Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (/pɛstəˈlɒtsi/; German: [ˈjoːhan ˈhaɪnrɪç pɛstaˈlɔtsiː] ⓘ; Italian: [pestaˈlɔttsi]; 12 January 1746 – 17 February 1827) was a Swiss pedagogue and educational reformer who exemplified Romanticism in his approach.

His father was a surgeon and oculist who died at age 33 when Pestalozzi, the second of three children, was five years old; he belonged to a family who had fled the area around Locarno due to its Protestant faith.

As a clergyman, he expected to have ample opportunity to carry out his educational ideas; however, the failure of his first sermon and influence from philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau led him to pursue a career in law and political justice.

[citation needed] The ideal system of liberty, also, to which Rousseau imparted fresh animation, increased in me the visionary desire for a more extended sphere of activity, in which I might promote the welfare and happiness of the people.

During the mid-18th century the government in Switzerland condemned Rousseau's Emile and Social Contract, saying they were dangerous to the State and the Christian religion.

Pestalozzi brought to light several cases of official corruption and was believed to be an accessory to the escape of a fellow newspaper contributor.

During this time, Johann Rudolf Tschiffeli, who was also a member of the Helvetic Society, attracted widespread attention regarding his successful business model.

Against the wishes of his wife's family, Pestalozzi gained the support of philosopher Isaak Iselin of Basel, who published it in Die Ephemerides, a periodical devoted to social and economic questions.

An appeal for public support in 1777 brought much-needed help, and Pestalozzi contributed to the periodical a series of letters on the education of the poor.

Pestalozzi knew the country peasant life much more intimately than his contemporaries did, from the visits of his childhood with his grandfather to his current state of poverty.

A weekly newspaper called the Schweizerblatt was also founded and disbanded during the same year with Pestalozzi briefly acting as the chief editor.

Few people read his work, and in an 1821 edition, Pestalozzi wrote: Scarcely any one has noticed the book, although it has been before the public for more than twenty years.

In the meantime, Pestalozzi was asked to take charge of a government newspaper, the Helvetisches Volksblatt, in hopes that he could win the acceptance of the people of Switzerland.

The Swiss government established an orphanage and recruited Pestalozzi on 5 December 1798, to take charge of the newly formed institution.

On 7 December, Pestalozzi went to Stans, writing: I went gladly, for I hoped to offer these innocent little ones some compensation for the loss they had sustained, and to find in their wretchedness a basis for their gratitude.

In my zeal to put my hands to the task which had been the great dream of my life, I should have been ready to begin even in the highest Alps and without fire and water, so to speak, had I only been allowed.

He wanted to cultivate the fundamental activities of the mind—the powers of attention, observation, and memory, which must precede the art of judgment and must be well established before the latter is exercised.

[15] It was during his time at Stans that Pestalozzi realized the significance of a universal method of education, which he would attempt to apply at future institutions.

A book was suggested to Pestalozzi by a friend, Herbart, Johann Friedrich, Vous voulez mécaniser l'education [The Application of Psychology to the Science of Education] (in French).

[16] It confirmed his ideas of education that he had developed at Neuhof, Stans, and now Burgdorf, in which all understanding can be achieved through a psychologically ordered sequence.

Pestalozzi's purpose in these letters was to show that, by reducing knowledge to its elements and by constructing a series of psychologically ordered exercises, anybody could teach their children effectively.

In response it sent two commissioners to investigate his work and, following their favorable review, the government decided to transform Pestalozzi's school into a national institution.

In 1801 Pestalozzi's son, Jean-Jacques, died at the age of 31, but his daughter-in-law and grandchild, Gottlieb, moved from Neuhof to Burgdorf to live at the institute.

Pestalozzi spent the first few months of his stay at Yverdon in quiet literary work, thanks to a monetary gift from the King of Denmark, Christian VII.

In 1809 and 1810 the criticism was so great that Niederer suggested to Pestalozzi that an impartial commission be brought in from the Government to assess the conduct and efficiency of the institute.

Schmid resigned his post and neither Pestalozzi nor Niederer could fill his position as teacher of mathematics, so instead they opened a printing and bookselling business.

In 1814 he also wrote an article titled "To the Innocent, Serious, and Magnanimous of my Fatherland", a testimony to the many people living in poverty which his institutions could not reach.

The last "exterior" sphere—inner sense—posited that education, having provided a means of satisfying one's basic needs, results in inner peace and a keen belief in God.

In 2003 it was renamed in Stiftung Pestalozzianum as its teacher-oriented objectives were integrated in the new model of university-like Fachhochschule colleges that was introduced in Switzerland in 2002.

In 1946 the foundation stone in the municipality of Trogen in the Canton of Appenzell Ausserrhoden was laid, and in the same year children from war-torn countries settled the first houses.