Analyzing the complex relationship between education and power, this paper aims to contribute to a deep understanding of the role of teachers’ pedagogical styles in the creation of a positive school climate. In the educational settings, power is often related to the concepts of authority and leadership that highlights the teacher’s influence on child development. In particular, previous studies (Pianta, 1999) demonstrated the importance of the relationship between teacher and student, as expressed in caring and supporting practices. However, these practices are influenced by different forms of power, some of which may have a negative impact on the students’ wellbeing and learning outcomes. Moreover, the different ways teachers use their power have a great effect on school climate and consequentially on classroom management (Shindler, 2010).

The relationship between education and power is a regular feature of the pedagogical discourse, even if the more detailed studies belong to the philosophical, psychological, sociological, economics and religious fields (ATEE, 2013). At school, the pedagogical research tries to answer some important questions. For example, is there a difference between power and authority? Is teacher power compatible with the freedom of students?

From this point of view, the power is the pedagogical way to translate adult’s authority in action. It is always a means, not an end, through which the adult fosters identity, autonomy and competence in children, young people and other adults. Power is never disconnected from values (Peiró, 2014), otherwise it can become a tool at the service of authoritarianism and dictatorship. Nevertheless, the educational power is often associated to discipline, correction, subjection (Millei, 2010). Starting from Foucault, many authors denounced the invisible power of the educational systems, in which power is not only held in the institutions, but also circulates through individuals. The Foucauldian study decenters the dominant representation of power in classroom, named “sovereign power”, transforming the “tug of war” metaphor in a new perspective. This perspective is based on a “productive power”, as patterns of effects which do not have a single coherent point of application or origin (Ford, 2003).

This productive power spreads in the classroom through interpersonal relationships, communicational strategies, social behaviors, teaching procedures. Particularly, power at school circulates in the social and emotional atmosphere that teachers and students breathe. In fact, «classroom climate includes observable behavioral indicators such as the frequency and quality of teachers’ affective communications with students (further specified in terms of smiles, positive verbal feedback) as well as the degree to which students appear to enjoy spending time with one another» (Pianta et al. 2012, 378).

So, an important issue for the educational research is to know how to prepare vital learning contexts, organizing settings that allow that ''something experientially significant'' occurs (Massa, 2000) and environments in which the personal wellbeing is promoted. Ensuring the basic conditions for the wellbeing at school is creating the conditions to arouse the desire to know and to learn, to reflect and debate critically, which is a fundamental commitment for school today (Riva, 2015).

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