the sense that the educator mediates between the child and the world. This can take different forms: the educator may function as a guide who initiates children into particular practices and domains and their modes of thinking and perceiving; or act as a filter, selecting what of the world the child encounters and how; or meet the child as representative of the adult world. I look at these types of mediation (or aspects of the mediating role of the educator) at the hand of the work of John Dewey, Martin Buber, Hannah Arendt, and Richard Peters. The purpose of this paper is to explore the bearing that the mediating role of the educator—as interpreted by these authors—has on the role wonder may play in the educational process. I suggest that initiation highlights the familiarizing function of wonder, and is most readily associated with inquisitive wonder; representation draws attention to the defamiliarizing role of (in particular contemplative) wonder, as well as to its world-affirming role; and selection (the educator as ‘filter’) foregrounds the distinction between momentary and dispositional wonder.
Highlights
Education as a deliberate activity and purposive process necessarily involves mediation: the educator mediates between the child and the world
From an Arendtian perspective the main question is: does wonder withdraw from, or rather attend to the world? While I recognize the former as a real possibility, my purpose in this paper is to explore the bearing that the mediating role of the educator has on the role wonder may play in the educational process
This can take different forms: the educator may function as a guide who initiates children into particular practices and domains and their modes of thinking and perceiving; or act as a filter, selecting what of the world the child encounters and how; or meet the child as representative of the adult world
Summary
Education as a deliberate activity and purposive process necessarily involves mediation: the educator mediates between the child and the world. Piersol recognizes that wonder can lead to questioning and to the exploration of new and newly imagined possibilities, as well as involve appreciation of the beauty and mystery—the extraordinariness— of the world. Both are connected through the notion of mystery: the world is always more and other than we thought. The point I wish to draw attention to in this article is that it is not just the educator’s skill that matters here, but that the potential role of wonder in education depends on how we interpret the role of the educator as mediator between child and world Wonder keeps the world interesting, stirs the imagination, and makes learning more meaningful (Trotman 2014, p. 29; cf. Hove 1996, p. 58), but as Trotman notes, ‘the capacity to generate and sustain wonder will always be in the hands of the skilful educator’ (ibid., p. 34). The point I wish to draw attention to in this article is that it is not just the educator’s skill that matters here, but that the potential role of wonder in education depends on how we interpret the role of the educator as mediator between child and world
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
