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111
STEWART HASE & CHRIS KENYON
Complicity: An International Journal of Complexity and Education
Volume 4 (2007), Number 1 • pp. 111–118 • www.complexityandeducation.ca
SEMANTIC PLAY AND POSSIBILITY
Invited Contribution
Heutagogy:
A Child of Complexity Theory
STEWART HASE AND CHRIS KENYON
Southern Cross University (Australia)
One of the great joys of being an academic is that you get to play in the world
of ideas and words. It is like being invited to get into your favourite sandpit
every day and fool around and see what happens. One of the problems with
this, however, is that sometimes people ask you to explain the curious sand-
castle you built or that odd looking shape in the corner. As those of you who
have a psychological interest might know, the psychoanalytically minded
in the profession make a lot of what we do in sand pits and the things we
create. They are a very symbolically minded lot. We mention this because
what follows is very much a child of our bias, world view, experience and,
perhaps, deep unconscious. Chris is an educator, researcher and consultant
known for his work in education and culture through his book, ‘More than
G’day’. Stewart is, variously, an academic, consultant, trainer, psychologist,
and psychotherapist.
Both of us had been interested for a while in complex adaptive systems
and had played a lot with the systems thinking of Bertanafly (1950), Ackoff
and Emery (1972), Fred Emery (1971–1986), and Emery and Trist (1965), for
example. For the most part they conceptualised the differential nature of
environments and how systems and environment could influence each other.
Bertanafly, in particular, challenged the notion that systems are always seek-
ing equilibrium and do in fact adapt to external change. Complexity Theory
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Heutagogy
seemed to us to be a natural progression to this theoretical development, in
tune with the functioning of the modern world. More importantly, given our
interest in learning, a number of complexity theorists had already pointed
out its implications for learning (e.g., Davis and Sumara 1997; Doll 1989;
Doolittle 2000). The notions of change or learning and bifurcation as being
natural phenomena that result from stress on the system was particularly
appealing. As educators, and me as a psychologist and psychotherapist,
it had become obvious to us (and many constructivists around the globe
I am sure) that people only change in response to a very clear need. This
usually involves distress such as confusion, dissonance, and fear or a more
positive motive such as intense desire. The satiated and the comfortable are
less likely to make a behavioural change no matter what others may desire
and we’ll come back to this later in relation to teacher-centred approaches
to learning.
We also like to make the distinction between knowledge and skill
acquisition and learning. We see these as quite different processes. Knowl-
edge and skills or competencies can be acquired and even reproduced. But
this is not learning at a deeper cognitive level. Learning is an integrative
experience where a change in behaviour, knowledge, or understanding is
incorporated into the person’s existing repertoire of behaviour and schema
(values, attitudes and beliefs). For example, it is possible to acquire a set
of competencies that one can repeat in familiar or known circumstances.
However, if learning has taken place, competencies can also be repeated
and even adapted in unfamiliar, unanticipated situations.
Against this background it appeared to us that there were some deficien-
cies with the existing notions of pedagogy and andragogy. While Malcolm
Knowles (Knowles 1970) contributed greatly to our understanding of the
limitations of pedagogy when it came to adult learning by defining andra-
gogy, we thought that andragogy did not go far enough. Any examination of
learning experiences and curricula designed around andragogical principles
certainly demonstrated the capacity for linking into the adult experience and
recognised the advantages of self-directed learning. However, curricula were
still very much teacher-centric with little opportunity for any real involve-
ment at a micro or even macro level by the learner.
So, over a bottle of a nice crisp white wine one cold Canberra evening,
Chris and I described the notion of self-determined learning that best de-
scribed an extension to pedagogy and andragogy. Chris eventually came up
with the term heutagogy, which is derived from the ancient Greek for ‘self’
with some adjustments and the ‘agogy’ added. Heutagogy is concerned
with learner-centred learning that sees the learner as the major agent in
their own learning, which occurs as a result of personal experiences. The
teacher might think that he or she can control the learning experience but
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STEWART HASE & CHRIS KENYON
we think the teacher’s role is limited to the transfer of knowledge and skills.
As well as being an agent in their own learning, it is impossible to predict
the extent and effect of bifurcation. Hence, the curriculum and learning
activities may become increasingly irrelevant at any point in the so called
‘learning process’.
Since the initial paper there has been a growing interest in the concept
that has resulted in some research and a number of theoretical papers looking
at how heutagogy might be further conceptualised and, more importantly,
applied in learning experiences. We’d like to quickly review where the
journey has gone thus far.
As noted above, we contextualised heutagogy with reference to com-
plexity theory (Hase and Kenyon 2000; Hase 2002). It thus seemed a natural
progression for us to examine a potential link between heutagogy and action
research (and necessarily to action learning but we’ll refer here just to action
research). Stimulated by her doctoral studies Renata Phelps and I (Phelps
and Hase 2002) wrote a paper describing what was for us a natural connec-
tion between action research and complexity theory. It seemed to us that
action research provides the flexibility of being able to try and understand
unpredictable and complex social phenomena. In addition both complexity
theory and action research emphasise the emergent nature of learning. We’ll
leave you to read the paper if you’d like to see the connections.
It was then a simple step to start thinking about how action research (and
action learning) might fall under the ways in which self-determined learning
might take place (Hase 2004; Tay and Hase 2004). Action research allows
experimentation with real world experience where learning is in the hands
of the participants. This learning can then be tested in subsequent learning
cycles. This is as close to real world learning as one can get in a controlled
setting where there is a legitimate observer who is also a participant and
learner all at the same time. In fact we have been able to document how
doctoral students undertaking action research theses have progressed from
pedagogical, then andragogical to heutagogical learning in the course of their
research (Hase, Tay and Goh 2006; Sankaran, Hase, Dick and Davies 2007).
This has been one of the few research projects conducted to investigate the
relevance of heutagogy in understanding the learning experience.
Another way in which heutagogy and complexity theory have been con-
nected conceptually is through the idea of capability (Phelps and Hase 2002;
Phelps, Hase and Ellis 2005; Kenyon and Hase 2001; Hase and Kenyon 2003;
Hase and Tay 2004; Hase 2002;). Capability is a holistic attribute and concerns
the capacity to use one’s competence in novel situations rather than just the
familiar, a justified level of self-efficacy for dealing with novel problems, hav-
ing appropriate values, being able to work in teams, and knowing how to learn
(Hase 2002; Stephenson 1994). It is posited that capable people are more likely
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Heutagogy
to be able to manage the world envisaged by complexity theory. In support of
this contention, a recent study has demonstrated how dimensions of capability
delimited the practice of advanced nursing practitioners in complex health
situations (Gardner, Hase, Gardner, Dunn and Carryer 2007).
We have also been particularly interested in how heutagogical ap-
proaches might in fact develop capability among people in workplaces
(Hase and Kenyon 2003; Hase and Davis 1999; Kenyon and Hase 2001). The
competency movement has dominated much of the vocational education
and training agenda in Australia and other countries such as New Zealand
and the UK. While competencies (knowledge and skills) are obviously es-
sential for effective functioning in workplaces they are concerned with prior
ability in known contexts. Capability, however, is concerned with unknown
contexts that extend beyond competence. Modern workplaces are complex
adaptive systems that provide continuous and rapidly changing contexts.
Our research and thinking has concerned how the self-determined learning
that occurs in the normal course of work leads to capability can be under-
stood and harnessed. In response to this Wilmott and Barry (2002) found in
a review of vocational education and training that there has been a shift in
the sector from pedagogical to heutagogical approaches to learning.
It is not surprising that this same thinking in relation to heutagogy has
been applied to the developing world of online and e-learning (Albon 2006;
Ivan 2006; Keogh 2005) and the transformation of learning in the online
environment (Idrus and McComas). It is also encouraging to see that Heu-
tagogy has also been referred to in a number of other contexts examining
learning such as: early childhood teaching (Ashton and Newman 2006);
problem based learning in the health sector (Kavanagh and Nicol 2007);
technology education (Eberle and Childress 2007; ethics (Simms 2003); and
credentialing (Olliges and Mahfood 2004).
Thus far there appears, potentially to be a number of ways in which
heutagogical thinking might be applied to designing learning processes:
· Recognition of the emergent nature of learning and hence the need for
a ‘living’ curriculum that is flexible and open to change as the learner
learns;
· Related to this is the involvement of the learner in this ‘living’ cur-
riculum as the key driver.
· Recognising that knowledge and skill acquisition, and learning are
separate processes and need different approaches;
· Identification of learning activities/processes by the learner not just
the teacher.
· Using action research and action learning as meta-methodologies in
the learning experience.
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STEWART HASE & CHRIS KENYON
· Involvement of the learner in the design of assessment, self-diagnosis
and application of knowledge in real life contexts.
· Collaborative learning;
· Coaching for individual learning needs and application.
There are two main agendas in our current work with heutagogy. The first
of these is to investigate through a focused research program whether or not
heutagogy is a useful concept. Some initial research is mentioned above but
there is more to do yet. It is surprising to see heutagogy spring up in so many
places such as curricula documents and theory papers despite only a modicum
of good research evidence to support it. Mind you, this should not discourage
thinking at a theoretical level. The second agenda, which may be related to the
first, is to understand further how learning takes place in complex adaptive
systems and then how to harness and facilitate these processes.
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About the Authors
Chris Kenyon has many years experience as a senior consultant and educator. He
has been director of two consulting organisations, and has worked with private
companies and government departments in Australia, New Zealand, Zambia, Saudi
Arabia, USA, Thailand and Malaysia. His book on cross-cultural communication
was a recommended text in many university courses, and for six years he ran the
“Strategies for Success” seminars designed to enhance the performance of senior
executives. He was director of an MBA level program for ten years, and is still a
guest presenter on a number of postgraduate courses. With Dr Stewart Hase in
2000, he introduced Heutagogy as a new approach to learning.
Stewart Hase is an academic, psychologist and psychotherapist, educator and
consultant. Until the end of 2007 he is employed at Southern Cross University in
the Graduate College of Management, in Northern NSW, Australia, where he has
been for 19 years. At the end of the year he is going into semi-retirement and will
pursue other interests as well as consulting should he be able to find anyone to drag
him away from golf, fishing, surfing, walking, reading and writing. It’s tough but
someone has to do it!. [e-mail: stewart.hase@scu.edu.au]
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© Copyright 2007. The authorS, Stewart Hase and Chris Kenyon, assign to the University
of Alberta and other educational and non-profit institutions a non-exclusive license to use
this document for personal use and in courses of instruction provided that the article is used
in full and this copyright statement is reproduced. The authors also grant a non-exclusive
license to the University of Alberta to publish this document in full on the World Wide
Web, and for the document to be published on mirrors on the World Wide Web. Any other
usage is prohibited without the express permission of the authors.