1st Edition

Ecologies for Learning and Practice Emerging Ideas, Sightings, and Possibilities

Edited By Ronald Barnett, Norman Jackson Copyright 2020
    254 Pages 36 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    254 Pages 36 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    Ecologies for Learning and Practice provides the first systematic account of the ideas of learning ecologies and ecologies of practice and locates the two concepts within the context of our contemporary world. It focuses on how individuals and society are being presented with all manner of learning challenges arising from fluidities and disruptions, which extend across all domains of life. This book examines emerging ways of understanding and living purposively in these new fluidities and provides fresh perspectives on the way we learn and achieve in such dynamic contexts.

    Providing an insight into the research of a range of internationally renowned contributors, this book explores diverse topics from the higher education and adult learning worlds. These include:

    • The challenges faced by education systems today
    • The concept of ecologies for learning and practice
    • The role and responsibility of higher education institutions in advancing ecological approaches to learning
    • The different eco-social systems of the world—local and global, economic, cultural, practical, technological, and ethical
    • How adult learners might create and manage their own ecologies for learning and practice in order to sustain themselves and flourish

    With its proposals for individual and institutional learning in the 21st century and concerns for our sustainability in a fragile world, Ecologies for Learning and Practice is an essential guide for all who seek to encourage and facilitate learning in a world that is fundamentally ecological in nature.

    List of figures

    List of tables

    List of contributors

    1 Introduction: Steps to Ecologies for Learning and Practice

    Norman Jackson and Ronald Barnett

    PART 1 Towards Ecologies for Learning and Practice

    2 Animating Systems: The Ecological Value of Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model of Development

    Leah O'Toole, Nóirín Hayes, and Ann Marie Halpenny

    3 Weaving Ecologies for Learning: Engaging Imagination in Place-based Education

    Gillian Judson

    4 Learning Ecologies: Liminal States and Student Transformation

    Maggi Savin-Baden

    5 Sustainability-oriented Ecologies of Learning: A Response to Systemic Global Dysfunction

    Arjen E.J. Wals

    PART 2 Advancing Ecologies for Learning and Practice in Higher Education

    6 Ecologies for Learning and Practice in Higher Education Ecosystems

    Norman Jackson

    7 Ecological Thinking about Education Strategy in Universities

    Peter Goodyear and Robert A. Ellis

    8 Education and Innovation Ecotones

    Ann Pendleton-Jullian

    9 Ecosystem Empowerment: Unlocking Human Potential Through Value Creation

    Sasha Barab, Anna Arici, Earl Aguilera, and Kathryn Dutchin

    10 Building Doctoral Ecologies and Ecological Curricula: Sprawling Spaces of Learning in Researcher Education

    Søren S.E. Bengtsen

    PART 3 Ecologies for Learning and Practice in the World

    11   Learning Ecologies at Work

    Karen Evans

    12 From Learning Ecologies to Ecologies for Creative Practice

    Norman Jackson

    13 Learning in the Cat’s Cradle: Weaving Learning Ecologies in the City

    Keri Facer, Magdalena Buchczyk, Liz Bishop, Helen Bolton, Zehra Haq, Jackie Gilbert, Gideon Thomas, Jessica Tomico, and Xiujuan Wang

    14 Society as a Learning Ecology: Glimpsed and Now Disappearing?

    Ronald Barnett

    Epilogue : Practice seldom makes perfect but …

    Ronald Barnett and Norman Jackson

    Index

    Biography

    Ronald Barnett is Emeritus Professor of Higher Education, University College London, Institute of Education. 

    Norman Jackson is Emeritus Professor, University of Surrey, and Founder of Lifewide Education.

    Ecologies for Learning and Practice is an amazing book—both eye opening and optimistic. Its subtitle: Emerging Ideas, Sightings, and Possibilities precisely captures its intent and content!…The writers expand our own imagination of new approaches to learning, to new institutional architectures for learning in a white-water world…We should congratulate [the editors] for assembling such a provocative collection of authors that helps unpack how learning can be reconstituted in an ever-changing world.

    –John Seely Brown, Former Chief Scientist of Xerox Corp and head of its Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), Advisor to the Provost, University of Southern California, USA