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The first stage in the chain of reasoning of phronesis entails the discriminatory capacity to recognize the moral issues of a given situation and which virtues are required (Kristjánsson et al. 2021). As Russell (2009) highlights, it is about the ability to “sense” and to “read” a situation so as to reflect on what to do.

Moral imagination stands out as a relevant ingredient in this stage in order to train practical wisdom, as it provides awareness and understanding of the consequences of different actions that may derive from a situation (Waddock 2010). In a well‐cited work, Werhane (2002) defines moral imagination as “the ability in particular circumstances to discover and evaluate possibilities not merely determined by that circumstance, or limited by its operative mental models, or merely framed by a set of rules or rule‐governed concerns” (p. 93). Moreover, Sanderse (2012) conceives moral imagination as a virtue itself, needed to deal with suffering and with the vulnerability of human life since it awakens our sense of commonness with others.

Thus, cultivating moral imagination to develop the phronetic capacity to “sense” and “read” the moral dimensions of challenges involves perceiving in a transformative way, as we argued in Section 4.2. In this sense, educators might focus on the awareness of dominant mental models as well as on the envisioning of new ones better aligned with the challenges posed by socioecological crises.

For that purpose, the development in the classroom of pedagogical activities designed from a systems perspective is key. The challenge of tackling most socioecological problems derives from the complex network of systemic relationships between worldviews, institutions, and technologies that define our current sociotechnical systems (Kallis and Norgaard 2010), as mentioned in Section 4.1. Thus, a systems approach has been widely acknowledged as necessary to address the dynamic interdependencies among economic, political, social, and ecological issues across temporal and spatial dimensions (Williams et al. 2017). A systems‐thinking and multiple‐perspective approach addressing such a complex network of relationships would be required so that moral imagination can be at work to question and reframe mental models (Werhane 2002, 2008; Waddock 2010). Ultimately, pedagogies that train systems thinking will be particularly useful for developing phronesis by focusing on the multiplicity of moral issues arising in the sociotechnical systems in which we are embedded.

A tool that might well contribute to achieve that goal is the use of maps in the classroom. If a picture is worth a thousand words, mapping might effectively connect learners with the multiple and interrelated domains, scales, actors, cause–effect relationships, feedback loops, and other systemic features of socioecological problems (see the proposal to operationalize the systems‐thinking competence for sustainability by Wiek et al. 2015, and Werhane 2002, 2008 for working with the stakeholder theory). As Corbett and Lydon (2018, p. 113) state, maps “reflect our relationship to ourselves, to one another and to the environment …. Whether conscious or not, our cognitive or mental maps guide the paths and routes that make up our lives.” Maps may thus be tools for transformation.

Students can be invited to brainstorm on the components involved in a socioecological problem they have identified. First, they could freely write down on a large piece of paper different words representing these components from as many different perspectives as they can imagine. For instance, words referring to concepts, emotions, principles, beliefs, technologies, causes, effects, institutions, collective actors, individual actors, time, places, geographies, and so on. When participants feel that no other elements come to their minds, they can be asked to think of the resulting word cloud from a systemic view rather than as a set of disconnected elements. As Meadows (2008) suggests, some questions can guide that task: “Do the parts affect each other?… Do the parts together produce an effect that is different from the effect of each part on its own?… Does the effect, the behavior over time, persist in a variety of circumstances?” (p. 13). Participants can then envision and depict connections among elements, again from all possible angles. Interconnections might include issues of power, time, causality, emotions, conflict, cooperation, harm, restoration, ideologies, sectors, levels, among many others. Finally, learners can be invited to deeply connect with the resulting “brainstorm system map” to disentangle the spaces of intervention where moral issues are relevant, so that they can individually and collectively reflect on those moral issues.

This type of activity might eventually contribute to the process of moralization, i.e. “the acquisition of moral qualities by objects or activities that previously were morally neutral” (Rozin et al. 1997, p. 67), of socioecological issues that have been traditionally addressed from technical grounds, such as urban mobility and emissions, or meat consumption. Moralization involves shifting mental models, at both individual and cultural levels, turning preferences into values (Rozin et al. 1997), thus potentially contributing to addressing more effectively the complexity of socioecological problems.