Constructivist teaching is based on constructivist learning theory. This theoretical framework is based on the belief that learning occurs through what a student already knows; this prior knowledge is called a schema. Because all learning should pass through the filter of the pre-existing schemata, constructivists suggest that learning is best accomplished when a student gets actively engaged in the learning process rather than attempting to receive knowledge passively with the teacher avoiding most direct instruction and attempting to lead the student through questions and activities to discover, discuss, appreciate and verbalize the new knowledge (Richards et.al., 2001). Technology is increasingly gaining attention of those who are obsessed with improving teaching and learning. In this research attempts has been made to describe and analyze elementary teachers’ perceptions of using technology as a means for implementing classroom constructivist activities. Doing this, private schools were chosen were every classroom was equipped with a PC for the teacher as well as students. The PCs were networked so that all students could interact with the teacher and other students independently or as a group. Data was gathered through questionnaires from both teachers and students. Findings of the study show that teachers intend to look at the technology provided as an effective tools for developing constructivist practices and for gaining students’ interest. Students are given free rein to be in charge of learning experiences. This method initiates an active and positive learning environment that is technology based, including teamwork while maintaining independence where necessary, which is safe and avoids the anti-motivation effects of being judged. The results show that teachers reported an increase of test scores.

Key words: constructivist education, leadership, technology in education, technology integration

Problem: Ernst von Glasersfeld’s radical constructivism has been highly influential in the fields of mathematics and science education. However, its relevance is typically limited to analyses of classroom interactions and students’ reasoning. Methods: A project that aims to support improvements in the quality of mathematics instruction across four large urban districts is framed as a case with which to illustrate the far-reaching consequences of von Glasersfeld’s constructivism for mathematics and science educators. Results: Von Glasersfeld’s constructivism orients us to question the standard view of policy implementation as a process of travel down through a system and to conceptualize it instead as the situated reorganization of practice at multiple levels of a system. In addition, von Glasersfeld’s constructivism orients us to understand rather than merely evaluate policies by viewing the actions of the targets of policies as reasonable from their point of view. Implications: The potential contributions of von Glasersfeld’s constructivism to mathematics and science education have been significantly underestimated by restricting the focus to classroom actions and interactions. The illustrative case of research on the application of these ideas also indicates the relevance of constructivism to researchers in educational policy and educational leadership.

Key words: mathematics education, science education, policy, leadership

Human thinking uses other peoples’ experience. While often pictured as computation or based on the workings of a language-system in the mind or brain, the evidence suggests alternatives to representationalism. In terms proposed here, embodiment is interlaced with wordings as people tackle the integration problem. Using a case study, the paper shows how a young man uses external resources in an experimental task. He grasps a well-defined problem by using material resources, talking about his doings and switching roles and procedures. Attentional skills enable him to act as an air cadet who, among other things, connects action, leadership and logic. Airforce practices prompt him to draw timeously on non-local resources as, using impersonal experience, he interlaces language, action and perception. He connects the cultural and the metabolic in cognitive work as he finds a way to completion of the task.

Key words: cognitive science, distributed cognition, ecological psychology, enactivism, integration problem, interactivity, problem solving, river problem, systemic cognition, thinking

The essay proposes to replace the leadership, as a way of managing organizations, for a co-inspiring management. The authors propose we are living in a post-post modern era, whose main characteristic is that we, human beings, know what we know we know and understand what we understand we understand. This situation leads us to an ethical action-reflexion in which human beings can not run away of the consciousness and responsibility of their behaviors. In this context, human relations such as leadership are meaningless. Thus, the concept of co-inspiring management arises. This concept allows people to participate in an active and creative way in the creation and accomplishment of common projects and in the fulfillment of well-being.

Key words: co-inspiring management, leadership, human relations, post-post-modern era.

This book describes a two-year project to build leadership capacity in residents of government housing estates. The project was based on the belief that learning is constructed by the learner out of his/her own history of interactions over a life time and from whatever there is in the environment that fits with the learner’s current state and is therefore recognized by him/her in some way. Thus any changes brought about in the learner as s/he interacts in the learning environments provided by the project leader are in fact learning. Such an approach means that there can be no “voice of authority” telling the learning what to learn and no expectation that the learner will learn whatever it is that the project leader has intended.

This paper is the result of my inquiry into the nature of my constructivist pedagogy in the context of a postgraduate course that focused on theoretical and practical dimensions of mentoring at a major university in the north of Israel. Drawing on four critical incidents in my university teaching, I address the question: What happens when you teach a course characterized by a process‐oriented, constructivist discourse to post graduate students who hold leadership roles, such as mentors of teachers, in an educational system characterized by a predominantly product‐oriented discourse?. Drawing on four illustrative cases, each of which highlights a particular ‘crack in the iceberg’, I discuss the understandings that I gained about constructivist pedagogy as I reflected on these incidents. The four critical incidents surface four major tensions that reflected the ‘competing discourses’ (Miller‐Marsh, 2002) that played out in my constructivist pedagogy: Problem solving discourse versus Dilemmatic discourse; Constructive discourse versus Constructing discourse; Language of discourse versus Approach of discourse; and Leading discourse versus Emerging discourse. The critical incidents have made me realize that identifying ‘cracks in the iceberg’ has as much to do with becoming aware of my personal ‘cracks’ hiding underneath the ‘tip of the iceberg’ as with surfacing the tensions between my constructivist agenda and participants’ agendas. Laying open these discourses and challenging their underlying assumptions, in the context of mentoring conversations and personal narrative accounts of practice, seems essential for reconstructing more authentic ‘curriculum stories’.

Key words: constructivist pedagogy, curriculum, mentoring, teacher education.

From the inception of the American Society for Cybernetics in 1964, its members have asked periodically, ‘Why this society? What is its purpose? What should it do? ’ Most pointedly, these questions arise in the face of today’s global challenges: energy and global warming, water and food, health and social justice. Designing for these challenges demands systems literacy as well as cybernetics, the science of purposive systems, to help society steer toward a world that it wants. Most recently, these questions arise after a significant increase in strength for the ASC under the leadership of Ranulph Glanville, president of the society from 2009 through 2014, and his executive team. As a scholar and as the society’s president he emphasized the theme of ‘living in cybernetics, ’ that is, embodying cybernetic ideas and ethics in everyday life. As designer and teacher he beautifully articulated the relationships of cybernetics to design. With tribute to Glanville’s contributions to our community and our discipline, I call upon the ASC to move beyond shared interests and accumulated knowledge to become a force of action. From first-hand history with the society since the 1980s, I highlight specific ‘clarities’ expressed by the society’s participants from that time, while calling for greater currency for our time, in the form of new members and new actions. I propose a rationale for using second-order cybernetics for the design of a better world, the Designers’ Imperative. Lastly I encourage every member to approach today’s vast design challenges by tackling focusing problems through which progress can be made.

Key words: cybernetic curricula, design, focusing problems, global challenges, second-order cybernetics, variety

In this chapter I propose a leadership model that represents a synthesis of four emerging fields of study: cultural biology, systems theory, Deep Ecology, and selected leadership models. This model is congruent with an emerging “eco-leadership paradigm” and may be seen as providing a conceptual foundation for leadership within that paradigm. I begin the chapter with an overview of relevant models proposed by leadership theorists as a starting point for my discussion. I then move into a discussion of cultural biology, as it lays the foundation for the model by clarifying the essential ties between the individual and their environment. This is followed by systems theory, which allows us to further extend our individual sphere of concern to large complex systems, and Deep Ecology, which provides a road map for living in a manner that reflects what cultural biology and systems theory teach us. I conclude with a discussion of what I will call the Deep Systems Leadership Model and demonstrate the interconnectedness of its components. Each component tells us in a different way that we are linked in a fundamental manner, both to one another and to the environment around us. Taken together, they help build a view of leadership that is nonhierarchical and nonpositional; is a capacity rather than a position; and is more of a lifestyle adopted after deep reflection than a skill gained through specialized training. Relevance: The leadership model proposed in this chapter utilizes elements of Maturana’s work on autopoesis and his concept of cultural biology as a foundation, also bringing together concepts such as systems thinking, adaptive leadership, and deep ecology.

Excerpt: The title of my original talk, “A Walk Through the Forest”, was chosen for several reasons: First: metaphorically, it was for the younger among us, including me, a journey in unexplored territory. There were highly detailed “trees” on all sides of us, bidding for our attention and tempting us to become lost in over-focused detail. Through Heinz’s leadership we were joined by a steady stream of men of vision, Ross Ashby, Gordon Pask, Gotthard Günther, Humberto Maturana, to name a few from the early days, who kept us aware that we were in a vast and living forest. As a sidelight, it is a pleasant thought to realize that Heinz was our true and our metaphorical “Foerster”, or in English, forest warden, who held the compass and the map and kept our spirit of adventure alive. Finally, I simply enjoy the image of a forest, having lived my early years in the middle of a real one. That forest provided some necessities of life; it was a playground, a school, a means of travel, and held places of true beauty. The real BCL did many of those things.