{"id":553,"date":"2019-12-22T14:53:02","date_gmt":"2019-12-22T19:53:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/?p=553"},"modified":"2020-02-16T20:47:56","modified_gmt":"2020-02-17T01:47:56","slug":"what-constitutes-innovation-new-thinking-and-actions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/what-constitutes-innovation-new-thinking-and-actions\/","title":{"rendered":"What constitutes innovation? New thinking and ACTIONS."},"content":{"rendered":"

In reading Dron (2014) and Goldman et al. (2012), I contemplated what constitutes innovation in the context of a distance education setting. As a K-12 educator, I consistently found that the challenges of change and innovation in distance education have many similarities to K-12 blended learning environments. <\/strong><\/p>\n

What constitutes innovation<\/em>? Amazing new tools that are put into practice<\/em> to improve student learning and to prepare them for the workforce and demands of life of the 21st<\/sup> century. If information and communication technologies (ICTs) are not used<\/em> by instructors and students, they are not an innovation, but merely an idea, a tool and resource that is not used. Dron (2014) points out that these innovations in ICTs can be \u201csoft\u201d or \u201chard technologies\u201d and highlights the creative licence, where the deeper learning happens, with soft technologies (Dron, 2014, p. 242). Dron (2014) speaks to processes related to the use of technologies and<\/em> pedagogies to share and engage with learning processes. These processes are discussed in the context of online distance education contexts but are relevant to my experience in K-12 blended learning environments as well. New thinking in education to meet the needs of 21st<\/sup> learners will remain ideas<\/em> if new actions<\/em> are not implemented to embrace learning with ICTs.<\/p>\n

Addressing the pedagogies involved with the use of technology is a part of innovation<\/em>: a part that is just<\/em> being addressed in many ways. Dron and Anderson look at the generations of ICTS in terms of FOUR dominant pedagogies:<\/p>\n

1) the behaviourist\/cognitivist model \u2013 learner-centric view (e.g., Piaget, Skinner, Bruner, Gagne);<\/p>\n

2) social constructivist model (Dewey and Vygotsky) \u2013 the importance of interaction with other people in the learning process;<\/p>\n

3) connectivist-model, pointing to the central role of the construction of knowledge in the network, both human and non-human;<\/p>\n

4) emerging fourth generation that Dron and Anderson postulate as being “holist,” drawing from different pedagogies, stating that “learning and teaching are deformed by the context and that no pedagogy has primacy” (p. 239).<\/p>\n

Part of innovation <\/em>is action <\/em>and Dron (2014) speaks to the pivotal issues surrounding technological acceptance and use amongst instructors and learners. He explores the SLOAN-C five-pillar model (Moore, 2005, in Dron, 2014, p. 244) which states five dimensions of the quality of the performance of a technology in a distance education setting: learning effectiveness, scale (cost-effectiveness and commitment), access, faculty satisfaction, and student satisfaction (p.244).<\/p>\n

Innovation involves not only the ideas <\/em>in new mindsets, but the action <\/em>in mindshifts <\/em>of both faculty and students (Goldman, 2012). Goldman et al. (2012) focused on four key mindshifts in relation to the adoption and assessment of ICTs in education: human-centred, experimental, collaborative, and metacognitive. For distance education to be innovative and <\/em>to embrace innovations in ICTs, there needs to be a shift in pedagogies and<\/em> assessments. Goldman et al. propose some valuable insights and tools to change how we look at assessing learning with edtech. Specifically, they explore how we measure learning and success with design thinking and creative endeavours that are very different from traditional culminating projects or assessments. They state \u201ca need for new metrics and assessment methodologies [to] accompany[y] these new ways of learning\u201d (para. 12), sharing a detailed \u201creflective assessment rubric\u201d (para. 25). They cite examples from the US National Science Foundation Task Force on Cyberlearning (2008<\/a>) that state: \u201cDespite the revolutions wrought by technology in medicine, engineering, communications, and many other fields, the classrooms, textbooks, and lectures of today are little different than those of our parents. Yet today\u2019s students use computers, mobile telephones, and other portable technical devices regularly for almost every form of communication except learning. The time is now\u2014if not long overdue\u2014for radical rethinking of learning and of the metrics for success\u201d ( in Goldman et al., 2012, para.12 ). As a K-12 educator, I could not agree more with these findings and observations. We have identified new mindsets, but the active changes that lead to mindshifts<\/em> call for different pedagogies that incorporate new assessment strategies to match innovative ICTs.<\/p>\n

Many innovations are \u201cdisruptive technologies\u201d (Christensen, 1997, in Dron, 2014, p. 245) that are initially less effective in their initial application, producing results in learning that are no more effective, if not less, than what they claimed to exceed and improve. Such disruptive technologies call for perseverance to meet their potential to amplify student learning. Unfortunately, the \u201cinitial worsening [of learning outcomes] can act as a brake on initial uptake of ICTs, especially for hard technologies\u201d (Dron, 2014, p. 246) in learning environments –decreasing the perseverance and action <\/em>needed to make innovations<\/em> truly innovative. <\/em>Textbooks, one of the hardest technologies, are still a primary resource for many teachers\u2019 practices, maintaining learning environments that are not in-line with the opportunities that edtech affords us; and, therefore, not in line with the radical rethinking of education that is underway. What constitutes innovation is a consolidation of new resources and tools in action.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

References<\/p>\n

Dron, J. (2014).\u00a0Chapter 9: Innovation and Change: Changing how we Change.<\/a>\u00a0In Zawacki-Richter, O. & T. Anderson (Eds.),\u00a0Online distance education: Towards a research agenda<\/em><\/a>. Athabasca, AB: AU Press. Retrieved from\u00a0 http:\/\/www.aupress.ca\/books\/120233\/ebook\/09_Zawacki-Richter_Anderson_2014-Online_Distance_Education.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n

Goldman S. et al. (2012) Assessing d.learning: Capturing the Journey of Becoming a Design Thinker. In: Plattner H., Meinel C., Leifer L. (eds) Design Thinking Research. Understanding Innovation. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. Retrieved from https:\/\/doi-org.ezproxy.royalroads.ca\/10.1007\/978-3-642-31991-4_2<\/p>\n

Attribution<\/p>\n

Photo by\u00a0Diego PH<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0Unsplash<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In reading Dron (2014) and Goldman et al. (2012), I contemplated what constitutes innovation in the context of a distance education setting. As a K-12 educator, I consistently found that the challenges of change and innovation in distance education have… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":163,"featured_media":554,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lrnt524"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/553","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/163"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=553"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/553\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":588,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/553\/revisions\/588"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0125\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}