Digital technologies in education:an innovation agenda?

LTU Innovation Showcase for Digital Learning 08/12/15Helen Beetham with La Trobe Library

#LTUinnov8

Technology as innovation

Beyond Current HorizonsFuturelab for UK Govt 2009

Beyond Current HorizonsFuturelab for UK Govt 2009

Education will not be changed simply as a result of a given invention or discovery, but by the ways in which these

developments are incorporated into social life (changing our values and goals for education) or into

educational practice(changing the methods

and tools we havefor education).

Education as innovation

‘Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today’The curriculum as a collective story about the futureand what people will need to thrive there

What are the real digital innovations(in our values & goals, methods & tools)?

screen capture from iai.tv/iai.academy

Knowledge: new things to know

‣ New (sub)disciplines: web science,digital media, internet culture,animation, gaming, GPS, networks, digital humanities...

‣ New interdisciplinary problems:digital bodies, globalisation,ethics, privacy, data security,digital divide, digital economy...

Methods: new ways of coming to know

‣ Data collection, analysis, management:what can be (done with) data?

‣ Secondary research: what andwhere is legitimate knowledge?

‣ Design, making, coding

‣ Collaboration: inc. remotely

‣ Modes of representation:data visualisation, animation,virtual worlds, hypermedia,infographics, digital presentation...

Practice: new ways of doing

‣ Customers/clients as data to be managed: diagnostics, analytics

‣ Continuous recording /monitoring of creativeor professional practice

‣ Virtual as a space ofreal social/economicactivity

‣ ‘All high value work isnow knowledge work’??

‣ Continuous self (brand? identity?) management

Theory: new explanations (including explanations for how we learn)

connectivism | networked learning | rhizomatic learningsystems thinking | educational cybernetics | instructional design

actor-network theory | activity theory

1. How have digital technologies changed

your subject area?

DiscussTweet #LTUinnov8

2. How do you share these uncertainties and excitements with students?

DiscussTweet #LTUinnov8

Towards a post-digital agenda for educational innovation?

internationalism | sustainability | access and equity | employability...

How are digital technologies defining the

contexts for learning?

Contexts: digital universities

‣ Students first experiencesof university are digital

‣ Digital systems define thetime and space of learning,recognise and credentialisestudents, give or deny access,monitor outcomes...

‣ Digital technologies, media and practices (continue to) originate and thrive in universities...

‣ ... have created a global market in learning and learners...

‣ ... enable new kinds of university e.g. multiply-located, virtual

Contexts: students with digital technologies and practices to hand

‣ ubiquitous connectivity

‣ near-open access

‣ constant data recording

‣ intimacy, identity

‣ frictionless adoption

‣ simultaneity‣ learning situations are porous

‣ learning events leave a persistent trace

‣ lowered barriers of access -> emphasis on capable use

Contexts: students with digital technologies and practices to hand

‣ ubiquitous connectivity

‣ near-open access

‣ constant data recording

‣ intimacy, identity

‣ frictionless adoption

‣ simultaneity‣ learning situations are porous

‣ learning events leave a persistent trace

‣ lowered barriers of access -> emphasis on capable use

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Contexts: students with digital technologies and practices to hand

Often do not know how to use their digital practicesfor transformational learning

73% under 35s >90% new jobs 7-10 careers

>98% of all information 43.5% graduates 1.4m ‘micro’ firms

36% UK jobs(40% US jobs) 2.5% EU jobs 4-20% learners

Contexts: an uncertain future

Pick a number... any number...

3. How do we enable students...

... to be innovators in a time of rapid change?DiscussTweet #LTUinnov8

Innovation funding in the UK

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Example: learning analytics

Technological innovationLearning analytics

Social/educational innovationWho owns students’ data?

What should it be used for?

Example: followthethings

www.followthethings.com

Example: BYOD4L

https://byod4learning.wordpress.com/topics/

Example: PhonarNation

CC phonarnation 2015

Example: authentic researchusing open data

UCL’s Connected Curriculum (Fung 2014)

4. What makes innovation possible?

How do (some) teachers deliverinnovative learning opportunities?

What gets in the way?DiscussTweet #LTUinnov8

Developing digital literacyas a creative, critical practice

The digitally capable organisationBeetham/Jisc 2015

Organisational identity & culture- vision & strategic planning- leadership

Practices• teaching, learning, assmt• research & innovation• content & information• external engagement

- staff expertise- resourcing & support

Infrastructure - virtual and real estate- policies

teaching & learning

research & innovation

external engagement

content & information

Organisational identity & culture

Practices

Infrastructure

Radical interventions in learning & teaching UK National Union of Students 2014

'it is not the technology in itself that is transforming education and society; it is, rather, the creative ways in which people are using technology to educate and drive change'

Over to you

interventions, suggestions, questions...