Work-related teaching and learning methods to foster generic skills in Higher Education. An Italian experience

open5siWithin the framework of modernisation of higher education systems in Europe, universities are invited to go beyond a knowledge-based perspective focused on disciplinary approaches and to be more concentrated on encouraging generic skills to deal with today’s complex and unpredictable career paths. The literature about Work-Related Learning and Work-Integrated Learning offers evidence to research regarding contributions of work-related experiences to the development of generic skills. The first part of the article presents a literature review carried out following the matching among three main keywords: work-related learning, generic skills, and higher education. Resources focused on the integration/teaching of generic skills in formal curriculum or in co-curriculum work-related activities and they were collected in order to explore the link between work-related learning in higher education and the development of generic skills. The focus is to identify valuable considerations to improve teaching strategies and methods. The second part presents an Italian work-related experience developed within the course of “Organizational Intervention Research Methods,” which involved 22 master’s degree students. The work-related assignment will be described in addition to the content analysis process of the 22 collected texts and the findings about the development of generic skills.openDaniela, Frison; Concetta, Tino; Jonathan, W., Tyner; Monica, FedeliFrison, Daniela; Tino, Concetta; Jonathan, W.; Tyner, ; Fedeli, Monic

Enactivism and ethnomethodological conversation analysis as tools for expanding Universal Design for Learning: the case of visually impaired mathematics students

Blind and visually impaired mathematics students must rely on accessible materials such as tactile diagrams to learn mathematics. However, these compensatory materials are frequently found to offer students inferior opportunities for engaging in mathematical practice and do not allow sensorily heterogenous students to collaborate. Such prevailing problems of access and interaction are central concerns of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), an engineering paradigm for inclusive participation in cultural praxis like mathematics. Rather than directly adapt existing artifacts for broader usage, UDL process begins by interrogating the praxis these artifacts serve and then radically re-imagining tools and ecologies to optimize usability for all learners. We argue for the utility of two additional frameworks to enhance UDL efforts: (a) enactivism, a cognitive-sciences view of learning, knowing, and reasoning as modal activity; and (b) ethnomethodological conversation analysis (EMCA), which investigates participants’ multimodal methods for coordinating action and meaning. Combined, these approaches help frame the design and evaluation of opportunities for heterogeneous students to learn mathematics collaboratively in inclusive classrooms by coordinating perceptuo-motor solutions to joint manipulation problems. We contextualize the thesis with a proposal for a pluralist design for proportions, in which a pair of students jointly operate an interactive technological device

How online small groups co-construct mathematical artifacts to do collaborative problem solving

Developing pedagogies and instructional tools to support learning math with understanding is a major goal in math education. A common theme among various characterizations of mathematical understanding involves constructing relations among mathematical facts, procedures, and ideas encapsulated in graphical and symbolic artifacts. Discourse is key for enabling students to realize such connections among seemingly unrelated mathematical artifacts. Analysis of mathematical discourse on a moment-to-moment basis is needed to understand the potential of small-group collaboration and online communication tools to support learning math with understanding.This dissertation investigates interactional practices enacted by virtual teams of secondary students as they co-construct mathematical artifacts in an online environment with multiple interaction spaces including text-chat, whiteboard, and wiki components. The findings of the dissertation arrived at through ethnomethodologically-informed case studies of online sessions are organized along three dimensions: (a) Mathematical Affordances: Whiteboard and chat spaces allow teams to co-construct multiple realizations of relevant mathematical artifacts. Contributions remain persistentlyavailable for subsequent manipulation and reference in the shared visual field. The persistence of contributions facilitates the management of multiple threads of activities across dual media. The sequence of actions that lead to the construction and modification of shared inscriptions makes the visual reasoning process visible.(b) Coordination Methods: Team members achieve a sense of sequential organization across dual media through temporal coordination of their chat postings and drawings. Groups enact referential uses of available features to allocate their attention to specific objects in the shared visual field and to associate them with locally defined terminology. Drawings and text-messages are used together as semiotic resources in mutually elaborating ways.(c) Group Understanding: Teams develop shared mathematical understanding through joint recognition of connections among narrative, graphical and symbolic realizations of the mathematical artifacts that they have co-constructed to address their shared task. The interactional organization of the co-construction work establishes an indexical ground as support for the creation and maintenance of a shared problem space for the group. Each new contribution is made sense of in relation to this persistently available and shared indexical ground, which evolves sequentially as new contributions modify the sense of previous contributions.Ph.D., Information Science and Technology -- Drexel University, 200

Professional learning & development : from innovative research to innovative interventions. Book of abstracts of the EARLI SIG14 2020 Conference

Special interest group 14 of the European Association for Research of Learning and Instruction (EARLI) brings together researchers who study work and education as contexts for professional learning. "From innovative research to innovative interventions" was the theme selected for the SIG14 2020 Conference in Barcelona. The conference was canceled due to the COVID-19 situation; however, the abstracts of all contributions are here presented, hoping that it can facilitate networking among researcher

Chronotope : an investigation of the spatial and temporal organization in technology-mediated collaborative learning

The present dissertation project investigated the organization of space-time in collaborative learning processes mediated by Information and Communication Technology (ICT). The background of my argumentation is that we live in an historical moment in which the introduction of continu-ously evolving virtual spaces and the implementation of novel pedagogical approaches entail the transformation of the spatial and temporal relations of pedagogical activities. In order to examine these transforming space-time relations and the role that they may play in the learning process, I propose an adapted socio-cultural perspective based on the dialogical notion of chronotope. A chronotope depicts the emergent configuration of space-time relations during an intentional, collaborative learning activity. In sum, the perspective that I adopt considers cognition and learning as distributed in the environment, and space and time as interdependent social constructions. The dissertation report aimed to account for multiple types of physical, so-cial, virtual, real and imagined spatialities and temporalities as they are per-ceived, discursively negotiated, and bodily enacted by participants in ICT-mediated learning practices. I carried out four studies that examine various aspects of space-time re-lations. In Study I, I explored how participants in collaborative learning activities locate themselves and the others across multiple physical, social and virtual spaces; in Study II I investigated how the space-time frames detected in students’ discourse on the task affect the process of task inter-pretation; Study III was aimed at analysing if and how space-time configu-rations bodily enacted by participants affect the pace and the quality of the learning process; in Study IV I examined the significance and implications of patterns of organization of space-time during the process of instrumental genesis. All the studies adopt a qualitative ethnographic methodology that involves the triangulation of participant observation, discourse analysis, and video analysis. The results of my studies suggest that examining the organization of space and time can provide crucial insights into technology-mediated col-laborative learning activities, informing both theory and practice. Under-standing how participants locate themselves and the others in space and time might help us to design learning space-times that enhance coordination and collaborative processes. Considering the discursive framing of space-time by the students can help teachers and instructional designers to ensure that divergent assumptions concerning space-time frames will not induce students to deviate from the set task. Modelling the space-time configura-tions bodily enacted by participants may provide cues for scaffolding the learning process, helping students to orchestrate space and manage time, in line with the teachers’ pedagogical aims. Finally, detecting patterns of space-time organization may inform decisions concerning where and when to provide just-in-time information, scaffolds and tools to enhance students’ learning without interrupting their experience of flow.Tämä väitöskirja käsittelee aika-tilan organisointia yhteistoiminnallisissa oppimisprosesseissa, joissa hyödynnetään tieto- ja viestintäteknologiaa. Väitöskirjan argumentin lähtökohta on,että elämme historiallisella hetkellä, jossa oppimisen suhde tilaan ja aikaan on muutoksessa. Muutokseen vaikuttaa uusien virtuaalisten tilojen ja pedagogisten lähestymistapojen käyttöönotto. Kehittelen väitöskirjassa sosiokulttuurista näkökulmaa, jonka avulla voidaan tutkia muuttuvia aika-tila-suhteita ja niiden roolia oppimisprosessissa. Näkökulma hyödyntää dialogista kronotoopin käsitettä, jonka avulla kuvaan tavoitteellisen, yhteistoiminnallisen oppimistoiminnan aikana syntyviä aika-tila-suhteiden muodostelmia.Kaiken kaikkiaan valitsemani näkökulma tarkastelee kognitiota ja oppimista ympäristöön hajautuneina ilmiöinä. Lisäksi tarkastelen tilaa ja aikaa toisistaan riippuvina sosiaalisina konstruktioina. Väitöskirjan tavoitteena oli selittää monentyyppisiä fyysisiä, sosiaalisia, virtuaalisia, todellisia ja kuviteltuja tilallisuuksia ja ajallisuuksia osana tieto- ja viestintäteknologiaa hyödyntäviä oppimiskäytäntöjä. Tavoitteena oli selittää tilallisuuksia ja ajallisuuksia sellaisina kuin osallistujat havaitsivat ne, neuvottelivat niistä diskursiivisesti tai toteuttivat ne kehollisesti. Toteutin neljä osatutkimusta, joissa tutkin aika-tila-suhteita eri näkökulmista. Ensimmäisessä osatutkimuksessa tutkin sitä, miten yhteistoiminnallisen oppimisen osallistujat sijoittivat itsensä ja toisensa useiden fyysisten, sosiaalisten ja virtuaalisten tilojen välillä. Toisessa osatutkimuksessa tarkastelin, miten opiskelijoiden tehtävän tekemiseen liittyvistä keskusteluista tunnistamani aika-tila-kehykset vaikuttivat heidän tehtävän tulkitsemisen prosessiin. Kolmannen osatutkimuksen tavoitteena oli analysoida,kuinka osallistujien kehollisesti toteuttamat aika-tila-muodostelmat vaikuttavat oppimisprosessin tahtiin ja laatuun. Neljännessä osatutkimuksessa tutkin, minkälaisia merkityksiä ja seuraamuksia aika-tila-suhteiden säännönmukaisuuksilla oli työvälineen syntyprosessissa. Kaikissa osatutkimuksissa käytin laadullista etnografista metodologiaa ja hyödynsin tutkimusmenetelmällistä triangulaatiota. Tutkimusmenetelminä käytin osallistuvaa havainnointia, diskurssianalyysiä ja videoanalyysiä. Tutkimukseni tulokset viittaavat siihen, että ajan ja tilan organisoinnin tutkiminen voi tuottaa ratkaisevan tärkeitä oivalluksia teknologiavälitteisestä yhteistoiminnallisesta oppimisesta. Tuloksista on hyötyä sekä käytännössä että teorian kehittämisessä. Sen ymmärtäminen, miten osallistujat sijoittavat itsensä ja toisensa tilassa ja ajassa, voi auttaa suunnittelemaan oppimisympäristöjen aika-tiloja, jotka edistävät osallistujien keskinäistä koordinaatiota ja yhteistoiminnallisia prosesseja. Sen huomioiminen, miten opiskelijat kehystävät aika-tilat diskursiivisesti,voi auttaa opettajia ja oppimisympäristöjen suunnittelijoita varmistamaan, etteivät aika-tila-kehyksiin liittyvät monenlaiset olettamukset saa opiskelijoita poikkeamaan annetusta tehtävästä.Osallistujien kehollisesti toteuttamien aika-tila-asetelmien mallintaminen voi antaa vihjeitä, miten oppimisprosessia voidaan tukea. Opiskelijoita voidaan tukea tilan organisoimisessa ja ajan hallitsemisessa opettajien pedagogisten tavoitteiden suunnassa. Lopuksi aika-tila-suhteiden säännönmukaisuuksien tunnistaminen voi auttaa tekemään päätöksiä siitä, missä ja milloin kannattaa tarjota opiskelijoille oikea-aikaista tietoa, tukea ja välineitä jotka edistävät heidän oppimistaan ilman, että heidän virtauksen kokemuksensa häiriinty

Becoming Bilingual: Examining Teachers\u27 Perceptions and Practices for Achieving Bilingualism and Biliteracy in English and Spanish in a Two-Way Dual Language Bilingual Education Program

Bilingualism characterizes not only people, but homes, schools, and communities across the United States. While some bilingual people are forced to suppress their bilingualism, others are encouraged to develop their skill set to a level of becoming biliterate. Bilingualism and biliteracy are key features in dual language bilingual education (DLBE) programs where students are provided daily opportunities to develop two languages simultaneously, along with grade-level academic content. Research in DLBE suggest closure of the achievement gap (Valentino & Reardon, 2015). Traditionally, DLBE programs were designed to keep the two target languages (for example, Spanish and English) separate as designated by time, space, teacher, and academic content area. Teachers who work under these strict guidelines often find that policing language use is both restrictive and unnatural, thus interfering with the flow of bilingual language development. This qualitative case study included 10 teacher participants from one rural school district in the Midwest. The study investigated how teachers perceive and respond to the constraints of language separation during instructional activities. Data were gathered from teacher interviews, classroom observations, and written informal interviews. Findings from this study indicate that under the strict separation of language program model, DLBE teachers brought their unique personal bilingual experiences to their practice by creating opportunities for dynamic and flexible bilingual language use during instructional time. The following strategies contributed to their students’ dynamic bilingualism: (a) the student as teacher, (b) active learning, student engagement, and group work, (c) the use of cognates, (d) strengthening bridges between languages and metalinguistic transfer, (d) reading the word and the world or learning literacy with culturally and contextually relevant literature, and (e) code-switching and translanguaging as a means of addressing the subtractive nature of language learning within an additive bilingual model. On the basis of the findings, the researcher recommends that DLBE program models open spaces for practicing dynamic and flexible bilingualism. Strategizing spaces for the use of two languages during instructional time fosters growth and development for students to become functionally bilingual and biliterate