Bret Victor wrote about some misconceptions about Papert's work (http://worrydream.com/MeanwhileAtCodeOrg/): "Papert explains that programming can serve as a medium in which powerful ideas can be brought within reach. but the focus, of course, must be on the powerful ideas, not programming itself"

One of the Problems I see with answering it is how to measure if learning with kids "works" or doesn't. In Paperts book Mindstorms he explains some interesting aspects of his vision. Later in the book he also has this example of Samba school as an example of a learning environment. I think, or at least it seems to me that she took him too "literal" or too constructivist - dogmatic. Which is never a good idea. I I still think Papert and his work have valuable lessons in them. But for her as for a very very very large part of society its just too much of a leap from existing culture.

Paperts words in Mindstorms regarding - Computer Cultures are real. But its not limited to Computers current "Mainstream" Civilization Cultures does quite a bad job at acknowledging its biases towards certain tendencies. So a bias towards explanation might not be easily spotted but still be there. I will just point to some effort which does also lean towards more self-directed learning. and these are SOLES such as proposed by Sugata Mitra: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self_Organised_Learning_Environment