Something I’ve struggled with throughout my time in the MALAT program is the ability to be concise and brief. Narrowing my focus to a just a couple of theoretical frameworks has proven to be another challenge in that respect.
My research question is as follows: In what ways might microlearning be used in employment contexts to build skills for use at work?
I will also attempt to delve into aspects of motivation, cultural differences and how communities of inquiry can be created within my sub questions.
This has led me to a few frameworks:
- Adult Learning Theory. I’m interested in inquiring further into elements such as intrinsic motivation, an assumption that this theory has as being high in adult learners. Learning more about best practices when educating and appealing to busy employees with strong sense of purpose and self will also be greatly beneficial to finding approaches to building skills for use at work while at work.
- Cognitive Load Theory. I’ve spent a fair amount of time delving into the intricacies of this theory throughout this program, so can see benefit to using this theory to aid in how activities are built to maximize learning and retention through combinations of text, images and narration in bite sized doses.
- Mobile Learning Theory. This is a theory that I would really like to dig a bit deeper into, as I can predict that microlearning may often be adapted to mobile type learning. I’m particularly interested in how it directs learning to authentic contexts where just in time learning is a goal, as well as participatory and collaborative situations where experienced staff can play a part in the content novice learners are accessing for real uses at work. Personalization is also an element of this theory I would like to learn more about.
Any suggestions or perspective from you all is always appreciated. A work in progress as usual.
December 5, 2018 at 11:59 am
Stu, I agree with your struggle to limit yourself to just one framework. I originally selected adult learning (andragogy) and was going to hang multiple other theories off it, such as self-directed learning, self-determination, constructivism, etc., but I was so overwhelmed I ended up just sticking with adult learning overall. In short, you may want to pick just one. I’ll also pass on some words of wisdom from Deb… If you’re interested in learning more about motivation theory or mobile learning theory, those probably aren’t the right options for your theoretical framework. Because you already know so much about cognitive load theory, you can take that as a foundation (i.e., your framework) and then explore the other theories within your research. Good luck!
December 7, 2018 at 8:17 am
Hi Stuart,
I am not super familiar with adult learning theory, but depending on what sort of target demographic you are lookign at I could see how it may work based on the name alone. I think cognitive load theorry seems the best fit based on what you want to explore. I think when you are looking at issues of motivation a key issue in the secondary academic world, that I would imagine extends beyond the classroom would be the reality that students get overburdened. They are asked to process too much in one sitting, and this leads to them just giving up on certain tasks. What little I do know about CL theory I think would lend itself well to issues of motivation.Good luck!