Committee of Inquiry into the Changing Learner Experience               

Documents

Related Programmes, Studies and Surveys

Meeting  Agenda      29/02/08 

Item: 3

Paper No: CLex/01/03

Introduction

1. This paper introduces a number of programmes, studies and surveys that may provide evidence to inform the Inquiry.

Recommendations

2. The Committee is invited to note and comment on the programmes, studies and surveys and to identify others that could be helpful to its work.

Programmes and Studies

3.  Programmes are outlined in Annex A and studies / surveys are identified in Annex B. Listings are not exhaustive; intended to inform the Committee’s work.

4.  Programmes include a number sponsored by bodies supporting the Inquiry - Cited with a focus on learner use, experience and expectation of new technology.

5.  Focus on innovation in education and conducting research and development work - organisations such as Futurelab, Heppell.net and Eduserv.

6.  Particular points to emerge from the studies are:

• Using digital technology is now part and parcel of the everyday lives of children and young people;

 

• While the range of ways in which these groups use digital technology informally remains to be explored, it is clear that the most common and widespread form of use is for communication;

 

• Immediate gaps in understanding of range may be less important than grasping the direction of behavioural or cultural development usage at once reflects and enables: participatory, collaborative and co-  operative;

 

• Older people are adaptable and pragmatic in their approach to new technology: they use it when they see it can make their lives easier and, indeed, are fast catching up on younger people in their familiarity with it – ‘we are all Google generation now’;

 

• Digital literacy and information literacy do not go hand in hand, and addressing shortfalls in the latter is critical in an educational context that emphasises self-directed learning;

 

• While a number of HEIs conduct surveys of their new entrants in which they include questions of expectation of the use of technology, there is seemingly little work in this area that is more generally available at present. Such work as has been undertaken suggests expectation of internet access, technical support, course notes etc, but of direct tutor engagement as the mainstay;

 

• Many of the studies, including some of those commissioned most recently, seem to proceed from the perspective of    the practitioner and/or technology rather than the learner or learning – their focus is technology rather than sociology or psychology.  This may be an inevitable consequence of the locus of funding in e-learning programmes and initiatives.

 

 

 For Further Information on Annexes A & B Please Contact Us