June 1, 2011

“The seventh big idea is do unto ourselves what we do unto our students. We are learning all the time. We have a lot of experience of other similar projects but each one is different. We do not have a pre-conceived idea of exactly how this will work out. We enjoy what we are doing but we expect it to be hard. We expect to take the time we need to get this right. Every difficulty we run into is an opportunity to learn. The best lesson we can give our students is to let them see us struggle to learn.”

Papert, S. (1999) “The Eight Big Ideas Behind the Constructionist Learning Laboratory.” In Stager, G. An Investigation of Constructionism in the Maine Youth Center. Doctoral dissertation. The University of Melbourne. 2006.

In 1999, Seymour Papert embarked on his last ambitious institutional research project when he created the constructionist, technology-rich, project-based,  multi-aged Constructionist Learning Laboratory inside of Maine’s troubled prison for teens, The Maine Youth Center. Shortly after the start of  the three year project, Papert outlined the Eight Big Ideas behind the Constructionist Learning Laboratory. Although non-exhaustive, this list does a good job of explaining constructionism to the general population.

Over eight days, each of the big ideas will be posted here at The Daily Papert.

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