Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner: the social landscape of learning

All learning is social, but not all learning is social learning. For Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner, the distinction between the two lies in three crucial factors: the pursuit of learning to make a difference; the engagement of uncertainty; and the paying of attention to what might emerge. Learning then becomes embodied, the engagement of the whole person in their world and a willingness to shape and respond to that world. More than just the content of learning, their idea of systems convening asks, who am I in the world, using this content to change things? Identity is therefore central to learning and indeed gives it its power, in that it is not just about learning what to do, what to say, what to think, but about how we experience the world. The landscape of learning is a place of potential, and in experiencing it, in turn it offers us new ways of seeing and experiencing ourselves. And yes, this may seem very theoretical. But as Etienne points out, learning theory matters. It’s how we recognise learning, how we support it, and how we assess it. Our only task is to decide how we might make it our own. The publication we talked aboutWenger-Trayner, E. and Wenger-Trayner, B. (2021). Systems convening: A crucial form of leadership for the 21st century. The Social Learning Lab. Available from: https://www.wenger-trayner.com/systems-convening-book/