Could these work together? – Pragmatist approaches in adult education and media didactic perspectives

Abstract

When it comes to the question of how learning with the media can be understood theoretically in adult education, the approach of pragmatism does not necessarily come to mind in the face of the prevalent use of the theoretical triad of behaviorism, cognitivism and constructivism. However, pragmatism, with its prioritization of action as an essential condition of human learning, has undergone a significant renaissance in the educational sciences in recent years. In adult education up until now Faulstich with his critical and pragmatic approach as an explanatory approach to human learning has become conspicuous. In media pedagogy as well, the design-orientated media didactic strongly refers to Dewey's pragmatism. In the article, it will be shown, however, that at least from a learning theory point of view, the design-orientated media didactic do not adequately take into account some of Dewey's important ideas in their own theoretical conception. Thus, a connection to Faulstich‘s pragmatic concept for adult education and the subsequent link to learning with media appears to be problematic. It is therefore attempted, to consider a preliminary pragmatic media didactic approach on the basis of the critique of the design-orientated media didactic.