Digital tools disrupting tertiary students’ notions of disciplinary knowledge: Cases in history and tourism

This paper reports on the findings from a two year research project that explored the potential of digital tools in support of teaching–learning across different disciplinary areas at a New Zealand university. Two courses (in History and Tourism) are case studied using data collected through interviews with lecturers, tutors and their students, and an online student survey. Findings from the research revealed that both lecturers and students were challenged in learning about the affordances and use of the lecturer selected digital tools as a mediational means. The tools were not initially transparent to them, nor were they able to be easily deployed to undertake their primary task—teaching for the lecturers, and, learning and demonstrating learning for the students completing assigned tasks. The process of learning and using the tools disrupted participants’ prior thinking and led to new understandings of both disciplines and of effective pedagogies for the two disciplines. The findings increase our understanding of the ways digital tools can develop, challenge and expand tertiary students learning and have implications for practice

D1.2 Information gathering report : societal, ethical, cross-cultural

This report has been submitted by Lund University (Sweden) as deliverable D1.2 within the framework of H2020 project "SO-CLOSE:Enhancing Social Cohesion through Sharing the Cultural Heritage of Forced Migrations" Grant No. 870939.This report provides a theoretically-informed approach to migration and heritage in response to the SO-CLOSE project's objective to "contribute to social cohesion and fight refugee marginalization or exclusion by facilitating the encounters between similar life stories, through the mediation of innovative digital and artistic tools. It reviews academic publications exploring how present-day global migrations resonate with the contemporary interest in the history of cross-border mobility in the receiving European societies

Smart thinking on co-creation and engagement: Searchlight on underground built heritage

This paper aims to explore public participation for activating underground built heritage (UBH). It describes and analyses practices of stakeholders’ engagement in different UBH assets, based on experiences gathered in the scope of the European COST Action ‘Underground4value’. It brings together five inspiring cases from Italy, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, in which digital and mobile technologies were used as tools to improve community experiences in UBH. Thus, the paper discusses ‘smartness’ from the perspective of people and communities around cultural assets, where ‘smartness’ becomes a new connotation and a pathway to advance (local) knowledge and know-how. Therefore, this paper takes on the challenge to define a smart city as an ecosystem for people’s empowerment and participation, and, in particular, to explore social tools for creating new values in heritage placemaking—where sharing knowledge becomes a fundamental principle.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Arts Service Organizations: A Study of Impact and Capacity

Evaluates the capacity of arts and cultural organizations during a two-year initiative while they assisted other small nonprofits and individual artists. Addresses issues of funding and partnerships; includes recommendations

Narrating the museum to promote empathy and critical thinking in medical science students and doctors through online activities: a pilot research experience

L'esperienza di ricerca "Narrare il museo per promuovere l’empatia e il pensiero critico in studenti di medicina e dottori", realizzata nell'ambito del progetto "Inclusive Memory", co-finanziato dall’Università Roma Tre, mira a promuovere l'empatia e la capacità di pensiero critico nei medici, anche in formazione, attraverso attività di educazione al patrimonio. Le caratteristiche innovative dell'esperienza di ricerca risiedono nell'utilizzo di attività online, che combinano diverse metodologie di apprendimento: Visual Thinking Strategies, Reflective Questioning, Storytelling e Object-based learning. Il contributo presenta i risultati dell'attività pilota svolta dal gruppo di ricerca del Centro di Didattica Museale, con sede presso il Dipartimento di Scienze della Formazione dell’Università Roma Tre, in collaborazione con Sapienza Università di Roma. Vengono inoltre descritte le attività didattiche, gli strumenti di apprendimento e di valutazione utilizzati durante tale esperienza, che ha coinvolto 35 partecipanti. I risultati della sperimentazione descritta evidenziano un miglioramento statisticamente significativo per quanto riguarda l’indicatore di pensiero critico “uso della lingua” e un miglioramento della dimensione empatica della sensibilità al contesto; i partecipanti dichiarano che i loro livelli di comunicazione e pensiero critico migliorano alla fine delle attività e che gli esercizi progettati stimolano la riflessione, l'osservazione e l'interpretazione.The research experience "Narrating the museum to promote empathy and critical thinking in medical science students and doctors through online activities", carried out within the "Inclusive Memory" project, co-funded by University Roma Tre, aims at promoting empathy and critical thinking skills in medical science students and doctors through heritage education activities. The innovative features of the research experience lie in the use of online activities, combining different learning methodologies: Visual Thinking Strategies, Reflective Questioning, Storytelling and Object-Based Learning. The paper presents the results of the pilot activity carried out by the Centre for Museum Studies research group, based at the Department of Education – Roma Tre, in collaboration with the Sapienza University of Rome. It also describes the teaching activities, learning and evaluation tools used during the pilot experience, which involved 35 participants. The trial results highlight a statistically significant improvement in the Critical Thinking use of language indicators and an improvement of Sensitivity to the context empathy dimension; participants state that their levels of communication and critical thinking skills improved at the end of the activities and that the exercises foreseen stimulated reflection, observation and interpretation

A Study on the Use of Ontologies to Represent Collective Knowledge

The development of ontologies has become an area of considerable research interest over the past number of years. Domain ontologies are often developed to represent a shared understanding that in turn indicates cooperative effort by a user community. However, the structure and form that an ontology takes is predicated both on the approach of the developer and the cooperation of the user community. A shift has taken place in recent years from the use of highly specialised and expressive ontologies to simpler knowledge models, progressively developed by community contribution. It is within this context that this thesis investigates the use of ontologies as a means to representing collective knowledge. It investigates the impact of the community on the approach to and outcome of knowledge representation and compares the use of simple terminological ontologies with highly structured expressive ontologies in community-based narrative environments

Action Research : the first steps to start up a pilot experiment in heritage education

Peer-reviewedLes relacions entre els museus i les escoles canvien amb l'ús d'internet. Volem analitzar com aquestes noves relacions tenen lloc a una escala nacional. És important analitzar aquestes noves relacions possibles, que són producte de canvis socials i tecnològics, ja que permeten noves interaccions i participació, al mateix temps que demanen canvis en les formes d'organització, la gestió de recursos web i els models d'ensenyament i aprenentatge. Concretament, les xarxes d'aprenentatge poden establir una nova forma de relació entre els museus i les escoles, i els recursos educatius en línia amb contingut sobre patrimoni cultural poden oferir oportunitats d'aprenentatge i recursos de coneixement més enllà dels límits de l'ensenyament formal. Tanmateix, calen projectes experimentals per a efectuar proves i veure com aquests tipus de pràctiques d'ensenyament i aprenentatge funcionaran en un context social i cultural concret. Així, doncs, la recerca activa pot contribuir al desenvolupament d'una experiència d'aprenentatge, basat en la reflexió i l'acció. L'objectiu d'aquesta experimentació és obtenir un model de treball i millors pràctiques per a aprendre i ensenyar en xarxes d'aprenentatge formades per gestors, professors i estudiants de patrimoni en què els membres produeixin i utilitzin recursos educatius en línia amb contingut de patrimoni cultural. Els resultats d'aquest projecte empíric seran comprovats amb resultats de la primera part metodològica de la tesi doctoral per a obtenir un model que es pugui exportar a altres contextos.Las relaciones entre los museos y las escuelas cambian con el uso de internet. Queremos analizar cómo estas nuevas relaciones tienen lugar a una escala nacional. Es importante analizar estas posibles nuevas relaciones, que son producto de cambios sociales y tecnológicos, ya que permiten nuevas interacciones y participación, a la vez que requieren cambios en las formas de organización, la gestión de recursos web y los modelos de enseñanza y aprendizaje. Concretamente, las redes de aprendizaje pueden establecer una nueva forma de relación entre los museos y las escuelas, y los recursos educativos en línea con contenido de patrimonio cultural pueden ofrecer oportunidades de aprendizaje y recursos de conocimiento más allá de los límites de la enseñanza formal. No obstante, existe una necesidad de proyectos experimentales para realizar pruebas para ver cómo estos tipos de prácticas de enseñanza y aprendizaje funcionarán en un contexto social y cultural concreto. Así pues, la investigación-acción puede contribuir al desarrollo de una experiencia de aprendizaje, basado en la reflexión y las acciones. El objetivo de esta experimentación es obtener un modelo de trabajo y mejores prácticas para el aprendizaje y la enseñanza en redes de aprendizaje formadas por gestores, profesores y estudiantes del patrimonio en las que los miembros produzcan y utilicen recursos en línea con contenido de patrimonio cultural. Los resultados de este proyecto de investigación empírico serán comparados con los resultados de la primera parte metodológica de la tesis doctoral para obtener un modelo que pueda ser exportado a otros contextos.The relationships between museums and schools are changing through the use of internet. We want to analyse how these new relationships occur at a national level. It is important to analyse these possible new relationships, which are the product of social and technological changes. They allow for new interactions and participation whilst requiring changes in the forms of organisation, web resource management, and teaching and learning models. Specifically, learning networks can establish a new form of relationship between museums and schools and educational online resources with cultural heritage content can offer learning opportunities and knowledge resources beyond the boundaries of formal education. However, there is a need for experimental projects to test the evidence and to see how these kinds of teaching and learning practices will work within a concrete social and cultural context. Thus, Action Research can contribute to the development of a learning experience, based on reflection and actions. The aim of this experimentation is to obtain a working model and best practices for learning and teaching in learning networks shaped by heritage managers, teachers and students where the members produce and use educational online resources with cultural heritage content. The results of this empirical research project will be compared with results from the first methodological part of the PhD thesis to obtain a model that can be exported to other contexts

A Sustainable Design-Oriented Process for Converting and Sharing Know-How

Explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge compose the Human Knowledge. While explicit knowledge refers to information sharable through communicative media (i.e. speech), tacit knowledge – also known as ‘know-how’ – is harder to be shared due to it is linked to experience mediated personal learning processes (i.e. learning by doing); moreover, know-how is useful to deal daily practical situations. This condition produces a dichotomy: people have know-how but they are unable to share what is mediated by their experience. Many studies evidence that know-how is a sustainable value that should be shared. While emerging opportunities arose from the last economic crisis have pointed out a large number of new chances for the use of know-how, there is a lack between the human sharing’s will and the need of solutions to convert, share and learn know-how. This study proposes a design-oriented process for converting know-how, which can be applied to emerging and developing contexts, as well as to all issues concerning social innovation, inclusion and knowledge development

Presented at New Factual Storytelling Symposium, Canberra

Presented Master of Arts research at New Factual Storytelling Symposium, Canberra, by Skype, and screened my film 'Greensplat' http://ucdoclab.blogspot.co.nz/p/news.htm