Your clarification seemed to further the misunderstanding (at least for me). At first you say:
[quoting Wild, 14 Nov 95.b] The C and I "recipes" come as integral and coherent meta-theories of learning (or epistemologies); and they must stand alone as such.
This to me, says "never the twain shall meet." Then you say:
...it is then perfectly reasonable to employ any number of instructional strategies, based on learning theories, to meet the particular needs of the instruction, without compromising the integrity of either C or I approaches. For example, using drill strategies can, at times ... occupy a respectable place in a constructivist learning environment.
Are you saying that FIRST you must be grounded in a metatheory (instructivist or constructivist), THEN within that framework you can select strategies that might be derived from either camp, as long as they are consistent with the learning goals, and are not in direct conflict with the meta-theory? Okay, that seems reasonable to me. But, is that what you were saying?