Digital Personalization in Early Childhood

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Digital personalization is an emerging interdisciplinary research field, with application to a variety of areas including design, education and publication industry. This book focuses on children’s education and literacy resources, which have undergone important changes with the ‘personalization revolution’ in the early 21st century. The author develops original insights from educational research and her own studies concerned with digital and non-digital personalization, to discuss in a clear and critical way the thinking, research issues and practical implications of this new field. She scrutinises the character of technology-based personalized education to substantiate the claim that the current models of personalized education tend to be technology- and business-driven, with little pedagogical understanding of the social value of personalization. Research involving touchscreens, personalized books and 2-8-year olds is interrogated for its impact on children’s development of language, creativity, identity, as well as family dynamics and classroom dialogue. The literature available on digital and non-digital personalization is discussed in relation to five key themes of personalized education, the so-called 5As: autonomy, authorship, aesthetics, attachment and authenticity. It is argued that the 5As need to be anchored in humanist principles for a sustainable pedagogy and practice. Based on the insights from research with typically and atypically developing children, Kucirkova proposes personalised pluralisation, as a pedagogical framework of personalized education for the future. The book aims to help scholars and professionals understand the connections between personalization and literacy, personalization and education, and personalization and wider socio-moral issues

‘What’s it like to have ME?’ The discursive construction of ME in computer-mediated communication and face-to-face interaction

ME/CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome) is a debilitating illness for which no cause or medical tests have been identified. Debates over its nature have generated interest from qualitative researchers. However, participants are difficult to recruit because of the nature of their condition. Therefore, this study explores the utility of the internet as a means of eliciting accounts. We analyse data from focus groups and the internet in order to ascertain the extent to which previous research findings apply to the internet domain. Interviews were conducted among 49 members of internet (38 chatline, 11 personal) and 7 members of two face-to-face support groups. Discourse analysis of descriptions and accounts of ME/CFS revealed similar devices and interactional concerns in both internet and face-to-face communication. Participants constructed their condition as serious, enigmatic and not psychological. These functioned to deflect problematic assumptions about ME/CFS and to manage their accountability for the illness and its effects

Narratives and Performance - The Case of Stock-broking

The performance of individual stockbrokers differs. This paper aims at explaining these differences, or at least at making some sense of them. In a study of fourteen stockbrokers, the high performing brokers described their working life in a systematically different way, compared to the low performing brokers. The high and low performing brokers gave fundamentally different accounts of what, from an outsider’s viewpoint, seemed to be very similar work and working conditions. The brokers’ different accounts are interpreted and reconstructed into two opposing narratives of stockbrokers’ world of working. In an ideal typical sense these two narratives explain, or at least make sense of, the stockbrokers’ different levels of performance.narratives; performance; stock-broking; phenomenography; competence; work; interaction; alienation

Digital Journeys: A Narrative Inquiry Into The Experiences Of Third- Grade Through Fifth-Grade General Education Teachers Implementing Instructional Technology In Northern California

The problem studied was the utilization of instructional technology in elementary classrooms, from third-grade through fifth-grade, and how teachers experience the use of technology in teaching methods and student learning. The purpose of this qualitative narrative inquiry was to understand the experiences of third-grade through fifth-grade teachers regarding the implementation of instructional technology in their classrooms. The study\u27s timing captured teachers\u27 views on technology before, during, and after the 2020-2021 academic year, which was heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and distance learning. Qualitative narrative inquiry allowed for a rich exploration of the teachers\u27 experiences, with results of the study informing future decisions and research related to instructional technology implementation in upper elementary settings. Purposeful sampling identified five participants meeting specific criteria. Virtual interviews provided detailed accounts of their encounters with instructional technology. The analysis involved restorying interview data, coding, and member-checking each narrative for accuracy. Four distinct themes emerged from this process: the evolutionary journey of technology integration, collaboration as a mode of professional learning, adaptability to change, and the personalization of learning experiences. The findings of this study underscore the necessity to empower teachers with ample time, resources, and collaborative platforms, enabling effective implementation of instructional technology that significantly enhances their teaching practice and fosters meaningful student learning outcomes

Meaningful Experiences of Community-Based Support Workers for Individuals with Acquired Brain Injury

Support workers hold a variety of roles and responsibilities when supporting individuals with Acquired Brain Injuries (ABI), yet research on the experience and meaning of being a support worker for individuals with ABI in the community setting is scarce. The present study explored the first-hand accounts of community-based support workers and their meaningful experiences of providing support for individuals with ABI. The guiding research question was: What is the experience of support workers who support youth and young adults with ABI in the community setting? Five female support workers, ranging in age from 21 to 28 years, participated in individual semi-structured interviews. The data were transcribed and analyzed using Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (Smith, Flowers & Larkin, 2009), revealing five themes: (i) forming the relationship; (ii) personalizing support; (iii) making a difference; (iv) growing personally; and (v) becoming politically and socially aware. The present study provided a valuable contribution to the limited literature on support workers’ experiences supporting youth and young adults with ABI in the community setting by illuminating the many roles of a support worker and by providing insight into the qualities that give support work meaning. Implications for practice and suggestions for future research are discussed

Wearables at work:preferences from an employee’s perspective

This exploratory study aims to obtain a first impression of the wishes and needs of employees on the use of wearables at work for health promotion. 76 employ-ees with a mean age of 40 years old (SD ±11.7) filled in a survey after trying out a wearable. Most employees see the potential of using wearable devices for workplace health promotion. However, according to employees, some negative aspects should be overcome before wearables can effectively contribute to health promotion. The most mentioned negative aspects were poor visualization and un-pleasantness of wearing. Specifically for the workplace, employees were con-cerned about the privacy of data collection