Victor Tiberius (2011): Hochschuldidaktik der Zukunftsforschung: Summary
Summary
We live in dynamic, complex, and erratic times. Simulaneously, human mankind evokes technically increased outcomes which reach further and further into the future. Against this background, a systematic examination of future questions is more important than ever.
Futures studies (or: futures research) which considers itself as an answer to this challenge explores possible and probable futures and assesses preferable and preventable futures. Since the 1960s, there are academic programms at universities worldwide. However, their didactics are still at the beginning. Due to the specific philosophy of futures studies, according to its ontology, epistemology, and both analytical and normative profile, the discipline needs its own didactics which meets these characteristics and helps to optimize learning.
The objective of this thesis is to develop a didactical concept for futures studies. Especially, the didactical components – teaching objectives, teaching content, teaching methods, classroom media, and learning assessment/ examination – will be substantiated. For these purposes, the philosophical foundation of both futures studies and didactics are set and an inductive-deliberate method is chosen. To inductively determine how futures studies is taught an analysis of academic literature from the futures field and two empirical studies, an analysis of university study programme curricula as well as interviews with professors and lecturers, are conducted. The empirical findings are critically analysed using the science, personality, and situation priciple and their operational criteria. On this base, own propositions for the five didactical components are presented. Starting with discipline-specific and comprehensive, future-relevant teaching objectives and teaching contents the methodological, medial, and assesment-specific issues are disposed. Here, it comes to a dichotomy in teaching in an objectivist or constructivist way. For the philosophical, historical and scientific issues the former way is appropriate, while the latter way is usefull when futures studies comes into action and students have to deal with concrete alternative futures. When it comes to teaching media the usual media can be distiguished from so-called future artefacts. Assessing learning effords can be conducted in an objectivist way when dealing with technical knowledge that can be seen as validated by the scientific community. However, the truth of alternative futures cannot be discovered. Thus, assessment criteria for both analytical and normative scenarios are presented. The concrete proposals for the five didactical com¬ponents are summarized in tables 13 et seqq.