Towards the Decline and fall of Radical and Educational Constructivism (Mark I)

Abstract

In 1974, W. J. McKeachie published a brief article in The Educational Researcher called, “The Decline and Fall of the Laws of Learning.” This article was primarily about the decline and fall of the behaviorist laws of learning and radical behaviorism, both of which were never quite the same in psychology or education after this article as before it was published. The purpose of this paper is to start of the process of developing and refining a series of core and critical analyses of radical constructivism, modified (radical) constructivism, and “educational constructivism’ that will initiate the process of the decline and fall of these views from educational circles and science education circles in particular, and have these replaced by modern, sound, and empirically documented and supported views and theories (yes, theories) of learning. Our purpose is to begin the process of “doing a Mckeachie” on “educational constructivism,” as it is as unscientific and misguided as behaviorism was in the sixties in education, and not much different from behaviorism in the sixties, as it is in numerous ways the opposite end of the same misguided and non-scientific continuum. The criticisms of constructivism to date have primarily been philosophical (see Matthews, 1993, 2004; and Nola, 1993) as opposed to psychological, learning theory centered and scientific theory centered, which is the primary focus in this paper. As Fensham (2004) and others have noted, (educational) constructivism is the dominant paradigm and ‘theory” in science education today. Science education simply cannot have a dominant paradigm that is unscientific, non-theoretical in the modern sense of scientific theory, and essentially Creationist Science in character. This current state of affairs is simply too radical of a core contradiction and cannot be supported or maintained any longer as an egocentric fad that may simply pass on and fade away.