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Mathematics, natural science and engineering are not among the most favourite learning objectives of either pupils or adults. While they do enjoy a high esteem, they are also perceived as difficult. The authors discuss why this should be so, and give a summary over participation statistics of Volkshochschulen in the past decades, where courses in mathematics, science or technical matters have been on the decline for some time. Against this background, they present aims and methods of their proj…
Holzapfel, Günther: More self-consciousness for pedagogy! A reply to REPORT 3/2003 titled "Brain and Learning" Referring to REPORT 3/2003 with its main theme "Brain and Learning" the author criticizes tendences in pedagogy which consider some results of neuro-sciences as confirmation for a naturalistic and biologistic trend. He pleads for emphasizing those aspects of neuro-sciences which are confirmations against obsolete concepts of learning and education as an accumulation of knowledge wi…
Striving for quality is at the core of pedagogical professionalism. Therefore the science of further education has to intervene in the quality discussion in two ways: Firstly, it must develop criteria by which systems of quality assurance can be compared and by which their appropriateness for the sector of further education can be evaluated. Secondly, it must inquire yet more persistently into the specifics of pedagogical quality and find out what further education science can contribute toward…
This article starts from the premise that an academic discipline directed at practice has to question, within which terms its research results become useful beyond science. For empirical research, the authors put forward the idea of use-inspired basic research. This approach might be a helpful orientation due to (further) educational science’s double challenge to simultaneously prove academic productivity and practical as well as societal usefulness. By reference to points of decision regularly…
The author discusses the way in which scientific knowledge and results of research are made public. He questions Gordon Shepherd’s assertion that scientists themselves are best qualified for a transmission of their results to the interested public, and rather makes a case for the expert as a mediator. In order to do so, he identifies the characteristics of science versus expertise, and defines the expert as one who, in addition to the knowledge required, also possesses communicative skill, disc…
How does knowledge come into science of adult education? The research undertaking of the author is sketched, in which an honouring of publications and the time-line of the lasting acknowledgement is to be explored.
This article examines learning at the university, which is located in the institutional context of the university with its structural conditions. The analysis of learning at universities opens research perspectives, to which the adult education science can deliver substantial contributions.
Right-wing populism has strongly polarizing effects in politics, education and science—a problem which this article aims to adress. Instead of claiming a demarcation between science and education on the one hand and right-wing populist ideology on the other, we initially focus on continuities. At the same time, we are concerned with finding a critical distance towards right-wing populism. Using the theoretical framework of boundary-work we therefore analyse a case of right-wing populist educati…
