Introduction : what are knowledge work practices in education? How can we study and promote them?

New kinds of jobs require managing new kinds of work life compe-tences and a number of such key competences for lifelong learningwhich equip young people for further learning and employability ina knowledge society have already been identified. Research hashowever indicated that formal education is not providing adequatesupport and opportunities for acquiring the needed competenciesin practice. More discussion and empirical research is needed aboutknowledge work competences and related practices in secondaryschools, higher education and in the work life. The theme of thisspecial Issue is‘Knowledge work: educational practices preparingstudents for work life’and it has as its aim to contribute toa discussion on how changes in professional work can be takeninto account in educational settings. Of particular interest in thisspecial issue is how educational theory about‘knowledge-creation’is applied in practice. The trialogical approach to learning highlightscollaborative knowledge creation and the development of shared,mediating objects. This theory and its associated design principlesare introduced. The contributions of this special issue relate toimplementing ideas of the trialogical approach to learning in var-ious ways and each contribution is briefly presented.Non peer reviewe

The TEAM instrument for measuring emergency team performance: validation of the Swedish version at two emergency departments

Background: The Team Emergency Assessment Measure (TEAM) questionnaire is designed for rating the non-technical performance of emergency medical teams during emergencies, e.g., resuscitation or trauma management. Originally developed in Australia it has today been translated and validated into eleven languages, but a Swedish version is lacking. The aim was therefore to cross-culturally translate and evaluate the reliability and validity of the TEAM questionnaire in a Swedish health care setting. Methods: The instrument was forward and backward translated and adapted into a Swedish context according to established guidelines for cross-cultural adaptation of survey-based measures. The translated version was tested through 78 pairwise assessments of 39 high-priority codes at the emergency departments of two major hospitals. The raters observed the teams at work in real time and filled in the questionnaires immediately afterwards independently of each other. Psychometric properties of the instrument were evaluated. Results: The original instrument was translated by pairs of translators independently of each other and reviewed by an expert committee of researchers, nurses and physicians from different specialties, a linguist and one of the original developers of the tool. A few adaptations were needed for the Swedish context. A principal component factor analysis confirmed a single ‘teamwork’ construct in line with the original instrument. The Swedish version showed excellent reliability with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.955 and a mean inter-item correlation of 0.691. The mean item-scale correlation of 0.82 indicated high internal consistency reliability. Inter-rater reliability was measured by intraclass correlation and was 0.74 for the global score indicating good reliability. Individual items ranged between 0.52 and 0.88. No floor effects but ceiling effects were noted. Finally, teams displaying clear closed-loop communication had higher TEAM scores than teams with less clear communication. Conclusions: Real time observations of authentic, high priority cases at two emergency departments show that the Swedish version of the TEAM instrument has good psychometric properties for evaluating team performance. The TEAM instrument is thus a welcome tool for assessing non-technical skills of emergency medical teams. © 2021, The Author(s). **Please note that there are multiple authors for this article therefore only the name of the first 5 including Federation University Australia affiliate “Simon Cooper" is provided in this record*

Assessing the learning of knowledge work competences in higher education : Cross-cultural translation and adaptation of the Collaborative Knowledge Practices Questionnaire

The Collaborative Knowledge Practices Questionnaire (CKP) is an instrument designed to measure the learning of knowledge-work competence in education. The focus is on qualities of knowledge work which can be learned and taught in multiple educational settings and which may be especially important for courses with collaborative assignments. The original instrument was theoretically based on the knowledge-creation metaphor of learning. The instrument has been validated in Finnish based on student responses from a large number of higher education courses. The validation of the instrument resulted in seven scales relating to different aspects of interdisciplinary, collaborative development of knowledge-objects using digital technology. This study aimed to cross-culturally translate and adapt the original instrument into English and perform an exploratory structural equation modelling (ESEM) analysis in order to investigate whether the same factorial solution of the instrument also works in English in higher education courses in international settings. The original instrument was translated according to established guidelines for cross-cultural adaptation of self-report measures. The translated version has been tested in courses in medical education, online teaching and problem solving. The results provided evidence that the latent factor model found in the original instrument provided a good fit also for the adapted questionnaire.Peer reviewe

Knowledge work practices in education - two cases of transforming pedagogical practices

Peer reviewe

Knowledge transfer of eLearning objects: Lessons learned from an intercontinental capacity building project

Background Effective knowledge transfer of eLearning objects can hasten the adoption and dissemination of technology in teaching and learning. However, challenges exist which hinder inter-organisational knowledge transfer, particularly across continents. The ACoRD project aimed to transfer knowledge on digital learning development from UK/EU (provider) to Malaysian (receiver) higher education institutions (HEIs). This study explores the challenges encountered during the knowledge transfer process and lessons learned. Methods This is a qualitative study involving both the knowledge providers and receivers in focus group discussions (n = 25). Four focus group discussions were conducted in the early (n = 2) and mid-phase (n = 2) of the project by trained qualitative researchers using a topic guide designed to explore experiences and activities representing knowledge transfer in multi-institutional and multi-cultural settings. The interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and checked. The transcripts were analysed using thematic analysis. Results Five main themes emerged from this qualitative study: mismatched expectations between providers and receivers; acquiring new knowledge beyond the professional "comfort zone"; challenges in cascading newly acquired knowledge to colleagues and management; individual and organisational cultural differences; and disruption of knowledge transfer during the COVID-19 pandemic. Conclusion This study highlights the need to create a conducive platform to facilitate continuous, timely and bi-directional needs assessment and feedback; this should be done in the early phase of the knowledge transfer process. The challenges and strategies identified in this study could guide more effective knowledge transfer between organisations and countries.publishedVersio

Prioritising topics for developing e-learning resources in healthcare curricula: A comparison between students and educators using a modified Delphi survey

Background Engaging students in the e-learning development process enhances the effective implementation of e-learning, however, students’ priority on the topics for e-learning may differ from that of the educators. This study aims to compare the differences between the students and their educators in prioritising the topics in three healthcare curricula for reusable e-learning object (RLO) development. Method A modified Delphi study was conducted among students and educators from University Malaya (UM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) and Taylor’s University (TU) on three undergraduate programmes. In Round 1, participants were asked to select the topics from the respective syllabi to be developed into RLOs. Priority ranking was determined by using frequencies and proportions. The first quartile of the prioritised topics was included in Round 2 survey, which the participants were asked to rate the level of priority of each topic using a 5-point Likert scale. The mean score of the topics was compared between students and educators. Result A total of 43 educators and 377 students participated in this study. For UM and TU Pharmacy, there was a mismatch in the prioritised topics between the students and educators. For UPM, both the educators and students have prioritised the same topics in both rounds. To harmonise the prioritisation of topics between students and educators for UM and TU Pharmacy, the topics with a higher mean score by both the students and educators were prioritised. Conclusion The mismatch in prioritised topics between students and educators uncovered factors that might influence the prioritisation process. This study highlighted the importance of conducting needs assessment at the beginning of eLearning resources development.publishedVersio

Prioritising topics for developing e-learning resources in healthcare curricula: A comparison between students and educators using a modified Delphi survey

Background Engaging students in the e-learning development process enhances the effective implementation of e-learning, however, students’ priority on the topics for e-learning may differ from that of the educators. This study aims to compare the differences between the students and their educators in prioritising the topics in three healthcare curricula for reusable e-learning object (RLO) development. Method A modified Delphi study was conducted among students and educators from University Malaya (UM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) and Taylor’s University (TU) on three undergraduate programmes. In Round 1, participants were asked to select the topics from the respective syllabi to be developed into RLOs. Priority ranking was determined by using frequencies and proportions. The first quartile of the prioritised topics was included in Round 2 survey, which the participants were asked to rate the level of priority of each topic using a 5-point Likert scale. The mean score of the topics was compared between students and educators. Result A total of 43 educators and 377 students participated in this study. For UM and TU Pharmacy, there was a mismatch in the prioritised topics between the students and educators. For UPM, both the educators and students have prioritised the same topics in both rounds. To harmonise the prioritisation of topics between students and educators for UM and TU Pharmacy, the topics with a higher mean score by both the students and educators were prioritised. Conclusion The mismatch in prioritised topics between students and educators uncovered factors that might influence the prioritisation process. This study highlighted the importance of conducting needs assessment at the beginning of eLearning resources development

Fostering Superficial Learning

Different views of learning and what it means to follow rules are discussed. The activities, the language and context of expertise and knowledge have traditionally often been neglected and underestimated as something ancillary to the real knowledge which lies "beyond " such surface manifestations and viewed as at most means to learn the knowledge beyond these aspects. The primacy of these aspects are argued for. It is further argued that these should be more emphasized and fully appreciated. The goal of fostering "superficial" learning is suggested, i.e., an emphasis on practical activities, the use of the language of the domain to be learned and getting familiar with the new culture. A case study is presented and discussed in terms of the theoretical viewpoint. 1. Criticisms of Traditional Approaches to Cognition According to traditional cognitive science based on the representation hypothesis human cognition is described (a) in terms of representations describing a portion of the world, e.g., in terms of propositions, ideas, or mental images or (b) in terms of symbol manipulation (also non-descriptiv