“Culture of poverty” arguments presume that the experience of poverty is homogenous and inherently produces intel-lective and social deficits (Payne, 1999

we fundamentally disagree with accounts of learning that routinely deny the humanity of some, or that view culture reductively in ways that limit how we understand and document human potential and its realizations

human learning and development unfold within complex systems whose dynamic interactions are not fully understood

the theory argues that schools allowed society to get what it needed and individuals to get what they deserved

They offered indi-viduals the opportunity to prove themselves on the level playing field of the classroom and then achieve social mobility according to their merit

In the consensus view, this happened almost entirely for political reasons

Cognitive theories are particularly well-suited for the focus that is common in Western schooling traditions on understanding how individual students struggle, or excelwhen engaging with these core, disciplinary ideas as presented by school

We argue, however, that these concerns must not remain the domain of“special-ized”sub-disciplines of the learning sciences, but instead constitute the purview of all learning scientists.

What have we been missing?

Dewey insisted thata sentient human being perceived — andthus reshaped — the stimulus itself. One’saims and beliefs were thus part of the S-Rcontext and so had to be considered in anycomprehensive theory of learning.