Strange pedagogical relationships in an unprecedented educational setting. Reflections on education in times of pandemic

Abstract

This essay is based on some reflections generated by the analysis of stories from students attending higher education institutions. They arise from a narrative inquiry about the pedagogical relationships of authority and the relationships that students establish with formative knowledge. On this occasion, we address only a part of the information obtained and its interpretation, which are linked to the pedagogical relationships that are developed in remote emergency education environments. In this social context of exceptionality due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the school population has not attended classes since the beginning of the school year, and both teachers and students have had to develop our practices confined to our homes. As part of an educational policy aimed at guaranteeing the right to education, and in order to sustain “pedagogical continuity”, it wasdecided to implement distance or remote education through the use of new technologies.We, the teachers, have been assuming the pedagogical political commitment that concerns us, and we have had to transform the teaching originally thought and organized to be delivered face to face to a non-face to face mode, especially using digital technology.In this work, we reflect on the pedagogical relationships that unfold at the higher education institutions, as part of the actions to ensure pedagogical continuity. We will focus on the senses that, in pedagogical relationships, the presence of the subjects acquire, the interactions that they establish and the mediations that are deployed in remote education practices in virtual environments.