<div dir="ltr">On Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 9:06 PM, Costello, Rob R <<a href="mailto:Costello.Rob.R@edumail.vic.gov.au">Costello.Rob.R@edumail.vic.gov.au</a>> wrote: <div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> <div link="blue" vlink="blue" lang="EN-AU"> <div> Bill I agree that its risky to simplify down; and thumbnail definitions do oversimplify     But I also think it must be possible/necessary, at some level, to do so   Always having to say 'no, its more subtle or sophisticated than that' can risk appearing as if there is no definite content or position   A simple version of any philosophy can be useful for several reasons, - eg an 'advance organiser' that gives a grid for the general thinking involved   'we can't give a simple version' seems a bit elusive to me</div></div></blockquote><div> hi rob, I've been thinking about a thumbnail definition but when I write it down it keeps growing. It's a very interesting word. One issue I think is that the constructivism word flirts with idealism in breaking with behaviourism and in this respect the issue is unfinished - because we don't actually know how the mind works and the issue of representation remains controversial, although it is part of constructivism But here is my effort, but  more its more like 4 or more fingernails than a thumbnail: internal, meta, interactive, scaffolding, mentored bit - mental modelling, self and others: Constructionist students and teachers create mental models of their own and others knowledge state external, social and personal bit - Learning by socially and personally meaningful doing or construction technology, education environment bit - Some tools are better than others for learning (more appropriable, evocative and integrated) philosophical, dangerous bit - Since we don't know how the mind works with any certainty then constructionists will inevitably flirt with idealism, the idea that all knowledge is subjective and idiosyncratic, that there is no such thing as objectivity - the need to stay grounded and to keep doing a theory to practice spiral another point not included is that we need to be concrete and give examples of real learning when talking about it - which I haven't done here I wouldn't like to take out the philosophical, dangerous bit because that would create the risk of too much blindfolded walking or something like that - I think it's better if the word is associated with some risk rather than blandness and the thumbnail definitions tend to gravitate towards blandness through simplification, imply that this is a known known. That has been my main general point on this list, that the definitions I have seen are incomplete and too bland and potentially mundane, eg. learning by doing I can't operate as a constructionist without all these bits Some more background information about this: the constructivist word is not prominent in either Mindstorms (Paperts original, not mentioned) or Margaret Boden's biography of Piaget (only mentioned twice) I think what Piaget did was treat young children as self directed learners through play etc. not as empty vessels to be filled by adults the term "genetic epistemology" is more associated with Piaget - the evolution of knowledge structures in the young learner - it seems to mean the same thing for Piaget as constructivism so the term did not originate with him probably but he might have been the first to investigate it as a concept in children learning seriously and consistently other theorist saw the learning ability as innate but needed time to unfold - some still argue this, I think Chomsky (and Pinker) argues that for language development that we are preprogrammed genetically in "mentalese", a universal grammar also the idea of mental representation (cog stuctures) is attacked by the connectionists who think it can all be done with patterns - Downes also argues this So Piaget, Papert, Minsky's position that humans gradually develop learning structures or representations over some years in childhood is still controversial - constructivism this concept has been altered by social constructivists but also by others - constructivist idealists (radical constructivists) like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_von_Glasersfeld" title="Ernst von Glasersfeld" target="_blank">Ernst von Glasersfeld</a> post modernists who deny objective truth sometimes identify with constructivism Boden makes the point that all constructivists flirt with idealism but they don't have to capitulate to it (pp. 79-80) (ie to move on from Skinner you have to speculate about things that can't be proven at least a little) wikipedia identifies Giambattista Vico or Giovanni Battista Vico (1668-1744) as the first constructivist ("truth itself is constructed") - also Kant and Dewey preceded Piaget <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_%28learning_theory%29" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_(learning_theory)</a> cheers  </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> <div link="blue" vlink="blue" lang="EN-AU"><div>   Cheers   rob     <div style="border-style: none none none solid; border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color blue; border-width: medium medium medium 1.5pt; padding: 0cm 0cm 0cm 4pt;"> <div> <div style="text-align: center;" align="center"> <hr align="center" size="2" width="100%"> </div> From: <a href="mailto:iaep-bounces@lists.sugarlabs.org" target="_blank">iaep-bounces@lists.sugarlabs.org</a> [mailto:<a href="mailto:iaep-bounces@lists.sugarlabs.org" target="_blank">iaep-bounces@lists.sugarlabs.org</a>] On Behalf Of Bill Kerr Sent: Saturday, 16 August 2008 4:09 PM To: <a href="mailto:seth@laptop.org" target="_blank">seth@laptop.org</a> Cc: Education; Educators and OLPC; Grassroots OLPC<div class="Ih2E3d"> Subject: Re: [IAEP] Concise explanation of Constructionism from the LearningTeam</div> </div>   <div> On Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 4:15 AM, Seth Woodworth <<a href="mailto:seth@laptop.org" target="_blank">seth@laptop.org</a>> wrote: <div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c"> <div> <blockquote style="border-style: none none none solid; border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color rgb(204, 204, 204); border-width: medium medium medium 1pt; padding: 0cm 0cm 0cm 6pt; margin-left: 4.8pt; margin-right: 0cm;"> <div> <h3>Inspired by Sameer's recent conversations with a pair of Montessori Kindergarden teachers.  I went to talk to Cynthia Solomon of the OLPC Learning team.  We got to talking about the theory of Activities and a few other topics.  Eventually she showed me this snippit from the Media Lab's Future of Learning Group:</h3>   <h3>Constructionism</h3> We are developing "Constructionism" as a theory of learning and education. Constructionism is based on two different senses of "construction." It is grounded in the idea that people learn by actively constructing new knowledge, rather than having information "poured" into their heads. Moreover, constructionism asserts that people learn with particular effectiveness when they are engaged in constructing personally meaningful artifacts (such as computer programs, animations, or robots). <a href="http://learning.media.mit.edu/projects.html" target="_blank">http://learning.media.mit.edu/projects.html</a>   I thought that this explination was concise and really interesting.  I would love to explain this to people who want to desige activities, just to give them a little snapshot of the concept.  Does anyone have a problem with this deffinition? Does anyone have an improvement?   -Seth </div> </blockquote> <div> hi Seth, It could be a mistake to try to summarise a complex idea as a thumbnail. Cynthia does not do that in her book (Computer Environments for Children) where she compares 4 different approaches to learning. Her description there of constructivism is far more nuanced with example of logo learning and historical and philosophical background. Some of the concepts included in that chapter are - <ul type="disc"> <li>a definition of mathematics</li> <li>people possess different theories about the world</li> <li>children build their own intellectual structures</li> <li>why would they change their theories?</li> <li>intuition</li> <li>natural learning development</li> <li>the role of computers</li> <li>the role of relationship</li> <li>different ways of looking at maths (constructive and intuitive compared with rule driven and formal)</li> <li>discussion of turtle geometry</li> <li>other mathematicians who hold similar views - Poincare, Brouwer, Godel)</li> <li>value of an anthropomorphic approach</li> <li>etc. (there is much more)</li> </ul> It's tempting to try to develop a thumbnail definition, it appeals to our sense of tidiness and closure, but with this complex idea it doesn't seem to work. While I was writing this Albert's response appeared which adds another dimension to the discussion -  oversimplification does make an easier target for critics. Since your definition does not distinguish Papert's constructionism from open ended discovery learning then it is easy to criticise in this way. The 4 models in Cynthia's book are: Suppes: Drill and Practice and Rote Learning Davis: Socratic Interactions and Discovery Learning Dwyer: Eclecticism and Heuristic Learning Papert: Constructivism and Piagetian Learning This illustrates the point that distinctions ought to be made between the latter three, rather than lumping them all into some exploratory basket.   </div> </div> </div></div></div> </div> </div> Important - This email and any attachments may be confidential. If received in error, please contact us and delete all copies. Before opening or using attachments check them for viruses and defects. 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