Abstract: A new level of systemic complexity of the tasks facing modern education determines the need to search for new thinking tools that ensure their solution. This is the reason for the relevance of this research, the purpose of which is to offer a new thinking tool that provides the opportunity to think complexly and about complex things, to view an object, for example, education, as a complex whole, i.e. included through the generality of the constitutive basis in a system of diverse connections and interactions$ Qualitatively compress large arrays of heterogeneous information, integrate (collect) it into semantic coherence.
In the process of scientific research, methods of scientific theorization were used in the context of the ideas of post-nonclassical science and on its methodological basis. The article considers the structure of the ontological representation as a tool of thinking, which is understood as the order of division of the world in the consciousness of society (how the meaning of this representation organizes consciousness). This is the scientific novelty of the study. Using the example of a traditional learning system, the fundamental influence of the structure of the ontological representation in which it is built (the separation between the subjective world and the objective world) is shown. From this position, four structural markers of this system and its basic meanings (ontological, anthropological, etc.) are identified. Their presence in educational (in) innovations indicates that these (in) innovations are a variant of the traditional learning system, respectively, the quality of the educational result and its inconsistency with the challenges of the time are common. The analysis of FGOS 4.0 — the first digital standard confirms this. The article examines the structure of the ontological foundation of a new education system capable of responding to the challenges of the time, its basic meanings are highlighted. It is concluded that in the new system, along with new educational opportunities, the educational opportunities of the traditional system of education should be used.