CSSE 2008 Symposium

Overview part
Principled Use of Technology in Higher Education: are there global commonalities?

In this interactive symposium we will present a diverse set of studies focused on technology in higher education, and the common design principles that unite them in the service of learning. The contexts include online graduate courses, initial teacher education, ESLcollege courses, and technology infusion with faculty and instructors. The principles we discuss include leveraging community, expanding learning boundaries beyond the course level, building socio-pragmatic competencies, and sustainable peer networks of support.

Clare Brett and Hedieh Najafi

Technology integration in pre-service faculty development: Examining opportunities and obstacles
This mixed-method study, which is situated within a boarder ongoing design-research study (Collins, 1992, 2004; Bereiter, 2002), investigated the impact of a technology integration initiative targeted toward pre-service instructors at OISE/UT on the instructors' instructional use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs). The "Technology Infusion in Faculty Development" (TechInfusion) attempts to transform elementary and secondary pre-service instructors' understanding of Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (Mishra & Koehler, 2006) by delivering biweekly research-informed and hands-on workshops and also by encouraging the instructors to share and discuss their technology-enhanced teaching artifacts in a shared database. Data for this study was collected through a close-ended survey that probed instructors' current ICT-integrated practice, level of ICT competency, professional development needs, and effectiveness of past TechInfusion initiative; ; open-ended questionnaire distributed at the end of every workshop to understand pre-service instructors' overall evaluation of the workshop in terms of meeting their needs and effectiveness of delivery method and content; and semi-structured interviews with two instructors who had integrated the technologies introduced in the workshops in their classrooms. In this presentation, instances of transformed practices of pre-service instructors' will be shared. Moreover, obstacles to pre-serivice instrucors' involvement in the activities of TechInfusion initiative and possible approaches to remove those obstacles will be discussed.

Kim MacKinnon

A Human-Tech Perspective on Technology Infusion in the Context of Teacher Education

This study attempts to explain the notion of "infusion" in terms of a Human-Tech (Vicente, 2003) relationship that exists between people and the tools they use for learning. I will discuss how adapting the use of a tool called Cognitive Work Analysis (Rasmussen, Pejtersen & Goodstein, 1994; Vicente, 1999) - or CWA - for investigating Human-Tech relationships in education holds promise as a way to inform more systematic design decisions, and shed light on "constraints" that often remain hidden during the Design Research process (MacKinnon & Woodruff, in press; Nirula & Woodruff, 2007). In particular, I will present research findings from a study that examined the outcome of using an adapted form of CWA to design an open online research forum (Innovations in Teaching and Learning Forum) in support of teacher candidate action research.

Nobuko Fujita, Cathi Gibson-Gates, & John Duwyn

SMART Ideas: Infusing interactive whiteboard technology into preservice teacher education

Existing literature on interactive whiteboards (IWBs) rely on teacher and student self-reports to highlight the impact and potential of this technology. More empirical studies that analyze the intersection of technical and pedagogic interactivity are needed to understand how educators can infuse IWB technology effectively (Smith, Higgins, Wall, & Miller, 2005) in different subject areas. This case study investigated how two university-based instructors integrated this internet communications technology into an initial elementary teacher education program after taking part in technology professional development workshops offered as part of the larger Technology Infusion initiative at OISE/UT. Specifically, these instructors explored the impact of peer networks on infusing SMARTboard?  1) as they integrated it into co-teaching the teacher education seminar at the university; and 2) as they supported six teacher candidate-associate teacher pairs infuse IWB into teaching grade 5 math and grade 8 science lessons at a partnership school. Questionnaire, classroom observation, and interview data are currently being collected and analyzed using both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The presentation will focus on the impact of peer networks, conceptualized as the collaboration with university- and school-based educators, on supporting growth of preservice teacher candidates' Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (Mishra & Koehler, 2006), and on sustaining the integration of technology into their instructional practices.

Wendy Freeman:

Crossing Boundaries: Attempts to encourage program-level graduate participation online

Studies of graduate study at a distance tend to examine the factors that support course-related learning. Within this approach the broader conceptualization of graduate study as a process that occurs over time can be neglected. Weblogs are a journal-like web-based application that can be used to easily publish text that is displayed in reverse chronological order. In this study weblogs written by students both within and outside courses were presented together as an aggregated view providing an integrated environment for graduate students at the program level. The goal of this study was to explore how the social and individual affordances of the technology could support graduate students in Education across a program of study by encouraging them to read and write within and across course boundaries, thereby creating resources for peripheral participation in academic practice. In this presentation the challenges presented in the design of an online environment that expands learning boundaries beyond the course-level are explored.

Gloria McPherson:

The relationship of intercultural sensitivity to sense of community in computer mediated multicultural learning environments

Studies of socio-pragmatic competency in online courses have mostly focused on exploring interactions between two distinct national cultures (Hofstede, 2001; Kim & Bonk, 2002). However, these studies do not adequately reflect multicultural contexts. Researchers have established that intercultural sensitivity (ICS) is an accurate predictor of intercltural communicative competence (Chen & Starosta, 1997). Furthermore, they have established the link between communication skills, interactivity and one's ability to feel a legitimate part of a community of learners (SOC) as well as the development of social presence on-line (Tu & McIsaac, 2002; Gunawardena & Zittle, 1997). To date no literature exists that correlates ICS directly with SOC. This study will attempt to identify the relationship that one's intercultural sensitivity has on one's ability to establish a sense of community in a computer mediated knowledge building environment. In this presentation, initial observations based on survery data and course discussion board entries are discussed.

References:

MacKinnon, K., & Woodruff, E. (in press). Understanding the Use and Misuse of Technology in Pre-service Education Through Cognitive Work Analysis.  In Proceedings of the 6th Annual Hawaii International Conference on Education. Hawaii (pp. TBA), Hawaii,  January 5-8, 2008.

Mishra, P. & Koehler, M.J. (2006). Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: A framework for teacher knowledge. Teachers College Record, 108(6), 1017-1054.
Smith, H., Higgins, S., Wall, K. & Miller, J. (2005) Interactive whiteboards: boon or bandwagon? A critical review of the literature. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning 21, 91-101.

Nirula, L., & Woodruff, E. (2007). Improving the Design of Educational Technology Interventions in Elementary Schools Through the Use of Cognitive Work Analysis.  In Proceedings of the 5th Annual Hawaii International Conference on Education. Hawaii (pp. 4077-4083)  ISSN 1541-5880, Hawaii.

Rasmussen, J., Pejtersen, A. M., & Goodstein, L.P. (1994).  Cognitive Systems Engineering.  New York: Wiley-Interscience.

Smith, H., Higgins, S., Wall, K. & Miller, J. (2005) Interactive whiteboards: Boon or bandwagon? A critical review of the literature. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning,  21, 91-101.

Vicente, K. J. (1999).  Cognitive Work Analysis: Towards safe, productive, and healthy computer-based work.  Mahwah, NJ: LawrenceErlbaum Associates.

Vicente, K. J. (2003). The Human Factor: Revolutionizing the way we live with technology. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Vintage Canada.