Imagining Education: Seeking New Metaphors For Schooling

Exploratory Seminar: Risk-taking Inquiry Into New Ideas About Education

Barcelona, October 23^rd and 24^th, 2014

Gaining access to education for all is one of the most important assets of democratic and fair societies. For a long time, state schools, the basic organisational metaphor of educational systems, have received a good deal of criticism, mostly due to neoliberal political interests as well as their difficulty of educating all children and responding to today’s educational challenges.

The structure (and the related machinery) created almost two hundred years ago has proven to be efficient in schooling most children, but is also emerging as a major obstacle to fostering genuine, self-regulated and student-centred learning, and seems to be failing to cope with the challenges and opportunities of the digital society. The need to deeply, openly and radically discuss these issues is based on our firm belief in the importance of education for all.

Video

Recording of the round table The need and the difficulty of profound and relevant change in educational systems.

Background

We are organising this seminar as a complementary activity of the research projects:

Identidoc — The construction of the professional identity of early-childhood and primary school teachers during the initial professional development and the first years at work. MINECO-EDU2010-20852-C02-01/02.
IN-OUT — Living and learning with new literacies in and outside secondary school: contributions to reducing drop-out, exclusion and disaffection among youth. MINECO. EDU2011-24122.
DIYLab — Do it yourself in Education: expanding digital competence to foster Student agency and collaborative learning. European Commision. Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency. 543177-LLP-1-2013-1-ES-KA3MP.

We would like to explore radical ideas, visions and scenarios about:

how to organise educational systems to provide public, democratic, fair and quality education for all;
how to maintain the current systems’ strengths, while trying to overcome most of its weaknesses;
how to foster meaningful and responsible learning for all in the digital society.

We understand radical as relating to the basic or inherent constitution of a thing; favouring or tending to produce fundamental changes; and/or challenging the status quo.

The seminar

The main endeavour of this seminar is to explore the strengths and weaknesses of current early-childhood, primary and secondary schooling and come up with radical ideas about how to organise education for these age groups, going beyond the school and classroom-related metaphors.

The seminar will consist of an ongoing discussion around four issues coordinated by invited speakers and members of the Esbrina and Elkarrikertuz research groups. The maximum number of participants allowed will be 35, in order to promote a deep interconnected conversation.

Issues:

What kind of education can foster Learning and Pedagogies of the Not-Known?
Can current schools implement the learning contexts of the present-future?
Where, what, how, and with what do children and young people learn?
What to keep, what to break, what to transform, what to create and how?

Program

Thursday, October 23^rd
9:15	Welcome
9:30	The meaning and challenges of an exploratory seminar Juana M. Sancho Gil. Esbrina’s co-ordinator Fernando Hernández Hernández. Esbrina’s co-ordinator José M. Correa Gorospe. Elkarrikertuz’s co-ordinator
10:00	What kind of Education can foster Learning and Pedagogies of the Not-Known? Presentation and discussion Dennis Atkinson. Goldsmiths College. United Kingdom
11:30	Networking
12:00	What makes it so difficult to engage in new learning spaces? Empirical findings from experiments in innovative learning environments Presentation and discussion Frank Fischer. Center for the Learning Sciences. Ludwig Maximilian Universität. Germany
13:30	End of day one

Thursday, October 23^rd. Afternoon Event This event will take place at a different venue: Sala d’actes. Facultat de Belles Arts. Pau Gargallo, 4. 08028 Barcelona (Google Maps)
18:00	The need and the difficulty of profound and relevant change in educational systems Round tables open to the whole educational community Simultaneous translation available Moderators Members of Esbrina and Elkarrikertuz research groups Participants · Dennis Atkinson. Goldsmiths College. United Kingdom · Frank Fischer. Center for the Learning Sciences. Ludwig Maximilian Universität. Germany · Ola Erstad. Department of Education. Faculty of Education Sciences. University of Oslo. Norway

Thursday, October 23^rd. Afternoon Event

This event will take place at a different venue:
Sala d’actes. Facultat de Belles Arts.
Pau Gargallo, 4. 08028 Barcelona (Google Maps)

18:00

The need and the difficulty of profound and relevant change in educational systems

Round tables open to the whole educational community
Simultaneous translation available

Moderators
Members of Esbrina and Elkarrikertuz research groups

Participants
· Dennis Atkinson. Goldsmiths College. United Kingdom
· Frank Fischer. Center for the Learning Sciences. Ludwig Maximilian Universität. Germany
· Ola Erstad. Department of Education. Faculty of Education Sciences. University of Oslo. Norway

Friday, October 24^th
9:30	Landscapes for contemporary learning. Where, what, how, and with what do children and young people learn? Presentation and discussion Ola Erstad. Department of Education. Faculty of Education Sciences. University of Oslo. Norway
11:00	Networking
11:30	Minds and hands on the future. What to keep, what to break, what to transform and how? Workshop to envision possible/desirable landscapes for education José M. Correa, Judit Vidiella, Luispe Gutiérrez, Leticia Fraga, Aingeru Gitiérrez-Cabello and Raquel Miño. Esbrina and Elkarrikertuz
13:30	Main conclusions and wrap up Juana M. Sancho Gil, Fernando Hernández Hernández and José M. Correa Gorospe
14:00	End of day two