Systemisch-konstruktivistische Ansätze und ihre mögliche Perspektive in der Religionspädagogik und -didaktik mit Blick auf den Religionsunterricht an Berufskollegsnanoparticles

Like at all other types of school, (Catholic) religious education is an orderly subject at vocational colleges. Nevertheless, religious education at vocational colleges differs significantly from the teaching at schools of general education. This is not only due to the strict orientation towards the learning concept and the demand for realisation of active learning (handlungsorientierter Unterricht), which is supposed to establish a strong relationship to the professional world. Against ecclesiastic order and legal regulation, religious education is not taught separately for each denomination but (unless single students have applied for exemption from religious education) to a whole class, which consists of students of different denominations and religions, and without the possibility of attending an alternative class. The teaching of religious education takes place in a most multifaceted and affected context and cannot elude itself from changes that are conditional upon postmodernism and (post-) secularism. Thus, religious education at vocational colleges can be seen as a pioneer in regard to the urgency and possibilities of religious education at schools of general education. The just described reality is in opposition to the development of religious pedagogy and didactics, as the principle of correlation didactics (Korrelationsdidaktik) – despite several attempts of reorganisation and modernisation – remains an integral part of current curricula. This principle envisages the possibility of establishing and the actual establishment of a critically productive correlation between the two poles of faith experience and revelation in the classroom. The basic assumption of the dissertation at hand is that this principle is not sustainable (any more) for different reasons and that it should come to a radical reorganisation in religious pedagogy and didactics. In this respect, allowance has to be made for the above-mentioned situation without having to give up the clear Christian (and at the same time Catholic) focus. For this purpose, “systemic-constructivist approaches and their potential perspective in religious pedagogy and didactics regarding religious education at vocational colleges” are analysed and discussed. In doing so, the term perspective is understood as a possible perception and view on the future. The dissertation is divided into three large sections. In a first step, a broad survey of current (problematic) situations is carried out. Religious education at vocational colleges with its unavoidable conditions is discussed and confronted with correlation didactical concepts. Remarkable at this point is the fact that due to its linear and (mono) causal orientation every correlatively working concept shows difficulties, which do not allow it to persist in the reality of postmodern and post-secular religious education at vocational colleges. In the next step, systemic-constructivist approaches are applied to religious pedagogical and didactical problem areas, followed by a thorough discussion of various aspects of systemic-constructivist thinking and acting. This examination is based on the following central questions: What can education look like in a systemic view and what kind of relation do people have that are involved in such a process? In how far do fundamental epistemological statements about phenomena, such as reality, causality, circularity, the impossibility of instructive interaction et al., affect pedagogical and didactical statements? What effect do the levels of construction, reconstruction and deconstruction have on teaching design? Furthermore, a first range of problem areas is established, such as the question of truth and reality and how they are understood from a viewpoint of faith and a systemic-constructivist viewpoint respectively. After a broad and diverse treatment of the basic principles of a possible systemic-constructivist perspective in religious pedagogy and didactics, the third section of the paper concentrates on the transfer of the findings into the area of religious pedagogy and didactics. Beforehand, previous constructs of systemic-constructivist thinking and acting in religious pedagogy and didactics are analysed. It has to be stated that mostly only minor adaptions and fractional attempts of transfer or, with back reference to other didactical concepts, potential links are described. Due to a link of systemic-constructivist basics with religious pedagogical and didactical findings, explicit correspondences between a concept of man coined by systemic-constructivist values and one that is coined by Christian values can be found, from which in turn an ethic orientation and a clear rejection of the idea of arbitrariness can be determined. It also becomes obvious, which possibility motivates a bridging between a systemic-constructivist understanding of truth and reality and the association of truth in faith. The crucial factor of the purpose of this paper was the idea of showing an altered perspective in religious pedagogy and didactics with systemic-constructivist ideology, which can withstand the reality of religious education that is coined by postmodernism and (post-) secularism as well as a mixture of denominations and religions without having to negate or give up essential factors, such as the poles of correlation didactics, experience and revelation. Due to the presented perspective, those do not oppose each other any longer, but are able to be realised in the aspects of construction and reconstruction in a systemic-constructivist understanding by everyone involved in order to finally be able to be deconstructed as well. In order to be able to verify the paper for its practical interest and to complete it in regard to its practical orientation, a further part of section three deals with a look at current textbooks for religious education at vocational colleges, which are suitable as a systemic-constructivist collection of sources. As the paper at hand is a construct itself, which deserves dialogical discussion in religious pedagogical and didactical spheres, section three closes with a critical retrospection and with requests and suggestions for a necessary further treatment.