Contributed talk in Philosophy, Language, Art & Education 1, July 29, 2019, 11:30 a.m. in room USB.G.003

Autopoiesis in digital learning design: Theoretical implications in education

Claudio Aguayo

watch Publication Today’s mobile and smart technologies have a key role to play in the transformative potential of educational practice. However, such processes are embedded within an inherent and unpredictable complexity, not only in the design and development of educational experiences, but also within the socio-cultural contexts where users and learners reside. This represents a limitation with current mainstream digital educational practice, as digital experiences tend to be designed and developed as ‘one solution fits all’ products, and/or as ‘one-off’ events, failing to address socio-technological complexity, therefore decaying in meaningfulness and effectiveness over-time. One ambitious solution is to confer the processes associated with the design and development of digital learning experiences with similar autopoietic properties found within living systems, in particular adaptability and self- organisation. The underpinning rationale is that, by conferring such properties to digital learning experiences, intelligent digital interventions can be achieved to respond to unpredictable and ever-changing socio-cultural conditions, promoting meaningful learning over-time. Such an epistemological view of digital learning technologies aims to ultimately promote a more efficient and low cost type of design and development of digital learning in education.