Wie wir über das Lernen und Lehren denken, ist vor allem in den Naturwissenschaften seit zwei Jahrzehnten vom Konstruktivismus beeinflußt worden, einer Bewegung, die Piaget viel zu verdanken hat. In jüngerer Zeit haben auch die Arbeiten von Vygotsky, mit ihrer stärkeren Fokussierung auf den Lehrer, die Aufmerksamkeit der Didaktiker auf sich gelenkt. Es ist eine verbreitete Ansicht, der jedoch widersprochen werden muß, Vygotsky habe Piaget als den maßgeblichen Theoretiker verdrängt. Beide sind für ein Verständnis des Lehrens und Lernens notwendig, ihre Ideen stehen nicht im Konflikt miteinander, sondern ergänzen sich. Die Autorin wird sich auf den naturwissenschaftlichen Unterricht in der Schule konzentrieren, da es trotz der enormen Anstrengungen auf diesem Gebiet während der letzten 40 Jahre Kinder immer noch schwierig finden, die Naturwissenschaften zu erlernen.

Key words: radical constructivism, Jean Piaget

Die konstruktivistische Sichtweise und die daraus folgende Didaktik haben große Verdienste, bergen aber auch Gefahren, wenn man sich zu ausschließlich auf die Konstruktionsprozesse der Lernenden konzentriert. Die Frage, wie man als Lehrer diese Prozesse optimal unterstützt, ist noch nicht abschließend beantwortet. Im vorliegenden Aufsatz wird vorgeschlagen, sich als Didaktiker von der modernen Erzähltheorie (Narratologie) anregen zu lassen. Die Resultate, die diese Theorien – durchaus auf konstruktivistischer Grundlage – hervorgebracht haben, erweisen sich als wirksame Indikatoren auch bei der Analyse von Vermittlungsprozessen im naturwissenschaftlichen Unterricht.

The concept of autopoiesis was proposed 40 years ago as a definition of a living being, with the aim of providing a unifying concept for biology. The concept has also been extended to the theory of knowledge and to different areas of the social and behavioral sciences. Given some ambiguities of the original definitions of autopoiesis, the concept has been criticized and has been interpreted in diverse and even contradictory ways, which has prevented its integration into the biological sciences where it originated. Here I present a critical review and conceptual analysis of the definition of autopoiesis, and propose a new definition that is more precise, clear, and concise than the original ones. I argue that the difficulty in understanding the term lies in its refined conceptual subtlety and not, as has been claimed by some authors, because it is a vacuous, trivial or very complex concept. I also relate the concept of autopoiesis to the concepts of closed systems, boundaries, homeostasis, self-reproduction, causal circularity, organization and multicellularity. I show that under my proposed definition the concept of a molecular autopoietic system is a good demarcation criterion of a living being, allowing its general integration into the biological sciences and enhancing its interdisciplinary use.

Key words: Autopoiesis, Definition of life, Individual identity, Physical proximity, Self-reproduction, Circular causality

Various studies show a positive impact of living animals on motivation as well as knowledge acquisition in biology lessons (e.g. Wilde & Bätz, 2009). The learning success was thereby accredited to a possibly more constructivist learning environment. In this study we examine whether the use of living harvest mice really facilitates a more constructivist learning environment (Reinmann & Mandl, 2006). It is to be expected that the use of living animals particularly improves situational, active and emotional learning. The sample of this study consists of 121 6th graders of two secondary schools (Gymnasium) in North Rhine Westphalia. The experimental group was taught with living harvest mice whereas the control group received short movies on laptops. In addition to a questionnaire, which was used to measure constructivist teaching characteristics (PgK, Urhahne, Marsch, Wilde & Krüger, 2011), a pre-, post- and follow-up test was carried out to control the knowledge gain. Surprisingly, not only the subscales “situational”, “active” and “emotional” turn out in favour of the experimental group, but all subscales of the PgK. Regarding knowledge acquisition, the hypothesis is confirmed by the results of the follow-up test.

Since the 1980s constructivist views have played an important role in science education research and in re- search on learning and instruction in general. It appears that constructivist approaches are better suited than “traditionally” oriented approaches to address key issues of recent conceptions of scientific literacy. There is also evidence that they allow more efficient teaching and learning processes. Recent quality development projects are usually based on constructivist ideas. However, it turned out that it is rather difficult to set constructivist ideas into practice. There is a large gap between what research on teaching and learning has to offer instructional design on the one hand and instructional practice in normal classes on the other. The study presented here is part of the “IPN – Physics Video Study” which is a project within the “BiQua” Priority Program of the German Science Foundation. The main aim is to investigate whether the teaching practice of a sample of German physics teachers meets key characteristics of constructivist learning environments as proposed in the literature. A category system called COSC (Constructivist Oriented Science Classes) was de- veloped to identify the extent constructivist characteristics may be observed in the lessons of the 13 teachers of the sample. It turned out that key characteristics of constructivist oriented learning environments are not frequently observed. Preliminary analyses revealed that if certain features occur more frequently (like providing thought provoking problems and addressing students’ ideas) the development of achievement is better. Interviews clearly showed that most teachers do not hold constructivist views of teaching and lear- ning and that they are not informed about key results of research on teaching and learning.