tandfonline.com – Teaching at the margin – Didaktik in the sphere of attention

ABSTRACT

Attentiveness is a crucial aspect in the practice of teaching. As teaching always is teaching about something, ideas, values, events, or objects, it both draws and forms the attention of the students. When contemplating on and looking into the term “attention”, it is apparent that it is not at all, a clear and well-defined concept. Acknowledging the relational aspects of teaching and its role in the formation of attention, the article seeks to turn away from psychologically, behaviorally, and cognitively based (or biased) perspectives that frame attention as either an individual capacity of the student or an expected student behavior in the classroom (Rytzler 2017). It also seeks to contribute to discussions of philosophy of education, where questions about uniqueness, otherness and subjectivity are seen as aspects of attention (c.f., Ingold 2001, Todd 2003, Lewis 2012, Rytzler 2019). In the article is suggested that a phenomenological account of attention adds nuances to an educational understanding of attention, as it comes to life (or not) in the lived practice of teaching. The main purpose is to show how teaching as attention formation, is a relational activity that builds on thing-centered and formative activities that take place in a domain that is both ethical and political but, first and foremost, educational.