Co-Design, Volume I

Co-Design, Volume I
Practical Ideas for Learning
Across Complex Systems

Mark Gatenby
Stefan Cantore
Co-Design, Volume I: Practical Ideas for Learning Across Complex Systems
Copyright © Business Expert Press, LLC, 2019.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored

in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—
electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other except for
brief quotations, not to exceed 250 words, without the prior permission
of the publisher.

First published in 2019 by

Business Expert Press, LLC
222 East 46th Street, New York, NY 10017
www.businessexpertpress.com

ISBN-13: 978-1-94819-872-1 (paperback)

ISBN-13: 978-1-94819-873-8 (e-book)

Business Expert Press Service Systems and Innovations in Business and

Society Collection

Collection ISSN: 2326-2664 (print)

Collection ISSN: 2326-2699 (electronic)

Cover and interior design by S4Carlisle Publishing Services Private Ltd.,

Chennai, India

First edition: 2019

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Printed in the United States of America.

 Abstract
Learning is fundamental to organizing in complex systems. This book
provides a guide to co-designing learning environments and relation-
ships. The authors begin by revisiting what learning means in living sys-
tems. Their experiences with business organizations and formal education
systems have led to the conclusion that learning has been lost from view
in many complex systems. The authors briefly trace the history of ideas
about learning to give new energy and focus for co-designing learning.
The chapters that follow focus on practical ideas. Each chapter centers on
a theme that is explored through a collection of short pieces—presented
as ideas, theories, stories, approaches, and methods. For those interested
in new ways to think about learning, both individually and collectively,
this book comes at the right time. It has been written with a diverse read-
ership in mind. Those who are professionals working in any field, at the
beginning or toward the end of their careers, organizational or system
leaders, organizational consultants, designers, or educators will all find
valuable ideas and practices. Those involved in designing formal educa-
tion environments will find fresh ideas for curricula and approaches for
cocreating learning experiences.

Keywords
Co-design; Complex Systems; Design; Education; Ideas; Leadership
Learning; Organizations; Practice
 Contents
Series Introduction..................................................................................ix
Introduction...........................................................................................xi
Acknowledgments..................................................................................xiii
Chapter 1 Revisiting Learning............................................................1
Chapter 2 Beginnings.......................................................................15
Chapter 3 Mindset...........................................................................25
Chapter 4 Inquiry.............................................................................35
Chapter 5 Boundaries.......................................................................47
Chapter 6 Situation..........................................................................63
Chapter 7 Place................................................................................75
Chapter 8 Scaffolding.......................................................................87
Chapter 9 Self-managing..................................................................99
Chapter 10 Adulthood......................................................................109
Chapter 11 Becoming.......................................................................123
Chapter 12 Closing: I’m Too Busy to Learn......................................131
About the Authors................................................................................141
Index..................................................................................................143
 Series Introduction
This book is part of a series on the subject of co-design in complex sys-
tems. Taken together, the three volumes provide a guide to practical ideas
about co-designing as a way of organizing in living systems:

• Volume 1 focusses on ideas and practices that enhance Learning

throughout our lives.
• Volume 2 considers how Design practices shape the systems we
create and experience together.
• Volume 3 offers insight into Developing mindsets and behaviors
needed to work effectively with co-design.

While each volume stands on its own, and may attract readers from
different professional backgrounds, we believe the series as a whole is
more than the sum of its parts. A practitioner or student who explores
the landscape of all three volumes will find themselves better equipped
to think and act in complex systems—like business, politics, health care,
and education.
The marketplace for ideas has no shortage of introductory guides to
managing and leading in organizations. This series is distinctive for the
specific reason that it looks beyond individual organizations, using a sys-
tems lens to bring together domains that have remained apart. A complex
systems perspective, as we apply it, looks at things together in the short
term and the long term, the big and the small, and the dynamically in-
terconnected. By exploring how to combine the domains of design and
development with learning, practitioners can find new confidence in how
to work effectively within the most challenging of professional contexts.
 Introduction

Why Should You Read This Book?

Books about learning are rarely best sellers. They often belong with spe-
cialist text books for students, guides for teacher training, and manuals
for professional educators. Here we contend that learning is fundamen-
tally what organizing can, and should, be designed for in complex sys-
tems. Learning provides the underlying energy for creativity, innovation,
social relationships, and human well-being. Within complex systems,
participatory approaches to learning enable us to flourish in ways that
conventional approaches to managing and organizing do not deliver.
The aim of the book is to offer “practical ideas.” We all carry ideas
about learning. These can be described variously as common sense, theo-
ries, frameworks, models, or ideals. They can be written down or dis-
cussed verbally or exist only in our minds. The ideas we use in our daily
lives—as practitioners, students, or parents—can be called theories-in-use.
They are ideas we incorporate into our behaviors and routines. We can be
aware of these ideas, for example, as reasons for acting, but often we are
unaware of them. Our ideas become absorbed into habits and assump-
tions. An important role for learning and reflecting on experience is to
surface the ideas we use and explore alternatives. A theory of practice is a set
of ideas about how people can or should behave to achieve certain goals,
especially within a professional context. It is important to think about
how our theories-in-use are often quite distinct from our theories of practice,
particularly those given to us in text books and formal education. This
book combines these different approaches and calls them simply “practical
ideas”—as ideas that interact in complex ways with our professional lives.
If you are interested in new ways to think about learning, both indi-
vidually and collectively, then this book is for you. We have written with
a diverse readership in mind. You may be a professional working in any
field, at the beginning or towards the end of your career, an organizational
or system leader, an organizational consultant, a designer, or educator.
xii INTRODUCTION

Regardless of how you currently define yourself, we think that you will
find much value in this work to support your learning. Those involved in
designing learning environments will find fresh ideas for curricula and ap-
proaches for cocreating learning experiences. Alongside introducing more
formal theories about learning, this book is full of practical ideas that you
can use straightaway.

Structure of the Book

Like the other volumes in the Co-Design series this book invites you to
pick and choose chapters when you have time. You may prefer to read
them from cover to cover or you may want to dip in to look at specific
topics—both approaches will work well with the structure of the book.
We begin by revisiting what we mean by learning. Our experience of
business organizations and formal education systems has led to the conclu-
sion that learning has become lost from view in complex systems. We draw
on our own experience and trace the history of ideas about learning to give
new energy and focus for co-designing learning. We then offer 10 thematic
chapters of practical ideas. Each chapter centers on a theme that is explored
through a collection of short pieces—presented as ideas, theories, stories,
approaches, and methods. For example, the theme of Beginnings is ex-
plored through ideas of novice, peripheral participation, apprentice, peers,
and opening up. Every chapter offers some provocation and challenge to
conventional ways of thinking about learning. At the end of each short
piece, we pose a What if? question as an invitation to further inquiry and
practical exploration. The final chapter offers some reflections about the
busy-ness of the contemporary world and how we might find time to learn.
You may find the book most helpful when you are grappling with a
complex dilemma, inquiring into your own practice, or sensing the need
to do something different. As well as challenge, the book is intended to
offer support and encouragement in the process of co-designing. We think
the book also offers value to groups interested to find new ways of learning
together. The themes of the chapters can be used as topics for conversation
about individual and collective learning, whether in the context of formal
education or more informal group learning. The book is a means of stimu-
lating conversations about the place of learning in our lives.
 Acknowledgments
The book could not have been written without hundreds of hours of
conversation with students, colleagues, researchers, policymakers, prac-
titioners, managers, and many others. In particular, we would like to
thank members of the Centre for Co-design and Learning for sharing
their insights and passion for a more participatory design culture. Special
mention goes to Tom Davidson, Tom Rowledge, and Zak Rakrouki, who
helped us to pioneer the use of co-design within the context of higher
education.
Our work in this volume is inspired by pioneers and practitioners
across many fields, including education, management, design, anthropol-
ogy, and psychology. We have been influenced by ideas from a wide va-
riety of theorists, including Donald Schon, Daniel Kahneman, Etienne
Wenger, Tim Ingold, Carol Dweck, Guy Debord, Sherry Turkle, Malcolm
Knowles, Margaret Wheatley, and Peter Senge. These people, along with
many others we have encountered, have all explored what it means to
learn in complex systems. We are grateful for their insights and wisdom.
 CHAPTER 1

Revisiting Learning
Mark Gatenby and Stefan Cantore

Imagine you are meeting a friend in a café. You arrive at the same time
and wait to order. In the queue you remind each other of the last time you
met up, share experiences of the traffic getting to the venue, and briefly
exchange bewilderment at the day’s news headlines. You are served your
drinks and both take a seat on a comfortable sofa by the window. Just as
you are taking your first sip of coffee, your friend sits back and asks:
“What are you learning at the moment?”1
You are surprised by the question and quickly search for some
thoughts. How would you respond to this question?
What we are learning is an unusual line of inquiry in our contempo-
rary culture. Some would see this as a personal question, even intrusive,
because learning is a private matter—it speaks of who we are, what ques-
tions we have, our frailties and needs, our desires and ambitions, our ­ethical
values, and even our social or economic value. There are many possible
meanings and intentions behind the question, and it would be easy to feel
defensive about the answer. For many people, learning is something they
were forced to do at school, or something they do only if required by their
employer. Learning is therefore something to comply with—something to
get through without too much pain. But for others, learning is a genuine
purpose for living, a reason they get up in the morning, and a central part
of their self-identity. New ideas, theories, techniques, skills, and practices
can be inspiring and empowering. But learning runs deep and asks so many

1
This question was inspired by the 2018 Workers’ Education Association (WEA)
Annual Lecture, given by Mathew Taylor, Chief Executive of the Royal Society of
Arts, London. Video available: “A place for Learning,” https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=ckRliYTMTxo (accessed June 15, 2018)
2 CO-DESIGN, VOLUME I

questions it often disappears into silence in everyday encounters. Learn-

ing is confusing because, on one hand, it has become a commodity—a
certificate you buy from an education provider; on the other hand, it is
now everywhere—information flows freely from our web-enabled devices.
Learning is something we can do on our mobile phones, in the gaps be-
tween chatting on social media and buying groceries. It is perhaps no sur-
prise that, for all its possibilities, learning appears like a wilderness.
People go to cafés to meet, talk, recharge, relax, think, read, work,
and study. Amid all of the conversation, you will see people looking into
their mobile phones and sharing information on screens. You will hear
people ask, “How is work going?” or ask children, “How are you getting
on at school?” You may still hear people occasionally asking, “What are
you reading?,” even “What are you thinking?”—but what would it take
to ask, “What are you learning?”

Why Are We Writing about Learning?

In early 2017, we began a conversation about the condition of learning,
both in higher education and professional development. To be honest, it
was a conversation we had been having together for 5 years, but now the
conversation felt more energized: as if something was emerging and tak-
ing form, partly beyond the words we had to articulate it. We wanted to
reflect on our experiences and determine whether the practices we were
exploring could be described in education as something like a new disci-
pline or paradigm shift. Stefan had spent several decades moving between
the worlds of managing large organizations, particularly in health care,
and the distributed networks around management learning and organiza-
tional development. Mark had spent a decade teaching and researching in
universities, a period leading undergraduate education strategy, and con-
sulting with organizations trying to redesign better services. We had spent
5 years working together in different ways, including designing courses
for full-time students and executive learners, coleading and facilitating
learning units, managing projects and teams of people, and hosting work-
shops and presenting at conferences.
The experiences we shared—conversations, time in classrooms and
lecture theatres, reading, travelling, and recurrent frustrations with formal
 Revisiting Learning 3

educations systems—had led to new ways of working that we started to

call co-design. This term was not completely new; it was being used in
art and design research and, with a different meaning, in hardware and
software engineering. Like a word cloud, language was floating in the air
that seemed to be covering similar ideas and assumptions. Cocreation
was a term being used in organizational and market contexts, most clearly
being discussed in business and management literature; coproduction
was also a term we saw more frequently used, particularly in health care
and other areas of public policy and service delivery. Within education,
both cocreation and coproduction were being used, as well as occasionally
co-design, but most clearly there was a growth in the language of staff–
student partnerships (Bovill et al. 2016).
As we read about these different areas and participated in discussions
with colleagues around the world, we developed our own understand-
ing of what was emerging. By this time, we had already been meeting
regularly with students and educators within a university context to dis-
cuss the complexities of learning in higher education and workplaces.
After a year or so of meeting informally, collaborating on small-scale
curriculum design projects, we called ourselves the co-design group
(Rakrouki et al. 2017). The usage occasionally slipped, and we were
sometimes the cocreation group, showing the difficulty of stabilizing
language, but the design label gradually held firm. Although language
is not everything, we believe it is vitally important when understanding
identity and action in the social world. We discussed language at length
and the merits of different terms. At one point, we discussed the idea
of writing a working dictionary in collaboration with students, but our
main interest was language-in-use. Cocreation was too broad a term; it
didn’t describe our practices or working relationships. Coproduction
was redolent of manufacturing and the world of factory-based produc-
tion, an image we were fighting against in education. Staff–student
partnership, or its related phrase students as partners (Cook-Sather, Bo-
vill, and Felten 2014), was helpful to describe more participatory and
reciprocal relationships between teachers and students, but it carried the
danger of fixing “student” and “staff” differences when these roles were
by no means well-defined. Our experience of organizational research
and practice also suggested that partnership was a term more relevant
4 CO-DESIGN, VOLUME I

to small-scale activity, either between a few people or in professional

governance.
The design-led perspective of co-design allowed us to focus on our
work as practice, as doing, as well as grappling with questions of orga-
nizing and governing. Design in its broad meaning is open-ended, is
future-oriented, explores possibilities, is human-oriented (rather than
technology-led), and works with the constraints of systems. The “co” for
us denotes cooperation, a term used in English since the seventeenth cen-
tury, meaning “to work together, with.” Co-design then gave us a new
way of thinking and a set of working practices to discuss the contempo-
rary context of learning.
In January 2017, Stefan sent an email to the co-design group, ask-
ing provocatively: “Are we on the way to creating a new discipline or
sub-discipline?” This had not been our explicit goal, but the question felt
significant. It led to us organizing a two-day workshop to discuss this at
the campus of the Winchester School of Art, UK. The group included
staff and students working in departments including business schools,
social science, education, computer science (including web science), and
engineering. We agreed that co-design had an energy and logic—bigger
than an incremental theory or local innovation and more important than
a passing trend. However, we were uncertain of whether it represented a
discipline in its own right or, indeed, if this should be an aim.
This book is the result of conversations, practical experiences, and
scholarly research we have engaged in since this period. It is our initial
attempt to capture what we are learning about the contemporary nature
of learning in complex systems. Our focus is not on any one industry or
organizational context. We believe the ideas have practical relevance for
those working in a wide range of learning situations: formal education,
like schools and universities, as well as in applied areas—such as profes-
sional associations, workplaces, and community groups. We have decided
to set out the ideas that we think have general relevance and appeal.

Why Is Learning Important?

Learning is something we all need. At its best, it is also one of the most ful-
filling things we can do. It is no surprise that many of the major schools of
 Revisiting Learning 5

thought since the ancient Greeks have placed lifelong learning at the heart
of human meaning. Learning is about self-understanding and self-mastery,
but it can also be self-less: bigger than any individual needs or desires. It
is both eternal and ever-flowing. Today, the UK National Health Service
(NHS) recommends a regular habit of learning as one of the main ingre-
dients of mental well-being—alongside connecting with community and
family, physical exercise, giving to others, and being mindful of the world
around us (NHS 2018). Perhaps health care providers should prescribe
patients courses of learning to make a happier society?
Despite its gifts, learning has been marginalized in society, in organi-
zations of all shapes and sizes, and in communities—even, strangely, in
educational institutions. Schools and universities no longer see it as their
primary mission to enable learning and imagination. Their main focus is
increasingly on narrow measures of performance and reputation, such as
league tables.
It is tempting to think that technology has freed us from the hard
work and effort of learning—perhaps even the need to remember any-
thing. Many people we have met in the process of writing this book have
pointed to technology as the answer to learning. If we don’t know some-
thing we can “Google” it or look it up on Wikipedia. If we want a practi-
cal skill we can watch a YouTube video to show us how it is done. These
tools and resources, growing at incredible rates with the participatory net-
works of the World Wide Web, are very useful, and we all use them. They
remove some of the obstacles and practical constraints, but they do not
offer a substitute for learning. We need to have an idea of what we want
to know, and what we want to do, before we trust an algorithm to help us.
Google can find us answers to questions, but it cannot find us the right
questions. Databases are efficient tools for storing and retrieving informa-
tion, but they are unable to imagine new possibilities. For this reason, we
can be open to the potential of learning technology but see it as only a
part of a larger system.

What Is Natural for us to Learn?

The Swedish botanist and father of taxonomy, Carl Linnaeus, devised
the term Homo Sapiens from the Latin for wise, discerning, intelligent;
6 CO-DESIGN, VOLUME I

we are defined by our ability to learn. He might have labelled us the

toolmaking species Homo Faber instead, given our ability to manipulate
the environment more powerfully than our ability to understand it. As
we have entered the Anthropocene—the geological age defined by the
impact human beings are having on the climate and ecosystems—our un-
derstanding of what is natural and what is artificial (or human-designed)
is increasingly difficult to discern. This is the essence of complex systems.
In higher education, there are more students studying social science and
humanities subjects than those studying natural science subjects, suggest-
ing there is as much to learn about the world created by human beings as
there is about the nonhuman world. Or perhaps, we are just more inter-
ested in ourselves than other things?
In the earliest places of human learning, there were few systems of
thought as we might think of them today. There were no clearly demar-
cated subject areas or disciplines, no standardized curricula, and no sepa-
ration of research from teaching. It took larger institutions, and above
all, writing (and printing) to make these things happen. The earliest rec-
ognizable institution of learning, Plato’s Academy (founded around 400
BC), was not a school in our current sense because there was no clear
distinction between teacher and student: only those who were more or less
experienced. The Academy was closer to the Greek word schole, mean-
ing leisure (Pieper 2009). The main process of learning was conversation,
or dialectical and dialogical practice—the Socratic method. In contrast,
today we must make sense of a labyrinth of disciplinary distinctions and
subject specialisms: “What do you want to study?” Libraries and mu-
seums represent the history of knowledge creation, as displayed in mil-
lions of books and other artefacts. We rely on information and knowledge
classification systems to make sense of the stock of human knowledge.
We are expected to attach labels to ourselves as markers of knowledge or
educational status: “I am a mathematician,” “I am a historian,” or “I am a
nurse.” But how many of us feel that we are more than, or different from,
the labels given to us by disciplinary boxes—often since childhood? We
are clearly products of our time and culture.
In formal education, there is sometimes the distinction between
­education and training (Grayling 2007). This contrast is used to separate
learning into more open-ended, liberal questions—philosophy being an
 Revisiting Learning 7

obvious example—and more goal-oriented, pragmatic, and well-defined

problems—dentistry being a reasonable example. However, the distinc-
tion between education and training is difficult to maintain in most taught
programs in schools and universities. For example, is a course in engineer-
ing education or training? Most people would say it is both, although per-
haps increasingly training. You might like to consider where other subjects
fall between these two categories. Most learning within workplaces and
professional associations is more clearly within the category of training—
but does this miss something? The distinction is interesting because it
throws up many questions about specialization of knowledge, preparing
learners for the future, and theory and practice.
Plato, the ancient philosopher, understood that as systems increase in
scale, such as in a city, they need specialization and division of labor to
function. He would not be surprised to find the complexity of education
systems we find today, but would he be disappointed in what we have
produced? It is often difficult to see the logic in our formal education
systems—with their uncomfortable mix of professions, markets, bureau-
cracy, and hierarchy. They are both public and private; they run not only
on altruism and passion for knowledge but also on greed and commercial
gain. Much of the writing about education today is about making sense
of the institutions of education. This includes debates about funding, pol-
icy, management, and organization. Somehow learning has gone missing
from this debate. In this book, we want to return to an underlying interest
in what it means to learn. We believe that learning can be reinvigorated
through what we call co-designing learning practices and environments.

Where Do We Start with Learning?

We start with the provocative insight that learning is not all that it seems.
What we learn is different from what we are taught. What we remember
is always different from the facts. The things we become interested in are
rarely the things we are told are important or necessary. Try to reflect on
this for a moment. Regardless of whether you enjoyed school or not, what
you learned at school was a lot more than the curriculum. What you can
still remember today are things that were probably not on the test. This
goes with all formal experiences of education. Some education theorists
8 CO-DESIGN, VOLUME I

estimate that 90 percent of what we learn takes place outside of the con-
fines of school and other formal institutions (Cunningham 2017). We can
extend this further and suggest that 90 percent of what you learn at school
is not on the national curriculum or standardized tests. The things we
mostly learn in these situations, and throughout life, are a sense of self, our
relationships with other people, our relationship with power and authority,
and our membership of social structures—like gender, class, nationality,
religion, and culture. In Deschooling Society, the philosopher Ivan Illich
(1973) argued that, more than any ideas or subjects, what students mostly
learn at school is how schools work; their power, discipline, and control-
ling structures as mini societies. For example, if you think you are “clever”
or “stupid” you probably learned this at school. This label, and many oth-
ers, may have stuck with you for years, even decades. This means we should
be mindful of the influence of education as a mode of learning that has
influences on us way beyond any specific notion of knowledge and skills.
The sociologist Basil Bernstein (2003) highlighted how language can
determine much of our experience of education and learning. Looking
at the way students from different socioeconomic backgrounds move
through school, he used the concept of codes to describe how learning is
packaged up in a particular language, reflecting power structures and cul-
ture. All knowledge is codified in some way. Bernstein found at least two
distinct codes operating in schools and colleges—the formal code of the
classroom and written assignments, what is sometimes called “academic”
language today. And a more informal language-in-use code is used among
family members and peers. The students who perform well on tests are
those who can navigate between the different codes, whereas those that
struggle often fail to use the more formal code of the classroom. This
finding is relevant today, when a student from private school carries a dif-
ferent set of language codes to a student from a public school or when an
employee from one department fails to use the correct code of the board-
room or technical specialty. Bernstein reminds us that what we are trying
to learn and the language we use to describe learning are separate, but
connected, things. Language and culture are our way into learning. The
social and cultural insights into learning are fundamental to the perspec-
tive of this book. They support what are generally called social learning
and practice-based theories of learning.
 Revisiting Learning 9

In the twentieth century, theoretical discussions of learning moved

from the wide-ranging domain of philosophy to the narrower method-
ology of psychology. The primary interest turned to measurement—of
people and learning. For example, the measurement of intelligence (IQ)
could be used to rank and sort people to serve many goals, including mili-
tary, governmental, and economic. Theories of learning moved between
cognitive processing and behaviorism. Both of these theories stripped human
learners of their social and cultural context, preferring to see learning as
a problem of subconscious computation and habit formation. However,
these approaches were strongly challenged by a set of ideas called construc-
tivism that argued learning was part of a complex multilayered system,
ranging from the genetic to the cultural, but one that was constructed
through the active thinking and doing of a learner. Our knowledge and
abilities have deep foundations, but they are mostly built in the conscious
minds of a motivated learner. The constructivist perspective sits comfort-
ably with ideas about the social context of learning, and with the active
doing—the practice of learning. The constructivist view is also supported
by systems theories of learning and theories-in-action. For example, the
“double-loop” learning perspective, defined by systems theorists W. Ross
Ashby (1952), and developed further by Chris Argyris (2005), an organi-
zation theorist, suggests that we can learn through different kinds of feed-
back loops. There is a “single loop,” such as a structured learning goal and
test, which allows the learner to refine their practice against a standard.
But learners can also question whether the test is a useful target, changing
the parameters of the goals and assessment, thereby learning about the
test itself—this is “double loop” learning.
The double-loop learning theory is an essential part of a social prac-
tice–based understanding of learning. This was demonstrated to us
strongly as part of our work with co-designing learning with students
and others. The single loop is the requirement of students to pass their
assignments and exams, as prescribed by course leaders. It is also the re-
quirement of teaching staff to ensure high pass rates and high levels of
student satisfaction with learning. However, the double loop is much
more powerful. This is the cooperative exploration of the curriculum
and assignments, along with the nature of student satisfaction. By work-
ing together as co-designers of education we reflected on our own codes
10 CO-DESIGN, VOLUME I

and constructed new social and cultural understandings of what it is to

be a teacher and a student. Like the student who learns 90 percent of
what they know outside the curriculum, students working as co-designers
have consistently reflected how they learn more through the process of
co-designing learning environments than they do through the content of
taught courses (Rakrouki et al. 2017). This is similar to the saying that the
best way to learn something is to try to teach it to someone else.

Co-design and Progressive Education

Co-design is not considered a traditional way to learn in formal educa-
tion systems. It shares more in common with Plato’s Academy than it does
with formal schooling of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Today,
co-design may even be considered by some to be a radical alternative to
formal education. We see the situation in reverse—the hyperspecialized,
formalized, and fragmented education of the twentieth century was an
aberration from the much longer trend in human development and civi-
lization—reflecting a system struggling to make sense of an increasingly
mechanized and commodified society. The twentieth century saw world
wars, technological proliferation, and dramatic social transformation—
democratic participation, cultural freedoms, and human rights. All of this
was witnessed with an industrial and mechanical view of the world. Soci-
ety was turned upside down, and the education system struggled to make
sense of the instability—leading to postmodernism and relativism of truth.
The central figure of the traditional education system is the embattled
teacher, who is struggling to survive against the currents of expanding
sources of information from multimedia, government policies, and regu-
lations; transformation of authority relations among professions, markets,
and civil society; performance measurement and standardization; and
changing expectations of students and parents. This is an artificial system
in an industrial mode. A system that through bureaucracy turned educa-
tors into factory supervisors, as with the infamous Gradgrind, the pedan-
tic teacher in Charles Dickens’ novel Hard Times. It is a system where the
teacher holds the gateway to knowledge and competence, either directly,
by transmitting their knowledge through a didactic process of instruction
and monologue, or indirectly, by controlling access to learning resources
 Revisiting Learning 11

like books and apparatus. It is a system where the teacher represents the
sum total of the learning; consider the teacher who says, “I taught them
that, but they didn’t learn it” (Rogers 2007, p. 6).
In contrast to what is considered the traditional approach, for cen-
turies there has been a stream of thinking that starts from the interests
of the learner rather than the teacher. It looks to the social nature of
learning rather than an individualistic system of measurement and com-
petition. Some point to the philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1979)
in the eighteenth century as a significant proponent for this perspective.
Between the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this view was
called Progressive Education and also New Education. In contrast to the
focus on teachers as pedagogues—with concern for discipline, punish-
ment, and preparing children for what was considered adult life—the
focus was on understanding the nature of development and growth in a
broader social context.
This movement also led to an increasing interest in adult education,
and the relationship between formal education and workplace learning.
For example, as cited by Knowles, Holton, and Swanson (2014, p. 23),
the first issue of the Journal of Adult Education published in 1929 con-
tained the ideas from a UK college principal: “At the risk of seeming
fantastic I will venture to say that the final objective of the New Educa-
tion is the gradual transformation of the industry of the world into the
university of the world.”
This was a vision of lifelong learning, learning organizations, and
learning cities—ideas that all emerged again at the end of the twentieth
century (Senge 1990; Longworth 1999). Communities of practitioners,
like The Progressive Education Association, founded in 1919, promoted
principles such as emphasis on “learning by doing”; integrated curricula
and practical projects with reflective theories of practice, group work,
and collaborative projects; creative use of learning resources beyond text
books; and an emphasis on lifelong learning. In progressive education
and adult education, we find a combination of ideas about what learning
is and how teaching and learning are different kinds of practices. These
principles fit well with what we call the co-design of learning.
We are moving into a world where learning situations and envi-
ronments are co-designed. This means that roles are more fluid and
12 CO-DESIGN, VOLUME I

implicit—they emerge through the unfolding of practice. Learning is

something to open up rather than close down. As Ivan Illich (1973) argued,
we need to move beyond an obsession with “funneling” learners into chan-
nels, grades, and disciplines and move toward “webs” of practice, which
create new opportunities to learn through relationships and collaboration.

What if learning becomes the focus of our lives?

References
Argyris, C. 2005. “Double-loop Learning in Organizations: A Theory
of Action Perspective.” In Great Minds in Management: The Process of
Theory Development, eds. K. G. Smith and M. A. Hitt. Oxford, UK:
Oxford University Press, pp. 261–79.
Ashby, W. R. 1952. Design for a Brain. New York, NY: Wiley.
Bernstein, B. 2003. Class, Codes and Control. Volume 1, Theoretical Studies
towards a Sociology of Language. London, UK: Routledge.
Bovill, C., A. Cook-Sather, P. Felten, L. Millard and N. Moore-Cherry.
2016. “Addressing Potential Challenges in Co-creating Learning and
Teaching: Overcoming Resistance, Navigating Institutional Norms and
Ensuring Inclusivity in Student–staff Partnerships.” Higher Education
71, no. 2, pp. 195–208.
Cunningham, I. 2017. Learning not Education, unpublished paper.
Cook-Sather, A., C. Bovill, and P. Felten. 2014. Engaging Students as Part-
ners in Learning and Teaching: A Guide for Faculty. New York, NY:
John Wiley & Sons.
Grayling, A. C. 2007. The Meaning of Things: Applying Philosophy to Life.
London, UK: W&N.
Illich, I. 1973. Deschooling Society. Middlesex, UK: Harmondsworth.
Knowles, M. S., E. F. Holton III, and R. A. Swanson. 2014. The Adult
Learner. New York, NY: Routledge.
Longworth, N., 1999. Making Lifelong Learning Work: Learning Cities for
a Learning Century. London, UK: Psychology Press.
NHS. 2018. Five Steps to Mental Wellbeing. https://www.nhs.uk/condi-
tions/stress-anxiety-depression/improve-mental-wellbeing, (accessed
June 15, 2018).
 Revisiting Learning 13

Pieper, J. 2009. Leisure: The Basis of Culture. Carmel, IN: Liberty Fund Inc.
Rakrouki, Z., M. Gatenby, S. Cantore, T. Rowledge, and T. Davidson.
2017. “The Opening Conference: A Case Study in Undergraduate
Co-design and Inquiry-based Learning.” International Journal for
­Students as Partners 1, no. 2.
Rogers, J. 2007. Adults Learning. London, UK: McGraw-Hill Education.
Rousseau, J. J. 1979. Emile or, On Education, Translated by Allan Bloom.
New York, NY: Basic Books.
Senge, P. 1990. The Fifth Discipline. New York, NY: Currency Doubleday.
 Index
Abstract conceptualization, 73
Academic learning, 72
Action learning, 43–44
Active experimentation, 73
Adulthood, 109–120. See also
Andragogy; Pedagogue
authoritarian and authoritative,
114–115
discipline, 112–113
emerging, 117–120
identity, 118
individualism and collectivism
in, 119
patience, 111–112
role confusion, 118
Aesthetic movements, 76
Aesthetic stage of life, 123
A-level (Advanced level), 19
Also Human, 60
Andragogy, 115–117
subject-centered to
learner-centered, 117
Appreciative inquiry (AI), 40–41
stages, 40
design stage, 40
destiny stage, 41
discover stage, 40
dream stag, 40
working with people, 40
Apprentice, 18–19
master and, 18
Argyris, Chris, 9
Arnett, Jeffrey, 118–119
Ashby, W. Ross, 9
Asset, boundary as an, 56–57
Auge, Marc, 81
Authoritarianism, 114–115
Ballard, J.G., 134
Bandura, Albert, 127
Bateson, Gregory, 51
Becoming, 123–130. See also
Competence; Three Stages
of Life
becoming with one another,
126–127
in groups, 129–130
who and what we notice, 127–128
Beginnings, 15–22
A-level (Advanced level), 19
apprentice, 18–19
full-time courses, 19
novice, 15–16
opening up, 21–22
peripheral participation, 16–18
practical learning, 19
theoretical learning, 19
T-levels (Technical level), 19
Behaviorism, 9
Bernstein, Basil, 8
Better Angels of Our Nature, The, 52
Boundaries, 47–60
as an asset, 56–57
boundary-forming, 48–49
competition in, 55
fixed and flexible boundaries, 59
fixed boundaries, downside of, 58
geographical maps, 51
hierarchy and bureaucracy, 54
in identification and differentiation,
55–56
knowledge and learning, 54
levels, 53
modularity, 54–56
private and public property, 51–53
psycho-geographical map, 64
roles and silos, 58–59
service boundaries, 59–60
territory mapping, 50–51
Bowling Alone, 48
Buchholz, Todd, 132–133
Burch, Noel, 124
144 INDEX

Burkeman, Oliver, 138 Double-loop learning theory, 9

Busy-ness, 131–139 Dweck, Carol, 25
But how long does it take to care for
those you love?, 133 Economic Prospects of Our
Grandchildren, 137
Capitalist culture, 139 Education, 6. See also Learning
Childish and Childlike, 110–111 training versus, 6
Clark, G., 92 Elements, The, 75–76
Classroom, 83–84 Elton, Caroline, 60
limitation, 84 Erikson, Erik, 118
Cocreation, 3 Ethical stage of life, 123
Codes, 8 Euclid of Alexandria, 75
Co-design, 3 Experiential learning, 72–73, 116
in complex systems, 128 abstract conceptualization, 73
design-led perspective of, 4 active experimentation, 73
progressive education and, 10–12 advantage of, 73
Cognitive processing, 9 concrete experience, 73
Community of practice, 70, 78 reflective observation, 73
Competence, 124–126
Complexity, 76 Fast thinking, 29–30
Concrete experience, 73 Faster, 131
Constructivism, 9 Fixed mindset, 25–26
Cooperative inquiry, 41–43 growth mindset versus, 25–26
Coproduction, 3 Flow, 16
Csíkszentmihályi, Mihály, 16 Foer, Joshua, 96
Culture Follett, Mary Parker, 68
language and, 8 Ford, Henry, 137
Cunningham, Ian, 104 Formal education, 6
Curiousity, 35–37 Frobel, Friedrich, 89
brings excitement, 36
brings stimulation to work, 36 Garrison, D. R., 106
exercise for mind, 36 Geometry, 75
aesthetic movements, 76
De Grazia, Sebastian, 139 line segment, 76
Debord, Guy, 64 lines, 76
Dérive, 64–65. See also Spaces plane, 76
advantages, 64 point, 75–76
disorientation and lostness, ray, 76
allowing, 64 Gleick, James, 131, 138
environment structure, noticing, 64 Global Network of Learning Cities
playfulness, encouraging, 64 (GNLC), 71
rules, rebelling against, 64 Graeber, David, 52
situational and contextual Group work, 129–130
awareness, enhancing, 64 Groupthink, 30–31
Deschooling Society, 8 Growth mindset, 25–26, 89
Dewey, John, 115 fixed mindset versus, 25–26
Dickens, Charles, 10, 109, 114
Dictionary of the English Language, 18 Hanks, Tom, 81
Discipline and learning, 112–113 Hard Times, 10, 109, 114
Disorientation in learning, 65–67 Harford, T., 52
 INDEX
145

Hidalgo, Cesar, 93 Learning Cities approach, 71–72

Holton, E. F., 11 natural in, 5–7
Honoré, Carl, 133 practice-based theories of, 8, 78
Huxley, Aldous, 115 problem-based, 70
revisiting, 1–12
Identity, 118 sets, 104
Illich, Ivan, 8, 12 single loop, 9
Independent learner, 89 social learning, 8
Ingham, Harrington, 125 society, 71
Ingold, Tim, 47 starting, 7–10
Inquiry, 35–44. See also Appreciative teacher and student, distinction, 6
inquiry (AI); Cooperative technology in, 68
inquiry theoretical versus practical, 19
being curious, 35–37. See also theory and practice, distinction, 79
Curiousity writing about, 2–4
being uncertain, 37–38 Legitimate peripheral participation,
questions, 38–39 16
Life of Lines, The, 47
Janis, Irving, 30 Life-long learning, 107
Johnson, Barry, 38 Lindeman, Eduard, 116
Johnson, Samuel, 18 Line segment, 76
Lines, 76
Kahneman, Daniel, 29 Linnaeus, Carl, 5
Keynes, John Maynard, 137 Luft, Joseph, 125
Khan, Sal, 92
Kierkegaard, Soren, 123–124. See also Map-making, 47–60. See also
Three Stages of Life Boundaries
Knowledgeability, 79 Mass media, 92
Knowles, Malcolm, 11, 116 Massive Open Online Courses
Kolb, David, 73 (MOOCs), 94
Korzybski, Alfred, 50 Master, apprentice and, 18
Kuhn, Thomas, 31–32 McLuhan, Marshall, 93
Meadows, D. H., 113
Landscape, 77–79 Media platforms, 91–94
Language, culture and, 8 mass media, 92
Lave, Jean, 16, 70 online economic data source, 91
Learning, 1–12. See also Action Mindset, 25–32. See also
learning; Experiential learning Groupthink
co-design of, 10–12 bounded rationality, 28–29
contracts, 103–104 fast thinking, 29–30
at basic level, 103 growth mindset versus fixed
disorientation in, 65–67 mindset, 25–26
double-loop learning perspective, 9 slow thinking, 29–30
for self-mastery, 5 worldview, 26–28
for self-understanding, 5 Minimalism, 76
formal education, 6 Modern, Tate, 135
goals, 101–102 Modularity, 54–56
development of, 102 Moonwalking with Einstein, 96
importance, 4–5 Motivation, 106
inquiry-based, 70 Mutual service, defining, 59
146 INDEX

Neighbors, 48–50 Ray, 76

blending and, 49 Reclaiming Conversation, 96
Non-place, 81–83 Reflective observation, 73
as subjective, 81 Reification, 78
Non-places: Introduction to Reischmann, J., 107
an Anthropology of religious stage of life, 124
Supermodernity, 81 Relph, Edward, 80
Novice, 15–16 Revans, Reg, 43
Role set, 59
Orwell, George, 115 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 11
Rush, 132
Paradigm shift, 32
Paradigms, 31–32 Scaffolding, 87–96. See also Media
Patience, 111–112 platforms
Pedagogue, 109–110 from four Ps (passion, peers,
childish and childlike, 110–111 projects, and play), 88
term origin, 109 playground, 89–91
Pedagogy as a university discipline, 115 screens and memory, 94–96
Peers, 19–21 support, 87–88
Peripheral participation, 16–18 Zone of Proximal Development
Physical environment, 67–69 (ZPD), 88–89
social interaction and learning, Scientific management, 137
mediating, 67 Screens and memory, 94–96
space, 68 Self-directed learning (SDL), 99, 101,
Pinker, Steven, 52 105–107
Place and Placenessness, 80 motivation, 106
Place/Placing, 75–84. See also self-management, 106
Classroom; Landscape; self-monitoring, 106
Non-place Self-managed learning, 104–105
artificial, 80 beneficial features of, 105
natural, 80 facilitated time mapping, 104
Plane, 76 individual time spent, 104
Playground, 89–91 key elements, 104
caregiver role in, 90 regular meetings, 105
purpose of, 90 time spent individually and
Point, 75–76 collectively, 104
Practical learning, 19 Self-managing, 99–107
Practice, 78–79 social context, 100–101
Practice-based theory of learning, 78 Service boundaries, 59–60
Praise of Idleness, In, 137 mutual service, defining, 59
Praise of Slow, In, 133 Silos, 58–59
Private property, 51–53 Simon, Herbert, 28
Property, 51–53 Single loop learning, 9
Psycho-geographical map, 64 Situated learning, 69–71
Putnam, Robert, 48 place-based, 69
Situation, 64–73. See also Dérive
Questions, 38–39 learning, disorientation in, 65–67
purpose behind, 39 physical environment, 67–69
Rattan, A., K., 26 Slow thinking, 29–30
 INDEX
147

Smith, Delia, 133 Thinking, 29–30

Social context, 100–101 fast, 29–30
as a mutually beneficial context for slow, 29–30
learning, 101 Three Stages of Life, 123–124
networks, 100 aesthetic, 123
supportive social contexts, 101 ethical, 123
Social learning, 8 religious, 124
Spaces, 68 T-levels (Technical level), 19
for learning, fluid and negotiable, Training, 6
68 education versus, 6
reflecting values and beliefs, 68 Turkle, Sherry, 96
Speed, 132
Support, 87–88 Uncertainty, 37–38
Swanson, R. A., 11 Unlearning process, 22

Taylor, Frederick W., 137 Vygotsky, Lev, 88

Taylor, Marilyn, 65
Taylor, Mathew, 1n1
Technology, in learning, 68
Theoretical learning, 19
Theories of practice, xi
Theories-in-use, xi
Theory of Forms, 76
Theory of practice, xi
Theory of the Dérive, The, 64
Theory-in-practice, 18
50 Things That Made the Modern
Economy, 52
Walters, Richard, 127
Wenger-Trayner, Beverly, 56–57
Wenger-Trayner, Etienne, 16, 56–57,
70, 78, 84
Workers’ Education Association
(WEA), 1n1
Worldview, 26–28
Zamyatin, Yevgeny, 115
Zone of Proximal Development
(ZPD), 88–89
 OTHER TITLES IN OUR SERVICE SYSTEMS AND
INNOVATIONS IN BUSINESS AND SOCIETY COLLECTION
Jim Spohrer, IBM and Haluk Demirkan, Arizona State University, Editors
• Citizen-Centered Cities, Volume I: Case Studies of Public Involvement
by Paul R. Messinger
• Citizen-Centered Cities, Volume II: City Studies of Public Involvement
by Paul R. Messinger
• Collaborative Innovation: How Clients and Service Providers Can Work By Design
to Achieve It by Tony Morgan
• How Can Digital Technologies Improve Public Services and Governance?
by Nagy K. Hanna
• The Accelerating TechnOnomic Medium (‘ATOM’): It’s Time to Upgrade the Economy
by Kartik Gada
• Sustainability and the City: The Service Approach by Adi Wolfson
• How Creating Customer Value Makes You a Great Executive by Gautam Mahajan
• Everything Old is New Again: How Entrepreneurs Use Discourse Themes to Reclaim
Abandoned Urban Spaces by Miriam Plavin-Masterman
• The Interconnected Individual: Seizing Opportunity in the Era of AI, Platforms, Apps,
and Global Exchanges by Hunter Hastings
• T-Shaped Professionals: Adaptive Innovators by Yassi Moghaddam, Haluk Demirkan,
and James Spohrer

Announcing the Business Expert Press Digital Library

Concise e-books business students need for classroom and research

This book can also be purchased in an e-book collection by your library as

• a one-time purchase,
• that is owned forever,
• allows for simultaneous readers,
• has no restrictions on printing, and
• can be downloaded as PDFs from within the library community.

Our digital library collections are a great solution to beat the rising cost of textbooks. E-books
can be loaded into their course management systems or onto students’ e-book readers.

The Business Expert Press digital libraries are very affordable, with no obligation to buy in
future years. For more information, please visit www.businessexpertpress.com/librarians.
To set up a trial in the United States, please email sales@businessexpertpress.com.