I enjoyed hearing the discussion on autopoesis and other than a new word I feel that I made my choice to live with this understanding from an early age in this world. I also go to great lengths in my class to illuminate to the class the connectedness of all living beings and for every action there is a reaction. The need to be mindful in all that we do. Within the structural coupling piece I feel that we as humans tend to surround ourselves with like minded beings and some choose not to move outside of that perceived “safe” zone. There is the constant movement of time that facilitates the process of movement and thereby experience and how that connects in cognitive, cultural and technological ways. I was excited to be reminded of the linguistic cognitive piece as I have said earlier the way forward for ICT is through connection, collaboration and creativity by all stakeholders. This might take time to ensure trust and safety are in place to ensure some level of success in education.
My inquiry piece is ever present in my thoughts and actions over the course of a day. I spent a certain amount of time exploring various venn diagram resources on the web, but as yet have not found the way I wish to present the district’s information. I also discovered some ICT Policy documents in draft format on the staff portal but I have more questions as to how they came to be there and when and what will take them to another level? What is the process? So I find myself darting back across the star of inquiry to spend time investigating more this evening.
When I was first introduced to autopoiesis, structural coupling, composite unities and linguistic cognitive domains I felt a kinship to this way of understanding my human existence. In a sense, when we consider our human existence as part of the entire ecology of life on this planet, we are transcending a limited, subjective interpretation of our humanity and our relationships. When I hear about an entire school being shuttered as a cost cutting device, I can’t help but think of the absence of calculating the human cost on the accounting sheet. What does it mean to those children to have their school closed? What does it mean to children in surrounding schools to have ‘refugees’ from the school closure come into their schools? If we consider schools as relational hubs with networks of connections to the surround community, what does it mean to ‘amputate’ that hub from the community? I don’t think these concepts are factored into the equations. But they carry a cost and benefit reality as well.