Pourquoi le constructivisme doit-il être radical?

Le terme « constructivisme » est devenu à la mode ces dernières années, mais plusieurs de ceux et celles qui l'utilisent ne semblent pas savoir qu'il a été lancé par Piaget il y a plus de cinquante ans, pour caractériser sa théorie révolutionnaire de la connaissance. Cet article trace les grands traits par lesquels l'orientation constructiviste s'est démarquée de l'épistémologie conventionnelle. L'auteur se concentre sur la dynamique de la communication et suggère que la compréhension du monde conceptuel de l'élève est un préalable à la « réussite » de l'enseignement.The term "constructivism" has become fashionable in recent years, but many who use it seem to be unaware that it was launched by Piaget more than half a century ago to characterize his revolutionary theory of knowing. This paper briefly outlines some of the breaks the constructivist orientation makes with conventional epistemology. I focus on the mechanism of communication and suggest that one prerequisite of successful teaching is insight into the students conceptual world.El término "constructivismo" se ha puesto a la moda en estos ultimos alios, pero muchos de los que Io utilizan parecen no saber que fue lanzado por Piaget hace mas de cincuenta anos, para caracterizar su teoria revolucionaria del conocimiento. Este articulo traza las grandes lineas por las cuales la orientacion constructivista se demarco de la epistemologia convencional. El autor se concentra en la dinamica de la comunicaciôn y sugiere que la comprension del mundo conceptual del alumno es un preâmbulo al "éxito" de la ensenanza."Konstruktivismus" ist seit einigen Jahren ein Modewort. Viele, die es verwenden, bedenken nicht, dass dieser Terminus vor einem halben Jahrhundert von Piaget lanciert wurde, um den revolutionâren Charakter seiner Wissenstheorie zu zeigen. Der Artikel umreisst einige der Punkte, in denen die konstruktivistische Orientierung mit der herkômmlichen Erkenntnistheorie bricht. Der Vorgang der sprachlichen Verstandigung wird untersucht, und Einsicht in die Begriffswelt des Lernenden wird als Vorbedingung erfolgreichen Lehrens hervorgehoben

Rethinking Polanyi’s concept of tacit knowledge: From personal knowing to imagined institutions

Half a century after Michael Polanyi conceptualised ‘the tacit component’ in personal knowing, management studies has reinvented ‘tacit knowledge’—albeit in ways that squander the advantages of Polanyi’s insights and ignore his faith in ‘spiritual reality’. While tacit knowing challenged the absurdities of sheer objectivity, expressed in a ‘perfect language’, it fused rational knowing, based on personal experience, with mystical speculation about an un-experienced ‘external reality’. Faith alone saved Polanyi’s model from solipsism. But Ernst von Glasersfeld’s radical constructivism provides scope to rethink personal tacit knowing with regard to ‘other people’ and the intersubjectively viable construction of ‘experiential reality’. By separating tacit knowing from Polanyi’s metaphysical realism and drawing on Benedict Anderson’s concept of ‘imagined communities’, it is possible to conceptualise ‘imagined institutions’ as the tacit dimension of power that shapes human interaction. Whereas Douglass North claimed institutions could be reduced to rules, imagined institutions are known in ways we cannot tell

A Poetics of Designing

The chapter provides an overview on what it means to be in a world that is uncertain, e.g., how under conditions of limited understanding any activity is an activity that designs and constructs, and how designing objects, spaces, and situations relates to the (designed) meta-world of second-order cybernetics. Designers require a framework that is open, but one that supplies ethical guidance when ‘constructing’ something new. Relating second-order design thinking to insights in philosophy and aesthetics, the chapter argues that second-order cybernetics provides a response to this ethical challenge and essentially it entails a poetics of designing. //// 'A Poetics of Designing' is part of the first book-length collection of texts in Design Cybernetics. It introduces the subject from the point of view of aesthetics. Importantly, the chapter argues that second-order cybernetics circumvents the necessity for a muse inspired artist or genius as a mediator between higher spirits and life, in favour of artists and designers who have true agency. //// Cybernetics is often associated with AI, which is, however, only one of the branches that developed on the basis of the interdisciplinary research begun in the 1940s and entitled cybernetics. I hope the chapter contributes to a better understanding of the second-order cybernetics that has been conceived in close relationship with art and design from the late 60s onwards

Predicating from an early age: edusemiotics and the potential of children’s preconceptions

This paper aims to explain how semiotics and constructivism can collaborate in an educational epistemology by developing a joint approach to prescientific conceptions. Empirical data and findings of constructivist research are interpreted in the light of Peirce’s semiotics. Peirce’s semiotics is an anti-psychologistic logic (CP 2.252; CP 4.551; W 8:15; Pietarinen in Signs of logic, Springer, Dordrecht, 2006; Stjernfelt in Diagrammatology. An investigation on the borderlines of phenomenology, ontology and semiotics, Springer, Dordrecht, 2007) and relational logic. Constructivism was traditionally developed within psychology and sociology and, therefore, some incompatibilities can be expected between these two schools. While acknowledging the differences, we explain that constructivism and semiotics share the assumption of realism that knowledge can only be developed upon knowledge and, therefore, an epistemological collaboration is possible. The semiotic analysis performed confirms the constructivist results and provides a further insight into the teacher-student relation. Like the constructivist approach, Peirce’s doctrine of agapism infers that the personal dimension of teaching must not be ignored. Thus, we argue for the importance of genuine sympathy in teaching attitudes. More broadly, the article also contributes to the development of postmodern humanities. At the end of the modern age, the humanities are passing through a critical period of transformation. There is a growing interest in semiotics and semiotic philosophy in many areas of the humanities. Such a case, on which we draw, is the development of a theoretical semiotic approach to education, namely edusemiotics (Stables and Semetsky, Pedagogy and edusemiotics: theoretical challenge/practical opportunities, Sense Publishers, Rotterdam, 2015)

Radikal Constructivism; A way of Knowing and Learning

Radikal Constructivism is a theory of knowing that provides a pragmatic approach to questions about reality, truth, language and human understanding. It breaks with the philosophical tradition and propose a conception of knowledge that focuses on experivii, 213 p.; 23 c

Small History of Constructivism

The article provides a series of hints on constructivist thinkers prior to the emergence of „radical constructivism“, starting with the Presocratics and progressing via Vico, Berkeley, Kant or Vaihinger and others. Following this the author investigates such core constructivist notions of „knowledge“ and ,„environment“ and concludes with a plea for an „ontological agnosticism“ which, in more than one way, leads back to the beginning of the article, namely to the presocratic schools of thought.The article provides a series of hints on constructivist thinkers prior to the emergence of „radical constructivism“, starting with the Presocratics and progressing via Vico, Berkeley, Kant or Vaihinger and others. Following this the author investigates such core constructivist notions of „knowledge“ and ,„environment“ and concludes with a plea for an „ontological agnosticism“ which, in more than one way, leads back to the beginning of the article, namely to the presocratic schools of thought

Anticipation in the Constructivist Theory of Cognition

e entity. I do not intend to bore you with a survey of a situation that, to me, seems quite dismal. Instead, I shall focus on the one theory that, in spite of all sorts of shortcomings, is in my view the most promising basis for further development, and consequently 2 the most interesting for people involved in the construction of autonomous models. The theory I am going to talk about is the one Jean Piaget called Genetic Epistemology. The name was not chosen at random. He wanted to make clear that he intended to analyze knowledge as it developed in the growing human mind, and not, as philosophers usually have done, as something that exists in its own right, independent of the human knower. The name should have warned psychologists that Piaget's theory was not merely a theory of cognitive development, but also constituted a radically different approach to the problems of knowledge. However, especially in the English-speaking world, Piaget was mostly considered as a child psycholo