The Meaning of Action in Learning and Teaching

Action is a highly theorised aspect of social life nonetheless it remains a relatively neglected source of data within educational research. This paper attempts to highlight the significance of the analysis of organised action within educational research. It describes and demonstrates an analytical approach to action applicable to the classroom developed from approaches to the analysis of bodily communication and action in drama education (Franks, 1995 & 1996) and from new approaches to rhetoric developed in the research project ‘Rhetorics of the Science Classroom’ funded by the ESRC (Kress, Jewitt, Ogborn & Tsatsarelis, forthcoming). These approaches draw on social semiotic theories of making meaning in order to describe the complex relationship between the semiotics of social action and the situated experience of learning in the classroom. This paper describes how action realises meanings and shapes classroom interaction through the application of the schema to video data from a science lesson on energy with year nine pupils (14 years-old). Finally, it draws attention to the research and pedagogical implications of a focus on action in the science classroom and in education more generally

Collaborative Robots and Tangled Passages of Tactile-Affects

Collaborative robots are increasingly entering industrial contexts and workflows. These contexts are not just locations for production, they are vibrant social and sensory environments. For better or for worse their entry brings potential to reorganize established tactile and affective dynamics that encompass production processes. There is still much to be learned about these highly contextual and complex dynamics in HRI research and the design of industrial robotics; common approaches in industrial collaborative robotics are restricted to evaluating ‘effective interface design’ whereas methods that seek to measure ‘affective touch’ have limited application to these industrial domains. This paper offers an extended analytical framework and methodological approach to deepen understandings of affect and touch beyond emotional responses to direct human-robot interactions. These distinct contributions are grounded in fieldwork in a glass factory with newly installed collaborative robots. They are illustrated through an ethnographic narrative that traces the emergence and circulation of affect, across material, experiential and social planes. Beyond this single case ‘tangled passages of tactile-affects’ is offered as novel and valuable concept, that is distinct from the notion of ‘affective touch’, and holds potential to generate holistic and nuanced understandings of how human experiences can be affected by the introduction of new robots in ‘the wild’

Sociotechnical imaginaries of remote personal touch before and during COVID-19: An analysis of UK newspapers

This article considers newspapers’ role in shaping the sociotechnical imaginaries of touch, and emerging technologies that digitally mediate touch. It examines the discourses of touch and personal relationships at a distance that circulated in major British broadsheet newspapers during the 2020 outbreak of coronavirus disease-19, alongside dominant narratives of touch and remote communication in the previous 5 years. In doing so, the article demonstrates how existing discourses of touch and remote communication intensified during the pandemic, while imaginations of remote touch narrowed. The sociotechnical imaginaries of digital touch matter because they illuminate the kinds of social relations touch technologies are perceived to forge, maintain or deny

School use of learning platforms and associated technologies – case study: secondary school 2

Study of benefits and effective use of learning platforms in schools based on 12 case studie

School use of learning platforms and associated technologies

Study of benefits and effective use of learning platforms in schools based on 12 case studie

School use of learning platforms and associated technologies - case study: primary school 1

Study of benefits and effective use of learning platforms in schools based on 12 case studie

Exploring whole body interaction and design for museums

Museums increasingly use digital technology to enhance exhibition experiences for families, notably in relation to physically mediated installations for young children through natural user interfaces. Yet little is known about how families and children engage with such installations and the kinds of interactive experiences they engender in museum spaces. This paper addresses a pressing need for research to adopt an analytical focus on the body during such digitally mediated interactions in order to understand how bodily interaction contributes to meaning making in the museum context. It reports an observation study of families and children interacting with a whole-body interface (using Kinect) in the context of an installation in a museum exhibit on rare Chinese paintings. The study shows how the installation design engenders particular forms of bodily interaction, collaboration and meaning making. It also contributes design insights into whole-body interaction installations in museums and public spaces