How Is Education Possible? Pragmatism, Communication and the Social Organisation of Education

Abstract

: Education cannot mean that the young are the product of the activities of their teachers. At the same time, we do not speak of education if students would simply learn something irrespective of the ac­tivities of their teachers. In this paper we focus on the question: How is education possible? Our aim is to contribute to a social theory of education, a theory that does not reduce our understanding of educational processes and practices to underlying ‘constituting elements’ but rather tries to understand the social nature of education as a reality sui generis.

An improbable leadership: structural limits of educational communication. The case of some Italian primary schools

“…In distinguishing between information and utterance, the receiver of a communication is able to criticize or reject the information (Vanderstraeten and Biesta 2006). Educational communication does not necessarily produce social consensus; on the contrary, it renews the possibility of resistance.…”

“…My analysis might be useful for teachers leading children, administrators and other educational leaders who, starting from the theoretical assumption that the development of children's minds cannot be completely controlled by education (James 1899/1983, Arendt 1961/1993, Luhmann and Schorr 1979, Vanderstraeten 2000, Vanderstraeten and Biesta 2006, Britzman 2007 accept the challenge of looking at children's freedom as a resource for education, rather than a risk to minimize.…”

Theories of Learning in a Digital Age

“…The exploration begins with pragmatism and the work of Dewey (1859Dewey ( -1952 and the way this outlook retains its infl uence (Garrison and Anderson 2003 ;Koschmann 2002 ;Vanderstraeten and Biesta 2006 ). It goes on to look at the varieties of what might be summarised as social and situated views of learning, including the ideas of communities of practice (Wenger 1998 ), legitimate peripheral participation (Lave and Wenger 1991 ), cultural historical activity theory (CHAT) and expansive learning (Engeström 1987 ), and CSCL which was at one time portrayed as a new paradigm for learning (Koschmann 1996 ).…”

Philosophy for Children as an Educational Practice

“…This shift has been termed an interactionist turn, intersubjective paradigm or a communicative turn (see e.g. Masschelein 1991;Biesta 1994;Siljander 2014;Vanderstraeten and Biesta 2006). According to Siljander (2014), the main characteristics of interactionist turn are: (1) Main concepts for understanding human behaviour are interaction and communication; (2) pedagogical action is conceived more as an intersubjective action rather than being considered from subject philosophical perspective, i.e.…”