Sociomaterial perspective of learning design practice and Its implications on learning design software development

Abstract

Research in Learning Design (LD), a subfield of Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL), aims to enable teachers to design and share pedagogically informed teaching ideas that make effective use of technology to enhance learning. LD is a widely researched field with numerous LD tools and LD approaches. However, despite its richness, there are several challenges to be addressed, including the low adoption of a plethora of LD tools that do not meet adequately the requirements of HE lecturers and practitioners. The thesis presents a sociomaterial design framework and design principles for LD tools to fill the gap between the Learning Design Practice (LD-P) of HE lecturers and existing LD tools and LD approaches. Design-Based Research (DBR) was employed as the primary paradigm and method in this thesis. A sociomaterial design framework was developed and the design principles for LD tools were derived through iterative design phases of DBR: analysis, development, two cycles of testing and reflection. The study was structured as follows. An extensive analysis of the LD field, existing LD approaches and LD tools, their weaknesses, strengths, and challenges are presented in Chapter 2. Chapter 3 presents the methodological design details of the thesis. The open issues and challenges are further explored from experts’ perspective using interview protocol, and from HE lecturers’ perspective via a survey in Chapter 4 and Chapter 5, respectively. The findings from Chapter 2, Chapter 4, and Chapter 5 helped to triangulate data that constituted the foundation-stones for a sociomaterial design framework and verified the need for introducing a new conceptual framework. In Chapter 6, an analysis of the LD-P of the experts from the sociomaterial perspective is presented, whilst an analysis of HE lecturers’ LD-P from a sociomaterial perspective is presented in Chapter 7. Chapter 8 presents the novel sociomaterial design framework and uses it to examine available LD tools and LD approaches. Chapter 9presents points of overlap and misalignments and design principles derived from the analysis of Chapter 8 and also it presents the sample implementation of the design principles. Finally, Chapter 10 gives a summary and findings of this thesis, thesis contributions and directions for future works