Technology Enhanced Informal Learning, Interdisciplinarity, and Cultural Historical Activity Theory

Abstract

This paper explores the role of theory and interdisciplinarity in Technology Enhanced Informal Learning, and the research community. We consider Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) but we strongly feel that our argument has broader application to the use of theory as part of the intellectual 'self-defence toolkit' that researchers and practitioners in the critical TEL community need to consider if they are to 'resist' the crises arising from educational globalisation. Theory offers us the history, scope, power, and language, that we need to be reflexively aware of both our own interests and those of others who are actors in the settings in which we are working. The paper arose from our concern to provide evidence that our work in virtual research communities (in the Inter-Life Project) -to help young people pursue their own research agendas and find their research 'voices' -was actually effective in serving their interests as well as our own.Our research revealed the centrality of learning space, community support, and creative/visual artefact production in the sustainability of these communities. We illustrate the interactions across these realms through selected examples from our Inter-Life findings. We explore how an interdisciplinary approach in TEL can support the creative confluence of learning in science and the visual arts, serving diverse cultural communities of learners. Finally, we consider resistance to the large-scale industrialisation of TEL, and its ideologies, that seems to us to be a key issue in TEL research. For example, we are concerned by the potential for surveillance and control that is contained in the whole learning analytics movement in which so many TEL researchers are becoming involved.

Interdisciplinarity and technology-enhanced learning: Reflections from art and design and educational perspectives

“…One key element of this approach is that the network will use creative practices as the ‘shared language’ to facilitate communication between participating researchers. Our recent research (Sclater, 2016; Sclater and Lally, 2016a) had highlighted the need for novel and creative ways to mediate interdisciplinary communications in order to support collaborative working. We have also shown that creative practices can offer a powerful language for such collaborative communication (Lally and Sclater, 2012, 2013; Sclater and Lally, 2013, 2014).…”

“…In earlier work (Sclater and Lally, 2017) we commenced the task by looking explicitly at interdisciplinarity in relation to TEL. We reported on the central role of art and design education in bringing creative practices into informal TEL learning communities, and talked with researchers who were members of an interdisciplinary TEL team in Scotland (Sclater and Lally, 2016a: 865).…”

New Vistas on Responsible Learning Analytics

“…Since then, many frameworks, checklists, and evaluation methodologies have emerged to address ethical and moral considerations of LA system development and interventions. These include, among others, the socio-critical ethical framework (Slade & Prinsloo, 2013), a set of design guidelines (Pardo & Siemens, 2014), the DELICATE ethics checklist (Drachsler & Greller, 2016), JICS's code of practice (Sclater & Lally, 2016), the SHEILA (Supporting Higher Education to Integrate Learning Analytics) policy framework (Tsai et al, 2018), and the more recent global guidelines for the ethics of LA (Slade & Tait, 2019). As LA systems evolve and become more technically sophisticated, including recent developments in AI (Buckingham Shum & Luckin, 2019), their further design and use in education contexts bring new questions into focus.…”