This article examines the role of educational technology from a constructivist perspective (clarified within the article). In particular, it discusses the sub-set of computer-based technologies, especially the Internet, that appear to be changing the way we define interactivity, and asks how these technologies interface with constructivist approaches to pedagogy. It argues that the seductiveness of emerging technology is such that it requires a framework for adoption, which rescues the educator from a position of reliance on intuition. It explores the place of constructivism as an appropriate educational philosophy that provides a pedagogical testing ground for establishing the value of such technological offerings.

Using the theoretical tools offered through the writings of Pierre Bourdieu, this paper develops a critique of constructivism. Constructivism has assumed a dominance with the field of mathematics education but, as an epistemology, it ignores the social implications of the construction of meaning. It is argued that constructivism is a liberal discourse which valorises the individual construction of meaning. In doing this, the social and political contexts in which mathematical knowledge is located is ignored and the marginalisation of many social and cultural groups is legitimated.

This paper focusses on how researching is done through reflections about, or at a meta-level to, the practice over time of an enactivist mathematics education researcher. How are the key concepts of enactivist theory (ZDM Mathematics Education, doi: 10. 1007/s11858–014–0634–7, 2015) applied? This paper begins by giving an autobiographical account of the author’s engagement with enactivist ideas and the development of enactivist research projects. The rest of the paper then discusses principles of the design of enactivist followed by four themes of learning, observing, interviewing and find-ing(s). The spelling, find-ing(s), draws attention to the findings of enactivist research being processes not objects. In the case of the collaborative research group used as an exemplar throughout the paper, for instance, the find-ing(s) shed light onto the journeys of professional development travelled by the members of the group as they develop their teaching.

Key words: mathematics, teacher prospective, teacher collaborative group, structural coupling, mathematics lesson

A central argument of this chapter is that there is a common basis for the failure of many instructional systems. The claim is that these deficiencies in the outcomes of learning are strongly influenced by underlying biases and assumptions in the design of instruction that represent the instructional domain and its associated performance demands in an unrealistically simplified and well-structured manner. We offer a constructivist theory of learning and instruction that emphasizes the real-world complexity and ill-structuredness of many knowledge domains. Any effective approach to instruction must simultaneously consider several highly intertwined topics, such as: the constructive nature of understanding; the complex and ill-structured features of many, if not most, knowledge domains; patterns of learning failure; and a theory of learning that addresses known patterns of learning failure.

Constructivism, or more precisely, a constructivist metatheory, presently prevails throughout professional education circles. Most educators easily accept constructivism’s central premise that learners approach tasks with prior knowledge and expectations based on their knowledge of the world around them. Naturally, then, constructivist educational technologists have been guided by the implicit (and increasingly explicit) desire to create “authentic” environments for learning: environments that correspond to the real world. In this paper, I argue that technologists have tended to paper over the critical epistemological dimension of constructivism by “pre- authenticating” learning environments: creating environments that are predetermined to reflect the real world even though constructivist theory contrindicates precisely this. I suggest that a rhetorical perspective on constructivism offers a way out of this bind and I propose some guidelines to assist developers of educational technologies in accommodating the essentially dialogic nature of teaching and learning.

Excerpt: The basic goals of education are deceptively simple. To mention three, education strives for the retention, understanding, and active use of knowledge and skills. Surely we want what is taught retained, else why teach it? Unless knowledge is understood, to what purposes can it be put? Finally, having and understanding knowledge and skills come to naught unless the learner actually makes active use of them later in lifein studying other subjects, shopping in the supermarket, getting a better job, casting a vote, or whatever other context. Although other desiderata can be added to retention, understanding, and active use, it is difficult to discard any one of these.

Key words: constructivism, educational environment, information processing, wigs, machine learning, environmental technology, physics, mathematics education, banks, learning.

There is no question that the major principles of instructional design have been derived from Skinnerian psychology and Gagne ‘s conditions of learning. These theories have been integrated, along with other principles, into systematic models for designing instruction. Instructional designers are now being challenged by constructivists to reconsider the theories they use in their design work. That challenge is well represented in the papers by Perkins, Bransford, Cunningham, and Spiro that appear in this issue of Educational Technology. The purpose of this paper is to review the work of each of these authors from the point-of-view of an instructional designer and to explore several general reactions that emerge from a review of all of the papers.

Excerpt: At Utah State University we are attempting to extend instructional design theory or IST. Our work may not reflect the views of the 1ST community at large. Nevertheless, we have been careful to identify our own assumptions and their implications for second generation instructional design theory (ID2). 3 In this paper I will review these assumptions and contrast them with corresponding assumptions of constructivism as reflected by the authors M. David Merrill, a Contributing Editor, is Professor of Instructional Technology in the Department of Instructional Technology at Utah State University. He is Director of the ID2 research program. in this issue. In this effort I shall identify those constructivism assumptions that are consistent with our assumptions and those which are clearly in opposition to our view. In addition I will identify the instructional design implications of our ID2 assumptions and will contrast these with the instructional design implications of constructivism as represented by the authors of this issue. Finally, I will take a very pragmatic stance and argue that the assumptions of both ID2 and constructivism may be equally valid or invalid. I will suggest a set of pragmatic criteria which has led us to accept the assumptions of ID2 and to reject the opposing assumptions of extreme constructivism. Ultimately the instructional design prescriptions of either position must be established by empirical verification. I will also suggest some of the difficulties in obtaining such verification, including the possibility that the instructional products resulting from either position may have far more in common than they have in opposition, making an adequate empirical test extremely difficult.