Theorising Education 2012
The Future of Theory in Education: Traditional, Trends and Trajectories
Proposal for a theory clinic (in which presenters work with the audience in the
critical analysis of the theoretical dimensions of existing research or practice)
Title of clinic:
Footprints of Emergence: applying complexity theory to education.
(Describing, Researching & Designing Emergence in Learning)
Proposers: Williams, R., Mackness, J., Gumtau, S.
Theoretical focus:
Complex Adaptive Systems Theory (CAST) and Emergence
Key Resources:
 Paul Cilliers’s work on complexity and post-modernism; Dave Snowden and
associates’ work on complexity.
 Etienne Wenger’s work on Communities of practice.
 Karin Knorr-Cetina’s work on ‘post-Weberian’ “micro-global structures”.
 Open Learning (various).
Background
The clinic will take as a starting point a paper on emergent learning, published in
IRRODL 2011, as well as continuing research (paper forthcoming) by the authors
into emergent learning and curriculum design. The focus of the clinic will be to
work with actual case studies, to explore what contribution complex-adaptive
systems theory might make to describing, researching, designing, and managing
‘emergent’ learning, i.e. learning that is substantially self-organised and takes
place among participants who interact frequently and openly, but within some
constraints; crucially, within learning environments in which ‘actors and
structure co-evolve’.
The Clinic
Participants will be requested to contribute their own case study/ies and, if they
have worked in this area, their own their own resources, reflections, and
research on complexity theory or its applications to educational research and
practice.
Rather than starting with theory and apply it to individual case studies, however,
the clinic will start with the presentation of visual analyses that have been
developed of a selection of case studies, the way that the characteristics of
emergent learning have been applied to each case study.
Clinic participants will be asked to create their own visual analysis (footprint) of
a case study of their choice. They will be encouraged to source these case studies
from their own experience or from a range of multi-media resources such as the
web, videos and concept maps (or, if they wish, to revisit some of the case
studies already presented). These case studies will be graphically represented as
a footprint (on in some other visual form), which applies existing learning
theories, complex adaptive systems theory (CAST) and emergence.
The premise of the clinic is that some institutions, and many teachers and
learners are increasingly engaged in extensive networking, self-organised
learning, and collaboration across the boundaries of ‘teachers’ and ‘learners’, and
of ‘formal’ and ‘non-formal’ education and learning, and that this produces
learning which does not necessarily follow predictable paths, or produce specific,
predictable outcomes. And further, that many of the attempts to describe,
research, design and manage this type of learning are already drawing on
complexity theory in some way (e.g. Communities of Practice, Organisational and
Knowledge Management, and Open Learning).
The question that follows is: Does complex-adaptive systems theory contribute
to our understanding of these issues, i.e. to both the theory and research of the
case studies, and the changing practice and context of education – and in
particular, of ‘emergent’ learning?
Aims of the clinic
 To model and demonstrate emergence in action and explore whether, and if
so how, theory (and in particular, complexity theory) informs this process.

To discuss, through the use of a variety of case studies, the criteria which
might be used for describing and researching emergence, and in particular,
emergent learning.

To employ an open and emergent process to explore and theorise emergence.
Indicative Bibliography
Cilliers, P. (2005). Complexity, deconstruction and relativism. Theory, Culture and
Society, 22(5), 255-267.
Cilliers, P. (2010). The value of complexity. A response to Elizabeth Mowat &
Brent Davis. Complicity: An International Journal of Complexity and Education,
7(1), 39-42.
Krarup, T. M., Blok, A. (2011). Unfolding the social: quasi-actants, virtual
theory, and the new empiricism of Bruno Latour
The Sociological Review. 59: pp.42–63. Retrieved from:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-54X.2010.01991.x/abstract
Knorr-Cetina, K. (2005). Complex global microstructures. Theory, Culture and
Society, 22(5), 213-234.
Morrison, K. (2008). Educational Philosophy and the Challenge of Complexity
Theory. Philosophy, 40(1).
Osberg, D., & Biesta, G. (2008). The emergent curriculum: navigating a complex
course between unguided learning and planned enculturation. Journal of
Curriculum Studies, 40(3), 313-328.
Scardamalia, M., & Bereiter, C. (2006). Knowledge Building : Theory , Pedagogy ,
and Technology. Knowledge Creation Diffusion Utilization, 97-118.
Snowden, D.J. and Boone, M. E. (2007) A Leader’s Framework for Decision
Making. Harvard Business Review, November.
Williams, R., Karousou, R., & Mackness, J. (2011). Emergent Learning and
Learning Ecologies in Web 2.0. The International Review of Research in Open and
Distance Learning, 12(3), 39-59. Retrieved from
http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/883
Wenger, E., White, N., Smith, J.D. Digital Habitats, CP Square, Portland, OR, USA.