There has been wide-ranging discussion about the concept of method and it still does not exist a definition that all scholars share; the debate that defines its contents involves both scientific practice and philosophical speculation. The experience that scientists have accumulated so far does not allow to identify a unique methodology that can be applied in various disciplines. Then, knowledge can be framed in a dimension of heuristic activity that tends to the progressive construction of the subject. This process develops in social interaction, in the negotiation and construction of meanings by teachers and students, in “representations” that they share by operating in the same regulatory space generated by body, mind and environment. It is possible to assume, therefore, that the nature of the essential categories of thought will be found in the structure of social relations that, consequently, become crucial to the cognitive development. The latter is fundamentally based on a “functional spiral” that interacts and nourishes itself between “organizational” mental skills and social interactions. The decisive social regulation that structures our cognitive system is conditioned by the underlying system of rules and representations involved in the communication. The educational relationship, although it is both intentional and asymmetric, is never direct and immediate, but by its nature it is “mediated”, namely it results from the teacher-symbolic universes-learner triangulation. Moreover, human communication would be impossible without the sharing of arbitrary and conventional signs. The openness and willingness towards relationship offer the individual the essential flexibility to deal with the contemporary complexity. Considering the educational relationship as a mediated relationship, one can manage the dimension of individual ego and the world-society in a way that one is for the other limit and stimulus at the same time. In this sense, relationship becomes the open space of the encounter-clash, the possibility to appreciate others’ perspectives and defend your own opinions, in order to develop a “structural criticality” as a decisive individual dimension of education.

Method, Social Processes and Relational Dynamics in Educational Contexts

ANNARUMMA, Maria
2016-01-01

Abstract

There has been wide-ranging discussion about the concept of method and it still does not exist a definition that all scholars share; the debate that defines its contents involves both scientific practice and philosophical speculation. The experience that scientists have accumulated so far does not allow to identify a unique methodology that can be applied in various disciplines. Then, knowledge can be framed in a dimension of heuristic activity that tends to the progressive construction of the subject. This process develops in social interaction, in the negotiation and construction of meanings by teachers and students, in “representations” that they share by operating in the same regulatory space generated by body, mind and environment. It is possible to assume, therefore, that the nature of the essential categories of thought will be found in the structure of social relations that, consequently, become crucial to the cognitive development. The latter is fundamentally based on a “functional spiral” that interacts and nourishes itself between “organizational” mental skills and social interactions. The decisive social regulation that structures our cognitive system is conditioned by the underlying system of rules and representations involved in the communication. The educational relationship, although it is both intentional and asymmetric, is never direct and immediate, but by its nature it is “mediated”, namely it results from the teacher-symbolic universes-learner triangulation. Moreover, human communication would be impossible without the sharing of arbitrary and conventional signs. The openness and willingness towards relationship offer the individual the essential flexibility to deal with the contemporary complexity. Considering the educational relationship as a mediated relationship, one can manage the dimension of individual ego and the world-society in a way that one is for the other limit and stimulus at the same time. In this sense, relationship becomes the open space of the encounter-clash, the possibility to appreciate others’ perspectives and defend your own opinions, in order to develop a “structural criticality” as a decisive individual dimension of education.
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11386/4678139
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