This might not help Don in Italy right now, but here's a suggested reading
for teaching on these topics:
Ford, Michael J., and Ellice A. Forman. "Chapter 1: Redefining
Disciplinary Learning in Classroom Contexts." Review of Research in
Education 30, no. 1 (2006): 1-32.
In the past, I've given my students papers representing various
alternative orientations. The Ford & Forman chapter is exceptional, I
think, in its presentation of a history that represents the successive
emergence of approaches, from behavioral to cognitive to what they call
the turn to practice(s) -- which refers to the historical development that
I would characterize as the turn to social ontology.
On Sat, 8 Sep 2007, Tony Whitson wrote:
> Hi, Don,
>
> I don't disagree with anything you say in this post. However, the narrative
> of cognitivism as a superior successor to behaviorism is a narrative that is
> generally taught and learned in our School of Ed, and I suspect not only in
> our place. And, as a matter of historical reality, behaviorism did exercise
> hegemony, as I think cognitivism does now.
>
> When I deal with this in my classes, I stress that of course cognitive
> science does not deny or disparage behavior, or the behavioral science
> approaches to understanding behavior. Nor does social ontology deny or
> disparage cognition, or the cognitive science approaches to understanding
> cognition.
>
> The problem lies in the reductionism whereby cognitivism (i.e., the reductive
> ideology) insists on treating matters that are not just matters of cognition
> as if they are merely cognitive, or can be understood adequately in purely
> cognitive terms. As suggested on http://postcog.net , it seems to me that
> this is what is done, for example, in the "How People Learn" model
> (Bransford, et al.) which has attained a kind of canonical status at our
> place, and I think widely in Education. So, for example, Lave is cited for
> the point that context involves conditions that are consequential for
> cognition. That proposition certainly is implicated in Lave's work, but to
> reduce her theory to that cognitivist plane is a real, limiting distortion,
> IMHO.
>
> On Sat, 8 Sep 2007, Cunningham, Donald James wrote:
>
>> Hi Tony,
>>
>> Thanks for the great reply. I'll have to beg off responding in any depth.
>> I am currently in Italy where the class I am teaching is happening and my
>> precious laptop has just blown up on me. Everything I need to teach is on
>> there!!!! So I am relegated to limited time on public computers with
>> European keyboards.
>>
>> But briefly, I take a more conciliatory approach to theory. I don't see it
>> as a matter of behaviorist hegemony, etc. ANY theory can be misused. I
>> take the theories to be tools or sets of glasses for viewing a situation
>> with each tool having its potentialities and its limitations, each set of
>> glasses brings some things in to focus and blurs or distorts others.
>> Behaviorism was very helpful to me in sorting out my son's episodes of
>> enuresis. It is a good tool for thinking about classroom organization. But
>> behaviorism omits/distorts notions like self agency so other tools, other
>> glasses should be examined as well. So I don't see the historical
>> progression from behaviorism to cognitivism and beyond as an evolutionary
>> one where were are gradually homing in on the one true theory. I see it
>> as a process of discovering more possibilities - which of course makes it
>> harder to know which alternative might be the most useful in a given
>> situation. I believe Giddens called that process "manufacturing
>> uncertainty". I have dedicated my career to creating uncertainty!
>>
>> Ciao..........djc
>>
>> Don Cunningham
>> Indiana University
>>
>> ________________________________
>>
>> From: Tony Whitson [mailto:twhitson@UDel.Edu]
>> Sent: Thu 9/6/2007 6:27 PM
>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>> Cc: Cunningham, Donald James; Mike Cole
>> Subject: RE: [xmca] mediational theories of mind: Suggestions requested
>>
>>
>>
>> Don,
>>
>> Sorry for the delay in responding to this -- but I think it's a useful
>> question for discussion in this group.
>>
>> I want to respond quickly on another point before getting to your main
>> question about teaching CHAT.
>>
>> First, you write:
>>> I've taught the usual suspects (behaviorism,
>>> Bandura, Piaget, cognitive information processing) for years and have a
>>> pretty good idea about them but would appreciate some help on CHAT.
>>
>> Where I am, students have learned a story about how once upon a time the
>> world was ruled by the behaviorists, but they've been vanquished by the
>> (scientifically, pedagogically, politically, and morally) superior forces
>> of Cognitive Science. They think that's where the story ends (as in the
>> "End of History" celebrated since Daniel Bell in the early 60's, where
>> history completes itself with the universal triumph of capitalism).
>>
>> I think it's important for students to learn about what's happening
>> "beyond cognitivism." For me, this is not just a matter of theory or
>> intellectual politics: My students just won't understand anything I'm
>> saying or doing unless they understand that I'm addressing an ontology in
>> which cognition cannot be understood except as it is embedded in the
>> broader (not only cognitive) projects and processes of being and becoming.
>> CHAT takes this stance against reductive cognitivism, and CHAT cannot be
>> understood (IMHO) without recognizing this. I think Wenger & the
>> Communities of Practice literature perhaps makes this point more directly
>> and accessibly, although details have not been theorized as extensively as
>> in CHAT. Curriculum theory -- my own home turf -- has always approached
>> education as a matter of ontology, not merely cognition (i.e., not just
>> Knowing, but Being and Becoming).
>>
>> So, I would want to tell the story of behaviorist hegemony giving way to
>> cognitivist hegemony, which in turn is being challenged by a turn to the
>> broader perspective of social ontology. This is not to say that the
>> reductivist ideology of cognitivISM is replaced by an ideology of
>> postcognitivISM (see my post at http://postcog.net <http://postcog.net/>
>> ); Nor is it a call for
>> hegemonic "postcognitivism" in place of hegemonic cognitivism.
>>
>> One good source is Lave, Jean. "Teaching, as Learning, in Practice." Mind,
>> Culture, and Activity 3, no. 3 (1996): 149-64.
>> I think this particular point might come through more strongly in
>> Lave, Jean. "Learning as Participation in Communities of Practice." Paper
>> presented at the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco
>> 1992.
>> (This paper is now linked from http://postcog.net/#Lave . This is the
>> paper Jean presented in the symposium that David Kirshner and I organized,
>> which grew into our book _Situated Cognition_, although a different piece
>> was used as her chapter in the book. The MCA article includes aspects of
>> the AERA paper, although its scope is broader and the social ontology
>> argument may be less central to the complete published article.)
>>
>> With regard to your main question, you write:
>>> [I] was wondering if any of you would be
>>> willing to share with me (and other XMCAers) how you present CHAT. I
>>> mean, I don't think undergrads are going to be too interested in the
>>> distinction between action and activity or working out the concept of
>>> "object". Or am I wrong?
>>
>> This could be a very interesting discussion for XMCA.
>> As you suggest, for an undergrad Ed Psych class, it might be best to
>> streamline CHAT a bit. However, I don't think the differentiation among
>> the three levels of activity, action, and operations is dispensable. I
>> think it's necessary to see activities and activity systems emerging on a
>> social/cultural level beyond consciously goal-oriented action, and to see
>> the role of routinized operational activity that does not require
>> conscious attention.
>>
>> It would be helpful to develop introductory approaches for this audience.
>> Starting points could include the resources at
>> http://www.edu.helsinki.fi/activity/pages/chatanddwr/
>> and
>> Roth, Wolff-Michael, and Yew-Jin Lee. ""Vygotsky's Neglected Legacy":
>> Cultural-Historical Activity Theory." Review of Educational Research 77,
>> no. 2 (2007): 186-232.
>> as well as
>> pp. 27-47 in Spinuzzi, Clay. Tracing Genres through Organizations: A
>> Sociocultural Approach to Information Design. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press,
>> 2003.
>> and
>> pp. 29-72 ("Activity Theory in a Nutshell") in Kaptelinin, Victor, and
>> Bonnie A. Nardi. Acting with Technology: Activity Theory and Interaction
>> Design. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2006.
>>
>> On Wed, 29 Aug 2007, Cunningham, Donald James wrote:
>>
>>> And in a week or so, I will begin teaching an undergraduate class in
>>> "Educational Psychology" for future teachers. It has been a few years
>>> since I taught such a class and was wondering if any of you would be
>>> willing to share with me (and other XMCAers) how you present CHAT. I
>>> mean, I don't think undergrads are going to be too interested in the
>>> distinction between action and activity or working out the concept of
>>> "object". Or am I wrong? I've taught the usual suspects (behaviorism,
>>> Bandura, Piaget, cognitive information processing) for years and have a
>>> pretty good idea about them but would appreciate some help on CHAT.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Don Cunningham
>>> Indiana University
>>>
>>> Ancora Imparo!
>>>
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu]
>>> On Behalf Of Mike Cole
>>> Sent: Wednesday, August 29, 2007 6:13 PM
>>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>>> Subject: [xmca] mediational theories of mind: Suggestions requested
>>>
>>> Dear Xmca-ites---
>>>
>>> Toward the end of the month I will begin teaching a grad course on
>>> mediational theories of mind.
>>> I would love suggestions for interesting readings.
>>> We will be looking in a sort of "mcLuhanesque" way at the affordances of
>>> different kinds of mediators
>>> in human action/activity/mind.
>>>
>>> So, language and thought
>>> writing
>>> film
>>> music
>>> tv
>>> rituals
>>> games
>>> .........
>>>
>>> Starting with early 20th century writers of general familiarity to
>>> members
>>> of this list, I have been thinking about including
>>> such works as Cszikentmihalyi, "meaning of things," Turkle's recent
>>> "evocative objects," and perhaps something on mediated
>>> behavior in large groups such as "the wisdom of crowds."
>>>
>>> Any and all suggestions warmly welcomed. So much going on its hard to
>>> even
>>> think about how to begin to think about this
>>> upcoming fall!!
>>>
>>> mike
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> xmca mailing list
>>> xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
>>> http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> xmca mailing list
>>> xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
>>> http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
>>>
>>
>> Tony Whitson
>> UD School of Education
>> NEWARK DE 19716
>>
>> twhitson@udel.edu
>> _______________________________
>>
>> "those who fail to reread
>> are obliged to read the same story everywhere"
>> -- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970)
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> xmca mailing list
>> xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
>> http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
>>
>
> Tony Whitson
> UD School of Education
> NEWARK DE 19716
>
> twhitson@udel.edu
> _______________________________
>
> "those who fail to reread
> are obliged to read the same story everywhere"
> -- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970)
Tony Whitson
UD School of Education
NEWARK DE 19716
twhitson@udel.edu
_______________________________
"those who fail to reread
are obliged to read the same story everywhere"
-- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970)
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Received on Sat Sep 8 07:50 PDT 2007
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