Complicity: An International Journal of Complexity and Education
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Ecological Systems and Complexity Theory: Toward an Alternative Model of Accountability in Education
No full textThe call for accountability within education has led to the increased examination of the academic achievement of students across the nation. Too often, however, schools and school districts are scrutinized by means of overly simplistic linear models that fail to consider the complexity of interactions that result in student achievement. This paper postulates that student achievement is instead best understood as a developmental outcome that emerges as a result of interactions among layers within a complex system. Organizations such as schools can be modeled using Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems and analyzed using complexity theory as an appropriate and useful alternative to the linear models that often form the basis of educational research and policy. Key elements of both Bronfenbrenner’s ecological-contextual theory and complexity are explained and applied at the level of an individual school
Evoking Desire…and Irreverence: A Collection of Women Writing Women
No full textWe draw from the diverse life experiences of women who have supported their academic and life journeys through membership in the Women Writing Women (WWW) collective. We come from diverse backgrounds in curriculum, new media studies, drama, english, art, science, creative writing, elementary, secondary, higher and adult education, and bring these multiple perspectives to our monthly dialogues. We explore how writing can evoke desire, longing, fear, reverence, irreverence, joy and awe rather than merely represent. The community offers an emergent space for these deeply personal, yet public explorations into meaning‐making. We share personal stories, perform writing, dialogue on the evolution of this collective, and co‐create with the audience gathered.
Throughout the four years of conforming, unforming, reforming and transforming within this collective, we have come to understand that the simple and seemingly isolated act of personal and academic writing is a complex social reality. We articulate singularities in our writings and discussions as we simultaneously discover overlapping links within personal and collective metaphors. The paper opens a much‐needed dialogue on the complexity of transformational learning communities, particularly within academia. We hope to evoke dialogue and inspire among our readership to also create writing collectives as a form of ‘joyful revolt’ against isolating hegemonics, opening up a new space to explore collectivity and emergent possibility
Some Differences between Maturana and Varela \u27s Theory of Cognition and Constructivism
No full textThe theory of cognition of Varela and Maturana differs in specific aspects from constructivist theories and so should not be seen or interpreted as another form of constructivism. To encourage the emergence of a discussion on important differences between both theories, this paper aims at highlighting three of these specific aspects, namely the biological roots of cognition, its phylogenic and ontogenic basis, and the nature of reality and knowledge. In many regards, it is possible that the first two points were seen as extensions of constructivism, and had not been theorized previously as distinctions, as is done in the paper. The third point concerning the ideas of “bringing forth a world” represents a clear conceptual shift from the visions inherent in constructivism, and should not be neglected in discussions on epistemology and the nature of knowledge and reality. This third fundamental point brings us to see Varela and Maturana as being different than constructivists, rather seeing them as “bring forthists.
Culturally-Responsive Mathematics Pedagogy Through Complexivist Thinking
No full textThis paper uses a complexity lens to consider the pedagogical project of culturally responsive mathematics. Need for new and different theoretical perspectives for Aboriginal education arise from chronic underachievement among Canada’s Aboriginal students. Culturally responsive mathematics pedagogy as a complex learning system allows a different view into the interrelationships and necessary conditions between culture, education and society, a view that aims to open new possibility for curriculum development, Aboriginal schooling and cultural renewal, while ensuring success for students.
As part of the $11 million school project, the Band School Society negotiated with the Federal Aboriginal Affairs Ministry and the building contractors to include apprenticeships for Band members to join the work crew hired to build the new school. For an Aboriginal village of 2000 people and up to 80% unemployment, this was a great opportunity. Interested workers were invited to apply for the positions. All 15 of the respondents were hired immediately, and all needed mathematics upgrading courses to enter the apprenticeship training program. Skilled trades workers were in short supply in the community, and so future employment opportunities were virtually assured after completion of the school project. A local, non-Native adult education teacher was enlisted to run an evening prep course for these newly hired apprentices. The course offered focused training in mathematics skills needed by tradespeople, and indeed, these were prerequisite skills for entering the apprenticeship program. On the first night of class, eleven men and women arrived. By week two, the group had dwindled to six. When the course was completed at the end of eight weeks, two students earned completion certificates and formally entered the apprenticeship program
Response to Semetsky: Thinking of(f) the Deep End: Semetsky and the Complicated Conversation
No full textAn astonishing array of theoretical discourses appear woven together seamlessly in Semetsky’s rationale for using Tarot practice as a tool for education, drawing from theoretical traditions that range from Jung’s and Pauli’s theories of archetypes and synchronicity, to chaos and complexity or complex systems theories, to C.S. Peirce’s semiotic pragmaticism, to natural law, to hermeneutics, and to the phenomenology of human subjects and life‐worlds. This response considers some of those traditions in relation to each other, with particular concern for issues of language, meaning, knowledge, thinking, and human agency. The priority of Semetsky’s concern for individuation and integration of the human subject within their meaningful life‐world is observed as having paramount importance for her project
Holy Ground of Teaching and Learning
No full textThis brief article consists of my reflections after attending a class about teaching and learning in higher education. After shifting my assumptions from modern expectations that a “good” and systematic form of teaching can be taught, to post‐modern ideas concerning rich and complex experiences, I express my new understanding of teaching and learning. Due to the complex richness of recursion and feedback loops, teaching and learning holds implications beyond the classroom into the wider world. Human capacities for play, creativity, and organization resonate with a spiritual understanding of a playful God. In this theological grounding, I conceptualize the classroom in terms of a holy place in which teachers and students playfully and reverently interact and care for one another and for the subject at hand