Adopting learning technologies: a collaborative exploration of staff needs and perceptions (648) [Up Home : Annual Conference 2014

Public Group Active 7 years, 8 months ago

Wed, Sep 3 2014, 11:35am – 12:35pm

Description

Educational institutions continue to be enthusiastic about the potential of technology to support teaching and learning, but to date few have been able to provide evidence around successful implementation (Blin & Munro, 2008). Institutional initiatives often provide visionary profiles for the use of technology enhanced learning but these exist in tension with staff attitudes and perceptions. This can result in innovative practice remaining in the domain of the individual (Russell, 2009) and never being realised beyond a few early adopters. Successful implementation of technology enhanced learning needs to incorporate a combination of bottom-up and top-down approaches (Cook et al., 2007). This session provides the opportunity for practitioners, policy-makers and academic technologists to explore self-reported needs and perceptions of staff towards the use of e-learning, and collaborate with colleagues from a broad range of contexts to being to identify effective next steps in creating this balance.

This interactive workshop will draw on data collected as part of a project carried out at the University of Warwick to investigate staff perceptions and attitudes towards the use of e-learning, including its role in higher education and the factors considered to influence its adoption. After a brief introduction to the data (five minutes) participants will work in groups to focus on areas of particular interest to them emerging from the data, for example:

developing a culture of e-learning through confidence boosting, skill development and awareness raising;
building a supportive infrastructure through strategic interventions; and
identifying approaches to meet perceived student expectations.

In these groups participants will explore some of the raw data, in the form of quotes taken from focus group transcripts, and drawing the group’s varied knowledge and expertise begin to consider how to best address the challenges presented. Although groups may start by focusing on a single piece of data they will be encouraged to develop ideas and strategies that take account of the varied perspectives presented, thus beginning to build a more comprehensive approach. (15-20 minutes)

Each group will be given time to share their initial thoughts and perspectives verbally within the session (5 minutes) before sharing final thoughts and identifying key next steps. These perspectives will also be collated in a virtual space so that colleagues can continue the conversation, common threads and approaches can be identified and the findings made available to all participants to support developments within their own context.

References

Blin, F. and Munro, M. (2008). Why hasn’t technology disrupted academics’ teaching practices? Understanding resistance to change through the lens of activity theory. Computers and Education, 50(2): 475-490.
Cook, J., Holley, D. and Andrew, D. (2007). A stakeholder approach to implementing e-learning in a university. British Journal of Educational Technology, 38(5): 784-794.
Russell, C. (2009). A systemic framework for managing e-learning adoption in campus universities: individual strategies in context. ALT-J: Research in Learning Technology, 17(1): 3-19.
Authors

Name Emma King

Affiliation University of Warwick

Country United Kingdom