Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi

savoir-faire and receptivity, but also and above all to the functioning of the institutions, lying

between the warmth of the family circle and the impersonal state, which is responsible for

establishing self-determining freedom in a living, carefully considered and practical way. Instead of

cradling children in the illusion of immediate democracy, as he had done in the Neuhof, from Stans

onwards, Pestalozzi set about establishing a human social order which came as close as possible to

fulfilling the desires of the individual and catering to the interests of the group, while ceaselessly

striving to surpass itself in action: the children at Stans, although extremely poor themselves, took

pains to make room for those even poorer.

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The various structures of the educational system must therefore be organized in such a way

as to enable the educator, in view of the task that he is called upon to fulfil, to work responsibly and

autonomously in an atmosphere of freedom. Each part of the institutional machinery should serve

the project that sets educational action apart from other human activities, a project intended

basically for a human society coming into being against a background of autonomy within the

teacher-student relationship.