Integrated assessment : new assessment methods evaluation of an innovative method of assessment-critical incident analysis

For many people, the term “assessment” is associated with tasks, which are less than inspiring, which are undertaken only because they are hurdles, which must be crossed in order to achieve some form of accreditation or to enable entry into work or a further course of study. In this worldview, what is important for the student is the final determination or grade assigned to their work. While summative assessment, in which students submit work that is marked by experts and which contributes partially or fully to a final grade, plays an important role in the lives of students and educators, contemporary thinking about “assessment” is much more expansive

Seeing is believing: primary generalist pre-service teachers’ observations of physical education lessons in Ireland and Switzerland.

Primary generalist pre-service teachers (PSTs) rarely have opportunity to observe teachers teaching authentic physical education lessons let alone reflect with the teachers, their lecturer or their peers following the lesson. Observation of, and reflection on, quality lessons can have a powerful influence on shaping the PSTs’ soon-to-be-teachers’ professional identities and can also help them to develop reflective and critical thinking skills. A qualitative framework utilising critical incidents, described as ‘events identified by student teachers as significant in making progress toward becoming a better teacher’ (Schempp, 1985: p.159) guided the PSTs’ observations in this study. One primary physical education initial teacher educator (PEITE) and four PSTs, from Ireland, participated in the study and data comprised of a planning discussion, 40 critical incident observations of ten lessons in two European countries and two reflective discussions. Each set of observations was followed by a group discussion to provide opportunity for reflection-on-action (Schön, 1983). Examination of the data showed that PSTs extended their understanding of professional practice in: questioning and demonstrating; inclusion; organisation and management; and feedback and were surprised that practice in both countries was more similar than different. Critical incidents were a useful method of focusing reflections for the PSTs and the opportunity to engage in the process of observing, and reflecting on, quality lessons impacted the PSTs’ perceptions towards becoming better teachers. Keywords: Critical incidents; reflection

Enhancing skills of critical reflection to evidence learning in professional practice

Professional organisations and regulatory bodies are making critical reflection a mandatory component of professional practice. Reflection is a vital part of learning from experience and is central to developing and maintaining competency across a practitioner's lifetime. This paper will discuss key educational theories to illustrate why reflection is important. Kolb's and Gibbs' reflective cycles are used to structure the process of critical reflection. Elements of the educational tradition of Bildung are discussed and integrated to enrich the understanding of self and to facilitate the reader's ability to enhance their professional practice

Exploring the value of a design for service approach to develop public services in the Community Voluntary Sector: a comparative analysis

This paper presents the findings from two action research case studies that explore the value of using a ‘design for service’ approach to develop public services in the community voluntary sector (CVS). Each case study was conducted within a CVS organisation that was developing or offering public services. Both were local charities that are part of UK federations; the first offering mental health and wellbeing services, the second providing community education services. The paper will present the outcomes of using a ‘design for service’ approach, including systematic inquiry, visualisation, and challenging existing stakeholder perceptions. The comparison will identify similarities and differences in each case. Factors that appear to affect the success of the approach in this context will be discussed, including organisational culture and the perception of ‘design’. These two case studies form the basis of an on-going doctoral programme. Further case studies are planned, to inform an approach framework with implications for a broad range of CVS contexts. This work will add theoretical rigour to design praxis in the emerging area service innovation for CVS organisations

Teacher Education Futures: Developing learning and teaching in ITE across the UK

A selection of papers from the Teacher Education Futures conference 2006

Creative strategies to support student learning through reflection

Reflective practice has become a key attribute of promoting quality teaching and learning. Learning is an active process and include reflective writing, visualising and verbalising to promote critical thinking. In our experience most often than not superficial reflective writing is used. We explored the design of opportunities for students to engage in critical reflection. Theoretical data were obtained through in-depth exploration of the literature to allow contextualisation while arguing a case. A qualitative approach was used. Judgements were not made about the measured quality of reported findings, but on the relevance of reflective strategies to support students, enhance critical reflection and transform practice. Combined with narration and dialogue, reflection can bridge the gap between theoretical ideals and realities of the practice context. Four reflective activities have been identified that could be used to engage students in critical reflection

Ideation as an intellectual information acquisition and use context: Investigating game designers’ information-based ideation behavior

Human Information Behavior (HIB) research commonly examines behavior in the context of why information is acquired and how it will be used, but usually at the level of the work or everyday-life tasks the information will support. HIB has not been examined in detail at the broader contextual level of intellectual purpose (i.e. the higher-order conceptual tasks the information was acquired to support). Examination at this level can enhance holistic understanding of HIB as a ‘means to an intellectual end’ and inform the design of digital information environments that support information interaction for specific intellectual purposes. We investigate information-based ideation (IBI) as a specific intellectual information acquisition and use context by conducting Critical Incident-style interviews with ten game designers, focusing on how they interact with information to generate and develop creative design ideas. Our findings give rise to a framework of their ideation-focused HIB, which systems designers can leverage to reason about how best to support certain behaviors to drive design ideation. These findings emphasize the importance of intellectual purpose as a driver for acquisition and desired outcome of use

Expectations eclipsed in foreign language education: learners and educators on an ongoing journey / edited by Hülya Görür-Atabaş, Sharon Turner.

Between June 2-4, 2011 Sabancı University School of Languages welcomed colleagues from 21 different countries to a collaborative exploration of the challenging and inspiring journey of learners and educators in the field of language education.\ud \ud The conference provided an opportunity for all stakeholders to share their views on language education. Colleagues met with world-renowned experts and authors in the fields of education and psychology, faculty and administrators from various universities and institutions, teachers from secondary educational backgrounds and higher education, as well as learners whose voices are often not directly shared but usually reported.\ud \ud The conference name, Eclipsing Expectations, was inspired by two natural phenomena, a solar eclipse directly before the conference, and a lunar eclipse, immediately after. Learners and educators were hereby invited to join a journey to observe, learn and exchange ideas in orde

Researching Across Two Cultures: Shifting Positionality

Embodied and creative research methods provoke honesty, emotion, and vulnerability in participants, which add to the richness of the stories they tell and are willing to share. The positionality of the researcher is less of “interviewer” and more “co-producer” or participant in a dialogue. Visual and creative approaches invite participants to share in ways in which they are not able or willing through words alone. The data and outputs they produce, with film, art, or objects, can in turn affect those who see it more than written text and need to be analysed and disseminated along with more traditional transcripts, articles, and presentations. In the context of investigating sensitive issues such as those around embodied identity, these methods, which use embodied methods to explore embodied research questions, may feel the most appropriate. These approaches lie along the boundary of therapy and research, asking much of researchers who are unlikely to have received therapeutic training or ongoing support. Due to this deficit, the researched may find that their experience is not held or contained in a way that the content would demand. Similarly, the data themselves lie on the boundary of art and research, in that they can be seen as more than a tool to facilitate reflection, but as artifacts in their own right. What are the implications in this scenario? Where should we position ourselves and our work along these boundaries? Who holds the space for the researcher and the researched if both are made vulnerable

A journey towards becoming a systemic practitioner: becoming a project manager and an educationalist

A thesis submitted to the University of Bedfordshire, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Professional Doctorate in Systemic PracticeThis thesis is a systemic examination of my practice as an educator specialising in the development of early career project managers. This inquiry is conducted through an internal inquiry into my living theory and an externally focussed inquiry into the journey that the early career project managers take to becoming a project manager. Four broad foci of my living theory are identified, ‘Soft Systems Methodology’, ‘Action Learning’, ‘Reflective Practice’ and ‘Systemic Practice’. These are discussed in order to consciously consider the foundations of my practice and to identify areas where the practice has been eroded through familiarity and developed through innovation. The external inquiry draws on three sources of qualitative data. The first two sources of data explore the experiences of students enrolled on the MSc in Project Management at Lancaster University during an action learning project. These two sources are an analysis of ‘word clouds’ and ‘critical incidents‘ presented in the dissertations that reflect on these projects. The third source of data is a series of interviews held with alumni of the MSc in Project Management at Lancaster University. These two areas of inquiry combine to present a framework for project management practitioner education that comprises of three broad areas of development. These areas of development align to the ‘ways of knowing’, ‘ways of doing’ and ‘ways of being’. The ways of knowing zone is made up of the development of a systematic approach to project management. This zone is complemented by the ‘ways of doing’ that looks at the development of this systematic perspective through the development of a range of analytical and social skills. It is suggested that systemic eloquence may be gained by enhancing the ‘ways of knowing’ and ‘ways of doing’ with a systemic perspective that encompasses relational dispositions to the practice of project management. This relational disposition covers the ways in which project managers learn to understand the dynamics of the problem situations that they co-create with their stakeholders. Furthermore, it is noted that the development of project management practitioners should be facilitated through their experience in the practice of projects. This ‘hands on’ engagement combined with an approach to self-development founded on reflective practice helps to develop people capable of delivering projects rather than talking about the delivery of projects