Empirical studies on information technology (IT) in early childhood education and care organisations are scant, despite an increasing number of these organisations choosing to innovate with IT. This paper presents a framework to understand the appropriation of IT as an innovation within such an organisation. The framework consists of three perspectives on innovation: an individualist, a structuralist and an interactive process perspective. While the first focuses on concepts such as leadership, IT champions, previous IT exposure, the second focuses on organisation size, parents as stakeholders, competitors, government compliance and regulatory requirements. The third perspective views the innovation as a dynamic phenomenon of change, produced by the continuous interaction of the innovation content, its context, and the appropriation process as related in an interactive process. We demonstrate the framework’s applicability and determine that the three perspectives supplement each other and together provide a deeper understanding of the IT appropriation process in terms of innovation determinants and barriers.

Gestural Interface Technology (GIT) has changed the way technology is adopted in classrooms for all ages. The accessibility of control through touch means that technology such as Apple's iPad can be used in early childhood education. In this paper, we introduce a framework for fully-engaged communication, developed from educational pedagogy and critical engagement in information systems. The intersection of these dimensions creates a view of a GIT lifeworld approach which allows it to be used to understand multiple layers of engagement that exist within an early childhood education environment.

Part 1: IS/IT Implementation and AppropriationInternational audienceExisting studies of IT within early childhood education and care settings are scant, and those that do exist traditionally utilise a Cartesian worldview where humans and IT are separate self-sufficient entities with properties. In this worldview, change is attributed to either the technological or the human entity, leading to limited, either techno-centric or human-centred accounts of IT implementation and use. We reframe the activities in an early childhood organisation as a process of appropriation, and utilise a sociomaterial theory of technology appropriation alternative to the Cartesian worldview. We contribute a rich account of the changes that occur to the practices, the educators, and the technology itself during the appropriation process and demonstrate the theory’s usefulness as an analytical tool for providing a deeper understanding of how early childhood educators appropriate a new technology into their practices in a sociomaterial, non-dualistic way

The Australian Government is financially incentivising work integrated learning (WIL) to enhance graduate employability. As such, universities are currently expanding WIL pedagogies and practices from their traditional domain of professional degrees, to be incorporate into almost all university degrees. Using Kemmis’ Theory of Practice Architecture, this study investigated the practices of established WIL practitioners in universities and uncovers what can be referred to as a WIL ecology of practice. This ecology comprises of key WIL practices, including: networking and selling, negotiating, collaborating and innovating and legitimising. The findings from this study offer important insights into how higher education institutions may develop a WIL ecology of practice, and critically, achieve WIL funding objectives, which has arguably become ever more important given the challenges COVID-19 has presented to university operational budgets.

This rejoinder discusses the essay by Ramiller (2016) entitled "New Technology and the Post-human self: Rethinking Appropriation and Resistance" which aims at exploring the implications of a sociomaterial perspective for people's practical encounters with new information technologies. Our argument is based on our position within strong materiality, which in line with the essay acknowledges the materiality of the post-human self, but does not accept a dualist positon which separates the human and the technical, or as the author expresses it the 'user' and the 'system'. While we agree with the author that it is important to research how sociomaterial entanglements emerge and not just research those which exist, we maintain "strong" sociomateriality does not, as the author puts forward, represent an end point for the academic inquiry into IT appropriation, but indeed is a starting point.