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Evolving Education: Pre-formal and Formal
Abstract
In the first part of this chapter I make an ambitious attempt to present an overview of what education-as-enculturation might have been like thousands of years before we had formal schooling—even for the elite. I trace fragments of the evolutionary narrative that have been critically underappreciated—the apparent aesthetic sensibilities of some early hominins and humans. I then discuss the early introduction of formal elite schooling in Europe and a handful of other civilisation centres. I show that formal, publicly funded, universal school education began little more than two hundred years ago in Europe and was holistic, idealistic and evolutionary. Only after the Industrial Revolution did schooling begin to resemble factories. The purpose of this chapter is primarily to contextualise the futures of education within the broad macro-historical development from pre-formal, to formal to postformal education.
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In this paper I explore Creative Inquiry as an approach to education that navigates between and beyond the Scylla of reproductive, "banking" education and "right brain" narcissism to view education as a creative process. This process includes the self-creation of the knower as well as the understanding of how knowledge is created. The paper takes a broader view of the creative process: it requires rigor and imagination, learning and unlearning, self-knowledge and a thorough grounding in one's subject matter, theory and praxis.
This article offers a synthesis of my recently completed doctorate study of Rudolf Steiner's notion of imaginative teaching. Seven original imaginative teaching methods (drama, exploration, storytelling, routine, arts, discussion and empathy) are introduced via phenomenological moments, followed by analysis and discussion. The article concludes with the argument that, whether or not the quality of these methods depends on the ethnographic context in which they were identified (Steiner schools), the methods might nonetheless inspire modification of existing efforts in mainstream education to cater for the imagination.
Education today in most of the world is more suited to the nineteenth-century industrial era than it is to the twenty-first century. There are three key aspects to this insight.
Firstly, knowledge is evolving. The fragmentation of knowledge through specialization is widely regarded as being unsuited to the complexity of the twenty-first century by scholars and thinkers from many fields (including complexity science, ecology, futures studies, integral studies, philosophy and psychology). Yet education is still largely a piecemeal affair.
Secondly, consciousness is evolving, and education needs to evolve with it. Research on the evolution of consciousness — pioneered by Rudolf Steiner in the early twentieth century (Steiner [1926] 1966) — has gathered impetus throughout the twentieth century. These theories are still marginalised by narrow Darwinian notions of biological evolution. However, evidence to support the evolution of consciousness comes from three main sources: from integral theorists (Donald 2001; Elgin 1997; Gangadean 2006; Hart 2001; László 2008; Russell 2000; Swimme 1992; Thompson 1998; Wade 1996); from adult developmental psychology research on postformal reasoning (Bassett 2005; Commons et al. 1990; Commons and Richards 2002; Cowan and Todorovic 2005; Kohlberg 1990; Labouvie-Vief 1992; Sinnott 1998, 2005; Torbert 2004); and from the literature on planetary consciousness (Benedikter 2007; Earley 1997; Elgin 1997; Gangadean 2006; László 2006; Montuori 1999; Morin and Kern 1999; Nicolescu 2002; Russell 2000; Swimme and Tucker 2006). My own research over the last decade on the evolution of consciousness confirms my view that education urgently needs to evolve (Gidley 2007a, 2007b, 2009, 2010a, 2010b).
Thirdly, education belongs in the realm of culture, not economics. Educational bureaucrats produce concepts such as the “knowledge economy” which appropriate education for the purpose of profit. While schooling was taken over during the Industrial Revolution to provide fodder for the factories, education is fundamentally a socio-cultural practice. In the post-industrial twenty-first century education needs to be primarily concerned with developing the minds, hearts and souls of young people, to live in an increasingly complex and uncertain world.
What do today’s educators know about, and think about, these challenges? What is the role of educational futures in these major developments? How can education transform itself to incorporate these new insights?
A comprehensive review of evidence of very early palaeoart covering all continents reveals significant misconceptions in the dominant models of 'art' origins. The traditional preoccupation with predominantly zoomorphic, figurative traditions of south-western Europe is examined, as well as the closely related concept of an endemic cave art of the Upper Palaeolithic period. The existence of much earlier non-utilitarian traditions is demonstrated, including bead making and pigment use in the Lower Palaeolithic, and the widespread uniformity of Middle Palaeolithic palaeoart traditions is noted. The review of this global Pleistocene evidence suggests that the oldest and symbolically most sophisticated palaeoart is that of Asia rather than Europe.
L'auteur etudie quelques aspects des methodes archeologiques en prehistoire, qu'il considere en declin, les relations entre ces methodes et celles employees lors des analyses de l'art prehistorique, et la maniere dont de recents developpements de la recherche ont pu influer sur une «archeologie cognitive». Il explique ensuite comment cette derniere peut survivre a la crise epistemologique de l'archeologie, et ainsi subvenir a une etude scientifique de l'art prehistorique
There is extensive psychological literature which has linked hopelessness with depression and suicide risk for decades. Although there is a strong research and clinical base for targeting depression, there is a gap in the psychological literature when it comes to targeting hopelessness, specifically. In the absence of such a body of psychological literature, this paper draws on the research from the Futures Studies field which also records a rise in hopelessness, negativity and fear of the future among young people in the West. These phenomena (hopelessness, depression and suicide) will be analysed using Causal Layered Analysis, a methodology from the Futures Studies field, pointing to the long-term psycho-social impact on youth of the materialistic worldview that underpins Western culture. The paper will also explore the question: "how can hope for the future be promoted?" by looking beyond the dominance of materialism to spiritually inspired worldviews and the new metaphors and stories that arise from them.
In this article I aim to broaden and deepen the evolution of consciousness discourse by integrating the integral theoretic narratives of Rudolf Steiner, Jean Gebser, and Ken Wilber, who each point to the emergence of new ways of thinking that could address the complex, critical challenges of our planetary moment. I undertake a wide scan of the evolution discourse, noting it is dominantly limited to biology-based notions of human origins that are grounded in scientific materialism. I then broaden the discourse by introducing integral evolutionary theories using a transdisciplinary epistemology to work between, across and beyond diverse disciplines. I note the conceptual breadth of Wilber's integral evolutionary narrative in transcending both scientism and epistemological isolationism. I also draw attention to some limitations of Wilber's integral project, notably his undervaluing of Gebser's actual text, and the substantial omission of the pioneering contribution of Steiner, who, as early as 1904 wrote extensively about the evolution of consciousness, including the imminent emergence of a new stage. I enact a deepening of integral evolutionary theory by honoring the significant yet undervalued theoretic components of participation/enactment and aesthetics/artistry via Steiner and Gebser, as a complement to Wilber. To this end, I undertake an in-depth hermeneutic dialogue between their writings utilizing theoretic bricolage, a multi-mode methodology that weaves between and within diverse and overlapping perspectives. The hermeneutic methodology emphasizes interpretive textual analysis with the aim of deepening understanding of the individual works and the relationships among them. This analysis is embedded in an epic but pluralistic narrative that spans the entire human story through various previous movements of consciousness, arriving at a new emergence at the present time. I also discuss the relationship between these narratives and contemporary academic literature, culminating in a substantial consideration of research that identifies and/or enacts new stage(s) or movements of consciousness. In particular, I highlight the extensive adult developmental psychology research that identifies several stages of postformal thinking, and recent critical, ecological and philosophical literature that identifies an emerging planetary consciousness. In summary, my research reveals an interpretation of scientific and other evidence that points beyond the formal, modernist worldview to an emerging postformal-integral-planetary consciousness. I posit that a broader academic consideration of such an integration of integral theoretic narratives could potentially broaden the general evolution discourse beyond its current biological bias. The article concludes with a rewinding of narrative threads, reflecting on the narrators, the journey, and the language of the discourse. Appendixes A and B explore the theoretical implications of the emergence of postformal-integral-planetary consciousness for a reframing of modernist conceptions of time and space. Appendix C holds an aesthetic lens to the evolution of consciousness through examples from the genealogy of writing. Citation: Gidley, J 2007, 'The evolution of consciousness as a planetary imperative: an integration of integral views', Integral Review: A Transdisciplinary and Transcultural Journal for New Thought, Research and Praxis, no. 5, pp. 4-226.
Equitable access, success and quality in higher education are examined from a variety of ideological perspectives. Quality is positioned as a complex generic concept while access and success are identified as key concepts in the social inclusion domain, supplemented by the concept of participation. The topic is approached through an integrative analysis of the theory and practice literature on social inclusion in higher education. After contextualising current higher education within economic globalisation, the notion of quality is uncoupled from the necessity of a neoliberal framing allowing broader interpretations arising from more inclusive ideologies. Access, participation and success are shown to represent degrees of social inclusion underpinned by a nested spectrum of ideologies—neoliberalism, social justice and human potential respectively—with human potential ideology offering the most embracing perspective. Australian higher education is foregrounded, yet contextualised within European historical precedents and contemporary global issues.
Cet article evoque le passage d'un scepticisme generalise a l'acceptation des processus de reforme dans le domaine de l'enseignement superieur et souligne les avancees de cette harmonisation en passe d'etre reussie...
This chapter takes as its starting point the notion that human consciousness is evolving beyond the boundaries of formal,
reductionist modes of thinking. The emergence of new modes of thinking and new knowledge patterns is discussed via discourses
that identify postformal reasoning, integral thinking, and planetary consciousness. The chapter explores the theoretical relationships
between several themes arising from the evolution of consciousness literature and a diversity of postformal educational approaches.
Four core pedagogical values emerge from the intersection between these two clusters: love, life, wisdom, and voice. These
core values are elucidated theoretically in relation to philosophies of education and practically through examples from the art of education. They are offered as pedagogical seeds for evolving consciousness through education in the 21st century.
The discovery of female figurines at Brassempouy in the 1890's would launch more than a century of debate and interpretation concerning Paleolithic representations of women. The figurines emerged from the ground into a colonial intellectual and socio-political context nearly obsessed with matters of race. This early racial interpretive frame would only be replaced in the mid 20th century, when prehistorians turned to questions such as fertility and womanhood.
The first figurines were discovered in 1892 under rather tortured circumstances in which their very ownership was the subject of a heated dispute between Edouard Piette and Emile Cartailhac. Their toxic relationship would lead Piette, in his subsequent excavations, to be extremely precise about issues of stratigraphic and spatial provenience. Piette's publications and archives enabled Henri Delporte to confirm the Gravettian attribution of the figurines and have allowed the present author to create a map of their spatial distribution within the site.
Technological and microscopic analysis of the Brassempouy figurines resolves some lingering questions about the sex of certain of the figurines and suggests an original context of figurine fabrication and the abandonment of unsuccessful sculpting attempts.
In his forward to The Postmodern Condition, Fredric Jameson distinguishes Lyotard's theories from Habermas. Using Habarmas' idea of the legitimation crisis as a starting point, Jameson outlines two legitimizing myths: the liberation of humanity and the speculative unity of all knowledge. He explains the trend in philosophy to express skepticism for totalizing philosophical narratives as part of the linguistic turn in philosophy. In the introduction to the book, Lyotard establishes the differences between modern and postmodern thought. He defines modern as a science that uses a grand narrative to legitimate itself. Conversely, postmodern is a general distrust of such metanarratives.
At once provocative and inspiring, Against the Flow is a work of polemic from an internationally respected writer and thinker on arts education. Peter Abbs argues that contemporary education ignores the aesthetic and ethical as a result of being in thrall to such forces as the market economy and managerial and functional dictates. He identifies the present education system as being inimical to creativity and authentic learning and instead, narrowly focused on the quantitative measuring of results. This absence of a creative and ethical dimension in education has implications for art making in wider society. Art is shown as emerging from, and appealing to, the ironic postmodernist sensibility and mass media-led culture, while being devoid of philosophical significance. This book opens up a fresh and timely debate about the vital power of creativity in modern education. Drawing on examples from modern poetry, literature and visual art, it is an eloquent and passionate argument for the need to develop ethical and aesthetic energies to confront the growing vacuity of contemporary culture.
Many definitions of postmodernism focus on its nature as the aftermath of the modern industrial age when technology developed. This book extends that analysis to postmodernism by looking at the status of science, technology, and the arts, the significance of technocracy, and the way the flow of information is controlled in the Western world.
This article explores the problem of discussing a spiritual dimension in education within the secular context of western society, and Australian society in particular. It explores the idea that spirituality is relational and proposes an approach to learning that nurtures and gives expression to spirituality in terms of the connectedness students may feel and experience. It argues that such an approach can lead to the development of learning programmes and environments which may reduce the number of students who become isolated and alienated in traditional classrooms; which should promote, among students, the traits of resilience, connectedness, compassion and meaning; and increase their chances of becoming more productive and affirmed community members in a global society that is besieged by divisiveness, violence and terrorism.
This is a call for the international community of qualitative researchers to address the implications of the attempt by federal governments to regulate scientific inquiry by defining what is good science. Around the globe governments are attempting to enforce biomedical, evidence-based models of evidence. These efforts must be resisted by critical, qualitative scholars.
This article is concerned with the violence done in and to education. It does not address physical violence in schools, but is interested in cultural, emotional and psychological violence in schools and education systems. It asks three questions: is education inherently violent? If so, how serious a problem is this? How should spiritual education respond? Using discourse analysis, it seeks to show that much educational language is implicitly violent, because it is in the habit of using terminology and metaphors taken from warfare and from heavy mechanical industry, and because its cultural position in relation to the people involved in its enterprise is domineering, controlling and invasive. This analysis is followed by a discussion of the extent to which implicitly violent discourses and cultural models matter, and whether they can be said to do any damage if physical violence is avoided. Finally, it invites spiritual educators to consider the ambiguous response of spirituality to violence, and to develop their own resources for dealing with education as violence.
Johann Paul Friedrich Richter (1763-1825) adopted the pen-name 'Jean Paul' in honour of Jean Jaques Rousseau. His Levana or the doctrine of education (Levana oder Erziehlehre) was once a standard text and required reading in teacher education. Outside Germany the name of Jean Paul is now little known and the seminal educational text for which he was famous is rarely read. This neglect of Jean Paul is undeserved. What Jean Paul owed to Rousseau is apparent, but his work is rich in insight of his own. Three principles undergird Jean Paul's understanding of spiritual education (geistige Erziehung). Jean Paul insisted that spiritual education is essentially counter-cultural, that it is promoted by play and that it is grounded in love. Such education can never be at home in a curriculum which, however lofty are its stated objectives, is ultimately politically controlled. Jean Paul's insistence that play is constitutive of education needs to be heeded in an educational culture in which the playful is always at risk of displacement by what the government of the day deems to be of greater consequence. The heart of Jean Paul's understanding of education can be expressed succinctly, 'We love to teach and we teach to love'.
In this article, Joe Kincheloe and Shirley Steinberg critique and challenge the reductionist conceptions of intelligence that underlie cognitive developmental theory. The authors formulate a post-Piagetian cognitive theory that is informed by and extends critical, feminist, and postmodern thought. By delineating the features of what they refer to as a "post-formal" way of thinking, the authors provide practitioners with a framework for reconsidering both curricular and pedagogical practices.
Discusses misconceptions that half-informed educators might have about the author's theory of multiple intelligences. The seven intelligences are based on explicit criteria and respond to specific real-world content. Educators can assess proficiency, but not intelligence at different tasks. Theories can have infinite numbers of possible applications. (MLH)
What does it mean to engage in rigorous research? What does a researcher need to know to produce such research? What is specifically involved in multiple method bricolage research? In an era where talk abounds about scientific rigour and evidence-based research in education, this groundbreaking book presents a new and compelling examination of these concepts. Arguing that much of what is promoted as "rigorous inquiry" is reductionistic and ultimately misleading, the authors present an alternative to such approaches to educational inquiry. This book provides readers with an understanding of the complexities of educational research, and of the interrelationships between multiple methods, theoretical perspectives, philosophical orientations, social positionalities, modes of power, and narrative strategies. The authors use the French term "bricolage" to signify the use of a variety of research tools and ways of seeing. The book then constructs a new conception of rigour in research that is culturally sensitive and socially transformative, and shows researchers how to use multiple methods. After developing this approach, the authors devise a practical process of initiating researchers into the "bricolage," and provide concrete examples and guidelines for using this innovative approach. This book contains the following seven chapters: (1) Introduction: The Power of the Bricolage: Expanding Research Methods (Joe L. Kincheloe); (2) Redefining Rigor and Complexity in Research (Joe L. Kincheloe); (3) Questions of Disciplinarity/Interdisciplinarity in a Changing World (Joe L. Kincheloe); (4) Redefining and Interpreting the Object of Study (Joe L. Kincheloe); (5) Structures of Bricolage and Complexity (Kathleen S. Berry); (6) Feedback Looping for Increasing Complexity (Kathleen S. Berry); and (7) Bricolage Is Many a New Thing Understood (Kathleen S. Berry). A list of references is also included.
This book examines the relationship between democracy and schooling and argues that schools are one of the few spheres left where youth can learn the knowledge and skills necessary to become engaged, critical citizens. Not only is the legacy of democracy addressed through the work of John Dewey and others, but the democratic possibilities of schooling are analyzed through a range of issues extending from the politics of teacher authority to the importance of student voices. These issues have only become more vital in an era of neoliberalism and "smaller government," as Giroux discusses at length in this new updated edition. The contents of this book include: (1) Introduction: Schooling, Citizenship, and the Struggle for Democracy; (2) Schooling and the Politics of Ethics: Beyond Conservative and Liberal Discourses; (3) Authority, Ethics, and the Politics of Schooling; (4) Schooling and the Politics of Student Voice; (5) Literacy, Critical Pedagogy, and Empowerment; (6) Teacher Education and Democratic Schooling; and (8) Conclusion: Beyond the Politics of Anti-Utopianism in Education.
Although the famous Blair mantra ‘education, education, education’ was applied by his government mainly to the compulsory education sector, there was no shortage of initiatives in Higher Education (HE). The scene was set by the Dearing Report in 1997 which effectively determined the direction of Blair’s first term. The second term enabled Blair to pursue further an agenda of public sector reform, yet the simultaneous commitment to market principles of choice and diversity and to social inclusion created major tensions and dilemmas. Funding the expanded HE was the stimulus which led to Dearing, and has continued to be the major challenge of the ten‐year period.
This article answers the question, How can we build capacity for the development of a critical democratic citizenry? This is achieved by generally describing postmodern society, and by introducing the idea of evolutionary consciousness as the next step in meeting the needs of a postmodern society. Secondly, the current nature of education is described, which is followed by a redefinition of education within the context of a critical ideal. The discussion concludes with a presentation of the pragmatics of building capacity for the development of a critical democratic citizenry through a redefinition of education.
The word “prospects” connotes the probability of success. The authors in this special issue of FUTURES have provided a broad view of the existing knowledge base, organizational structures, and strategies for implementing transdisciplinarity. At the same time, they were mindful of the remaining impediments. This closing reflection builds on their insights in two parts: (1) by defining the key imperatives of transdisciplinarity and (2) by reflecting on the requirements for a genuinely human science and transdisciplinary capacity.
