Petrie remarks on the way in which pedagogues' training enables them to be confident about using their personal judgment, rather than the more typical UK approach of relying on procedures, which often cannot accommodate individual circumstances.
The irony is that just as the UK begins to grasp something of the rich idealism of the concept of pedagogy, Denmark is beginning to import the Anglo-Saxon preoccupation with value for money and measuring effectiveness. The reforms the Danish government has been proposing may seem mild by UK standards, but they have provoked fierce resistance from pedagogues, who see it as the beginning of a slippery slope. There have been demonstrations by students, claiming that the government is "killing Danish pedagogy."
Much of the controversy centers on the issue of how to evaluate the work of pedagogues. Watch a pedagogue at work, -- as I did in a forest kindergarten (the children play in the forest all day) near Aarhus -- and it's the spontaneity and self-effacing way they facilitate group play that is so striking. How do you measure that?
Karen Prins, a senior lecturer at Frbelseminariet, says: "Someone asks a pedagogue what they did all day and they reply that they played a football match with homeless people. But people say: `Anyone can do that. Why do you need to study for a degree for three-and-a-half years?' It's very hard to defend and justify the skills of pedagogy."
Her colleague, Christian Aabro, adds: "We have never been able to measure what we do, and we used to just trust the professionals. Now value for money, proof of what works, are new concepts for us and there's a lot of admiration for the UK model in education and social work."
Petrie counters this by pointing out that pedagogy produces some obvious outcomes that can be measured and on which the UK scores very badly. She says: "Being a pedagogue is a very popular job -- even in areas such as residential care -- and they retain their staff."
The sense of pedagogy under scrutiny has even reached the peaceful Josephine Schneider House, and Hirtshals has felt forced to take a stand. He says: "All the policies and paperwork take the pedagogues away from time with the children. Now the council has asked us to do a questionnaire with the children on how satisfied they are living here, and I've refused. It's wrong. Children are not asked to assess their parents, so why should they assess this place? I don't mind questionnaires of older children who have been here, and we have had researchers do studies of them."
Hirtshals believes there is a point of principle at stake. He argues, after 20 years of running the home, that there are important things about human beings and relationships that you can't measure, and that it is absurd to believe you can.
The question now is whether the UK is going to learn more from Denmark, or Denmark learn more from the UK.
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