Ania Lian (ania@lingua.arts.uq.edu.au)
Thu, 10 Jun 1999 09:27:37 +1000 (EST)
Date: Thu, 10 Jun 1999 09:27:37 +1000 (EST) From: Ania Lian <ania@lingua.arts.uq.edu.au> Subject: Re: Pedagogy or Learning?
List address to send message to everyone: ifets-discuss@LISTSERV.READADP.COM
Details of current discussion: http://ifets.gmd.de/discuss.html
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Muhammad Betz wrote:
> > Lastly, I continue to be unsure of contributors who suggest
> > "Constructivism" as a method... when it is a theory. Any teaching method
> > is "constructivist" if you adopt the point of view that constructivism is
> > the way humans come to know. Martin Owen
since constructivism is a method of looking at reality, then I see no
reason for making distinction between the two. More to the point, because
I see no such reason, this may then be an indication of the kind of
thinking that eliminates a need fro thinking about pedagogogy in terms of
method/theory distinction where the method is thought to be derived from
the theory. To reject such attempts may prove helpful especially
considering the history of hickups that previous attempts which hoped to
'translate' theory into a 'method'. As this is always the case, to use a
metaphor of a children's game, what came through one ear was not the same
that came out from the other.
So it seems that it may be useful to think of pedagogy as ways of
facilitating learning which is true to the method, or theory, whcih
underpins it. Now, this type of narrowing of the problem of pedagogy is
quite useful considering that it is this notion of 'facilitating' or
making it happen where problems arise.
Furthermore, when making a distinction between theory and method, what
strikes me happens is that people then create a method, or, a recipe for
doing it right. This is exactly when problems arise. The result is that
when the recipe fails, then the next thing is a search for a new
antidotum, preferably, a new theory because the former one was, obviously,
wrong.
So let me summarise: rather than focusing on the lower level of analysis
of pedgaogic practices in terms of them being true to a method, we should
abaondon the the notion of method as interesting and focus our efforts on
designing criteria whcih would allow us to assess (and make better) the
relationship between what we do and how is this consistent with the method
of looking at reality, or theory of reality, as we believe we see it. In
this way, we will stop being bogged down to the level of "pedagogic
method" and will be prompted to explore better (more extensively) the
theory itself in terms of its assumptions, consequences and implications
to our teaching practices.
Ania Lian
---------------------------------------------------------
Forum website: http://ifets.gmd.de/
Forum's contact person: kinshuk@ieee.org
Info on Join/Leave List: http://ifets.gmd.de/maillist.html
---------------------------------------------------------
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Thu 10 Jun 1999 - 02:03:59 MEST