Starting from the notion of learnification (crafted by Gert Biesta), understood as the prevalence of the language of learning over that of education within the educational discourse of the last three decades, it is argued that such an emphasis on learning has been one of the reasons for the hegemony of the constructivist paradigm in educational practices. Against this backdrop, the present paper endeavours to identify a possible horizon of a re-thinking of constructivism thanks to a recovery of the idea of paideía, in the peculiar meaning provided by Heidegger. By contrasting the Heideggerian reflection on education (marked by a privilege granted to original intentionality, to the link between alétheia and paideía, and to a specific interpretation of Verstehen) and the educational proposal of von Glasersfeld (of which solipsistic risks and a solidarity with the mathematical project of modernity are highlighted), this paper portrays the profile of a ‘pragmatic paideía’ which can allow us to overcome some excesses of constructivism as well as to situate in a right perspective the recent appeals to ‘reality’ occurring in the international theoretical debate.