Dealing with Conceptualisations of Learning: Learning between Means and Aims in Theory and Practice

This book addresses the multiple aims/means structure in educational processes of learning. Learning happens everywhere. When dealing with learning in educational contexts, means and aims always have both a normative and an instrumental content. Furthermore, learning always actualises itself in terms of methods and targets and must be viewed from a teacher’s as well as a student’s perspective. The book deals with learning by using ‘means’ and ‘aim’ as metaphors and analytical categories. As a mean, learning is the description of ‘something which happens in a process’. As an aim, learning is the description of a kind of expertise, which might be the result of a learning process. In order to get an analytical grip of learning as a phenomenon in teaching and within student/teacher interactions, the book conceptualises and discusses the multiple aims/means structure, which we assume characterises processes of learning that involve a teacher and a student.