Reading more about constructive alignment(Wickström, 2015, on “Dekonstruerad länkning En kritisk läsning av Constructive Alignment inom svensk högskolepedagogik och pedagogisk utveckling”)

Wickström (2015) states that the (Swedish) academic development has become dominated by very few concepts and theoretical models, mostly constructive alignment, Bloom‘s and SOLO taxonomy, and deep- and surface learning (which, funnily enough, I complained about here just recently. And just to make it clear, in the article it is used without the “approach”, which is something that my work group is collectively allergic to ;-)). But in any case, Wickström (2015) argues that there needs to be a diversity of approaches to look at teaching and learning, rather than one set of ideas completely dominates academic development and thus teaching, in order to actually develop teaching and learning further. And I 100% agree!

Wickström (2015) presents a critical reading, and critical discussion, of constructive alignment specifically. Main points of criticism include that constructive alignment is normative: the assumption is that it should be applicable for all types of courses and subjects (but of course there is no one-size-fits-all approach to teaching and learning), that students should see and understand the red thread, and that constructing it is the teacher’s main task. Which of course clashes with the idea of constructivism and runs the risk of falling into behaviorism, and which also does not work in combination with critical and emancipatory approaches or “Bildung”. If we want education to be transformative, it cannot be described within constructive alignment. This is also described in the “pedagogic paradoxon”: if you have knowledge you cannot seek it any more because you already have it, and if you don’t have it, you wouldn’t know where to find it and you wouldn’t recognise it if you did… Nevertheless, constructive alignment builds on the implicit idea of a rational student/customer who can read the ILOs (which are written in a language that people can undestand before taking the course, but that is likely not even possible) and plan their learning, both in which courses to take and what to do to pass the exam.

Constructive alignment is also often presented as a tool for effective teaching, but efficiency is not a good measure of what makes good education. Teaching methods are not neutral but value-ladden, also in relation to the goals we want to achieve. For example, punishment can be effective, but that does not mean that that works with how we think education should work. Education should also have moral and qualitative dimensions, and constructive alignment does not provide any guidance for what is ethical for example in what methods to choose (but then maybe that is also a little too much to expect? How can you criticize constructive alignment for prescribing so much that it doesn’t leave room for teacher agency, so that teachers become administrators and students become customers, but then criticize that it does not prescribe enough so the teacher still has to choose methods that align with their own values?).

Another important point is that the key assumption in constructive alignment, that “examinations drive learning”, can become a self-fulfilling prophecy, where examinations might not only dominate learning, but also all collegial conversations around teaching and learning (and I definitely see this as a problem, too! Especially when you bring GenAI and cheating into the mix…). And when that is the case, the students are quickly not seen as full humans any more; their identities, experiences, lives, bodies, etc become background factors that can help or hinder learning. But learning is always subjective and situated and between humans in a sociocultural context, so of course we need to make sure to consider all those factors!

Lastly, constructive alignment has reached its level of importance because it works beautifully with burocracy and neo-liberal ideas, and with standardising higher education nationally and internationally, but that at the same time erases local context (if you can take the same module with the exact same learning outcomes anywhere in Europe, and the idea is that this is great because it makes it easier for students to study abroad and then have those credits count at their home institution, then what is the point of studying abroad, if you could have the exact same learning back home?). So instead, Wickström (2015) calls for Humbold-university type seminars and people’s movement reading and discussion circles — co-creation of teaching and learning. And he mentions Biesta’s qualification, socialisation, and subjectification as the ideal we should strive for.

So far, so nothing shocking in this article! And also I am really so bored with constructive alignment, can we as a community please start talking more about what to do instead? I read this article because one of the participants in my ongoing Teaching for Sustainability course warned me that they are very critical of constructive alignment (and they said that with what I read as an undertone of “probably more critical than what I am allowed to be in an academic development course”, so I was intrigued) and they sent this article as an explanation for what their position might look like. To me this is critical, yes, but definitely not more than I am anyway. So I guess we are in good company, E.! :-)

Wickström, J. (2015). Dekonstruerad länkning-En kritisk läsning av Constructive Alignment inom svensk högskolepedagogik och pedagogisk utveckling. Utbildning & Demokrati–tidskrift för didaktik och utbildningspolitk, 24(3), 25-47.

Featured image is on the walk back from this dip, when the sun has managed to break through the fog, and when it was nice and warm in the few sunny spots (and really cold in the wet and foggy ones)