Markus Lindholm 
NORENSE funding: 80.000 NOK in 2019

Background and motivation
The aim of the project is to publish a book tentatively entitled Curiosity based pedagogy (“Nysgjerrighetens pedagogikk”). The book will explore the cultural importance and value of wonder and curiosity, their historical roots and discuss how curiosity and joy of knowledge can be better maintained and promoted across school Publicationcurricula, from kindergarten to university. Wonder and curiosity are usually considered as human universalities, but this is hardly the case. Nearly all civilizations have been based on traditions, old truths and old Gods, where curiosity has been met with distrust, as reflected in the myth of Pandora or the expulsion from Paradise. Nonetheless, the ability to naïve wonder, curiosity and joy of wonder is essential for any human development, as it is for science and societal welfare, and for our developmental based western societies. Following Rudolf Steiner’s call to constantly renew the conceptual frames and terms of what he termed ‘deep pedagogy’, the book attempts to find new approaches and perspectives to what he circumscribes as ‘pedagogy’. Clearly, Waldorf pedagogy could be characterized as a pedagogy aiming to promote life-long curiosity and joy of knowledge. Principal agreement of publication is made with Universitetsforlaget, Oslo.
 
Research questions
The book will address the concern of bored students and analyse the reasons for why contemporary pedagogy tend to promote brain-tired students who take an indifferent position to knowledge. The book will hence explore how pedagogy, and especially science didactics, can be maintained in ways which renew the joy of knowledge, wonder and curiosity.

Sources, methods and theoretical perspectives
The book will be based on literature studies and relevant research. I have already published on the issue and have a fair overview over the relevant literature. Moreover, I have established contacts with the according research network, and in April 2019 I attended a conference on the pedagogical implications of wonder and curiosity in Amsterdam, where I gave a talk, as well. That event further improved my international network with co-researchers in the field.
The book will be research based and address core questions of deep pedagogy, and meet several issues of Waldorf pedagogy, as well, on how knowledge and science may connect to aesthetics, art exercises and practical crafts, and hence establish interfaces between knowledge, art and practical experience. By focussing on wonder and curiosity, the book will explore how school curricula can contribute to deepen knowledge and make learning a more personal conquest, hence maintaining a closer contact between knowledge, aesthetics, ethics and life practice.

The book Nysgjerrighetens pedagogikk – Dybdelæring i informasjonssamfunnet was published in 2021.