irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2017 editorial eamon costello 1 dublin city university, dublin, ireland dear reader, welcome to this special issue of the irish journal of technology enhanced learning the journal of the irish learning technology association. this issue comprises a selection of papers based on submissions to the next generation: digital learning research symposium in november 2016. this symposium was held in partnership between the irish learning technology association, the educational studies association of ireland, and both the institute of education and national institute for digital learning at dublin city university. the symposium was framed around the notion of building capacity in research in digital learning. the symposium’s title not only alluded to generations of teaching and learning but also to learning futures and how we might ford the chasm of the great promise of the digital with evidence of its actual effects. the symposium sought to foster discussion, debate and above all a community of scholars by discussing and debating the big issues we face in digital learning research. the event gave voice to a wide range of irish educators and researchers across all levels and sectors. the articles in this issue represent a selection of the highlights of presentations at the symposium in extended written form. professor gráinne conole’s keynote served in many ways to set the scene for a broad gathering of educators and researchers from across all levels and sectors. her article in this issue research through the generations: reflecting on the past, present and future traces a broad arc of research in educational technology framed around key technologies and methodological developments. she identifies five transformative technologies: the web/wi-fi; learning management systems (lmss); mobile devices, open educational resources (oer) and massive open online courses (moocs); and social media. her piece considers the characteristics that made these developments transformative, along with the challenges to their usage. this examination is followed by an overview of the field of digital learning research and divides 1 irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2017. © 2017 e. costello. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. http://journal.ilta.ie/ http://ilta.ie/ http://www.ilta.ie/ http://www.ilta.ie/ http://www.ilta.ie/ http://esai.ie/ http://www.dcu.ie/institute_of_education/index.shtml http://www.dcu.ie/institute_of_education/index.shtml http://www.dcu.ie/nidl/index.shtml http://www.dcu.ie/nidl/index.shtml http://dlsymposium.dryfta.com/en http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/20 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2017 digital learning research into three main types: research around the pedagogies of digital learning, research on underpinning technologies, and research at an organizational level. using this framework the reader is afforded an insight into how digital learning has emerged as a new interdisciplinary field. it is always at the tectonic plates of previously separate disciplines that new terrain emerges and professor conole’s piece will provide an invaluable contextual overview to readers both new to the field of digital learning research but also to those more experienced researchers who may be too close to see it. as such it is a richly rewarding read for ed tech visitors and residents alike. a second position paper in the issue by tony murphy also invokes educational technology futures. it examines a key area, and one the three broad themes identified by conole, that of organizational forms in digital learning. behind the provocative title of the future of technology enhanced learning (tel) is in the hands of the anonymous, grey nondescript midlevel professional manager is an informative and insightful research-informed commentary on how technology confronts existing practices and boundaries in higher education. key insights that this paper affords arises from how it draws on well developed concepts from literature of organizational forms outside of education and uses them to interrogate the emerging practices of work and professional roles for 21st century educators. the theme of contemporary professional practice is central to exploring higher education professionals’ use of twitter for learning by muireann o’keeffe. using a visitor and resident typology this paper reports on research into how higher education professionals were involved in a range of types of participation (and nonparticipation) on twitter. it shows how participants both use and sometimes fail to use social networking for professional learning and attempts to unpick the complexities of participation in online spaces. this paper makes an important contribution to the topical area of how we participate (or resist participation) in online spaces as a professional community. professional practice is also to the fore in a fascinating research piece by michael hallissy that looks at practices in synchronous computer mediated conferencing (scmc) which is, relative to asynchronous environments, an under researched area. sharing professional practice – tutors have their say reports on research into teaching in synchronous environments. using pedagogical and content framework (tpack) in parallel with the flanders interaction analysis category the practices of teachers are explored with the aim of challenging and changing them. the findings of this research enjoin us as educators to share our practice critically and reflectively. its core message is perhaps encapsulated in that both teaching and teaching development are a form of dialogue. appropriately then, this article is written in a style that immediately engages the reader, draws them into a story and is a richly rewarding read. http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/14 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/14 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/14 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/11 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/11 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/12 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/12 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2017 a number of current trends are captured in barry james ryan’s research article near peers: harnessing the power of the populous to enhance the learning environment. this research investigated the impact of a tool called nearpod used in third level educational settings. using a case study methodology it shows a practical implementation of some key trends in higher education and reports on its aims to enhance the student learning experience through the integration of byod (bring your own device) and flipped classroom learning. methodologically this study is interesting for its use of student and teacher reflective forms of data and provides a valuable vignette of contemporary research informed teaching. to conclude it is hoped that the diverse array of articles in this issue offers something for every interested reader. indeed this is reflective of the diversity of the irish community that is engaged in practices informed, mediated or enabled by some kind of digital learning technology. conole’s article sets this out from a research perspective and the picture has been painted elsewhere of what “ed tech” as an emergent discipline might look like. to this end it is hoped that this issue goes some way towards helping us build our community through the critical lens of research. on behalf of the irish learning technology association and the journal editorial team we wish you happy reading (and hope to see your work in a future issue). best wishes, eamon, tom and fiona http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/16 http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/article/view/16 https://blog.edtechie.net/edtech/ed-tech-as-dsicipline/ http://journal.ilta.ie/index.php/telji/about/submissions microsoft word 07_telireland_issue1_mrotter.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 1, issue 1, 2014 perpetual digital literacy martha rotter1 microsoft (received march 2014; final version received september 2014) digital literacy today means something very different from what it did ten years ago, five years ago, last year and maybe even last month. when i was growing up in the 80s, it meant that you could use the clunky search machines at the local library, and possibly that you had to take touch typing classes in school. in the 90s it evolved into being able to use a word processor and email. and in the last twelve years, it has come to mean everything from browsing the internet to buying goods online to using social media (and not putting your job in jeopardy by doing so!). today’s new hires will be expected to be proficient at using tablet computers and e-reader devices, and to be able to do a lot of their job on the go using a phone more powerful than laptops from only five years ago. since the definition of digital literacy changes constantly, there is no way to standardize on it. instead, i propose we focus on the term “perpetual digital literacy” and define it as a constant effort to improve our ability to communicate in the current technology environment. i am an advocate of perpetual digital literacy because it does not concern itself with learning some finite, subset of knowledge. instead, it focuses on learning how to learn, which is a much more valuable skill. technology will outdo itself every year for the rest of our lives. don’t plan on “catching up,” or you will be endlessly frustrated, feeling like you’re running to stand still. instead, focus on learning how to learn. are you panicking a little? it sounds like we have a lot to do, and a lot more to learn. metacognition is defined as “cognition about cognition”, or “knowing about knowing.” some evolutionary psychologists have hypothesized that metacognition has been used as a survival tool. if that’s true, then learning to learn is not anything new, it is a skill humans have nurtured and cultivated for a very long time. the reason it feels somewhat wrong to have to continually update our skills might be because we are accustomed to a traditional education structure: we identify an interest, we study it, we learn it all and we get a degree certifying that we have mastered the area. following that process, we are a subject matter expert. however this format for education is not best suited to subject matter like this which changes so quickly. so how do we learn how to learn? and equally important, how we do teach this skill in the classroom to our own students? learning how to learn can be broken down into three components: 1. awareness 2. relevance 1 corresponding author. email: irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2014. © 2014 m. rotter. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. m. rotter 2 3. application awareness: to be able to learn about new technology, we must first enable ourselves to be aware of it. what are your sources of news, of insights, of interesting approaches? catalogue them and find a tool that starts bringing them into view on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. what communities are you a part of that contribute to your awareness? with whom can you discuss trends, changes and interesting developments? good sources might be particular blogs, news sites, conference papers or even twitter. twitter often has educational chats using hashtags, find one that is relevant for you. exercise take five minutes and quickly write down as many sources you can think of that you have used in the last couple of months. write them down along with a note about where it came from: was it something you’ve been following for a while or did a friend or colleague point you to it, did you spot it on a social network, in a newsletter. now go through the list and determine which of the sources you have gone back to since or continued to follow. determine which of these you might be able to incorporate into a news routine. relevance: not everything we hear about in passing is relevant to us, our scenario, our students. setting up filters is a way of reducing your signal-to-noise ratio so that the things you investigate are actually relevant and useful for you. don’t be afraid to cull blogs that aren’t providing value for you or unfollow people on twitter that are negative or not helpful. people often spend a lot of time reading useless information. your time is worth more than that. treat your time as a precious resource and do not waste it reading content that depresses or drains you. exercise – find a tool that helps you skim content better. try google reader, feed.ly, the reeder ios app or others to help you flip through your sources quickly and discard those that are irrelevant to your work. try the same on twitter if you’re using it. set up lists of individuals, organisations and hashtags you wish to follow and check those once a day rather than trying to stay on top of everyone’s tweets all the time. application: the last step is application. once a relevant technology, skill, device or tool is identified, now is the phase where you can put it in to practice. find a course, either online or in-person to learn more about it. block off two hours and dive in yourself. make it a class activity where everyone tries it together. exercise – pick a reasonable timeslot for yourself individually, and one for your class if it’s appropriate. it can be weekly, monthly, quarterly, whatever works for you. the goal is to ignore everything else for that timeslot and focus on trying to learn something new. if it’s you individually, perhaps you want to spend a half hour each week trying different techniques for storing course documents online until you find one that suits best. or maybe you plan to spend one day each month learning how to set up a blog or email newsletter for your class. group activities might be something like a half day every other week using a social learning portal, or creating and uploading videos of something students would like to teach others. or maybe it is two days each month using collaborative learning technology and talking with classrooms on the other side of the world, sharing what you’re learning. students will have ideas of what would be interesting and what they would like to learn, and activities like this are engaging and encourage cooperation as well. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 combining these three steps will allow you to constantly have an ear open for practices that can help you and technologies that may be useful for your teaching or for your students. as an example, i use google reader to capture several blogs i choose to follow, the reeder app on ipad to quickly parse out the posts i want to read or spend more time with, instapaper for longer articles, and both kippt.com and pinboard.in to store and share links. i share these links occasionally as recommended reading for classes i’m teaching, as project ideas for students, and as tutorials for those wishing to learn more about a certain area. the things i want to spend my time learning change constantly, but i am careful to block out at least a small bit of time for myself to read and try new things every week. essentially, perpetual digital literacy is about embracing the idea that i will never know everything, but that i can focus on finding and learning the most important and relevant skills for me to do my job. building perpetual digital literacy into my goals and workflow is something i can do to make sure the students i teach are prepared for a world that will never stop changing. resources: wikipedia – metacognition http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/metacognition wright, frederick. apera conference 2008. 14 apr. 2009. tools: google reader – http://google.com/reader twitter – http://twitter.com reeder app for ios – http://reederapp.com/ feedly rss reader – http://www.feedly.com/ kippt link sharing – http://kippt.com pinboard link sharing -http://pinboard.in/ instapaper reading tool – http://www.instapaper.com microsoft word 03_telireland_issue1_ndixon.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 1, issue 1, 2014 13 ensuring success in a fully online computer literacy module niall dixon1 dublin institute of technology (dit), dublin, ireland (received march 2014; final version received september 2014) 1. introduction in recent years much has been written about the potential of e-learning to address some of the difficulties that higher education institutions are faced with in relation to reduced academic staffing levels catering to an increasing and diverse student population. the mere mention of e-learning (hunt, 2011) may indicate an assumption that e-learning will solve these issues. providing access to these systems without sufficient supports reduces the likelihood that these systems will succeed. this presentation and discussion will focus on the need for supports considered essential in the delivery of fully online courses. 2. context dublin institute of technology (dit) has its origins in technical education extending back over 100 years and currently awards up to doctorate level in a wide variety of disciplines including; business, arts, tourism, engineering, built environment, science & health. basic ict skills using “productivity” software such as word processing, spreadsheets, presentation software are deemed essential tools for students (ezziane, 2007, gnudi and lorenzi, 2002). modules containing these topics are at the core of many undergraduate programmes. the initial stage of this research focussed on the use of the ita by a group of 71 students studying auctioneering, valuations and estate agency in the school of real estate. the it module is allocated 2 hours per week and its overall aim is to: …introduce the student to the uses and applications of information technology. … develop student proficiency in using a range of computer applications including microsoft excel, word and powerpoint; and provide an understanding of how students can better organise, manage and implement their studies using it and apply the practical skills necessary in the production of coursework, projects and presentations. (mccann and o’shea, 2010) learning outcomes were assessed by end-of-semester examinations and progression to the second year of this programme is based on successful completion of these assessments. the designers of this online module were cognisant of the perception (mclennan and gibbs, 2008) that traditional first year entrants automatically have good productivity software skills due to the transfer of their internet, web 2.0 and social networking skills. it may also be assumed that second level entrants in general also have good software productivity skills due to the fact that it subjects are covered in secondary schooling and that students have sufficiently grasped these subjects (edmiston and mcclelland, 2000, 1 corresponding author. email: niall.dixon@dit.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2014. © 2014 n. dixon. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. n. dixon 14 oblinger and oblinger, 2005). both these assumptions are dismissed in this study leading to an emphasis on design weighted towards the less it computer literate learner. 3. background the option to provide this module in a fully online format came about as a direct result of a reduction in the availability of it teaching staff at dit due to financial restraints. the lack of experienced it lecturing staff has resulted in non it specialists delivering these essential modules. for the purpose of this study, the author, an it subject specialist, delivered this module in a fully online mode. at the outset, the role of the online tutor was to deliver a once off face-to-face induction presentation, provide a structure to the course, guide students through a range of topics and provide support via e mail and to provide some face-to-face tuition when required. 4. description of the study 4.1 microsoft® it academy program the it academy is a web based learning system which provides learning resources for the full suite of microsoft applications. it is hosted and maintained by microsoft us. like many commercially available systems it has some limitations. it affords the usual benefits of most lmss – access anywhere, anytime and at any pace. it was selected as the learning management system (lms) of choice for dit (specifically for ms applications) due to its low annual subscription cost. its alignment with the concept of scaffolding is evident in the provision of video demonstrations of tasks and the provision of hands-on exercises where tasks are broken down into chunks. there is an e-mail feature within the system and a discussion forum but these are not activated on the dit licence agreement. access is by way of a userid and password. it also has a reasonable reporting function to track student activity and progress. gagne’s “events of instruction” (gagné, 2005) are evident in the design of the it academy. modules are “chunked” and presented in a variety of modes appealing to different learning styles e.g. video simulations, interactive videos, self tests and practical “lab” exercises. access is by way of a username, password and access codes. the design of the overall it module identified a core set of skills within each collection and these were aligned with the specific learning outcomes. consequently, not all modules and lessons were mandatory. the more advanced students have the opportunity to complete optional lessons. 4.2 induction on the first day of this module students received an induction onto the module consisting of a detailed presentation and demonstration in the use of the it academy. they were asked to log in and navigate through a sample course. it was explained that this is a fully online system and that it would require some degree of self-directed learning, a concept that may appear new to traditional first year entrants or one that may require development. (nikolova and collis, 1998) report that “a higher demand on the learner’s self-initiative, self-motivation, and self-control” is required to succeed in these type of learning environments. to address this, weekly e-mails were used as an extrinsic motivating factor to engage the students (biggs and tang, 2007). 4.3 a typical week following the induction week, a typical week for a student could be characterised as follows: • notification of weekly tasks via e mail i.e. specific modules and lessons • logging on and completing the required lessons including the hands-on practical exercises irish journal of technology enhanced learning 15 • sending queries in relation to system usage or lesson content via e-mail to the online tutor • receiving responses from the tutor usually within 24 hours • attending group “drop-in” sessions for those who required face to face assistance • attending one-to-one tuition sessions if required. 4.4 module website the website was constructed as a central source of information including modules and required lessons, access codes, links and references. it also incorporated supports to the lessons such as a glossary of terms, an faq, and a collection of additional instructions. the faq section grew as a result of recurring questions from students. the following is a typical e-mail from a student who had difficulty using the system: question answer hi,i can get access to the site and have completed the 1st course. however when i logged on with the second access code i don’t seem to be in on the courses. i am just being navigated around the site as i am not given any exercises to do i’m logged in but i don’t really understand the menus and what is being asked of me?well done! you have successfully logged in. you need to read all the screens especially the first one. make sure you click on the “navigation overview” link when you get into a course – it is a video of how to use the system and runs for about 2 minutes it is well worth viewing this the first time you log in. 5. data collection a pre-course questionnaire was developed, the focus of which was to evaluate the student’s general it awareness (n=71). a summary of the results are as follows: • male/female = 78% / 22% • school leavers/other = 54% / 46% • access to a computer = 100% • hours spent on computer per week = 50% of students spent 5+ hours • studied any it previously = 89% only 16% of respondents ranked as most important, the use computers for the creation of documents and spreadsheets, whereas 36% ranked this as their least important use of computers. the cohort which was the subject of this initial study was made up of varying backgrounds ranging from the typical school leaver to an out-of-work bricklayer. those students who studied it prior to college reported that they completed a range of courses from a single ms word course to a full suite of ms office products. as the module progressed, e-mails provided a qualitative representation of the experience of students. most of the e-mails were in relation to the use of the system e.g. forgetting password, unsure of what was being asked, not working in a certain browser, not having the correct software version at home so unable to practice from home and finally, navigating the system. an unstructured focus group was held prior to the final exam of which the results were: system difficult to use but became used to it after time, too many steps, would like more face-to-face tutorials, enjoys using excel as a result of module, required ms paint for other subjects on programme but not part of it module. 6. lessons learned, so far… n. dixon 16 this research is on-going however there are a few recommendations to be made. the first major finding is that the students simply will not succeed if learning supports are not in place to complement and enhance the online learning system. a variety of different approaches being considered that will improve the student experience include; provision of a short pre-programme face-to-face bridging module (calder, 2000), more face-to-face tutorials to supplement the online learning system for weaker students (reeves et al., 2002), more frequent tests with specific deadlines to promote better engagement, a more considered relationship with other modules on the programme, some element of localisation of the learning system itself to address ambiguity of interpretation of instruction. discussion undoubtedly, e-learning has the potential to alleviate some of the pressures that faculty are faced with today. the use of commercially available learning systems will have minimal impact in isolation if they are not packaged with well designed appropriate supports. references biggs, j. b. & tang, c. 2007. teaching for quality learning at university, maidenhead, mcgrawhill/society for research into higher education & open university press. calder, a. 2000. online learning support: an action research project. the fourth pacific rim – first year in higher education conference: creating futures for a new millennium. queensland university of technology. brisbane. edmiston, e. & mcclelland, m. 2000. a conversation about ensuring computer literacy of first-year students. proceedings of the second annual ccsc on computing in small colleges northwestern conference. oregon graduate institute, beaverton, oregon, united states: consortium for computing sciences in colleges. ezziane, z. 2007. information technology literacy: implications on teaching and learning. journal of educational technologyand society, 10, 175-191. gagné, r. m. 2005. principles of instructional design, belmont, ca, thomson/wadsworth. gnudi, a. & lorenzi, a. e-learning to acquire the basic ict skills for first-year university students. in: wagner, e. & szucs, a., eds. european distance education network; open and distance learning in europe & beyond : rethinking international co-operation, jun 2002 granada, spain. budapest, 551-555. hunt, c. 2011. national strategy for higher education to 2030. in: skills, d. o. e. (ed.). dublin, ireland: government publications office. mccann, p. f. & o’shea, c. 2010. dit coursewise [online]. available: http://modulecatalogue.hosting.heanet.ie/catalogue/modules/rece1134/ [accessed 20th september 2010. mclennan, t. & gibbs, s. 2008. has the computing competence of first year university students increased during the last decade? in hello! where are you in the landscape of educational technology? conference. ascilite. melbourne, australia. nikolova, i. & collis, b. 1998. flexible learning and design of instruction. british journal of educational technology, 29, 59-72. oblinger, d. & oblinger, j. 2005. educating the net generation. in: oblinger, d. & oblinger, j. (eds.). educause. reeves, t., baxter, p. & jordan, c. 2002. teaching computing courses – computer literacy, business microcomputer applications, and introduction to programming online utilizing webct. journal of computing in small colleges, 18, 290-300. microsoft word 06_telireland_issue1_dbelshaw.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 1, issue 1, 2014 34 zen and the arts of digital literacies doug belshaw1 dynamic skillset, morpeth, northumberland, uk (received march 2014; final version received september 2014) the main skill is to keep from getting lost. since the roads are used only by local people who know them by sight nobody complains if the junctions aren’t posted. and often they aren’t. when they are it’s usually a small sign hiding unobtrusively in the weeds and that’s all. county-road-sign makers seldom tell you twice. if you miss that sign in the weeds that’s your problem, not theirs. (pirsig, 1974, p.16) the arena of digital literacy is a confusing, contested place. there are multiple definitions of the term; (supposed) ‘authorities’ on the subject express diametrically opposing views; and there exist almost as many frameworks for developing digital literacy as there are researchers in the field. the purpose of what follows is to try and clear a way through some of the weeds inherent in the ‘field’. the first problem when trying to understand digital literacy is the sheer pace of technological change this is not a new phenomenon: there have been those complaining about feeling overwhelmed by developments since at least the luddites at the dawn of the industrial revolution over 250 years ago. having said that, it does appear that we live at a time when it is increasingly difficult to reflect adequately on our use of digital technologies. the reason for this is, perhaps, the release cycle of new products forcing us into a never-ending, uncritical, ‘presentism': society is being transformed by the passage from the ‘solid’ to the ‘liquid’ phases of modernity, in which all social forms melt faster than new ones can be cast. they are not given enough time to solidify and cannot serve as the frame of reference for human actions and longterm life-strategies because their allegedly short life expectation undermines efforts to develop a strategy that would require the consistent fulfillment of a ‘life-project’. (bauman, 2005, p.303) if this is true, then the rapid pace of change could mean that ‘digital literacy’ becomes, in the eyes of some people, a synonym for mere ‘functional skills’. what becomes important is the ability to ‘keep up with new technologies’ by being able to know which buttons to push when. instead of critically reflecting upon our use of technology we’re happy to merely ‘get things done’. the more procedural elements of using technology are foregrounded with the consequences of our choices backgrounded. operating at this surface level can be monotonous: we’re in such a hurry most of the time we never get much chance to talk. the result is a kind of endless day-to-day shallowness, a monotony that leaves a person wondering years later where all the time went and sorry that it’s all gone. now that we do have some time, and know it, i would like to use the time to talk in some depth about things that seem important. 1 corresponding author. email: hello@dynamicskillset.com. irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2014. © 2014 d. belshaw. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 35 (pirsig, 1974, p.17) one extremely important concept to pay attention to in the realm of digital literacy is how to conceive of the term itself. there are many references in the literature to a singular, unitary form of ‘digital literacy’ as if there was something objectively ‘out there’. as hannon (2000:31) points out, for those who subscribe to this view “the actual uses which particular readers and writers have for [a] competence is something which can be separated from the competence itself.” this seems problematic. instead, more progressive thinkers believe that we should “recognise… many specific literacies, each comprising an identifiable set of socially constructed practices” based upon print and organised around beliefs about how the skills of reading and writing may or, perhaps, should be used” (lankshear, 1987, quoted in hannon, 2000, p.32). this is the ‘pluralist’ view of digital literacies. pluralists believe not only that we should speak of ‘literacies’ rather than ‘literacy’, but reject the notion that literacy practices are neutral with regard to power, social identity and political ideology. by intentionally or unintentionally privileging certain literacy practices hegemonic power is either increased or decreased (gee, 1996). unfortunately, talk of hegemonic power, social identity and political ideology is not something you hear much of from those evangelising new technologies: one thing about pioneers that you don’t hear mentioned is that they are invariably, by their nature, mess-makers. they go forging ahead, seeing only their noble, distant goal, and never notice any of the crud and debris they leave behind them. someone else gets to clean that up and it’s not a very glamorous or interesting job. (pirsig, 1974, p.259) while we need such technological pioneers, we also need people to ‘clean up’ after them. we need people to critically analyse both the intended and the unintended impacts of the technology they evangelise. while it may have been possible to outsource this critical reflection to ‘experts’ in the past, the speed of technological change means that we all need to be experts. we all need to develop our digital literacies to fully function in today’s society. the problem with this is that technologies can, broadly speaking, perform two functions. they can, to be sure, streamline, improve and speed up existing processes. but technologies can also bring about new habits, new behaviours, and new workflows. unless these habits, behaviours and workflows are analysed along with the technologies upon which they depend, then we (as a society) are sleepwalking into potential problems: there is a knife moving here. a very deadly one; an intellectual scalpel so swift and so sharp that you sometimes don’t see it moving. you get the illusion that all those parts are just there and are being named as they exist. but they can be named quite differently and organized quite differently depending on how the knife moves. (pirsig, 1974, p.81) technology can provide us with such certainty. it promises to make us more productive, more creative, and even more ‘cool’. the world we inhabit, however, is fundamentally ambiguous. some of this ambiguity is unavoidable as we cannot, for example, know each others’ thoughts. we are limited to imprecise forms of communication (such as speech) where, depending on context, ‘wombat’ can refer both to a marsupial or a term of insult. on the other hand, some ambiguity can be intentional. while this may often be looked upon as a bad thing, it can, in fact be positive. as william empson (1930) set out in seven kinds of ambiguity there are many forms of such ambiguity. and, in the words of richard rorty, those terms that lose all vestige of ambiguity become “dead metaphors”, carapaces, forming a kind of coral reef, a “foil for new metaphors” (rorty, 1989, p.118). d. belshaw 36 digital literacies are inherently contextual. to name but two of a myriad of factors, digital literacies depend upon the situation in which the technology is being used, and the skills of those using the technologies. attempting to impose a supposedly ‘objective’ definition of a singular ‘digital literacy’ is therefore likely to prove problematic. unless we co-construct definitions of plural ‘digital literacies’ then we are likely to run into some of the problems we discussed above, particularly around power and identity. take, for example, the number ‘zero’ as a metaphor for digital literacies: zero, originally a hindu number, was introduced to the west by the arabs during the middle ages and was unknown to the ancient greeks and romans. how was that?… had nature so subtely hidden zero that all the greeks and all the romans – millions of them – couldn’t find it? one would normally think that zero is right out there in the open for everyone to see. (pirsig, 1974, p.237) we can have what professor cathy davidson calls ‘attention blindness’ when we are dealing with things in the realm that we think we know. co-creating definitions of digital literacies can empower those who would not ordinarily have a voice within an institution, organisation or group to have their skills and behaviours validated. what is also important about such co-construction is allowing alternate views of the world. as alluded to above, ‘digital literacies’ are not objectively out there in a tangible form: some things you miss because they’re so tiny you overlook them. but some things you don’t see because they’re so huge. we were both looking at the same thing, seeing the same thing, talking about the same thing, thinking about the same thing, except he was looking, seeing, talking and thinking, from a completely different dimension. (pirsig, 1974, p.62-3) digital literacies are what could be termed a ‘convenient hypocrisy’. they are concepts that we use fully knowing how problematic and divisive they can be. our justification for using such terminology is that we hope that drawing attention to the skills, practices and behaviours they represent is socially useful. procedural, functional, skills are important when it comes to technology. however, if this is all we have then we are missing something. they are the mere vestibule to the rich hall of digital literacies. we need a method for including conceptual skills whilst not denigrating the functional, the utilitarian. to be ‘digitally literate’ it is important to display both. we need ways in which to quickly agree on the skills, practices and behaviours that are useful in both the procedural and conceptual domains: what has become an urgent necessity is a way of looking at the world that does violence to neither of these two kinds of understanding and unites them into one. such an understanding will not reject sand-sorting or contemplation of unsorted sand for its own sake. such an understanding will instead seek to direct attention to the endless landscape from which the sand is taken. (pirsig, 1974, p.86) one way to view the (digital) world in a way that “does violence to neither these two kinds of understanding” is to avoid objective definitions of a singular digital literacy. in my doctoral thesis (belshaw, 2012) after an extensive literature review and meta-analysis i came up with eight ‘essential’ elements of digital literacies. these were elements that were present in most of the important literature in the field of digital literacies: 1. cultural 2. cognitive 3. constructive 4. communicative 5. confident irish journal of technology enhanced learning 37 6. creative 7. critical 8. civic the eight elements form a framework to allow for the co-construction of a definition of digital literacies that suits the particular context – be it an organisation, institution or group. those involved can, for example, even decide for themselves what constitutes the ‘civic’ element of digital literacies in their context. once they have done this they can proceed to ‘weight’ the elements to decide which they believe to be the most important or relevant. finally, this should lead them to be able to define ‘digital literacies’. it is easy to see the history of technology as the history of increased atomisation of society, as leading humans to be increasingly individualistic: technology is blamed for a lot of… loneliness, since the loneliness is certainly associated with the newer technological devices – tv, jets, freeways and so on…[t]he real evil isn’t the objects of technology but the tendency of technology to isolate people into lonely attitudes of objectivity. it’s the objectivity, the dualistic way of looking at things underlying technology, that produces the evil. (pirsig, 1974, p.361-2) what we need to remember is that technology is designed by people. it is created by an individual or group of people for a particular purpose. we, too, need to decide what our response is going to be to that technology. this could be to reject the technology completely, or it could be to design new workflows and behaviours because of it. the important thing is to have a clear response based on a co-constructed definition. i hope that that the ‘eight essential elements’ framework enables this to happen. references bauman, z. (2005) ‘education in liquid modernity’ review of education, pedagogy & cultural studies 27(4) pp.303-317 belshaw, d.a.j. (2012) ‘what is digital literacy? a pragmatic investigation’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, durham university, 2012, available online at: http://neverendingthesis.com) davidson, c.n. (2011) now you see it: how technology and brain science will transform schools and business for the 21st century new york: viking penguin empson, w. (1930:2004) seven types of ambiguity 3rd ed. london: pimlico gee, j.p. (1996) social linguistics and literacies: ideology in discourses 2nd ed. london: falmer press gilster, p. (1997) digital literacy new york: wiley hannon, p. (2000) reflecting on literacy in education london: routledgefalmer pirsig, r.m. (1974) zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance new york: william morrow & company rorty, r.m., (1989) ‘the contingency of language’ in r.b. goodman (ed.) (1995) pragmatism: a contemporary reader new york: routledge irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 1, 2018 56 navigating the open educational practice landscape marin weller*1a a. the institute of educational technology, the open university (received may 2017; final version received may 2018) open education is an evolving term that covers a range of philosophies and practices aimed at widening access to education for those wishing to learn, with the current focus predominantly on practices based around reuse and sharing. this current focus can be traced back to the open educational resources (oer) movement, and the use of open licences, such as creative commons licences. however, it also has links to open universities, open access publishing, moocs, open source software and open approaches to teaching. the current interpretation of open education is heavily influenced by the oer movement with an emphasis on the ‘5rs of reuse’ (reuse, revise remix, redistribute and retain wiley 2014). the profile of open education has been further raised in recent years by the popularity of massive open online courses (moocs). although they do not always meet the 5rs criteria, moocs are open to all and freely available, and have gained considerable attention and funding. another growth area is that of open textbooks, which can be viewed as a specific form of oer, and is particularly prevalent in north america through projects such as openstax and bc campus this focus on oer as the dominant, or even sole form of open education has implications for how open approaches to education develop. for instance, wiley (2013, 2017) defines open pedagogy as the ‘set of teaching and learning practices only possible in the context of the affordances of open educational resources as enabled by the 5rs’ and talks of oer enabled pedagogies. however, concepts and practices associated with open education have a longer history than the oer movement. peter and deimann (2013) highlight open education practices stretching back to the middle-ages with the founding of universities which “contained in them the idea of openness, albeit by no means comprehensive. this period highlights ‘open’ as learner driven, resting on a growing curiosity and increasing awareness of educational opportunities” (p. 9). open education can be traced through the 17th century with coffee-houses and then into the industrial revolution with schools and working clubs. then in the 20th century the founding of ‘open’ universities such as the uk open university and the university of south africa developed a model of large-scale provision. * corresponding author. email: mweller@dcu.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 m. weller. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 57 open education can be viewed as a broader concept, of which oer is only part. weller (2014) proposes three core antecedents for the current open education movement, namely open universities, open source software, and web 2.0 culture. from these a number of coalescing principles can be derived, including: freedom to reuse; open access; free cost; easy use; digital, networked content; social, community based approaches; ethical arguments for openness; and openness as an efficient model. these shared principles are significant for the work that follows, as it suggests that even though practitioners may be working in tightly focused and defined areas of interest, there are commonalities across much of open education. however, while this suggests that the current manifestation of open education has its roots in previous interpretations and developments, much of the current literature in what can broadly be defined as open education fails to acknowledge or cite this earlier work. there is a strong tendency to be self-referential in the oer area, with little reference to open education prior to the founding of the oer movement. a preliminary systematic search (rolfe, 2016) for “open education” across a number of databases, retrieved over two hundred articles and revealed that there was an initial peak in the period 1970-74, with articles deriving largely from the concentrating on open pedagogy in uk infant schools, and also from the founding of the open university. the next significant peak in publications is found in 2010-15 as moocs, open textbooks and oer gain traction (figure 1). figure 1: frequency of published articles on open education over time working with colleagues katy jordan, vivien rolfe and irwin devries, we set out to determine if our informal impression that work in the open education field tends to be conducted in islands or silos of interest, with little referencing or awareness between them. using a citation analysis method, the landscape of research in open education could be constructed. this method proceeded by gaining an initial sample of 20 documents on the m. weller 58 basis of literature database searches for items which referred specifically to the history or definition of openness ((“open education”, “open learning”, openness) and (history,definition)). the references of these articles were then extracted, and the papers which were cited by at least two of the original sample items were then added to the sample to include their references in the next iteration. although this process could be repeated indefinitely, four iterations have been carried out and it was felt that meaningful clusters had emerged at this point. at this point, the network included 5,217 references from a total of 172 publications. using the social network analysis tool gephi, a network of citations could then be plotted. clusters within this could be identified, and appropriate labels imposed. the resulting network is shown in figure 2. figure 2: annotated version of the network. colour coding indicates categories applied by the researcher, and node size is scaled to reflect the number of times each item is cited within the dataset from this network, eight distinct areas of interest emerge: distance education, e-learning, open education in schools, oer, moocs, open access publishing, social media, and open practices. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 59 what the network demonstrates is that our impression that there is little cross referencing between these areas is borne out. in some areas this might be understandable, for example many articles on open access publishing are from an information science, librarianship perspective, and similarly the work on social media emerged from a communications focus and evolved into consideration of academic use of such tools. given the similarity in aims and issues faced by moocs and oers, the absence of much overlap between them is surprising. the lack of a basis in foundational work in elearning and open education speaks to a ‘year zero’ mentality that posits this work as revolutionary and new. perhaps the area of most interest is that of open educational practices (oep), which acts as a bridge or glue between many of the other clusters, located as it is at the intersection of social media, open access publishing, and oer. it includes articles focused upon digital scholarly practices, and open educational practices, spanning both the research and teaching remits of higher education. this may demonstrate that once initial foundation of content has been established, the more interesting work relating to what it means for educators and learners in terms of new opportunities, changes in practice, and critical analysis can commence. this work is more likely then to make connections beyond its immediate category, linking to pedagogical theories, sociology, computer science and general education. it is our contention then that providing connections between these bodies of research in open education is mutually beneficial for researchers and practitioners. the studies into practice since the 1970s have produced an extensive body of theory in open and distance education, which can add valuable insights for current researchers and practitioners. in addition, researchers and graduate students will be able to enrich their studies by tracing ideas, connections, discontinuities and patterns gleaned from the analysis of earlier studies. further, current discourses about the meaning of openness in education may well benefit from an understanding of historical patterns of open and distance education research, in particular the challenges faced. open educational practice provides one means of encouraging these connections and overcoming silos of practice. for a full account of this research, see: weller, m., jordan, k., devries, i., & rolfe, v. 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(cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. m. oliver 28 within the uk, the jisc has adopted a definition that, initially, appears to adopt this decontextualized position: “digital literacy defines those capabilities which fit an individual for living, learning and working in a digital society” (beetham, 2010). however, the definition is quickly followed up by the following qualification, showing a practical commitment to (if not a theoretical explanation of) a more nuanced, situated model: all of these capabilities are expressed in specific learning, teaching and research activities, which take their meaning from the subject areas in which they are practised. for the purposes of this programme, ‘digital literacy’ is not a loose collection of separate skills, but rather their integration in specific educational contexts. in further and higher education at least, digital literacy is not a ‘one size fits all’ skill set, though there may be elements of common entitlement: rather it is a nuanced and varied set of capabilities, tuned to the requirements of different roles and the practices of different subject areas. (beetham, 2010, p. 2-3 ) however, while new literacy studies moved discussion away from the cognitive and towards the social, it does not emphasise the embodied materiality of textual engagement. this risks losing sight of what students actually do, where they do it and what resources and artefacts they work with. educational technology research has taken a far greater interest in technologies themselves – but the accounts it offers have been simplistic and deterministic, as if the presence of technology causes learning or ability (oliver, 2011). in this work the conceptual pendulum has swung too far away from human agency; what is needed is more nuanced account that can explain both how people act and what resources they are able to act with. work that does address this – for example, research that explores new literacy studies in relation to technology – uses theoretical perspectives such as actor network theory (latour, 2005) to explore areas such as e-learning (e.g. goodfellow & lea 2007; hamilton, 2001; clarke, 2002). such work has not applied sociomaterial perspectives to the day-to-day textual practices of students as they engaged in their studies using digital devices, however. in this paper, we will outline a position that begins to address this. theoretical framework actor-network theory (ant) was developed within the field of science and technology studies (e.g. callon 1986, law & hassard 1999, latour 2005), and has recently begun to be applied to educational contexts (e.g. fenwick & edwards 2010, tummons 2010). it focuses on how society is created rather than on causes, leading to rich explanatory accounts. within this tradition of work, there is a strong emphasis on the importance of nonhuman actors (such as objects or animals) as members of networks: if you can, with a straight face, maintain that hitting a nail with and without a hammer, boiling water with and without a kettle…are exactly the same activities, that the introduction of these mundane implements change ‘nothing important’ to the realisation of tasks, then you are ready to transmigrate to the far land of the social and disappear from this lowly one. (latour 2005, p. 71) ant also rejects essentialist categories (e.g. gender), viewing social action as constantly enacted through detailed, networked practices. in this it is related to ethnomethodology (e.g. garfinkel 1967), emphasising the everyday and ‘micro’ as the key site of social process. in the context of studying students’ learning, this involves consideration of how students organise and undertake their studies. this necessarily involves devices and artefacts, whether these be books, ipads or learning management systems (lms). irish journal of technology enhanced learning 29 methodology a jisc-funded study was undertaken to investigate student engagement with digital technologies (jisc 2012). firstly, accounts of practices were generated through focus groups with four main groups of students at the institution (teacher education, taught masters, taught masters at a distance, doctoral). this was followed by a six-month longitudinal study involving students assembling multimodal journal records of their practices using ipod touch handheld devices. this longitudinal work involved three students from each of the groups documenting their day-to-day practices and interactions with texts and technologies in a range of settings, producing images, videos and textual notes. they then assembled and discussed these in a series of 3-4 interviews. (participants who provided particularly rich data were invited back for a fourth interview.) participants were encouraged to focus on the ‘messy’ micro-level day-to-day lived activities, networks and the material / spatial aspects of practice. as highlighted in the preceding theoretical section, this was important in moving beyond neat, decontextualised accounts such as those generated by stand-alone interviews, which rely on self-report and may lead to abstraction (gourlay 2010). the study received institutional ethical clearance and followed approved procedures for informed consent, including guarantees of anonymity and confidentiality, and the right to opt out at any point. findings resource discovery the four focus groups differed in the ways they discovered and accessed texts. the teacher education students used the lms to access resources their tutors had uploaded. distance students found the physical library irrelevant; they focused on the lms and online library database. for them, ‘information overload’ was a bigger problem than finding where a tutor had placed a specific reading. masters’ students were different again, focusing on the physical library – accessing digital resources was relatively problematic. before you get on the internet or on the computer, you have to wait, like, ten minutes before it’s starting up. doctoral students talked mainly in terms of academic texts, which they found in social or purposeful ways, such as “following people” whom they perceived to be doing particularly relevant work. the practices of incorporating texts into their own work also differed, depending on whether they were printed, exported from a database via endnote (or similar) or obtained through electronic searches. the diversity of these experiences undermining a monolithic, convergent or taxonomic understanding of student learning strategies; these ‘digital literacies’ are not generic, but reflect the specific ways in which resources were discovered, curated and then used in the production of assessed work. centrality, access and convergence networked devices were central to all students’ accounts of access and text production, although which devices each used differed. collectively, they used desktop pcs (at home or in the library) and portable devices (including smart phones, ipads and e-readers), from occasional use through to constant dependence. portability was a particular concern for students such as yuki (a masters’ student): m. oliver 30 for me the most important thing is portability, because i use technologies, ict, everywhere i go, anywhere i go. for example of course i use some technologies, pcs and laptops and my ipad in the ioe building, and in the ioe building i use pc, i use them in pc room, in library, and for searching some data or journals. in the lecture room i record my, record the lectures and taking memos by that. devices and applications were multi-purpose. for some, this allowed them to bring together personal and private spaces or activities in ways they found productive. well, in my bedroom, on my bed, it’s mainly my mobile and going through my emails, travel information, whether on facebook, my mobile too. then, um, and in the study room, that would be my laptop and, um, laptop, that would be blackboard, research, entertainment. however, some students struggled to create boundaries to keep spaces and practices separate; for example, by using separate email accounts for study, professional practice and personal purposes. some students found this unsettling. the only thing i struggle with […], is the issue of like keeping your private life separate from your work life because i think increasingly the two, you’re being forced to kind of mush the two together. [another institution] used to have its own email server and it would provide you with an email. now it’s provided by gmail and it’s like everybody knows that gmail is the nosiest thing in the world and tracks absolutely everything you do. and […] i’m a little bit uncomfortable with the idea that my work email knows what shopping i do and, you know what i mean? i just find the whole thing is starting to get a little bit scary. similarly, juan (another masters student) worked to prevent study from ‘colonising’ private space. he showed the temporary and shifting arrangements he made for study at home with the photograph in figure 1. figure 1: juan’s temporary configuration of devices in his flat he explained: this is my very small flat that has a bedroom, bathroom; kitchen’s over here. and then this is the tv which is obviously technological but distinct, it’s not really connected at all. and there’s a laptop here which is on the little table and that’s kind of it. there is a sort of a line from which work doesn’t, university work doesn’t breach really. he focused on this theme of separation in the ‘map’ of practice he produced, as can be seen in figure 2: irish journal of technology enhanced learning 31 figure 2: juan’s ‘map’ of practice locally-negotiated engagement with texts and devices just as there was a complex interplay between spaces, devices and purposes, students also reworked the relationships between texts and devices. some students struggled to access or create texts; there were many accounts of spaces, devices or applications being modified, reconfigured or recombined. in this sense, digital literacy became a sociomaterial achievement, brought about by a constant reconfiguration of the human, technological and text. yuki (a masters student) used a range of portable and handheld devices, and discussed the very close relationship between her engagements with texts and mobile networked devices. she regularly scans texts into her ipad, reading and annotating them digitally. she also records all her lectures on her ipad in lieu of note-taking. the centrality of devices to her practices is illustrated by figure 3: figure 3: yuki’s image of her ipad on the bath m. oliver 32 yuki puts her ipad in a ziplock bag to allow her to use it in the bath. while reading in the bath is nothing new, this specific textual engagement was innovative in the way it used a networked device, constituted by an amalgam of human, text and machine, and only made possible by the light weight and compact shape of the ipad compared to a laptop. yuki’s manipulation of texts shows the active assemblage and mediation of texts in conjunction with devices. this made texts (including books, recorded lectures, etc) more portable in terms of space, manipulating texts and sound files of lectures to make them come into being or disappear digitally at any time. her intensive use of pdf annotating software also allows her to create palimpsest-like texts digitally, written over and reconstituted in any spatial or temporal domain she chooses. further examples of this type of reconfiguration and modification of texts were found throughout the data in a range of practices involving spaces, devices and applications such as mobile phone and ipad apps, interactive whiteboards, and referencing software. conclusions this study demonstrates that students’ learning strategies are both shaped and are shaped by the spaces, devices and people that are available to them. conventional accounts of digital literacy ignore this rich interrelationship between people and things, with ‘capability’ accounts tending to ignore material considerations and educational technology accounts often ignoring peoples’ agency. the findings here are best characterised in terms of multiple spaces and domains of engagement, the centrality of networked devices, and the highly contingent, negotiated nature of practices. this demonstrates how a sociomaterial approach, as framed by concepts from actor-network theory, can recast students’ learning strategies and with it our understanding of ‘digital literacies’ more generally. the fine-grained, situated accounts show how students’ practices and networks are generated, modified and maintained. it also demonstrates the limitations of a ‘tidy’, generic and taxonomic concept of digital literacies. it is inappropriate and unrealistic to assume that students will simply access texts via a lms or institutional portal; whether they are intended to or not, they will use a range of devices. institutional strategies and services need to be designed with this diversity in mind. references beetham, h. (2010). review and scoping study for a cross-jisc learning and digital literacies programme: sept 2010. bristol: jisc. callon, m. (1986). the sociology of an actor-network: the case of the electric vehicle. mapping the dynamics of science and technology. springer. 19-34. carrington, v. and robinson, m. (2009). digital literacies: social learning and classroom practices: sage. clarke, j. (2002). a new kind of symmetry: actor-network theories and the new literacy studies. studies in the education of adults 34(2) 107-122 fenwick, t. and edwards, r. (2010). actor-network theory in education: routledge. garfinkel, h. (1967). study in ethnomethodology. new york: prentice-hall. gourlay, l. (2012). student author as actor network? using ant to explore digital literacies in higher education. proceedings of the 8th international conference on networked learning. hamilton, m. (2002). sustainable literacies and the ecology of lifelong learning. supporting lifelong learning 1 176-187. latour, b. (2005). reassembling the social: an introduction to actor-network-theory: oxford university press. law, j. and hassard, j. (1999). actor network theory and after. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 33 lea, m. and goodfellow, r. (2007). challenging e-learning in the university: a literacies perspective maidenhead & philadelphia: srhe. open university press/mc graw hill. lea, m. r. and street, b. v. (1998). student writing in higher education: an academic literacies approach. studies in higher education 23(2) 157-172. oliver, m. (2011). technological determinism in educational technology research: some alternative ways of thinking about the relationship between learning and technology. journal of computer assisted learning 27(5) 373-384. steinkuehler, c. (2007). massively multiplayer online gaming as a constellation of literacy practices. e-learning and digital media 4(3) 297-318. tummons, j. (2010). institutional ethnography and actor–network theory: a framework for researching the assessment of trainee teachers. ethnography and education 5(3) 345-357. weller, m. (2011). the digital scholar: how technology is transforming scholarly practice: a&c black. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2017 leading with digital in an age of supercomplexity lawrie phipps*a, donna lanclosb a. jisc b. j murrey atkins library, unc charlotte (received august 2017; final version received october 2017) abstract across education all aspects of practice, including teaching, research, public engagement and administration, are taking place increasingly against a digital backdrop. as digital becomes widely recognised as both a key element of enabling institutional change, and creating challenges for all institutional activities, jisc have developed a digital leaders course to engage delegates with their own digital practices, and help them in applying tools and methods to both support their own development and leverage digital in their organisation. this concise practice report reflects on the initial courses,some of the delegate reactions and drivers to participate in the course. it also outlines the structure of the course and the underpinning approaches taken. the intent here is to take the observations we have made over two years delivering five iterations of this course, and suggest positive directions forward for those interested in researching and developing effective leadership strategies around digital environments in higher and further education. barnett’s definition of supercomplexity, a time of uncertainty, unpredictability, challenge and change frames the nature of the education landscape faced by institutions well. through the digital leaders course, jisc seeks to both frame the challenges created by digital, and also show digital as providing the capacity and capabilities to respond to supercomplexity. 1. introduction jisc is a not-for profit provider of services to united kingdom higher and further education institutions and funded largely by higher and further education governmental funding bodies. since october 2015 jisc has been running the digital leaders course for higher and further education. the course builds on some of the approaches and research from the changing learning landscape programme (lfhe, 2014). whereas some approaches to developing digital skills have relied heavily on diagnostic testing and focused on recipes and checklists for enhancing capabilities, the purpose of the jisc leaders course was to enable delegates to investigate and develop the roots of their own digital practice and that of their organisation; setting their own priorities for development in the context of their role. in running and further developing the course, further information has been garnered from the participants, via follow-up visits, structured interviews, and institutional feedback forms, to identify effective * corresponding author. email: lawrie.phipps@jisc.ac.uk irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2017. © 2017 l phipps and d lanclos. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. http://www.ilta.ie/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 2 l. phipps & d. lanclos approaches and early successes in both the delegates’ digital capability and in changemanagement approaches involving digital1. in this article, we look at the framing of the course, and the discussions from leaders that have emerged from their participation in it, so as to point to directions we hope the higher and further education sector will take in developing and researching effective leadership practices in digital environments. in particular we are interested in the ways that the conversations emerging from several runs of the leadership course are pointing us towards the need for more attention to and development of organisational culture, rather than exclusive attention to digital tools and skills. here we describe the framing and intentions of the course, contextualise it, and draw out themes that we hope can be explored further via research and additional development around digital strategy and policy. the approach of the jisc digital leaders course is designed to provide staff in institutions with an awareness, and ability to respond both to and with digital in a time of ‘supercomplexity’, the shorthand term used by barnett (2000) to describe the state of affairs in which we find ourselves: one of uncertainty, unpredictability, challenge and change. the core work of educational organisations teaching and learning, research and innovation, partnership-building, public communication and organisational management takes place in an increasingly digital setting (evans & morris, 2016; pearce et al, 2010). in developing the jisc digital leaders course it was recognised that leaders in education need to both be effective in their own use of digital and understand the benefits and affordances of digital in leading organisations and departments. furthermore, strong “digital leadership” will be a key feature of effective educational organisations, and its lack can be a significant barrier to progress. technology in universities is no longer the sole domain of it managers, or indeed those staff involved in technology enhanced learning (tel). the opportunities and risks offered by developments in digital technology need to inform the full range of institutional strategies and be embedded into the institution’s core mission. 2. identifying wants, fulfilling needs the jisc digital leaders course began as a pilot project in october 2015. we ran two different four-day courses, one for further education and skills leaders and one for higher education leaders, recruited from across the uk and ireland. since then two further versions of the residential course, and two non-residential single institution courses have been run. as a result of feedback we no longer have separate runs for further and higher education, as we realised that the content of the conversations around the role of digital in higher and further education were broadly similar, and people from all parts of the sector learned a great deal from their colleagues in different areas. to date, 145 people have gone through the residential course, with courses booked for november 2017 and spring 2018. all leadership roles in institutions need to have some understanding of the affordances and challenges associated with digital and leaders need to feel confident in their own digital capabilities and able to model at least some of the digital behaviours they want their staff to 1 during the course jisc asks for consent of participants to use the materials generated within the course for analysis, reporting, and iterations of future versions of the course. each course is evaluated and jisc also seeks to interview delegates to elicit further feedback. all material, including feedback and evaluation is anonymised. irish journal of technology enhanced learning display. they need a vision for digital technology in their part of the organisation and confidence to trust other people who have the technical and specialised expertise to implement the vision. in addition, and especially in the later courses, the diversity of roles participating in the course has increased. as well as academic leaders, participants have included staff from information and technology services, libraries, human resources, communications and marketing, estates and academic support staff (staff and educational developers, tel staff). in each run of the course, there were individuals who wanted top tips, and tool recommendations. our intention was not, and never has been to fill this desire. there will never be a tool that will help address uncertainty, unpredictability, challenge and change. several attendees had been sent to the course because they had been tasked with writing a “digital strategy,” but what we needed to do at the outset of the course was to get them thinking about what comes before that. running the course is an exercise in facilitating conversations grounded in initial activities that attempt to make the abstract a bit more concrete. we use (as many workshop facilitators do) sticky notes, colored markers, a4 paper, and the walls of the rooms we are in for recording, displaying, and collecting the perspectives in the room. for example, at the beginning of the most recent course, we collected what people’s motivations were to come on the course. the motivations clustered into the following primary themes: ● time ● strategy ● tools ● networking ● visualising and understanding practice ● uncertainty, unpredictability, challenge and change while “tools” is on their collective list of motivations, it stands out as being different from the other items, which are about process, organization, management, and people. we suspect that tools are on the list at least in part because the larger context in higher and further education highlights “skills” and “tools” as solutions to problems, as demonstrated, for example by jenzabar (2016) and educause (2017). this context frames our primary challenge in running a course like this: successfully encouraging delegates to move towards a set of motivations that is not about “tools”. we designed the course to be a reflective space, from which strategic thinking can emerge. we recognise, through the structure of this course, the dearth of reflective time in our ordinary day jobs, and the importance of that time to build effective strategies. it is through fulfilling these non-tool-centred motivations that we can start to build the capacity and confidence for leaders to address supercomplexity. 3. structure of the course: practice and strategy the approach of the jisc digital leadership course is development rather than training, and it draws upon research that centers motivations to digital practice, in particular the visitors and residents approach to digital (white & lecornu, 2011; white & lecornu, 2017; phipps, 2016; lanclos, 2016; white, 2016) , contrasting with outmoded “digital native/immigrants” 3 l. phipps & d. lanclos 4 notions (margaryan et al, 2011; prensky, 2001). the core of the first day is built around delegates mapping their practices. we therefore start with visualisation exercises, having the leaders draw, rather than write lists, as a way of moving them away from text-based notions of where they work and what they are trying to do. figure 1: institutional representation we asked delegates first to draw a representation of their own organisation. the picture in figure 1 was drawn to illustrate the contrast between the image of the university, robust and full of happy people working and studying, with the precarious support structure (and the people victimised by that lack of support) that lies just underneath. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 figure 2: institutional representation (value alignment) in figure 2, a delegate represents their organisation as a system of planets, but ones that are not quite in alignment with the central values around which they orbit. after they draw their organisations, and discuss these drawings with their fellow delegates, they are ready to move on to the visualisation of their personal digital practices. using a pole graph, delegates engage with the visitors and residents framework, placing the digital things they do and places they visit on the graph, (see figure 3) as a way of grounding their development in their own practices. l. phipps & d. lanclos 6 figure 3: mapping along a pole graph in these mapping exercises one of the fundamental shifts we are trying to facilitate is in moving from thinking about digital as a tool or a set of resources, what we call “visitor” mode, towards considering digital as a place, what we call “resident” mode, where people can engage with other people, have conversations, and exchange ideas. delegates are encouraged to annotate their practice maps, for example, with the ways they would like to move their practice (e.g., accelerating, enhancing, or decreasing particular practices), or signaling the ways that their practices are linked, or informed by other priorities. in mapping what they do as individuals, the leaders are then primed to move to strategic approaches to their organisation’s digital footprint. in this case, as with the individual mapping, the process of creating a map of practice allows for reflection, not decisions about what is right and what is wrong. the intention is to provide spaces where choices can be better understood. the process of developing their own map allows leaders to think about maps for their organisation and how the organisation engages with its community. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 figure 4: organisational map the organisational map in figure 4 is an early iteration of the mapping process, where we tried to get delegates to simultaneously map the range of practice (and the motivations behind those practices) as well as whether those practices were open (accessible on the wider web) or closed (locked behind a password). in future versions of the course, we are moving to the simpler mapping process (figure 5), and will be discussing the open/closed spectrum (and the motivations behind that) as a separate stage of the mapping. in figure 4, the arrows indicate where this individual wished their organisational practices could be located, overall hoping for more engagement, and less broadcast. l. phipps & d. lanclos figure 5: simpler map for organisational mapping in both the new and old organisational templates, delegates are encouraged to think about the entirety of their organisation’s digital practices as best they can recall them--part of the challenge is that of course no one individual has a comprehensive perspective on all of the digital places, tools, and activities in a given institution. one result is usually that people start to have ideas about who else they need to talk to, to get a more holistic perspective. the distinction between “broadcast” of information and “engagement” with people is derived from that which we make between visitor and resident in the individual maps, again drawing out the fundamental difference between an operational approach to digital, and one that sees the human potential for interaction and engagement via digital places. the maps that delegates produce always reflect a range of practices, something that occurs in visitors and residents mapping workshops in other contexts, such as libraries, and teaching and learning (white, 2016a). we encounter, in the jisc course, leaders who are very practiced and confident in digital places, and others who are confidently disconnected from digital, for very specific reasons around time, privacy, and professionalism. participants produce maps of organisations that are operating predominantly in broadcast mode, and others that have both broadcast and engagement as part of their digital presence. none of the mapping is intended to make people think there is a right way to “do digital.” part of the point is, regardless of one’s own personal approach, leaders need to be aware of the range of possibilities in digital places and practices. the important aim in all of the mapping exercises we run participants through during the jisc leaders course is not the representation that each delegate produces, but is a shift in thinking. in each case, both individual and organisational mapping, there are no templates in this approach that can be elicited, no best practice that can be duplicated. the process is a 8 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 9 journey, and the maps that leaders create are merely a snapshot of where their current practice stands. the jisc leaders course uses digital practice maps created as a development tool, allowing delegates to understand and reflect, with their peers, on what they do, and importantly what their motivations and aspirations are. these moments of understanding and reflection are the real outcomes of this process, which in turn have already led to changes within participant organisations. swansea university staff participated in the course and used the techniques to refocus their strategy around active learning classrooms (griffith, 2017). cardiff university staff used the course as a springboard to accelerate their deployment of digital capabilities frameworks both in the uk and in overseas campuses (parry, 2017). 4. discussion and conclusions during the discussion of the results of the mapping exercises, change management approaches emerge, with delegates looking at how they approach digital change projects and what makes them successful (or not). we have, in the process of running the jisc leaders’ course, been particularly struck by the ways that even conversations that start grounded in lists of tools and skills swiftly develop into discussions of organisational culture and practice, history, and the occasionally difficult process of working with people. we would like to use the insights highlighted in this paper to encourage our colleagues in the sector to reflect on the ways in which digital is approached at both a personal and strategic level, identifying the drivers and the needs that they think they can respond to and fulfill via digital. through working with leaders in higher and further education it is apparent that many of the technology related adoption issues can be attributed to people lacking ‘confidence’ in their digital skills or, instances where organisational culture is engaged in digital rhetoric rather than the work of transforming digital behaviour. the role of effective leadership in institutions must now include how leaders see and use digital; both in terms of how new digital practices are emerging and using digital to respond to change. in developing an approach on the jisc digital leaders course we seek to give leaders a place, to situate themselves within their own digital practices and then develop outward, encompassing opportunities to incorporate digital in their practice and leveraging digital for the benefit of their organisational goals. our role is not to give them skills and competencies (because they already have those), but to inspire them to reflect on, develop, and grow their digital confidence. leading organisations in a time of supercomplexity is inevitably difficult, the digital layer should not be seen as another “challenge” to be overcome, but should be embraced as an opportunity. “digital” permeates every part of an institution, and strategy around digital cannot be limited to just one piece of any organisation. digital tools, places, and practices also provide ways for individuals and institutions to respond and thrive in new realities. the context in which educational practices take place is changing; quality metrics, student funding, policy imperatives and the rise of new providers seeking to compete with traditional providers all have an impact. barnett’s reference to supercomplexity is prescient but should not come as a surprise as, especially in higher education, change can be seen as the norm. the myriad drivers for change in institutions may be ephemeral, or more sustained, and in order to better respond all staff, including academics, need to be able to understand the 10 l. phipps & d. lanclos change processes and adapt their practices accordingly. digital is a facet of supercomplexity, an indelible part of the context in which changes are occurring. references barnett, r. (2000) realizing the university in an age of supercomplexity. maidenhead, uk: mcgraw-hill/open university educause (2017) higher education’s top 10 strategic technologies for 2017 (2017, january 17) retrieved from https://library.educause.edu/resources/2017/1/higher-educations-top-10strategic-technologies-for-2017 evans, l and morris, n (2016) leading technology-enhanced learning in higher education. research and development series, leadership foundation for higher education jenzabar (2016) solving higher ed’s biggest problems with technology (2017, october 27) retrieved from https://www.jenzabar.com/blog/2016/10/27/solving-higher-eds-biggestproblems-with-technology/ richard griffith [@health_law] (11 october 2017) active learning suite now up and running in the @swanseauni shhs #jiscdiglead @jamesclay @donnalanclos retrieved from https://twitter.com/health_law/status/918065134995681282 lanclos, d. 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(2017). using ‘visitors and residents’ to visualise digital practices. first monday, 22(8). doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.5210/fm.v22i8.7802 http://daveowhite.com/vandrworkshops/ http://daveowhite.com/truth-and-method/ http://dx.doi.org/10.5210/fm.v16i9.3171 http://dx.doi.org/10.5210/fm.v22i8.7802 irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 216 eportfolio in teacher education and academic further education: a new learning journey experience at the university of konstanz, germany christine ziegelbauer*1 barbara d’errico2 1university of konstanz 2academy of advanced studies at the university of konstanz abstract nowadays more than ever private and professional life is shaped by rapid changes in society and developments in technology which have been accelerated even further by the covid-19 pandemic. it is at these times, therefore, that the ability to learn is essential to become and stay employable. in addition to university education, the acquisition of this skill is increasingly being taken into account in further education. alongside classroom teaching, digitalisation is gaining in importance in this context too. one tool that supports selfregulated learning while promoting digital literacy is eportfolio. at the university of konstanz, eportfolio was introduced in two areas with two different objectives: (1) in teacher education (b.ed.), eportfolio is compulsory and aims to support students in becoming competent teachers by documenting and questioning their professional development. (2) in the bachelor of further education “motor-neurological rehabilitation” (b.sc.) participants can voluntarily use this tool to collect, reflect on and showcase professional skills and competences along the course of study. students with difficulties in self-regulation and in meeting organisational requirements will be able to receive the support they need. based on these case studies this paper describes the experienced challenges and potentials by adopting eportfolio in lifelong learning context. it highlights the worthwhile efforts as well as the profitable values delivering an appreciable impact on the future of new learning strategies and mechanisms. 1. introduction education enjoys a high-quality status in germany, offering opportunities to develop personal, social and professional skills. however, if we compare this to international standards, the participation in further vocational and academic courses was, until recently, relatively low (wissenschaftsrat, 2019). the importance and necessity of lifelong learning or continuing education training are growing in today’s german education policy debate. the state invests considerable sums in the german education system (high-tech-forum, 2020). factors such as demographic development, shortage of skilled professionals, and an increasingly dynamic way of learning are significant driving forces. nevertheless, we see fundamental structural shift in key industries driven by technological, social and geopolitical changes, as well as by unpredictable crisis situations such as the current covid19 pandemic which is causing growing precariousness of employment. hence, the german higher educational system is undergoing wide changes especially in the field of digitalisation irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021 217 (bündnis für lebenslanges lernen, 2020). in this paper we will present firstly the current developments regarding lifelong learning in germany, we will then discuss the role eportfolio can play in this context by presenting two case studies from the university of konstanz, and finally, we will describe the challenges we encountered while establishing eportfolio and its potential for the future. 2. further academic education and lifelong learning in germany nowadays the federal ministry of education and research and the federal states promote the educational opportunities aiming at achieving a higher professionalisation and higher participation of the population in all form of learnings. the resolution of the standing conference of the ministers of education and cultural affairs (kmk, 2009) contributes to a wider permeability in the education system and allows higher education admission even for professionally qualified applicants without a school-based higher education entrance qualification. academic further education is a university’s core task1, but often legal and financial framework conditions are not uniformly available. the discussion on goals and fields of action is currently more topical than ever. in this context “learning how to learn” is a key competence (european union, 2018), and self-regulated learning (zimmerman, 2000) – in the first phase of academic training and even beyond – is essential. the ability to reflect, and specifically to self-reflect, is a prerequisite to achieve this objective. a valid instrument that can help learners to regulate their personal learning process is the eportfolio (mcallister et al., 2008). barrett (2011, why e-portfolios?) defines eportfolio as “an electronic collection of evidence that shows your learning journey over time. portfolios can relate to specific academic fields or your lifelong learning. evidence may include writing samples, photos, videos, research projects, observations by mentors and peers, and/or reflective thinking. the key aspect of an e-portfolio is your reflection on the evidence, such as why it was chosen and what you learned from the process of developing your e-portfolio” so, the eportfolio as a tool can help students setting their goals individually, documenting their process by artefacts and notes, and reflecting on the progress, not only chronologically. if necessary, eportfolio allows students to adapt the learning strategies in a purposeful and flexible way. it also enables the users to collect, select and present outcomes of informal as well as formal learning activities. 1 the higher education framework act (hochschulrahmengesetz, 1999, § 2) defines continuing academic education, alongside research and teaching, as one of the main tasks of the universities. 218 even in teacher education life-long learning is a relevant component for their professional development. in german teacher education eportfolio programmes are mostly used during practical training. considering that teachers, during their career, have to deal both with fast changing generational and social requirements as well as with new teaching and learning methods, eportfolio – both as a concept and a tool – decisively contributes to the development of the capability of being a “reflective practitioner” (schön, 1983) which is particularly relevant to this profession. 3. using eportfolio at the university of konstanz: two case studies at the university of konstanz eportfolio is still relatively uncommon. two fields where it gains more importance are teacher education and academic further education. in the following, we will describe the use of the eportfolio in these two fields in detail. 3.1 eportfolio in teacher education (orientierungspraktikum) introduction since 20152 in the german state of baden-württemberg portfolio is an obligatory element in university’s teacher training study and, later on, in teaching practice. in a portfolio, students can document and reflect their professional development during all practical trainings (rahmenvo-km, 2015) in order to improve one’s pedagogical actions out of the combination of theoretical knowledge and practical behaviour. furthermore, the portfolio clearly highlights the relevance of the transition between the different training phases in the whole teacher education process. at the university of konstanz students have to keep an eportfolio in mahara during their first three weeks of internship (orientierungspraktikum) of their bachelor’s programme. the internship is the first significant opportunity for students to experience school from the perspective of an aspiring teacher. the reflective tasks are worked out within the eportfolio during this process to help the students in taking a conscious look at their future career and addressing the question about their study choice and their suitability for the job early on. implementation for the first time in the history of the establishment, due to the contact restrictions caused by the covid19 pandemic, in spring 2020 the university of konstanz had to shift in a very short time from face-to-face lectures to e-learning. the fully digital implementation, by consequence, affected the work with eportfolio in teaching education during the internship and within the modular supporting courses. the eportfolio supporting team, therefore, was forced to redesign the way of conducting portfolio work in a mahara group completely online: an agile and significantly easy-to-follow approach was needed. students were given practical guidance and easy access to work on the 2 in germany we have three phases in teacher education. at first you have to study five years at a university (1st phase). afterwards you have to complete one to one and a half years of teaching practice depending on the school type you will teach at (2nd phase). only after graduating from teaching practice you are a fully qualified teacher. the 3rd phase is the further education while you are teaching. https://www.mahara-bise-unikn.de/view/view.php?t=xixn5ubuob8csghgwva4 irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021 219 assigned tasks, enabling them to be more flexible to accomplish the reflective process in a distance learning situation. all relevant organisational information and all tasks (that have to be finished ahead of the internship) can be found on the mahara group homepage. it is a repository for those tasks, that provide students with basic knowledge about observation and reflective writing. every task is linked to a page or collection with further details and/or informative screencasts, and some of the units include exercises as well. for example, within the “unit no.4: eportfolio and reflective writing” (figure 1) the students are invited to first deal with theoretical input and, afterwards, to practice the knowledge acquired while watching a sequence of recorded lessons and, finally, to write down their reflections by guiding questions. templates for written reflection, which students have to copy and submit them in mahara as a proof of the accomplished self-report for the topic, are also provided. figure 1: learning units provided at the group homepage unlike in the past, when we would have been able to run a guided tour in the classroom with the students at the beginning of their internship, in these exceptional circumstances we had to choose a different approach. we stepped up the online support, set links to the specific topics and invited open discussions in the forum. this worked quite well. while being in school, the students had to work on reflective tasks, which were provided as templates at the group section “pages and collection” (figure 2) and submit them as a collection. 220 figure 2: templates for reflective tasks. each page contains one reflective task. during the self-regulated learning and writing process the students are usually supported by the lecturers, whom they can always ask for feedback. after completing the internship, students can discuss their experiences with peer students and share different perspectives with regards to their own personal development. in the approach adopted each student has: • to identify two fields of action, in which s/he has evolved, and underpin them with practical examples by creating a page and ask some peers for feedback; • to identify two additional fields of action, in which the student himself/herself still recognises a need for development, and formulate open questions based on practical examples. these questions shall be discussed within a forum in mahara; • to summarise which effects the discussion had on the student with regards to the further professional development in a prospective way. the use of eportfolio during the internship offers many benefits. the students can share their eportfolios not only with their lecturers, but also with their training teachers at the same time. this allows them to get a variety of feedback to learn from. furthermore, the eportfolio has to be continued during the following internships. because of the use of mahara the students have their eportfolio in one space. this makes it very easy for them to carry on with their professional development. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021 221 3.2. eportfolio in academic further education by the example of the part-time bachelor “motor-neurological rehabilitation” (b.sc.): a trial project. introduction the part-time bachelor of continuing education “motor-neurological rehabilitation” (b.sc.) offered by the academy of advanced studies (afww) at the university of konstanz addresses examined professionals with a completed vocational training and profound professional subject-related experience in the physiotherapy and ergotherapy. those therapists who want to update their knowledge with scientific skills on the basis of a theorypractice interlocking, can attend the modular blended-learning study programme developed in a close cooperation between the department of sport science of the university of konstanz and the kliniken schmieder, clinic for neurology and neurological rehabilitation. the afww became familiar with the concept of portfolio work within the framework of the project epass (eportfolio as a key system for lifelong learning) sponsored by the ministry of science, research and culture of baden-württemberg`s programme "teacher education in baden-württemberg”. moreover, as a member of the baden-württemberg portfolionetwork3, the academy recognises that some basic principles of the portfolio approach (even if primarily directed to the school sector) can be transferred to adult education. the first key aspect in this context is the “learner centric approach”, enabling participants to experience the process of collecting, reflecting on and showcasing skills and competences on a voluntary basis. the second relevant aspect for this target group is a practical one: we intend to provide support especially to those students who have difficulties with certain processes such as selforganisation, administration and archiving of collected or self-designed documents, meeting deadlines, and collaborative work for group assessments. thus, we decided to introduce the open source eportfolio-tool mahara – integrating it in the lms moodle system – as a trial project for the study programme starting on fall term 2020. implementation working with mahara is not anchored in the curriculum and it is not granted. therefore, it remains for students voluntary and, at the moment, merely a recommendation. nevertheless, we believe that the target group will benefit from the tool once they recognise the potential of some functionalities. in order to foster a high acceptance and provide strong motivation of usage, the eportfolio as a tool and as a concept will be presented from the user’s perspective. to counteract k.o. criteria such as “time-consuming”, “not meaningful”, “arduous and labour-intense” or “additional burden”, the design of a portfolio environment will intentionally be kept “lowthreshold”, that means: as tight as necessary and as open as possible. in our view, clear structure, easy manageability, goals’ transparency, and recognisable advantages are promising criteria for acceptance by users and successful transfer from theory to practice. the portfolio concept and its advantages will be presented to the students in an introductory lecture before the official programme starts. the students will be provided with practical information to facilitate familiarity, user friendliness and a fast handling and adoption of the tool right from the start: 3 the portfolio-network is an informal network of universities and institutions, located in the state of baden-württemberg, aiming at developing a concept for digitation and reinforcing a better acceptance of portfolio within educational cross-phases. https://afww.uni-konstanz.de/de/neuroreha/studieninhalte-studienplan-modul%c3%bcbersicht https://afww.uni-konstanz.de/en https://www.kliniken-schmieder.de/ https://www.bise.uni-konstanz.de/projekte/epass/ https://mwk.baden-wuerttemberg.de/de/hochschulen-studium/lehrerbildung/foerderprogramm-lehrerbildung/ https://mwk.baden-wuerttemberg.de/de/hochschulen-studium/lehrerbildung/foerderprogramm-lehrerbildung/ https://www.bise.uni-konstanz.de/projekte/epass/portfolio-netzwerk/ https://www.bise.uni-konstanz.de/projekte/epass/portfolio-netzwerk/ 222 • video tutorials as “quick-start” to get accustomed with the mahara environment • “how to” as step-by-step instruction (summarised in a view-collection in mahara) • examples for templates • faqs (sampled in moodle) • online support considering the programme structure, we suggest students use mahara preferably for each module, and particularly during the two practical phases (two supervised internships lasting from one week, up to two weeks), which will normally be integrated in the final dissertation. however, we do not expect that every student will make use of it in every part of the programme. the main functions below will particularly benefit students in their own learning processes, development and goals: • collection & organisation students collect "learning products" module by module and store them in mahara's file repository, which can be structured by directories and subdirectories with less effort • communication & peer-review students collect feedback from fellow students and benefit from a multi-perspective space (external perception) • reflection a learning journal "blog" for each learning product that is stored leads to self-assessment of the acquired competencies. moreover, allowing peers' external assessment before, during and after the creation of the learning products, creates valuable new insights • selection students can select the products that best demonstrate the achievement of their learning objectives (for assessment and/or presentation purposes) 4. conclusion challenges and conditions for success the challenging tasks for successful lifelong learning with eportfolio are firstly of strategic nature (financial, human, and technical resources) such as the intensive support of both learners and lecturers at the very beginning, and secondly of conceptual nature, for example in regards to the opportunities of its application (ziegelbauer et al. 2013). a lack of digital competencies, whether by learners or by lecturers, obviously requires support (workshops, technical introduction) but this is not really the major difficulty. a positive mind-set and acceptance, shared by most users, are crucial and lead significantly to success (shroff et al., 2011, ziegelbauer, 2016). all efforts to promote the benefits of the portfolio concept are necessary and relevant. clear specification on intention, purposes, meaningfulness and advantages are key determinants. in this case, objections concerning lack-of-time or disproportionate effort for supervision become superfluous within a rather short time. potential of eportfolio working with an eportfolio is an investment in people’s potential. when well supported and thoughtfully structured, it enables the display of learners’ potential alongside their own personal and professional curriculum. the ability to sample, (self-) reflect – in a constructive irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021 223 critical manner – and engage, encourages the willingness to assume a new perspective: a determinant aspect in nowadays lifelong learning approach. this is precisely the particular strength of the portfolio. it leads away from conventional, selective forms of performance determination and offers a presentation of performance over a longer period consistently geared to the learners' competences (häcker, 2007). without a doubt, eportfolio helps student teachers to gain a deeper understanding of the teaching contents and, therefore, to better perform in exams. though, portfolio, with its various possibilities, is more than a measurement tool of achievement: it reflects one’s "deep learning" in formal as well as in informal context. additionally, it improves the selfmarketing strategy of the users (digital career identity). considering that teachers in germany are mainly civil servants, we are quite confident that eportfolio might have good chances to be introduced in teacher’s in-service training too, and even more as an accompanying tool along teachers’ career pathway. surely, a legislative framework – which we are still waiting on – would facilitate and speed up implementation. the clear trend about the role of modern learners shifting “from consumer to producer” and the changing of educational reform goals definitively encourage a wider acceptance of eportfolio in academic further education. we are conscious that portfolio is not the perfect tool for everyone, but it is certainly a powerful one when wisely orchestrated. 224 references barrett, h. 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(eds.), handbook of self-regulation (13-39). cambridge: academic press. doi: 10.1016/b978-012109890-2/50031-7 https://www.wissenschaftsrat.de/download/2019/0418-19.pdf?__blob=publicationfile&v=2 https://www.wissenschaftsrat.de/download/2019/0418-19.pdf?__blob=publicationfile&v=2 eportfolio in teacher education and academic further education: a new learning journey experience at the university of konstanz, germany christine ziegelbauer*1 barbara d’errico2 1university of konstanz 2academy of advanced studies at the university of konstanz abstract 1. introduction 2. further academic education and lifelong learning in germany 3. using eportfolio at the university of konstanz: two case studies 3.1 eportfolio in teacher education (orientierungspraktikum) 3.2. eportfolio in academic further education by the example of the part-time bachelor “motor-neurological rehabilitation” (b.sc.): a trial project. 4. conclusion references irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 1 ‘lessons learnt’: the student view in the #vleireland project deirdre ryan, mary immaculate college, university of limerick angelica risquez, university of limerick abstract this paper offers an overview of general results and of longitudinal aspects of the data collected to date from student populations which generated from the #vleireland project. we argue how results shed light on common misconceptions around vle usage, and what vles can offer from a pedagogical perspective. building on previously published research results; this paper incorporates a total of 22 data collections, representing almost 24,000 responses, and deals with the general findings and some trends emerging from the data. overall results year on year have shown that vles are used frequently and increasingly by the respondents, but much remains to be done in order to incentivize their use to generate student engagement, and move beyond the use of vles as content repositories. while being mindful of the methodological limitations of survey methods relying on self-selection, the breadth and scale of the data gathered across thirteen institutions over a decade offers a degree of reliability, and we attempt to mount a strong challenge to some common myths around the use of vles in our discussion. 1. introduction the widespread investment in virtual learning environments (vles) by higher education institutions is often largely driven by political and contextual considerations, rather than by evidence of pedagogical impact. in order to inform the return on investment from vles from both an economic and learning perspective, it is crucial that patterns of actual user engagement by students and teachers are explored (naveh, tubin & pliskin, 2012). we know from our experience as academic developers that vles and similar online tools can be harnessed very successfully to facilitate pedagogical approaches that emphasize student engagement and teaching innovation. but we have also learned from our practice that we need to be cautious when making claims about the use and impact of the vle as a game changer. early research into the use of vles (blin & munro, 2008; mcgill & hobbs, 2008; sun, tsai, finger, chen & yeh, 2008) showed that vles are used, by and large, to facilitate ground-level pedagogical functions related to access and delivery of content, management of class administration and communications. irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 ryan, d. & risquez, a. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. d ryan & a risquez 2 broadly, this can be attributed to lecturers’ tendency to make incremental changes to their practice when faced with new technology (dutton, cheong & park, 2004; jenkins, browne & walker, 2005; kirkup & kirkwood, 2005). naveh et al. (2010) raise a critical voice and claim that “in fact, instructors can maintain their conservative teaching habits except for posting their course content on the website. from an organisational perspective, this can be done at low cost, yielding relatively high student satisfaction” (p. 132). however, much can be said about lecturers making incremental teaching improvements, as supposed to embracing disrupting change for change sake. also, it is true that sometimes, it is the simple things that can make a big difference and enable student learning. this paper draws on the responses from the last coordinated iteration of the #vleireland survey and compares these with previous trends in the data. the findings are discussed in terms of two common myths which center on attendance and the value of face-to-face teaching that are often cited by teaching and management staff about the use of vles. this paper provides evidence from the student perspective that may help to debunk these myths and add to the debate on the role of vles in the current teaching and learning landscape. 2. methods the results presented here are based on the survey of student attitudes and usage of vles that has been run for a decade in the irish higher education sector, which we came to term #vleireland. the survey instrument itself consisted of 20 questions, some of which had large numbers of sub-questions. the design incorporated a mix of yes/no and likert question styles, and a mix of positive and negative questions to avoid common survey design bias. in addition to the quantitative data, there were a number of open ended questions that enabled the respondents to provide a little more depth to their input. once coded, these responses provide a very useful qualitative addition and thus offer a greater degree of insight into the students’ perceptions and opinions. surveys were conducted online, with the survey instruments generally disseminated via email to the whole student cohort. this paper draws on a pool of 23,879 responses across 12 institutions, collated from 22 survey instances from early 2008 to 2015 (administrations have not been jointly coordinated since). it is to be noted however that response rates varied from institutions to institution, from 18% to as low as 4%. the limitations of the survey design are noted in the editorial to this special issue in some detail. nonetheless, we would argue that given the sheer breadth and scale of the data gathered across the large number of institutions, the data and resultant discussion has a degree of reliability, and certainly constitutes the largest dataset related to technology enhanced learning in the country. results reported in this paper showcase the most recent set of cross-institutional results collected in 2015, with reference to differences found in earlier administrations of the survey. their interpretation is enriched and informed by previous publications, the results and insights of which are also reported in this paper (risquez et al., 2013a; risquez et al., 2013b; cosgrave et al., 2013). 3. results/findings overall results year on year have shown that vles are used frequently and increasingly by the respondents: the proportion of students reporting that they accessed their system daily or a few times a week has increased from about 77% in 2008/09 to 94% in the 2015 administration. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 3 the utility of the vle as a content distribution platform for curating and distributing teaching material has been evident year on year. as seen in figure 1, a substantial proportion of students also report using the vle for submitting assignments, which is probably associated with increasing adaptation of plagiarism detection systems like turnitin or safeassign, which are often integrated with the vle. however, the data suggests that vle's have not yet become a widespread platform for more complex activities like online discussions or quizzes. the use of discussion forums has remained typically low, which may reflect the fact that moderating a discussion forum requires more input from the lecturer, and the resulting decrease in engagement might reflect increasing time pressures on teaching staff. figure 1. if you use the vle, why? what are the benefits to you? (2015) 3.1 accessibility and flexibility about three quarters of the students (74%) reported that the vle helped to make their lecturers more accessible to them, with 28% reporting that they were more likely to communicate with their lecturer using the vle. on occasions, the vle provides a choice of communication for students unwilling or unable to communicate with lecturers in class. obviously, increased class sizes bring more relevance for the need of such open, class based communication in larger classes, and it is a significant and overlooked benefit of the vle as an ‘open office door’ for students to engage with their lecturers. about 45% of respondents felt that the vle changed the hours they could study. this was corroborated by a large proportion of students who reported accessing the vle from home (86%) and outside of ‘normal’ working hours (44% accessed the systems after 6pm and before 9am). part time, mature and distance learners reap the benefits of enhanced flexibility of study time and location, obviously. one of the major trend changes during the longitudinal administration of this survey has been related to the very substantial increase in the reported use of mobile devices, with the d ryan & a risquez 4 flexibility they afford for vle use, and blended learning in general. a growing 43% of 2015 respondents reported using a mobile device to access the vle, compared with only 3% in 2008/09. in the meantime, laptop use has decreased by 10% during the same period from around 39.6% in early administrations. the questions around the use of mobile devices have been reviewed over the course of the research project to reflect the changing nature of device usage (for a more detailed exploration of its implications in greater detail, see raftery (2018) in this issue). finally, it should also be noted that the proportion of students who either strongly agree or agree with the statement “i can get help and support with the vle” has changed little along the life of the survey. 3.2 usage issues poor, inconsistent or non-usage of the vle by lecturers emerged as a key issue in the open ended questions. of the vle’s users, the vast majority identified improved lecturer usage as the most important improvement they would like to see. students recommend some conventions around file naming; files provided in consistent and accessible formats; making resources available in a timely manner; and updating resources. simply putting up notes and/or links to other material and leaving that on the vle indefinitely is frustrating to students, as one student noted: sometimes the lecturers put up too many notes … so it's harder to find the relevant material and to make sense of all the extra writing/diagrams etc. students welcome straightforward, comprehensive and consistent basic usage, which obviates the need for all staff to master basic vle management skills. this being said, we observe that good progress is being made as 63% of students agree or strongly agree that their lecturers make good use of the vle in 2015 (figure 2), compared to 42% in 2008/09, so in general, the data seems to indicate that we are moving into a late majority, away from early adopters. figure 2. my lecturers make good use of the vle (2015) irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 5 when asked what deterred them from using the vle, lack of use by lecturers (23.8%) was by large the most common barrier to use identified. students clearly would like their lecturers to make more use of the vle (in 2015, 66% agree or strongly agree with this statement) as seen in figure 3. this could be seen as a maturity of use of the system: as lecturers overwhelmingly are using the vle now, students are increasingly focusing on the quality of this usage. figure 3. i would like my lecturers to make more use of the vle (2015) the student voice states a clear disagreement with the association of vle use with class disengagement: results from the full dataset indicate that 88% of students disagree or strongly disagree with the statement that ‘getting notes on the vle makes me less likely to go to lectures’. figure 4. getting notes on the vle makes me less likely to go to lectures (2015) indeed, the learning advantages of facilitating access to lecture notes prior to class time is reported in open ended questions throughout the dataset as being one of the most positive d ryan & a risquez 6 effects of using a vle on student learning. in this vein, analysis of the whole dataset showed that 73% of respondents felt that using the vle helped to clarify what was covered in class, 63% indicated that it made it easier for them to learn, and 41% expressed the opinion that it helped them to understand how well they were doing. if used properly, especially when using a well thought out ‘flipped classroom’ approach, the vle can promote a more meaningful engagement during class time as this student expressed: ..it just makes the lecture easier to understand when you have it on paper, then in the lecture you can focus on what the lecturer is saying, rather than scribbling the notes down. 4. discussion it has been long expected that vles would be a means to helping students engage with each other and with their lecturers. this expectation has been largely revised in the current landscape dominated by social media, but still, the vle retains an important role to play as the institutional supported, password protected, class enrolment based solution for teaching and learning. many pockets of good teaching practice that make the most of the vle features to encourage student engagement exist, but these are substantially more demanding of lecturer time than uploading class handouts and resources. using the discussion forums in a constructive way to foster engagement, or using quizzes as formative assessment tools require more complex planning and pose an additional workload on the teacher. time and the lack thereof are examined in mcavinia, ryan and moloney (2018) later in this special issue. student reports have supported that there is potential for making more and better use of the vle to bridge the online communication gap between teachers and students, supporting class based interaction. these findings suggest a model of vle usage as being a platform for the solution of existing problems. lecturers have used it to solve the 'paper mountain' problem of disseminating material to students, and in tandem are using it to address the reverse problem of managing and grading submitted work, using the technology to solve conventional teaching management problems. while being mindful of the methodological limitations of survey methods relying on selfselection, and its potential impact on survey results, we would argue that given the sheer breadth and scale of the data gathered across the large number of institutions over seven years, that the data and resultant discussion has a degree of reliability and we can safely attempt to mount a strong challenge to two common myths around the use of vles. 4.1 using a vle will decrease my class attendance vles are commonly misunderstood as a mere content distribution solution that adds nothing to the actual learning process. the students’ perceptions we have collected show disagreement with this and suggest that, in general, the use of a vle adds value over and above content dissemination. during our daily educational development practice, academics often attribute vle use to the attendance crisis. the results reported by farrelly, raftery and harding (2018) in this special issue regarding the barriers to vle use reported by staff also go in this direction. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 7 their concern is that students will not be motivated to show up for class if notes and course materials are available online. this assumes, of course, that the main take-away from class attendance consists of information and information only, which has been strongly contradicted by our data. we have also learnt that while the availability of notes on the vle is not in itself a deterrent to attending class, it can be regarded by students as a means of compensating for non-attendance when this happens. non-attendance may be due to a range of factors, including illness or injury, part-time or full-time working, childcare arrangements and conflicting deadlines for coursework. indeed, increasingly diverse student populations, balancing life and study demands, hugely benefit from having access to educational materials and use these as a safety net. the false vle-nonattendance attribution needs to be studied more broadly and to think of student motivation in real terms, as in the insight offered by this student: sometimes lecturers don't use it to its full potential…some are reluctant to put lecture notes up in the flawed attempt to make people come to class but if people don't want to be there they just won't come either way 4.2 if everything happens online, the face to face teaching will be redundant from the previous discussion follows another widely held misconception that, perhaps surprisingly, persists to this date: some educators fear that the progressive adoption of online learning approaches threatens their own professional identity and their relevance within the learning process. this is understandable amidst increased workloads and class sizes, concerns for job stability, intellectual property and growing accountability. a more productive debate can however be raised around what constitutes productive use of student time while attending class. online and face-to-face teaching are not mutually exclusive; on the contrary, there is huge potential to blend them creatively. the widespread availability and support of an institutional vle can lower the access barrier for many teaching staff with a reasonable learning curve, and provide a quick win-win solution. overall, the data year on year tells a consistent story: the satisfaction of student use of vle is intrinsically associated to the quality and quantity of the educational design invested in the first instance. this seems to indicate that, despite vle usage tending to be highly focused on the content dissemination function, its use can help learners as a reliable, definitive curated repository of course material. it can be seen as a ‘one stop shop’ students can refer to at any time to access material before or after class times, allowing the teacher, and not the content, to be a the center of the learning process. 5. conclusion the results summarized in this paper support the general view of the literature that vles prime function remains being an online repository. however, the importance of facilitating access to educational resources should not be underestimated, as clearly supported by the views that students have widely expressed. we must not forget that many faculty do not feel at home with online tools and that providing a user-friendly, non-technical, flexible and effective solution for content curation enables them to surmount some access barriers. given increased pressures on teaching staff to deliver on the teaching, research and administration fronts, there is a lot to be said about reaping the low hanging fruit. during our practice we have however found that, while faculty often approach the vle to upload content, this often d ryan & a risquez 8 leads to more creative uses including plagiarism prevention, faculty and peer interaction, more efficient feedback on learning, using learning analytics to monitor student retention at the early stages, and so on. despite this, quite often we may become over-obsessed with the failed promises from the literature that did not seem to materialise, and we need to conciliate with the reality that, instead, the vle is facilitating very effectively other -alsonecessary functions. clearly, if an all-mighty policy maker (we don’t see many of those too often though) was to decide to switch off vles suddenly, the disruption to the normal functioning of teaching and learning at the grass-roots would be huge. in the many conversations that have taken place around this research project, we have often referred to the potential of vles to metaphorically serve as a ‘trojan horse’ to many other pedagogical developments in expected and unexpected ways. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 9 references blin, f. & munro, m. (2008). why hasn’t technology disrupted academics’ teaching practices? understanding resistance to change through the lens of activity theory. computers & education, 50(2), 475-490. cosgrave, r., costello, e., risquez, a., raftery, d., logan-phelan, t., harding, n., palmer, m., mcavinia, c., & farrelly, t. (2013). evolution of the vle in irish higher education: the student perspective. paper presented to the european association of distance teaching universities (eadtu) conference 2013. october 23rd-24th 2013. paris, france. dutton, w. h., cheong, p. h. & park, a. (2004). an ecology of constraints on e-learning in higher education: the case of a virtual learning environment. prometheus, 22(2), 131-149. farrelly, t., raftery, d. & harding, n. (2018). exploring lecturer engagement with the vle: findings from a multi-college staff survey. [special issue, mcavinia & risquez]. irish journal of technology enhanced learning, 3(2), 11-23. jenkins, m., browne, t. & walker, r. (2005) vle surveys: a longitudinal perspective between march 2001, march 2003 and march 2005 for higher education in the united kingdom., 30, oxford, england: universities and colleges information systems association (uk). kirkup, g. & kirkwood, a. (2005). information and communications technologies (ict) in higher education teaching—a tale of gradualism rather than revolution. learning, media and technology, 30(2), 185-199. mcavinia, c., ryan, d. & moloney, d. (2018). "i don’t have the time!" analysing talk of time in lecturers’ use of the vle. [special issue, mcavinia & risquez]. irish journal of technology enhanced learning, 3(2), 35-46. mcgill, t. j. & hobbs, v. j. (2008). how students and instructors using a virtual learning environment perceive the fit between technology and task. journal of computer assisted learning, 24(3), 191-202. naveh, g., tubin, d. & pliskin, n. 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(2013a). an investigation of students' experiences of using virtual learning environments: implications for adacemic professional development. in c. o'farrell d ryan & a risquez 10 & a. farrell (eds.). emerging issues in higher education iii: from capacity building to sustainability, dublin: educational developers in ireland network, 99-113. risquez, a., mcavinia, c., raftery, d., costello, e., o’riordan, f., palmer, m., harding, n., cosgrave, r., logan-phelan, t., & farrelly, t. (2013b). engaging students through the vle: findings from the vle usage survey 2008-2013. 6th annual learning innovation conference: sustainable models of student engagement – rhetoric or achievable? aisling hotel dublin, 17 october 2013. sun, p.-c., tsai, r. j., finger, g., chen, y.-y. & yeh, d. (2008). what drives a successful elearning? an empirical investigation of the critical factors influencing learner satisfaction. computers & education, 50(4), 1183-1202. irish journal of technology enhanced learning editorial: there's an ai for that: rhetoric, reality, and reflections on edtech in the dawn of genai fiona concannon* 1 eamon costello 2 orna farrell 3 tom farrelly 4 leigh graves wolf 5 1 university of galway 2 dublin city university 3dublin city university 4munster technological university 5university college dublin 1. introduction in recent months, the educators and higher education institutions have responded with concern, critique, and hope, to the rise of generative artificial intelligence (ai)’s unregulated and mounting influence. following the period of emergency remote teaching, and the great ‘snapback’ (jandrić et al., 2022), yet another new concern has emerged, promising to revolutionise education, or threaten its existence. the gravity of the situation has reverberated across the system, as wizardry of predictive pattern recognition fundamentally threatens the validity of long-held practices of summative assessments including essays, and online quizzes. this latest quandary/crisis shows no sign of abating, as venture capitalist funding and language modelling datasets grow. the technology becomes more deeply integrated into word processing, and cloud-based applications through which much of our academic labour is conducted. understanding and conceptualising new technology within education has long been a necessity, as we wrestle with wrangling tools into our human interactions. higher education’s relationship with edtech has always been characterised by a cyclical response to disruptive external influences of evolving technology, whose recent developments are often underpinned by neoliberal values of competition, efficiency, market-based solutions, and the privatisation of software platforms. recent large language model developments are proving no different, with deregulation and the free market serving as the impetus to design and create such tools. across higher education, educators scramble to decode the genai black box, deciphering hallucinations, confabulations, and smooth outputs indistinguishable from original student work. policy responses range along a continuum of ban or embrace. new ai literacies are being woven into curricula, as change continues apace. 2023 marks a year of existential crisis precipitated by a global pandemic, followed by geopolitical events and a fatigue from the continual adaptation to a new normal. even within, we are constantly shaping our educational systems. that pull is in many different directions – to accredit, to certify, to help learners become, to socialise, to emancipate, to measure to meet very diverse purposes and aims. the politics and power structures inherent in our system further affect our response (kuhn et al., 2023). irish journal of technology enhanced learning while the potential of ai chatbots based on natural language processing models is undeniable, it is crucial to discern the reality from the hype and to better understand how our actions and responses are shaping our educational systems in this evolving domain. this editorial examines this dilemma further, to consider the impact on our scholarship of teaching and learning and how we as a community of researchers and educators respond. 2. educators lived experiences with edtech vs the hype of technosolutionism what is the reality of teaching with technology in irish higher education? the lived experience in our classrooms, whether on campus or online, differs significantly from the lean, flat, and well-resourced organisational model of the san francisco-based start-up that develops solutions designed to enhance learning within our public institutions. significant challenges arise from a lack of core government funding, precarious teaching contacts and inadequate infrastructure for teaching both within the built environment and in the digital. students’ financial burdens from working long hours worsen these difficulties. moreover, the pandemic shift to rapid remote, and subsequent haphazard decisions to retain online, blended or on-campus modes of learning, specific assessment practices and academic integrity responses reveal how crucial reliable evidence to inform digital education is, balancing the needs of stakeholders, and keeping the purpose and aims of education firmly in sight. walking into a classroom, educators face physical constraints with room layout and seating (selwyn, 2023); technical challenges with network access, wi-fi, authentication, and gdprcompliant platforms; audiovisual arrangements with microphones, venue cameras, room lighting, and multiple projector connectors to further augment the complexity, even before one begins to use a presentation application, or an accompanying audience polling tool. all these physical and technical arrangements, albeit necessary to support a range of demands, result in an environment where teaching is subject to numerous potential incompatibilities, glitches, and breakdowns. research by littlejohn (2023) and others illustrated the reality of the limited and problematic access to appropriate technology for teaching that were brought into plain sight during the pandemic and beyond in hyflex scenarios, for both teaching staff and also with regard to students (buckley et al., 2021; cullinan et al., 2021; gourlay et al., 2021; ó súilleabháin et al., 2022). however, these problems in the use of edtech existed even before the pandemic. henderson et al. (2017) in their analysis from a large survey of student practice noted that “university educators perhaps need to temper enthusiasms for what might be achieved through technology-enabled learning and develop better understandings of the realities of students’ encounters with digital technology.” (p. 1567). even beyond the physical classroom, over the last decade big edtech providers or smaller startups have become deeply embedded into the university’s core operations. systems and platforms from vles to moocs, interactive polling software, application, and data tenancies, learning analytics and plagiarism detection software, amongst the data infrastructure of student information systems, have become central. as these shift to cloudhosted software-as-service choices, there is less opportunity to opt out of upgrades, or new features, and the direct decisions of these external companies, including those relating to the incorporating generative ai. in fact, a very recent report by unesco (2023) found that “good, impartial evidence on the impact of education technology is in short supply….a lot of the evidence comes from those trying to sell it” (p.5). irish journal of technology enhanced learning this is also true research on the efficacy of ai in education (holmes & tuomi, 2022). ai in education, like edtech, has a long history of “bullshit” or discourse that is effusive while managing to say very little about what actually works (selwyn, 2016; costello, 2023). ai may be just another layer, albeit a deeply pervasive one of technology in education that we need to learn to live with that may prove as confusing as it is ever useful. thus, the ideal of the digital university for efficient and flexible teaching clashes with the challenges educators face. the reality of teaching with technology in higher education is far from a utopian ideal, with educators facing numerous complexities and constraints in adapting these digital tools in their on-campus and online teaching spaces, for various ends. 3. our sensemaking new ai as the current phase given how far the lived reality of the digital campus is from what is sold as the dream, what collective responses are possible in the face of fast-changing technology developments such as genai? higher education must now step up and address a “dramatic lack of critical reflection of the pedagogical and ethical implications as well as risks of implementing ai applications in higher education” (zawacki-richter et. al., 2019, p. 21). as it is almost impossible to keep up with evolving technology and new tools in the genai space, the logical approach would be to focus on developing educators and students' critical skills, attitudes, and competencies. three areas that we as a community need to focus on to address the challenge of genai: 1. critical ai literacy 2. ethical use and integration of technology such as genai in education 3. re-imaging assessment design. critical ai literacy it is clear that educators and students need to develop critical ai literacy… and fast. one model of ai literacy developed by southworth & migliaccio (2023), which describes four ai literacy types in the context of curriculum design: 1. knowing and understanding ai 2. using and applying ai, 3. evaluating and creating ai 4. ai ethics another interesting approach to critical ai literacy is taken by the civics of technology group called “asking technoskeptical questions about chatgpt'', this encourages educators and students to ask critical questions about technology (civics of technology, 2023). literacy in this context is not only an ability to engage, but also to resist or build in opportunities for a negotiation or discussion on the issues raised. ethical use universities need to develop clear policies on the ethical use of genai. from a policy point of view, there has been a swift reaction to genai at national, european, and global level. in ireland, the quality and qualification agency (qqi) issued broad advice for tertiary education providers on genai in the context of assessment and academic integrity in march irish journal of technology enhanced learning 2023 (qqi, 2023). the qqi led a sectoral response across irish higher education institutions, and sought to connect to others in australia, canada, and across europe, also focused on reacting to the impact of ai on assessment designs (qqi, 2023). in europe, the european network for academic integrity (enai) published very useful recommendations on the ethical use of artificial intelligence in education in may 2023 (foltynek et al., 2023). at the global level, unesco (2023) published a simple guide for educators called chatgpt and artificial intelligence in higher education: quick start guide in april 2023. for a sector that usually moves slowly, the response on a higher education policy level to genai was very swift, but will this talk translate into action? integration faced with the option to ban or embrace genai, it seems like integration is the most likely approach for universities because detection does not work. although, integration should be done in the context of agreed policies and underpinned by ethical frameworks. genai has the potential to enrich and encourage creativity, innovation, and experimentation in our academic communities, therefore integrating it into our teaching, learning and assessment makes sense. one such example is the crowdsourced open access book called 101 creative ideas to use ai in education (nerantzi et. al., 2023) which aims to give educators and students creative ways of integrating genai into their practice. the development of such approaches can involve online communities that cross institutional and disciplinary boundaries; via social media, email groups, public annotation; that enable online spaces for educators to sketch early, rough ideas and practices and reflectively iterate them to facilitate crowdsourced curation of resources and learning materials (mills, bali & eaton, 2023). crucially, such approaches will also involve conversations with students as core building blocks. re-imaging higher education assessment a reinvention of higher education assessment is long overdue (farrell et al., 2021). the emergence of generative artificial intelligence (ai) tools such as chatgpt, elicit, ia writer, marmof, botowski and dall-e amongst others, pose a challenge to the academic integrity of traditional higher education assessment approaches (bozkurt, et al., 2023; glesson, 2022). however, this challenge is also an opportunity to innovate and evolve higher education assessment to be more authentic, creative, and inclusive. the solution is a major focus on higher education assessment design, but this requires institutional resources, time, leadership and buy-in (o’neill & padden, 2021). will universities rise to this challenge? 4. visions of “hope punk” futures we need to reflect on the lessons we have learned from our response during and since the covid-19 pandemic and the current genai panic. we need to move away from the reactive pedagogy of crisis toward a more agentic, measured and evidence-based approach, grounded in hope, care and ethics. taking a critical mindset when evaluating the skeletons of edtech, old and new. we need to put people at the centre of our design, focus on the human and humane elements of education. we need to engage with new challenges and technologies by holding onto our values, weaving ethical frameworks, openness, and equity through the fabric of our research and practice. in 2023 it is all too easy to fall into the trap of using the terms post-covid, post-digital but we would suggest that are a little too trite as if to say that we irish journal of technology enhanced learning have crossed a highly debatable invisible line of demarcation into a post ‘something’ era. instead, we are responding to toft nørgård’s call at eden 23 to adopt a “hope punk” mindset (eden digital learning europe, 2023). this mindset asks us all to consider that when ideating our education futures fighting for positive change, radical kindness, and a communal response to challenges; designing learning experiences for what we desire them to be rather than in response to (yet) another crisis. we look forward to future contributions to the irish journal of technology enhanced learning that share answers that our community of scholars are reflecting on as we navigate the continually evolving terrain of edtech. 5. about this issue there are six articles in this issue, spanning research and practice, which pull common threads from many of the topics and themes in the editorial above. collectively, the articles present a wide range of stakeholder perspectives. michael flavin’s “i kind of feel resigned to the fact”: a foucauldian perspective on data privacy and social media presents the findings of a study analysing the extent to which social media users accept their loss of privacy. framing the results through a foucauldian lens presents a unique contribution to the literature. while discussion boards are now deeply embedded into online community experiences, there are still many under researched areas of their implementation. in the research study “how are you getting on? “evaluating discussion boards as assessment for social care work-based placement, karolyn mcdonnell presents the results of a pre-covid inquiry providing insight and advice for reflective practice in social care work-based placement settings. in the study covid, campus, cameras, communication, and connection, jasmine price, donna lanclos, and lawrie phipps explore the lived “back to campus” experiences of students as they (re)transitioned from the digital to the physical campus. the article presents implications for institutions, students, and staff. a case study of computer science lecturer’s selection and use of digital tools in an irish technological university by michael gleeson uses activity theory to explore the lived pedagogical experiences of computer science lecturers and how their selection and use of digital tools may unintentionally contribute to “digital tool sprawl.” in another pedagogically focused inquiry, karen taylor presents an investigation into the student experience in a hidden benefit in the covid-19 pandemic: rethinking physical geography pedagogy in higher education using a flipped classroom approach. this study provides further evidence for moving away from traditional lecture-based approaches in large classes and provides a model for fostering an interactive and dynamic educational experience. finally, in applied gamification using virtual escape rooms: case studies in entrepreneurial and anatomy classes, roisin lyons, eva marie sweeney, and ciara lynch share a practice report on the use of escape rooms. this detailed report can serve as a mentor text for others who wish to explore the use of escape rooms or other game-based learning approaches in the classroom. irish journal of technology enhanced learning references bozkurt, a., xiao, j., lambert, s., pazurek, a., crompton, h., koseoglu, s., farrow, r., bond, m., nerantzi, c., honeychurch, s., bali, m., dron, j., mir, k., stewart, b., costello, e., mason, j., stracke, c., romero-hall, e., koutropoulos, a., . . . jandrić, p. 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(2022). teaching in the age of covid-19—the new normal. postdigital science and education, 4(3), 877-1015. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-022-00332-1 kuhn, c., khoo, s.-m., czerniewicz, l., lilley, w., bute, s., crean, a., abegglen, s., burns, t., sinfield, s., jandrić, p., knox, j., & mackenzie, a. (2023). understanding digital inequality: a theoretical kaleidoscope. postdigital science and education. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-023-00395-8 littlejohn, a. (2023). transforming educators’ practice: how university educators learned to teach online from home during the covid-19 pandemic. higher education research & development, 42(2), 366-381. https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2022.2073982 mills, a., bali, m., & eaton, l. (2023). how do we respond to generative ai in education? open educational practices give us a framework for an ongoing process. journal of applied learning and teaching, 6(1). https://doi.org/10.37074/jalt.2023.6.1.34 nerantzi, c., abegglen, m.k., & martínez-arboleda, a. (eds.). (2023). 101 creative ideas to use ai in education. a collection curated by #creativehe. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8072950 ó súilleabháin, g., farrelly, t., & lacey, s. (2022). dataset on student experiences and perceptions of emergency remote teaching (ert) in an irish university. data in brief, 41, 107954-107954. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dib.2022.107954 o’neill, g., padden, l., (2021). diversifying assessment methods: barriers, benefits and enablers. innovations in education and teaching international. 59(4), 398-409. https://doiorg.dcu.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/14703297.2021.1880462 selwyn, n. (2016). minding our language: why education and technology is full of bullshit… and what might be done about it. learning, media, and technology, 41(3), 437-443. https://doi.org/10.1080/17439884.2015.1012523. selwyn, n. (2023). the modern classroom chair: exploring the ‘coercive design’ of contemporary schooling. power and education, 17577438231163043. https://doi.org/10.1177/17577438231163043 qqi. (2023, march). advice on artificial intelligence in education and training. https://www.qqi.ie/news/advice-on-artificial-intelligence-in-education-and-training unesco. (2023). global education monitoring report summary: technology in education: a tool on whose terms? https://www.unesco.org/gem-report/en/technology unesco. (2023). chatgpt and artificial intelligence in higher education: quick start guide https://www.iesalc.unesco.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/chatgpt-and-artificialintelligence-in-higher-education-quick-start-guide_en_final.pdf zawacki-richter, o., marín, v. i., bond, m., & gouverneur, f. (2019). systematic review of research on artificial intelligence applications in higher education–where are the educators?. international journal of educational technology in higher education, 16(1), 1-27. https://doi.org/10.1186/s41239-019-0171-0 https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-022-00332-1 https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-022-00332-1 https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-023-00395-8 https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-023-00395-8 https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2022.2073982 https://doi.org/10.37074/jalt.2023.6.1.34 https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8072950 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dib.2022.107954 https://doi-org.dcu.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/14703297.2021.1880462 https://doi-org.dcu.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/14703297.2021.1880462 https://doi.org/10.1177/17577438231163043 https://doi.org/10.1177/17577438231163043 https://www.qqi.ie/news/advice-on-artificial-intelligence-in-education-and-training https://www.unesco.org/gem-report/en/technology https://www.iesalc.unesco.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/chatgpt-and-artificial-intelligence-in-higher-education-quick-start-guide_en_final.pdf https://www.iesalc.unesco.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/chatgpt-and-artificial-intelligence-in-higher-education-quick-start-guide_en_final.pdf https://doi.org/10.1186/s41239-019-0171-0 editorial: there's an ai for that: rhetoric, reality, and reflections on edtech in the dawn of genai 1 university of galway 2 dublin city university 3dublin city university 4munster technological university 5university college dublin 1. introduction 3. our sensemaking new ai as the current phase critical ai literacy ethical use integration a reinvention of higher education assessment is long overdue (farrell et al., 2021). the emergence of generative artificial intelligence (ai) tools such as chatgpt, elicit, ia writer, marmof, botowski and dall-e amongst others, pose a challenge to the... 4. visions of “hope punk” futures 5. about this issue references irish journal of technology enhanced learning “how are you getting on?” evaluating discussion boards as assessment for social care work-based placement * karolyn mcdonnell *1 1south east technological university abstract this research evaluates the use of asynchronous online discussion boards for assessing workbased placement in a social care degree programme. owing to a scarcity of educational technologies in the programme at the time (pre-covid), discussion boards were introduced to assess students' reflections on placement experiences. one objective was to facilitate knowledge transfer: sharing their experiences of placement might prompt a stronger understanding of applying professional competencies required for the role. another was to enable peer-learning, reflection and peer feedback to take place. . staff (instructors) and students’ attitudes were explored to identify the acceptability of using discussion boards for work-based placement. the components of discussion boards for this purpose are identified, and the considerations to be made when implementing discussion boards to support the development of reflection skills are presented. using a mixed methods sequential complementarity research design, two student focus groups were held following the distribution of an online survey. four instructors were interviewed about their attitudes and experience of using the boards for the first time. finally, a code adapted from henri’s (1992) computer mediated conferencing framework and kolb’s (1984) learning cycle was created to analyse the types of reflectivity and depth of interactivity within the group discussions. whilst discussion boards are a useful platform to facilitate student to student conversation, their use in this instance fell short of maximising their potential to achieve the learning objectives and to foster substantive and meaningful learning. students found the interface cumbersome and unappealing and there was a lack of consistency with instructor’s provision of feedback where one instructor admitted providing none. despite this, four components of discussion boards were identified and key considerations when using discussion boards to encourage reflective activity in social care work-based placement are proposed and discussed. 1. introduction students must demonstrate proficiency in eighty listed threshold standards to be deemed competent to enter the professional social care register (coru, 2017). digital literacy skills, communication technologies (coru, 2017, p.6), and the ability to evaluate and reflect critically on one’s own professional practice (coru, 2017, p.8) are included in the listed standards. the data reported here is part of a broader study. a summation of some literature focusing on communication, engagement and reflection using discussion boards is presented, the methodology is described, and some of the most salient findings from the evaluation are discussed in efforts to support future iterations of this assessment in a similar context, with recommendations emerging for instructors and students. 2 1.1 communication and constructivism social care scholarship draws from the socio-constructivist theory of learning posited by vygotsky (1978) who stressed the fundamental role of interaction to cognition and learning development. social interaction is vital to the learning process providing ‘a means for students to view topics from multiple perspectives and enhance their critical thinking and problem-solving skills’ (hurst et al., 2013, p.390). bates (2005) proffered a distinction between participatory activities in the online environment by categorising the social component as activities between two or more stakeholders, and the cognitive component as between the learner and the task activity. participation in an online domain can be a perfunctory activity. logging in and providing intermittent, cursory commentary for example merely confirms the learner’s attendance and suggests attention to the task or activity at hand: the quality of the learner’s engagement remains ambiguous (douglas et al., 2020). the moderator’s key function is to oversee and facilitate communication in online discussions. their behaviour and interaction with discussants have the biggest impact on whether the discussion achieves what it sets out to achieve (donnelly and gardner, 2011; loncar et al., 2014). loncar et al., (2014) state that ‘an un-mediated, uncontrolled, or unfacilitated discussion will likely not result in an ‘effective’ discussion, learning, or knowledge construction’ (loncar et al., 2014, p.98). moderator absence has a profound influence on students’ engagement with and perceptions of the usefulness of the discussion. moderation is crucial to keep topics and engagement focused as well as helping students acclimate to the online environment and participate productively. indeed salmon (2003) describes the moderator as a social host, where xie et al., (2018) suggest they serve a leadership role, emphasising its significance within social constructivism theory. 1.2 factors of engagement guidance and technical support are essential to foster an integrative online community. the actions of the moderator inextricably influence the students’ engagement with and experience within the discussion. instructors often struggle with their moderator role to promote and develop a lively and productive online discussion (de lima et al., 2019). salmon (2014) devised a five-stage model highlighting the moderators’ tasks in online discussions. ease of accessibility to a device, the platform and systems and wi-fi increases users’ motivation to engage online. following this, effective moderation involves providing induction, prompting social exchanges, facilitating the discussions, and querying and supporting users’ conclusions (salmon, 2014). grade provision also affects how students engage and participate in online discussions. ransdell et al., (2018) warn that ungraded boards will not attract any appeal for learners. in cognate health related disciplines, polarising results emerge from studies exploring discussion boards as an augmented learning activity. whilst caldarola (2014) and giacumo et al., (2013) concluded that there was no improvement in student’s final grades correlating to their irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 discussion board activities, taradi and taradi (2004) found their students earned higher mean grades, suggesting that substantive learning from discussion boards is entirely subjective and influenced by a myriad of factors. to encourage engagement with feedback, kuepper-tetzel and gardner (2021) propose withholding grade: students are more likely to re-read their submissions, engage with feedback and recognise their own strengths and areas for development if grade is not their focus. kohn (1994) questioned the reciprocal enterprise of graded assessment, impelling a student to perform based on their desire for validation, rather than fostering a learning mindset. they argue that timely and actionable feedback is inherently more useful to encourage students’ acquisition of self-determination, motivation and confidence, supporting learners to reach their full academic potential (wormeli, 2006; deci et al., 2011). 1.3 reflection learning to reflect on professional practice is learning how to learn from practice experiences. social care students must demonstrate their ability to evaluate their development as a professional using critical reflection on real-world experiences, encompassing their positionality, life experiences, biases and personal values (coru, 2017). assessing reflection continues to be a challenging undertaking in higher education. a key argument led by ixer (1999), russell (2013) and yip (2005), has produced contrasting discourse centring on the indeterminate power differential that can exist between staff and students. ixer suggests as a practice, its integrity is compromised because of this power imbalance, stating the ‘harm’ of assessing ‘vulnerable learners who do not happen to fit into the assessors' own ideas of what they believe reflective learning to be’ (ixer, 1999, p.514). staff with poorly formed conceptions of reflection are ill equipped to assess what constitutes ‘good’ reflection. a sentiment shared amongst a select few academics, russell (2013) advances the argument that those who do not engage in systematic reflective practice are not well placed to teach and assess it. yip (2005) emphasises the self-involved nature of reflection and it is potential to trigger uncomfortable feelings and deep-seated emotions, warning against the ‘highly destructive’ practice of exploring these emotions under inappropriate conditions in an oppressive environment, for example, or to a highly critical supervisor. (yip, 2005, p.785) similarly, students bearing unresolved trauma or a negative self-image may internalise critical comments from an unsympathetic or untrained assessor. sumsion and fleet (1996), similarly documented the limited availability of an impartial instrument to measure or assess reflection in learners. in 2000 however, kember et al., devised a four-scale measurement which has been deemed robust and rigorous within the academic community and has been reliably used in a number of studies, lucas et al., (2006), tsingos et al., (2015) and perkowska-klejman and odrowaz-coates, (2019) for example. this measurement might well reduce ambiguity for instructors and address the arguments mentioned by asking respondents to selfassess their development of reflective thinking under four domains: habitual action, recognition, reflection and critical reflection (kember et al., 2000). 4 2. methodology a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods in a sequential complementarity approach was used for this investigation. the data comprised of the results of an online survey (n=34), and feedback from two social care student focus groups (n=6 each). the survey was devised from kember et al’s., (2000) questionnaire for reflective thinking. four instructor interviews and the focus group transcripts were thematised and categorised using braun and clarkes (2012) thematic analysis framework. finally, a code adapted from henri’s (1992) content analysis framework and kolb’s (1984) learning cycle was applied to a group transcript. this code was used to analyse the semantic content of discussions to ascertain the extent to which reflection was evident in the students’ accounts of experiences, as well as identifying the extent to which the students were interacting with and learning from each other, in contrast to providing a series of monologues. according to kolb, the four stages of learning are concrete experience (describing the experience, etc.,), reflective observation (reviewing thoughts, emotions, feelings, etc.,), abstract conceptualisation (extracting deeper insight, creating links between the experience and new learning, etc.,) and active experimentation (realisation of learning, resolution towards action, etc.,) (kolb, 1984). henri (1992) developed a framework of five dimensions of interaction within online communications: participative, social, interactive, cognitive and metacognitive with specific indicators for each to mitigate dissention from multiple reviewers. both kolb and henri’s codes were applied in tandem to identify whether students were achieving the markers of reflection (according to kolb’s stages) and what types of, interactions were taking place within the discussion (according to henri’s framework). limitations data collection was delayed to the academic year following placement instead of immediately after placement due to timing issues with ethical approval. following ethical approval from the institute of technology, carlow ethics committee, consent was acquired for just one group transcript to be analysed rendering this aspect of the investigation exploratory and its findings not transferable. final stage data analysis would have benefitted from inter-rater reliability and as a result, findings for this section of the investigation are inferential. 3. findings instructors remarked upon the immediacy of being able to check in and see how students were progressing on placement to be a huge benefit. identifying deficits in students’ understanding was a useful feature and students who appeared disengaged from their work placement became apparent early on, thus allowing for early intervention and support. you could see that they were engaging with the course material regularly rather than leaving them to it for three months (paula, instructor) i was able to pinpoint exactly where the learning deficit was within the online discussion. but also it became very apparent that [the student] wasn’t reading nor were they engaging while they were on placement (kim, instructor) the discussion boards were accessed through the blackboard learning management system. despite the convenience of accessing, the boards with a number of devices (mobile phone, irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 tablet, laptop, pc) instructors and students remarked that the interface was unappealing, cumbersome and rudimentary compared to other applications. the discussions were described as ‘contrived’ at times, with one respondent describing how they felt compelled to engage to adhere to the instructional brief, rather than adding value to the discussion. i was like…i’ll reply to her, and then i’ll go in and reply to him, and then i was like, i wish they’d hurry up and write something… (lorna, student) group dynamics are an important feature of discussion boards. the random allocation of students to groups affected their engagement, participation and the quality of the discussions. students admitted if they did not know or did not like members of their group, this affected their interest and motivation to participate. students described discussion boards as ‘useful’, ‘accessible’, and ‘reliable’ as assessment and expressed a preference for using them over the paper-based portfolios they had replaced. however, they were not appropriate and effective in how they were delivered in this assessment. the four listed components emerged from the shortfalls identified by instructors and students in this research. mitigants are suggested, and led to the development of a forpurpose instructional guide to set up and deliver discussion boards for work-based placement. these four components are time management, moderation, instructional guidance and peerlearning. 3.1 time management instructors need to be cognisant of and plan for the front-end time it takes to set up discussion boards as well as their time commitment to provide feedback. students might be encouraged to create a group agreement to avoid participants waiting days for a reply as the asynchronous feature frustrated some users. 3.2 moderation moderation serves to keep a focus on the discussion, ensures all participants contribute, and maximises the opportunity for collaborative learning. the lack of an appointed moderator and instructor feedback was a considerable drawback to the acceptability of the discussion boards in this research. the absence of a moderator to prompt, encourage users to elaborate on their opinions or ask less participative users questions resulted in some feelings of frustration and apathy towards the task. despite this, the research identified how some students were proactive communicators and others were more responsive. 3.3 instructional guidance no negative commentary was recorded regarding the availability and quality of technical support, and the assignment brief was deemed clear and comprehensible. however, the completion instructions were haphazard, unrefined and unsuitable for this type of activity. considerations include whether grades will be allocated, or whether the discussion will be assignment-related to offer an opportunity to share ideas. if participation is voluntary, a strategy for encouraging participation is needed. moderation is recommended with instructional support provided if students are appointed as moderators. 6 3.4 peer learning discussion boards facilitate peer learning. instructor and student comments regarding peer learning reaffirmed the importance of a grouping strategy to maximise opportunities for peer learning. suggestions included allocating groups according to friendships to dissuade users being excluded or posting last-minute comments. alternatively, allocating group members according to the remit of their placement organisation was also suggested students could be tasked with solving a service-related issue and invited to reflect on the process afterwards. 4. conclusion covid-19 social distancing regulations impelled a global focus on blended learning strategies in higher education. this research was conducted prior to the pandemic against a markedly different educational landscape. digitalisation of education has been a main trend in the 21st century, and much of the research focuses on the perception and attitudes of instructors and learners towards technologies and their implementation. despite this, this is the only research documenting social care placement students’ experiences of using discussion boards on work-based placement. this research created baseline data on the topic of reflection using discussion boards in an irish social care placement context. whilst the process was not entirely effective as assessment in this case, a number of useful findings emerged for future use to enhance the process for instructors and users. students stated that the experience was valuable to help them understand different professional territories of social care work, and as a result, they benefitted from having a more practical knowledge of the sector. they commented that the process compelled them to engage more frequently in conversations about their placement experiences, regularised their engagement with reflection and helped them to understand other-person perspectives. four components essential to prepare and deliver a best practice approach for using discussion boards for work based placement emerge from this research. this context, yet there is scope for further investigations into this area. ironically, these components are rooted in communication and effective time management at each phase of delivery. discussion board instructors need to anticipate the front-end set-up expectations and manage their time effectively around the provision of feedback. clear and unambiguous instructional guidance should be communicated to the student users. time for moderation must also be considered. other findings from this study (not reported here) suggest a more time effective strategy is to appoint students as moderators in rotation with requisite training, thus facilitating peer learning, imparting more autonomy to students, and modelling a students as partners in assessment approach. whilst reflection is ultimately a personal activity, this research found that discussion boards mitigated the sometimes-described isolation of the work-based placement experience. more research using discussion boards in this context is recommended to maximise their functional capacity in supporting learners to understand reflection and prompt active engagement and deeper learning from their placement experiences. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 references bates, a. t. 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(2006). accountability: teaching through assessment and feedback, not grading. american secondary education, 14-27. xie, k., di tosto, g., lu, l., & cho, y. s. (2018). detecting leadership in peer-moderated onlinecollaborative learning through text mining and social network analysis.internet and highereducation,38,9–17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2018.04.002 yip, k. s. (2005). self-reflection in reflective practice: a note of caution. british journal of social work, 36(5),777-788. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bch323 https://www.gillysalmon.com/five-stage-model.html https://doi:10.1080/0260293960210202 https://doi.org/10.1152/advan.00017.2003 https://doi.org/10.5688/ajpe798124 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2018.04.002 “how are you getting on?” evaluating discussion boards as assessment for social care work-based placement abstract 1. introduction 1.1 communication and constructivism 1.2 factors of engagement 1.3 reflection 3. findings 3.1 time management 3.2 moderation 3.3 instructional guidance 3.4 peer learning 4. conclusion irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 186 lessons from reflective journaling in undergraduate eportfolios ruth mcmanus*1 1 dublin city university, dublin, ireland abstract this article explores and critically reflects on the use of the eportfolio as a space for student reflection, demonstrating its utility as a teaching and learning (t&l) tool for both learners and educators. it draws on the author’s experience of using eportfolios for assessment purposes, incorporating a reflective component, over a four-year period within an irish university. particular emphasis is placed on the experiences and outcomes of two groups, each with approximately 35 students, who undertook undergraduate modules between february and may 2020. the discussion develops a number of aspects of the eportfolio experience, considering benefits to both learners and educators, with specific reference to group work, to struggling students, and to the role which these reflective journals played during the early stages of the covid crisis. in conclusion, some best-practice guidelines are proposed, focusing on effective module design and pedagogical scaffolding, and points for further consideration are raised. introduction my earliest engagement with student reflection arose in 2005, when the geography department of what was then st patrick’s college, a college of dublin city university, first adopted the moodle platform. from 2005, i experimented in using the journal facility on moodle to obtain feedback and encourage student reflection, initially with first and second year ba students undertaking practical geography modules. in this iteration of moodle, individual students could make a private journal entry responding to a prompt, while the educator could respond with a comment or feedback which was only visible to that student. at the time, this was a revelation, offering a new form of communication between student and educator. within the department our use of moodle evolved over subsequent years, however, in 2013 a change in the platform removed the existing journal facility. significant changes to the degree programme were initiated when a two-subject ba joint honours degree replaced our previous ba model which had required three first year subjects. combined with modified teaching allocations and a period of major institutional change, it was not until 2016 that student reflection using an electronic platform became a renewed focus of activity. in 2016 the mahara platform was introduced into the university. initially, this seemed to provide a solution to issues arising from the changes to the moodle platform outlined above, but it quickly became apparent that the mahara eportfolio was a more versatile tool, offering a more rounded and holistic approach for students as it enabled them to create, collate, curate and comment upon material related to their modules (see mcmanus, 2018). i initially adopted the eportfolio approach for a second year undergraduate population geography optional 187 module, where it forms a major assessment component, but subsequently incorporated an eportfolio into two practical hands-on research methods modules in second and final year respectively. in these latter cases, the modules are flexible in content and aim to foster a creative approach to problem-solving and presentation of results. the eportfolio requirements for the three modules differ, and all incorporate additional elements of content, but in all cases, students are required to incorporate a reflective learning journal within the eportfolio. thus, the reflective journal forms one component within a broader eportfolio, but the observations within this article focus specifically upon the reflective learning journal. these reflections are based on my on-going experience of using eportfolio-based reflective journals with approximately 200 students over a four-year period. the journals were a graded activity to be completed on a weekly basis throughout the module for final submission at the end of the semester. while the weighting varied between the three modules, in all cases a significant proportion of overall marks (ranging from 10% to 30%) was allotted to the eportfolios, to encourage student engagement. students were briefed on the nature of the reflective journal component at the start of the module and given short prompt questions on a weekly basis. they were also regularly reminded of the need to maintain their reflections on an on-going basis. literature review although eportfolio practice has become almost ubiquitous across higher education, only a small body of empirical research exists in relation to the practice in ireland (donaldson 2018, farrell 2018). as chen and black (2010) have pointed out, eportfolio is a multifaceted concept and the eportfolio can be used to fulfil many functions. some limited research has demonstrated its use as a tool for reflection, including exploring broader aspects such as developing self-reflection and self-regulated learning, and exploring identity (alexiou & paraskeva 2010, slepcevic-zach & stock 2018, farrell & seery, 2019). reflection, reflective learning and reflective journaling are terms which have become increasingly common in the academic literature, seen as offering beneficial opportunities for reinforcing student learning (e.g. harvey, coulson, & mcmaugh, 2016). kember et al (2008) identified four levels of reflection, ranging from the most minimal ‘habitual action’ through understanding, reflection and, the deepest level, critical reflection. this final level of reflection implies a transformation in perspective, which is a process that takes place over time and therefore should not be expected to be seen early or necessarily frequently as a student gradually develops reflective skills. while reflective journals have become a common tool to promote reflection, the degree of structure varies. journals may be prompted, whereby students are presented with specific themes or questions to reflect upon, but others are unprompted, with students invited to reflect on topics they consider important (wallin & adawi, 2018). sultana et al (2020) recently examined the role of eportfolios in encouraging reflective learning among undergraduate students at a hong kong university, drawing on kember’s (2008) work. their findings emphasise the role of teacher as a learning facilitator and guide, the desirability of building scaffolding toolkits to support both students and teachers, and the need to provide sustained capacity building on both reflection writing and building e-portfolios. some of these elements will be explored further in the discussion which follows. within the geography discipline, early attention was paid to the benefits of learning journals as a means of encouraging active student engagement in the learning process (park, 2003), while more irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 188 recently hegarty (2017) has explored the use of eportfolios as an integral part of assessment within a geography module. the specific use of reflective learning journals within an eportfolio context is the focus of this reflection. experiences of using reflective journaling in an eportfolio format since 2016 i have incorporated an eportfolio element (based on the mahara platform) into a number of second and third-year undergraduate modules, particularly those which have a practical, hands-on element. the key goal in this particular use of eportfolios has been to encourage reflective learning within the relevant module. reflection serves a number of different purposes as outlined by moon (2004), but despite varying interpretations, it seems clear that reflection is an integral part of developing deep learning. indeed, mann et al. (2009) concluded that reflection and a deep approach to learning seem to be integrally related and mutually enhancing. the observations which follow begin with some general comments about student engagement before discussing, in turn, the value of reflective journals in group work situations, for struggling students and for the educator. the final theme of this section turns to specific learning from the early stages of the covid-19 pandemic and the role which reflective journals played at this juncture. analysis of the grading outcomes over a four-year period suggests that, even with ongoing modifications to increase clarity regarding the nature of the task, levels of engagement with the reflective journal continue to vary significantly between students. learners were encouraged to use the journal in a creative way – with a reminder that no two journals should be alike – but many struggled with the concept. quite frequently, students sought to ascertain the number of words and/or the number of reflective journal entries required, then somewhat woodenly produced a very basic summary of class notes or activities, with no reflection whatsoever (similar to kember’s lowest level of reflection). at worst, it became apparent that these very limited eportfolios had been cobbled together at the last minute rather than reflecting ongoing engagement throughout the semester. another significant subset of students appeared to approach the task with an attitude of ‘tell the lecturer what you think they want to hear’. their journals were littered with plaudits praising the ‘exciting’ or ‘fascinating’ content of the classes, without ever engaging in deeper reflection on the material or on the learning process. the best reflections came from those students who used the reflective process in a very honest and genuine way, sharing their lived experience. quite frequently the quality of entries varied across the course of the module’s run, perhaps depending on the time students allotted to their reflective activities, or the degree to which particular topics appealed to their imaginations. for two of the modules using eportfolio, teamwork was also a required component. students frequently experience challenges in undertaking a complex assignment, particularly as part of a team where different personality traits and working styles assert themselves. their reflective journals offer an opportunity for them to comment on evolving group dynamics and other practical experiences, as well as considering intellectual content. in some cases, the journal offered a safety valve, a ‘safe place’ where they could confide difficulties without feeling that they were being disloyal to their teammates. careful review of the eportfolio entries could thus ensure some differentiation by the educator in grading group projects. 189 the practice of reflective journaling can be particularly beneficial for students within a cohort who appear to be struggling with the material, and can show the educator how these lessacademically-able students have benefitted from their experiences in the module, such as building skills or enhancing their knowledge base. reflective journaling allows learners to develop their writing skills, by encouraging them to write small amounts on a regular basis. because all students are on an equal footing, they can gain marks simply by reflecting on their learning processes. the very act of reflection can help students to see where they are going wrong and perhaps address their own weaknesses. in the teamwork environment, one student might say that they were not particularly good at x task, but were being supported by a team-mate, while they recognised their own skills in another area, perhaps to do with organisation or motivation of the team. students could learn from each other but also recognise and celebrate their own skills, particularly those beyond traditional academic tasks. sometimes, too, reflective journaling will reveal development over the course of the module. while a struggling student may not have fulfilled the objective assessment criteria to a particularly high level, it may become apparent from their journal entries that they have nevertheless developed their skills or understanding significantly over the course of the module, perhaps from a lower starting point. for example, a student who reflected on their fear of using maps because they considered themselves to be ‘useless’ at map reading, could state by the end of the module that they felt more confident and proficient at the task. although this might not necessarily earn them a higher grade, the student’s trajectory should be recognised in some way, at least through positive written feedback from the educator at the end of the module. while research has evaluated the benefits of reflective journals for students (e.g. park 2003, moon 2004, mann 2009, harvey et al 2016), less has been written about their potential benefits for the educator. indeed, i would argue that student reflective journals can become an important tool for reflection on the part of the educator; they can remind the educator of the student’s lived experience, demonstrate their trajectory through a module, and illustrate what teaching elements work effectively or are less successful. where students have recorded their journal entries on a regular basis, the educator is potentially brought on their learning journey. reading the student experience serves as an important reminder of the student’s situation, of the challenges which they face and their position at a particular point of learning. it can reveal the gaps in their knowledge, but also the sense of discovery and sometimes even of wonder as a new area opens up to them and they begin to develop an appreciation for the topic. the most encouraging reflections show a clear trajectory, with a developing understanding, or sometimes even a ‘lightbulb’ moment where a student suddenly makes a connection or develops a deeper appreciation of a topic. however, the reflective journal should not simply function as a device to reassure the educator of their efficacy. they are not there to make us feel better. careful and critical reading of reflections from an entire class cohort is a way of assessing oneself as a teacher, remembering to engage in self-reflective practice. they can provoke many questions: what elements of the module were successful? where was the information conveyed clearly? where were the points of confusion? are there areas that need to be reconsidered, presented in a different way or developed differently? further, reviewing individual journals and seeing the range of responses to the same teaching, is a helpful reminder of the variation within the student body. it can sometimes also prompt a rethink on the approach to a particular topic. unlike grading exam papers, where a student’s misunderstanding of a particular topic can feel hugely frustrating, because the journal presents reflections over the duration of the module it can give a broader overview and insight into student thinking and engagement with irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 190 the module. although not their primary purpose, such learning journals offer a more meaningful feedback mechanism to assist educators than many student surveys, because they are more holistic and can show the degree of student engagement as well as their gaps in understanding. furthermore, there is potential for this material to be incorporated in more formalized continuous professional development (cpd). for an educator building their own portfolio of evidence prior to applying for advance he fellowship, for example, the learning arising from careful engagement with such student eportfolios could be highly relevant. the development of the educator as evidenced by their engagement with – and reflection upon – student reflections, thus has potential at both formal as well as informal levels of cpd. having looked at overall student engagement with reflective journals, with teamwork, with the experiences of struggling students and with the educator’s perspective, we finally turn to the very particular experience of spring 2020. when evaluating the eportfolio submissions of the two cohorts who undertook modules in spring 2020, it became apparent that the reflective journal was used by some as a means of exploring and/or coming to terms with the traumatic events of that semester. the students had completed the majority of their coursework prior to the closure of third level institutions on 13 march 2020, but were heavily engaged in project work, much of which was to be undertaken in teams. in many cases, archival and library visits had been planned by students but could not now be undertaken. following the ‘emergency online pivot’, learning including teamwork was moved to the online environment, using zoom (lecturer and formal class sessions) and whatsapp (student informal team meetings), with googledocs used for sharing documents. despite the difficult circumstances, the students coped remarkably well and successfully completed their modules. in reviewing their eportfolio reflections it was clear that a significant number of students had used them to consider their educational experience in a far deeper and more meaningful way than had been the case for previous cohorts. there was deep engagement with the experience of transitioning from the face-to-face to online environment, with the challenges associated with accessing research materials, and the personal sense of loss and need for adjustment as a result of the lockdown. a number of students remarked upon the usefulness of their reflective journal as a grounding mechanism or as a way of tracking their ‘journey’ through these uncharted waters. it functioned almost in the same way as a teenager’s diary, to which they sometimes poured out their concerns. they made meaningful observations about their experiences, in which they revealed a deeper understanding of their own modes of learning, including the impact of informal learning through their peers, which they were now missing. what can be taken from this? clearly the degree of engagement with the reflective journals was a product of particular circumstances and the heightened emotions of that period in time. perhaps it was inevitable that students whose learning rug had been pulled out from under them, who had been forced to engage in new ways, would reflect more deeply than usual on their experiences. nevertheless, are there elements which can be taken from this? could some of this enhanced engagement be encouraged by means of a sequence of question prompts, with the prompts moving from relatively superficial to deeper levels over the course of a number of weeks? what else made it attractive to the students to reflect in this way? did they develop a habit of engaging more regularly with the learning journal? these are questions which merit further consideration, perhaps in the form of a dedicated research project. practical implications these observations on the reflective journaling experience over several years and with different student cohorts lead to a number of conclusions relating to both module design and 191 student outcomes. my personal experience supports the available research into the benefits for students of incorporating a reflective journal eportfolio element in module design, but also stresses the potential benefits for the educator in terms of feedback and their own reflective practice. however, it is also clear that such a component is not a panacea; it needs to be approached with care. inevitably, as with all aspects of teaching, there will be students who engage in only the most limited way with the process. careful attention at the module design stage may enhance engagement and encourage the greatest possible benefits (moon 2004, sultana et al 2020). mcintosh (2010) found that attempts to include reflection in assessment tasks with limited pedagogical scaffolding was likely to result in superficial reflections with very limited impact on learning, while ryan (2013) has identified pedagogic strategies that can be used to prompt these reflective levels in students' work. combining this research with my own experience, the following points become clear. reflective journals are most effective in an eportfolio when the students receive clear briefing and are aware of the benefits of undertaking this process. provision of marks towards the journal offers a tangible incentive for students, while the less tangible benefits of the activity may become clear over the course of the module. therefore, the following guidelines are suggested: • identify clear objectives for the learning journal and convey these to the students at the outset • give enough marks towards the task to make it clear that this is important and worthy of attention. • consider incorporating a reflective journal within a broader eportfolio context, as this may help to embed student reflective practice • develop a grading template to share with the students, which will further clarify expectations, while also ensuring that evaluation of the student’s work can be as impartial as possible • show students samples of a range of successful journals, while also reminding them of the desirability of originality, rather than following the model too closely • avail of opportunities in class time to remind students about their eportfolio entries, including talking over how they might incorporate a learning experience into their journal discussion • offer periodic (ungraded) feedback on the eportfolio to date – this can provide guidance and/or reassurance to students, while the educator can also gain feedback from students to aid in targeting and supporting challenging areas. • require a final overarching reflection to encourage students to draw together their thoughts on their experience of the module as a whole. this helps learners to evaluate how far their thinking has evolved over the course of the semester, and thereby encourages a deeper level of reflection. • take time, as an educator, to review and reflect on the feedback received from students through their reflective journals, and incorporate this learning into future iterations of the module. conclusion with careful scaffolding, reflective journaling in an eportfolio format can offer meaningful benefits to both learners and educators. indeed, as discussed above, the increased level of student engagement with such journals at a time of crisis reveals their additional value, including their potential role as a ‘safe space’. reflective journals within a broader eportfolio context offer particular benefits to struggling students and can also be hugely helpful for the irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 192 development of the educator. although a degree of caution should be observed in raising expectations that one learning element can perform multiple functions, it is nevertheless worth considering the potential revealed by this experience. this simple format, when effectively introduced and scaffolded, can prove to be a powerful tool for deep engagement, reflection, and transformative learning. acknowledgments 'i would like to thank the guest editors for their supportive approach and the anonymous peer reviewers for their very helpful comments on a previous draft of this article' references alexiou, a. & paraskeva, f. 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(2013) the pedagogical balancing act: teaching reflection in higher education, teaching in higher education, 18(2), 144-55. doi: 10.1080/13562517.2012.694104. slepcevic-zach, p. & stock, m. (2018). eportfolio as a tool for reflection and self-reflection. reflective practice, 19(3), 291-307. doi: 10.1080/14623943.2018.1437399. sultana, f., lim, c.p. & liang, m. (2020). e-portfolios and the development of students’ reflective thinking at a hong kong university. journal of computers in education, 7, 277– 94. doi: 10.1007/s40692-020-00157-6. wallin, p., & adawi, t. (2018). the reflective diary as a method for the formative assessment of self-regulated learning. european journal of engineering education, 43(2), 507–21. doi: 10.1080/03043797.2017.1290585. lessons from reflective journaling in undergraduate eportfolios ruth mcmanus*1 1 dublin city university, dublin, ireland abstract this article explores and critically reflects on the use of the eportfolio as a space for student reflection, demonstrating its utility as a teaching and learning (t&l) tool for both learners and educators. it draws on the author’s experience of using... introduction literature review experiences of using reflective journaling in an eportfolio format since 2016 i have incorporated an eportfolio element (based on the mahara platform) into a number of second and third-year undergraduate modules, particularly those which have a practical, hands-on element. the key goal in this particular use of eport... analysis of the grading outcomes over a four-year period suggests that, even with ongoing modifications to increase clarity regarding the nature of the task, levels of engagement with the reflective journal continue to vary significantly between stude... for two of the modules using eportfolio, teamwork was also a required component. students frequently experience challenges in undertaking a complex assignment, particularly as part of a team where different personality traits and working styles assert... the practice of reflective journaling can be particularly beneficial for students within a cohort who appear to be struggling with the material, and can show the educator how these less-academically-able students have benefitted from their experiences... while research has evaluated the benefits of reflective journals for students (e.g. park 2003, moon 2004, mann 2009, harvey et al 2016), less has been written about their potential benefits for the educator. indeed, i would argue that student reflecti... however, the reflective journal should not simply function as a device to reassure the educator of their efficacy. they are not there to make us feel better. careful and critical reading of reflections from an entire class cohort is a way of assessing... having looked at overall student engagement with reflective journals, with teamwork, with the experiences of struggling students and with the educator’s perspective, we finally turn to the very particular experience of spring 2020. when evaluating the... what can be taken from this? clearly the degree of engagement with the reflective journals was a product of particular circumstances and the heightened emotions of that period in time. perhaps it was inevitable that students whose learning rug had bee... practical implications conclusion acknowledgments references microsoft word 01_telireland_issue1_lcasey.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 1, issue 1, 2014 1 live learning: online teaching, digital literacy and the practice of inquiry leo caseya1, and michael hallissyb acentre for research and innovation in learning and teaching, national college of ireland bh2 learning, digital exchange, crane street, the digital hub, dublin 8 (received march 2014; final version received september 2014) introduction there has been significant discussion in recent times around improving the quality of teaching and learning in higher education (laycock, 2009; laurillard & masterman, 2010; des, 2010). the lisbon strategy (commission to the council and the european parliament, 2006) has framed much of this discussion at a european level with individual countries, such as ireland, developing their owntargeted strategies to expand and improve higher education (des, 2010). in the case of ireland, these strategies specifically mention the need for institutions to provide ‘excellent teaching’ whether in face-to-face or online settings. whereas there is a significant body of on-going research conducted around effective teaching in traditional, face-to-face settings in higher education (for example, bennett & barp, 2008, beetham & sharpe, 2007) there is, in recent times, an emerging need for investigations that focus on new contexts for teaching particularly in online synchronous classrooms. many institutions have invested substantial time and resources in procuring new technology systems to support on-line teaching and in training staff to operate the many varied functions within these technologies. however, there is also a need to go beyond mere functionality and to provide deeper pedagogical support to faculty so they can fully realise the instructional potential of these systems (kim & bonk, 2006; lee & hirumi, 2004). technological innovations in the area of online teaching lead to new challenges for teachers and educators as new tools are developed and adopted by their institutions. a question for researchers is the extent to which these tools augment or inhibit existing roles and practices in the classroom and to ask how we can conceptualize learning and teaching in such contexts. the case for considering inquiry learning as the ‘telos’ or central purpose of classroom practice is presented here. in this way the live on-line classroom is conceived as a communal learning space where teacher and students participate in activities that are enabled, sustained and enriched by the functionality of the technology system. online tutorial software computer-mediated communication (cmc) technology has evolved in recent years and it is now quite popular in many online higher education courses. cmc has been defined as “communication that takes place between human beings via the instrumentality of computers” (herring, 1996, p. 1 in 1 corresponding author. email: leo.casey@ncirl.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2014. © 2014 l. casey, m hallissy. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. l.casey 2 rosell-aguillar, 2007: p. 81). initially the majority of cmc was asynchronous and used tools such as email, message boards etc., however in recent times there has been a move towards synchronous tools. initially synchronous cmc (scmc) was limited to “text chat” but it has now expanded to include both audio and video conferencing. today there is a growing list of software tools, such as adobe connect, at&t connect and blackboard collaborate, to allow teachers and learners to interact in real-time online. typically these interactions are scheduled in advance so that students and teachers attend at the same time – this is why we use the term ‘live learning’. these tools create online classrooms where tutors and their students communicate in live interactions, something that heretofore may have been difficult to accommodate. lyceum technology was one of the earliest scmc tools designed to replace face-to-face tutorials (buckingham shum et al., 2001) within the uk open university. the technology was developed in-house and was initially trialed in foreign language and business courses. an early review of the lyceum system captured the challenges it presented to some teachers who felt they were ‘deskilled’ in this new environment. we are hearing enthusiastic praise for lyceum’s potential from many tutors and students, but also understandable reluctance from others who feel deskilled in the new medium, who have had poor experiences using it, or who fear that face-to-face meetings may be abolished. (buckingham shum et al., 2001; p. 8) the introduction of these new tools appears to present challenges for tutors who are often experienced and knowledgeable in face-to-face settings and in using other technologies. there is a need to support faculty in this transition so they are confident and competent in these new spaces. challenges faced by teachers in online classrooms teaching online casts teachers in new roles where they will require training and support in how to use the technology effectively. integrating technology into one’s teaching is a complex task (koehler & mishra, 2008) that may require the teacher to rethink how they teach. typically institutions, in the first instance, tend to focus on providing teachers with the technical skills associated with using the technology (lee & hirumi, 2004; kim & bonk, 2006) often at the expense of developing their pedagogical skills. undoubtedly teachers require technical knowledge in order to use these tools but it also needs to be balanced with pedagogical knowledge. ultimately teachers will need to develop their ‘professional practice knowledge’ (loughran, 2010) around using these technologies in order to create quality teaching-learning interactions. loughran defines professional practice knowledge as the ‘craft’ or ‘tacit’ knowledge that includes the tips and tricks of using certain tools in practice, while polany (1967) the inventor of the term, described it as “that which we know but cannot tell” (eraut, 1994; p. 15). there currently appears to be a deficit of such practical, concrete knowledge to support tutors to create effective live classrooms online using scmc tools. there is evidence that the use of such technologies in higher education is now placing demands on teachers to update their skills and competences in order to enhance teaching-learning interactions (laycock, 2009). some, such as laurillard and masterman (2010), have raised concerns that teachers are not fully utilising these tools and the new opportunities they offer for recasting teaching-learning interactions online. instead many teachers appear more comfortable transferring existing ‘traditional teaching approaches’ from face-to-face to online settings (kim & bonk, 2006), despite a growing literature that recommends the need for more active or inquiry led teaching approaches (conrad, 2007; hrastinski, 2009; laurillard & masterman, 2010). much of this literature acknowledges the social nature of teaching and learning online and calls on teachers to change their practices in order to create more collaborative and co-operative learning activities for their students (mcinnerney & roberts, 2004). undoubtedly this places new demands on teachers and requires them to invest time and energy in updating their professional knowledge (loughran, 2010). technological developments are happening so fast that institutions often struggle to design timely professional development interventions for their staff. faced with this constant challenge some believe that teachers, at all levels, need to take more responsibility for their own learning and not wait for their institution to provide such ‘training’ (barber, 1996; mishra & koehler, 2006; laurillard & masterman, 2010). it now seems timely for tutors to begin capturing their own irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 practice and to reflect on it in a critical way in order for them to share their experiences with colleagues and beyond their institutions. within this discourse teachers are viewed as “learning professionals” who take responsibility for developing their skills and professional competences right throughout their careers (eraut, 1994). if teachers view themselves as ‘learning professionals’ then they are expected to share and publicise their professional knowledge of working online with their colleagues, something many teachers have been slow to do in the past (loughran, 2010). as professionals there is an expectation that they take responsibility for their own learning and continually keep up to date with developments in their field. however, there is also a need for better guidance and more user friendly frameworks that will provide teachers with strategies and protocols they can successfully implement to improve learning. there is a growing body of research and literature on competences and strategies for on-line tutors (collison et al., 2000; cornelius & higgison, 2001; ko & rossen, 2004; palloff & pratt, 2007, 2011; salmon, 2000, 2008, 2011). the approach suggested here adds to this body of evidence and suggests that further insights can be gleaned from research conducted in other classroom contexts namely, investigations on digital literacy in primary classroom practices. literacy and participation in order to see the connection between literacy and learning and thereby appreciate the usefulness of these insights for teaching on-line, three conceptual assertions will need to be accepted. firstly, we argue that the most useful conception of learning in on-line classrooms is the practice inquiry (casey & bruce, 2011; bruce & casey, 2012); particularly as based on the inquiry cycle (bruce & bishop, 2002) which presents a model of the teaching-learning activities involved – we discuss this further below. there is nothing special about the live on-line classroom that connects it to learning as inquiry as such; it is more that the new capabilities and potentialities for learning that are enabled by the technical system facilitate this wider conception of the processes involved. we could discuss learning as inquiry in a traditional classroom context without any reference to technology; such a discussion would emphasise questioning, creativity, participation, communication and reflection – these are the very practices that live, on-line classroom configurations facilitate and encourage. the second assertion is the centrality of participation as an essential quality of the practice of inquiry. this notion of participation extends beyond other measures such as attendance, interaction or task completion – it is an altogether more complete quality that implies student and teacher activities unencumbered by communication or technical barriers. the third assertion is that the digital literacy of the classroom is the degree to which participation and inquiry are enabled, sustained and enriched by the media environment. this often involves a perceptual shift from the skills model of digital literacy to be replaced by a situated view emphasizing inquiry as the ultimate goal of instruction in this mode. furthermore, far from regarding digital literacy as associated with either teacher or student, the alternative identifies literacy as associated with classroom or context rather than individuals. arising from previous research (casey, et al., 2009) a new definition for digital literacy in primary school settings was developed: digital literacy involves pupils and teachers using digital technology to enable, sustain and enrich all aspects of the inquiry cycle of learning as: ask, investigate, create, discuss and reflect (ibid, p. 7) the definition centres on ways in which digital media enhance the practice of inquiry in the primary school classroom. we argue that this approach may be extended to include other classroom settings and, in particular, it presents a useful lens through which the learning and teaching practices for live, online classes in higher education may be investigated. the practice of inquiry l.casey 4 the practice of inquiry is not a modern approach to learning; its theoretical underpinnings are to be found in the writings of plato, rousseau and more specifically john dewey. dewey (1902) identified natural impulses for learning which he argued could be harnessed and directed in teaching situations. he suggested learning contexts take advantage of these impulses or instincts which he categorized as (i) the social instinct – conversation, personal intercourse, and communication; (ii) the instinct of making – the constructive impulse; (iii) the instinct of investigation – doing things and watching to see what happens; and (iv) the expressive impulse – the desire to extract meaning from experience. building upon these ideas, the inquiry cycle (bruce & bishop, 2002) emphasises a spiral path of inquiry as: asking questions, investigating solutions, creating and connecting, discussing discoveries and experiences, and reflecting on new-found knowledge, and asking new questions. these are condensed to give: ask, investigate, create, communicate and reflect – the constituents of the practice of inquiry in classrooms. practice of inquiry applied to cmc – some emerging evidence from the field the pedagogic task of nurturing practices such as student discussion, argument, investigation and collaboration in synchronous online classes is not always straightforward. effective strategies for online teaching and classroom management characterised by the practice of inquiry require a careful balance between student exploration and teacher direction. in these settings learning is initiated and directed by the questions formulated by learners; however generating conditions for the appropriate ‘ask’ to emerge requires skillful teaching. it is a pedagogy that relies on engaging the learner actively in their own learning and thus competent teachers who are comfortable working with levels of complexity and uncertainty. teachers who adopt such an approach may perceive themselves as relinquishing control, allowing the learners to dictate the course of their inquiry and this may be challenging for some. we argue however, there are substantial benefits that outweigh the challenges involved. in live, online classes the sense and nature of participation is an important quality. traditional formats such as lecture and presentation offer little by way of added value for the ‘live’ classroom. for many subjects there is ample supply of pre-recorded and packaged content. something extra needs to be involved when students and teachers come together in a virtual classroom. the practice of inquiry encapsulates this extra dimension. yet we know from recent research (hallissy, 2013) that tutors often struggle to create such active learning environments when using scmc tools. emerging research on the use of scmc technologies in an online course has revealed that tutors have found the transition from face-to-face to online challenging. they reported that their existing teaching competences and strategies required additional tweaking when they began using these tools. though many of their existing strategies and competences did transfer across they also needed to further develop their digital literacy in this new setting. we have selected some comments from one tutor who had already used an inquiry approach in her face-to-face teaching below to illustrate the struggle she had to recreate an inquiry-based classroom online. she noted: i had absolutely no experience of it previously, the first time i put on those headphones and said “hello” or “good evening” i was absolutely terrorised [nervous laughter] however, once she overcame her initial fears she immediately tried to recreate the type of learning environment she had in her face-to-face setting. this tutor, who espoused an active teaching pedagogy, noted that that she was able to draw on her existing teaching skills to re-create an inquiry classroom online. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 i was pleasantly surprised it all happened much much easier than i thought and so i think the strongest thing i found is that my teaching skills are, or if you like my onsite classroom teaching skills, i was able to call on once i just got over the first hurdle of actually doing this online. yet she too found that teaching in such settings is different to teaching in a face-to-face classroom (kim & bonk, 2006) and that she needed to adapt her strategies to fit the functions of the scmc tool she was using. certainly the technology doesn’t prevent [discussion] they are able to communicate with the technology and it’s mainly by writing notes to each other and also by coming in one-voice-at-a-time, but the one-voice-at-a-time only allows one person to speak and so you have twenty listening, whereas when they can write to each other you have, we will say, 10 of the 20 are speaking at any one time. it appears that this was a learning journey for her, one in which she was cast in the role of a learning professional. eraut states that, “professionals continually learn on the job, because their work entails engagement in a succession of cases, problems or projects which they have to learn about” (1994, 10). as it is still so new online tutors have no choice but to learn from their experiences and to continually develop their ‘tacit knowledge’ in relation to using these tools to create engaging online classrooms. conclusion in this paper we have sought a pedagogical response to the challenge and opportunity of live on-line instruction in higher education. we have argued that scmc environments present teachers with an array of new possibilities for teaching-learning interactions; however, significant professional development, going well beyond functional training, is required to take full advantage of these. we have made the case for practice of inquiry as an appropriate framework for learning in live, online classroom settings. within such a framework, participation and its enabling condition ‘digital literacy’ is an essential quality. the inquiry cycle provides a list of elements that characterise the practice of inquiry namely: ask, investigate, create, communicate and reflect. this list may provide a useful template to support teachers in planning and evaluating classroom activities (casey & bruce, 2011). ironically, learning as inquiry is quite a traditional pedagogy and it is associated more with the play-like activities of the primary classrooms rather than higher education settings. however, higher education is also experiencing a radical shift of emphasis in teaching and learning; a movement that sees open access to streamed content whilst new skills such as problem solving, creativity, collaboration and communication become the sought after outcomes. where and how will these skills be developed? live, online classrooms and the practice of inquiry may provide part of the answer. as we have acknowledged earlier, there is currently a deficit of knowledge in relation to how higher education teachers and tutors are using scmc technologies. as more and more institutions purchase these systems there is an opportunity to capture the professional practices of faculty in these new environments. the capturing and sharing of such practice will undoubtedly add to the knowledge base of the profession and provide practical ‘tips and tricks’ on how to enhance student learning. the teaching community is best placed to lead this research agenda and to capture and critique what is taking place in their live classrooms. by engaging in such reflective practice the entire teaching community will learn from the experiences of others and add to the knowledge base associated with developing tutor digital literacies in relation to using scmc technologies. references l.casey 6 barber, m. 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(2011). e-moderating : the key to online teaching and learning (3rd ed.). london: routledge. microsoft word 16-104-2-ed.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2017 1 corresponding author. email: barry.ryan@dit.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2017. © 2017 b. ryan. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license near peers: harnessing the power of the populous to enhance the learning environment barry ryan1 dublin institute of technology (received january 2017; final version received february 2017) abstract nearpod is a multiplatform e-learning tool that allows students to engage with each other and the lecturer in real time, independent of learning space size or type. this research investigated the impact of nearpod use in two different third level educational settings. the rationale was the practical implementation of key trends in higher education, and enhancing the student learning experience, through the integration of byod (bring your own device) and flipped classroom learning. one aim of this project was to identify if nearpod, could address these trends in a simple, cost effective way. secondly, the research sought to investigate if embedding engaging technology into the learning environment could enhance the student learning experience and create a truly interactive environment. the impact of nearpod as an interactive learning tool was evaluated in terms of student interaction, engagement and participation through nearpod facilitated synchronous learning activities. evaluative data were collected in several forms; anonymous questionnaires, academic facilitated discussion fora with purposefully sampled students and a staff reflective diary. the data were qualitatively and quantitatively analysed, leading to a triangulated data set ensuring only valid themes emerged. overall, the students perceived use of the technology, and the academic’s personal reflective writings, suggested that the learning environment evolved towards a student-orientated, interactive space where the students took ownership for their participation in the learning activity. students became responsible for constructing their learning ‘product’; created by the students, for the students and, hence, their learning overall. 1. introduction interactive teaching methodologies are synonymous with an interactive, student-centred, learning environment in which interactions, typically peer-peer or peer-teacher, help to create knowledge and understanding. interactive teaching methodologies encourage student participation to be at a high level of autonomy. riley and myers (2014) proposed that interactive teaching, and associated methodologies, are encouraged in a learning environment where students’ contributions are encouraged, expected and extended to others. additionally, b. ryan 2 they suggested that students’ participation should be at a higher level of autonomy, beyond the traditional initiation-response-feedback approach. in this approach to teaching, student engagement is central to the learning process, but extends beyond the typical constructivist learning paradigm. active learning carried out in a constructivist learning environment may appear similar to interactive learning. however, there is a clear difference between active learning, constructive learning and interactive learning, as outlined in table one. table one: learning approach synopsis comparing active, constructive and interactive teaching approaches. adapted from chi (2009). learning approach typical actions passive learning learners are not required to partake or engage with the learning event. content is delivered didactically. active learning engage the learners’ attention by focusing upon key aspects of the learning material, repeating the material, or manually manipulating the learning material provided. constructive learning requires learners to produce some outputs, which may result in new ideas, such as in self-explaining, drawing a concept map or inducing hypotheses and reflecting. interactive learning learners participate in two kinds of dialogue patterns discussion with experts; for example with the teacher (termed instructional dialogues) discussion with peers, for example classmates (termed joint dialogues). the use of active, constructive and interactive teaching do not have to be mutually exclusive. chi (2009) suggests a hierarchical, and symbiotic, approach to learning in an ‘active’ classroom. she suggests that active learning is more engaging than passive learning, that constructive learning is more likely to generate new understanding than active learning and that interactive learning is more likely to develop substantive, new understanding compared to constructive learning alone. the participation in specific dialogue patterns is the basis of interactive teaching and learning. hybridisation of the two main dialogues patterns can be pedagogically powerful. for example, teacher-student based interactions can follow a guidedconstruction approach whereby a student is asked to revise an essay based on constructive feedback. for peer-peer interactions, learners can participate in co-construction learning activities whereby students critically analyse a peer’s contribution. step-wise incorporation of active, constructive and interactive approaches will, therefore, guide students to a deeper understanding. an example of how this hierarchical approach can be applied to a typical student centered classroom is outlined in figure one. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 figure 1: an example of a modelled hierarchical teaching philosophy to progressively promote a learning event from an active approach, through constructive, to an interactive approach. this modelled example is based on a typical first year foundation organic chemistry topic; organic reaction mechanisms and synthesis. achieving an interactive classroom in large, higher education, lecture theatres can be challenging where, typically, both student-student and student-teacher interactions tend to decrease as student numbers increase (hornsby & osman, 2014). one approach to increasing, and enhancing, meaningful interactive dialogues in large class settings is to embed technology enabled interactions (tlhoaele, et al., 2014). beauchamp and kennewell’s (2009) interactive teaching with technology paradigm provides an adaptable approach to quantifying the level of interactivity offered by the use of a given technology. in this model interactions, supported by technology, are classified across four levels, as outlined in table two. table two: classification, and comparison, of the different levels of teaching enabled by technology with relevant technologies and sample case studies provided. adapted from beauchamp and kennewell (2010). classification characteristics sample technology reference authoritative the primary opinion supporting student understanding is that of the academic; there is little or no student discussion or contribution. slideshow presentation dipiro (2009) dialectic student contribution is encouraged; however, the interactions are focussed on resolving student misconception and is academic facilitated. personal reseponse system (e.g. clickers) barbour (2013) dialogic sustained and in-depth use of discursive interactions interactive presentation simpson & walsh (2014) b. ryan 4 between students and academic resulting in purposeful outputs, from different perspectives, that develop student understanding. software (e.g. nearpod) synergistic contextualised, open ended problems act as triggers that allow students and the academic of develop new knowledge. interactive white boards van laer, beauchamp, & colpaert (2014) a technology-enabled approach, married with a judicial pedagogical underpinning, can result in a large interactive classroom whilst simultaneously aligning to emerging educational trends. a recent nmc horizon report (johnson et al., 2015) cites that the higher education adoption of byod (bring your own device) and flipped classroom learning is imminent; however, practical implementation of these strategies remains unclear, particularly in the context of large class teaching. this research aims to investigate, at a practical level, if the use of an interactive presentation technology, nearpod, can address these two key trends in a simple, cost effective way. furthermore, the investigation queries if integrating this technology can assist current challenges facing many further and higher education institutes; specifically improving enhancing the student learning experience. from a learner’s perspective, embedding engaging technology into the learning environment was hypothesised to enhance the learning experience. technology enhanced learning, aligned to a flipped classroom pedagogy has many benefits including allowing the academic to adapt learning activities to the specific learner’s style, pace and learning needs (hwang, lai, & wang, 2015), resulting in a student-orientated learning environment where the student(s) take ownership for their participation in the learning activity, and subsequently, their knowledge development. as such, the research question that structured the research described here was: can embedding an interactive presentation technology, nearpod, into the learning environment enhance in-class interactivity and the overall student learning experience in large stem lectures? 2. methods the research question limited the research boundary to a specific case and as such the methodology employed was an intrinsic case study (noor, 2008). in line with best practice, the participants were protected following the guidelines of the dublin institute of technology research ethics committee (dit, 2017) according to ethical approval (ref: 65/10). these guidelines include the core principles of ethics in research: voluntarily participation, fully informed consent, ability to withdraw, anonymity, do no harm to the participant or researcher, privacy, confidentiality and data storage. the data collected took several forms; an anonymous, online multiple choice questionnaire (n=30 year one cohort equating to a 22% participation rate and n=41 year two cohort equating to a 38% participation rate), an independent academic facilitated discussion forum (n=1) after the students completed their relevant module, an anonymous standard institute module review form (n=53 year one cohort and n= 48 year two cohort), and a personal reflective researcher diary (n=1). irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 the study participants comprised a mixed (level 6 and 8) first year foundation organic chemistry cohort (n= 136) and a level 8 only, second year introductory biochemistry group (n=109). all data were collected once the students had completed their modules, with the exception of the reflective diary, which was recorded by the researcher on an on-going basis. the reflective diary recorded 'informal' discussions with students, personal researcher observations and comments. students were asked for consent to allow the researcher to record any interesting or relevant point raised during an informal discussion. quantitative data were manipulated with basic mathematical functions in microsoft excel and used to produce graphical outputs. qualitative data were coded onto several key themes and sub-themes based on researcher interpretation influenced by strauss and corbin’s (1990) method of constant comparison and braun and clarke’s (2006) six step approach to data analysis. data saturation was observed, as per the qualitative coding method employed. data triangulation was utilised to ensure only valid themes were investigated and that the examples and findings are based on feedback from as broad a student base as possible (jick, 1979). 2.1 limitations and bias in this study, the researcher adopted the role of an ‘insider-researcher’, based on his role as both the academic and researcher. this power relationship with the participants could lead to researcher bias and skewed data. appropriate methodology, leading to data triangulation, was used to circumvent this bias, with the benefit of the insider-researcher role deemed an advantage to this research (chavez, 2008). one of the major limitations of this study is the relatively low response rate and corresponding population sample that formed the basis of this research. data were collected from two class cohorts from one school, within a single higher education institution. additionally, participants self-selected for the questionnaire component and, in all data collection methods, volunteered to take part. this may have resulted in a bias toward strongly engaged or dis-engaged participants. 3. findings and discussion data analysis was carried out interrogating the data based on the research question and four key, dominant, themes emerged, namely; impact on interactivity, impact of technology, impact on learning, and impact on student ownership. 3.1 impact on interactivity all participants, in the questionnaire and discussion forum, described interactivity as the key benefits of a nearpod enabled class. the participants did not explicitly note their interactions as either instructional or joint dialogues, as defined by chi (2009); however, the examples they provided mapped onto both of these interactive dialogue patterns. students commented on how the interactions felt “real”, “worthwhile” and allowed them to connect, on a meaningful level, with their peers and the academic. “it felt like a one-to-one tutorial class” (ug_02_yr1) b. ryan 6 the design of the nearpod enabled classes in this research were strongly informed by both chi (2009) and beauchamp and kennewell’s (2009) classification of interactive approaches to technology informed teaching. the level of interactivity observed in class, and noted in the researchers reflective diary, could not have taken place without the use of technology. quite simply, the large class size would not have allowed meaningful instructional and joint dialogues to take place unsupported. however, the introduction of technology to the class did, at times, inhibit interaction. students noted that they struggled to stay on task during some activities and the ease of access to their smart device, coupled with ability browse the internet, proved too tempting a distraction in some cases. student distraction is a commonly noted problem in the technology-enabled classrooms (goundar, 2014); however, recent research attempts to identify ways to circumnaviagte this perpetual problem (chen, 2016). 3.2 impact of technology unsurprisingly the role technology played in their in-class activities dominated the student evaluation and the participants had both positive and negative perceptions and outcomes from the use of technology in the lecture hall. the vast majority (>90%) of all questionnaire respondents and all the participants of the discussion forum noted the ease of use of the technology. they appreciated the seamless connectivity between the different devices (smart phone, tablet and laptop) and the ability to digitally record their interactions, with peers and the academic. all individual student activities were recorded and could be securely saved to the students google drive; and those that participated in the questionnaire and discussion forum noted that this added value to the class notes as they created their own version of the notes through the structured, interactive activities. this was also observed as a positive for the academic, as an overall class engagement file (as a .pdf, with each students engagement, collated by activity) could be downloaded and reviewed after class. this review process allowed the academic to prepare for the next class with beauchamp and kennewell’s (2009) classification in mind; for example, to identify areas of misconception (i.e. dialectic teaching) or student generated ideas worth exploring (i.e. synergistic teaching). both cohorts cited the limitations of the wifi network as a major to widespread and continued usage. these limitations were both hardware (i.e. capacity of the wifi router) and student related (i.e. ability of students to log on to the eduroam network, particularly the first year cohort). students were not willing to use their own 3g/4g data plans on a regular basis for in-class activities. the availability and capability of wifi networks is a known limitation for technology enhanced classrooms (riyukta, anker & nortcliffe, 2016); however, an unexpected additional limitation was the effect of extended use of nearpod on the battery life of smart devices and laptops and this mirrors previous research exploring barriers to student use of polling software on smart phones (warnich & gordon, 2015). the teaching spaces where this research was carried out did not have charging points accessible to the students, and this resulted in students not engaging with all activities to ‘save their battery’. 3.3 impact on learning the majority of questionnaire participants, from both cohorts, suggested that a nearpod enabled class was the most interactive class in comparison to a traditional (non-technology enhanced) class or a blended (mix of traditional and technology enhanced) class, see figure 2. a difference between the two cohorts is noted in the decrease between years 1 and 2 who perceived a blended learning model to be the most interactive. interestingly, the year 2 cohort also indicated a stronger perceived positive impact of a nearpod enabled class (78%, n=32; compared with the year one cohort 47%, n=14; see figure three). this data suggests irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 that the year 2 cohort felt a stronger perceived benefit from the nearpod class; however, additional factors, such as the cohort type (year two cohort were level 8 students only), content of the curriculum (year two curriculum was a traditionally popular introductory biochemistry module) and the personal development of the student in terms of maturity and awareness of their role in learning should also be considered. the flipped classroom approach was adopted in the nearpod classes that underpinned this research, and was supported by the pervasive use of technology. this aligned to strayer’s (p.172, 2012) position that “regular and systematic use of interactive technology” enables technology enabled flipped classes to empower students to deeper levels of understanding and knowledge development, more so than more traditional, non-technology enhanced classes. although the year one students in this study had experienced traditional flipped classes; they may not have yet developed the maturity and skill set to become independent learners in comparison to the more experience year two cohort, resulting in a differing perceived impact on learning. this echoes previous research, which outlines how early year undergraduate students can initially struggle with flipped classroom learning, but with experience develop the skills set and maturity required to learn effectively under that teaching paradigm (mason, shuman, & cook, 2013). additionally, perhaps the year one cohorts’ larger perceived benefit of a blended approach (30%, n= 9; versus 5%, n=2 for yr2; see figure two) reflects the transitional nature of the first year group recently exposed to technology enhanced learning. figure 2: comparative chart depicting the perceived most interactive class. year one cohort (n=30), year two cohort (n=41); trad = traditional non-technology enhanced class. year 1 year 20 20 40 60 80 blended nearpod traditional % r es po ns e b. ryan 8 figure 3: comparative chart depicting the perceived impact (neutral, positive or negative) on learning in a nearpod class. year one cohort (n=30), year two cohort (n=41). 3.4 impact on student responsibility a comparative emergent trend was the perceived impact on student responsibility for their own learning. again, two opposing categories were observed here; students that saw nearpod as empowering them to learn and those that questioned the role of the academic in the flipped classroom. the majority of participants (>70%) students felt enabled not only by the flipped classroom approach but also by the inclusion appropriate technology. “i'm more interactive in a nearpod class; it requires me to pay attention, think, answer and discuss the questions” (ug_11_yr1) “forces you to engage with the lecture material, the lecturer and classmates” (ug_27_yr2) a re-occurring theme was the sense that the technology placed the student at the centre of the class and gave them a voice, even within large lecture theatres. this sense of student creative freedom, voice, ownership and belonging has also been described in similar flipped classroom research (al-zahrani, 2015 and baytiyeh & baytiyeh, 2017). “i felt my input was important to the class” (ug_41_yr2) “allows for creativity and a student voice” (ug_09_yr1) additionally, some common issues noted by students with the flipped classroom were also observed in this study; specifically the desire for exam-focussed learning. this is perhaps a hangover from the traditional approach to teaching and assessment that these students have become accustomed to, particularly in secondary school. “it would be more helpful if [the academic] continued to teach as previous – cause [sic] that was actually helpful in preparing for our exams”. (ug_36_yr2) irish journal of technology enhanced learning 9 indeed, one student comment succinctly summarises some students’ struggles with their (inter)active role in flipped class learning and taking responsibility for their own learning: “the lecturer asked us to work on questions on topics we were supposed to teach ourselves. i only learned and understood them when i sat down and studied the notes myself before class”. (ug_12_yr1) 4. conclusion centralising the student is critical in the learning and knowledge creation process, particularly in large undergraduate classes. engaging students in an interactive learning environment, in large lecture theatre can be difficult and requires judicious curriculum and pedagogical design. in this intrinsic case study it was demonstrated that interactive teaching can be achieved in large classroom environments; enabled and facilitated by technology and underpinned by an appropriate pedagogy. while not the panacea for all large class-teaching issues, it does offer an alternative approach to engage students in meaningful dialogue and can result in an enhanced learning experience. in this research, an interactive presentation software was evaluated as having a positive impact on the student learning environment and promoted self-responsibility and ownership within the case study cohort. b. ryan 10 references al-zahrani, a. m. 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(2015). the integration of cell phone technology and poll everywhere as teaching and learning tools into the school history classroom. yesterday and today, 13, 40-66. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 47 ubiquitous mobile use: student perspectives on using the vle on their phone damien raftery, institute of technology carlow abstract with the rapid increase in the use of smart phones (and other mobile devices), students in irish and international higher education institutions are increasingly accessing virtual learning environments (vles) using their phones via an app or their browser. this brings both welcome flexibility for the students’ digital learning experiences and wider opportunities to support both asynchronous and synchronous learning in innovative ways. however challenges exist, initially regarding the functionality, user interface, reliability and speed of mobile use of the vle (specifically via a vle app as well as a phone browser) but also how best to empower students and lecturers to harness the potential benefits. this article explores the 2017 results of the #vleireland student survey in one higher education institution, expanded to include questions about student experiences of using a vle app. almost all students have smart phones, with the vle app used by 7 in 10 students surveyed and, despite the many limitations of the vle app, two-thirds found it useful. student comments highlighted the benefits of notifications on the student’s phone and the convenience of easy, flexible access to the vle. barriers to the use of the vle app included poor design and working of the app, and limitations of the student’s own phone. a major implication of increasing mobile access is that the vle design needs to be more responsive for users, that the vle itself be fully functional and user-friendly on smart phones and the challenges to design, develop and deliver a rich functional vle app are met. there is potential for flexible mobile access to the vle outside of class to be complemented by increased in-class use to enrich innovative approaches to engage learners. increased mobile vle usage has consequences for how lecturers use the vle; they need to be conscious of this mobile use when designing, creating and using their vle course as well as utilising appropriate digital pedagogies. irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 raftery, d. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irishbased professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. d raftery 48 1. introduction vles provide a stable base … (risquez et al, 2013, p.106) as can be seen from the articles in this special issue (ryan & risquez, 2018; raftery & risquez, 2018), students both frequently use the vle and maintain broadly positive attitudes to its use, finding it helpful to their studies. the predominate use of the vle remains as a curated repository for class notes and slides, links to videos, websites and other learning resources, and one-way communication via announcements. substantial use of assignment submission, grading and sharing of marks and feedback is complemented by some use of online quizzes, discussion boards and other vle tools. this is mirrored internationally, with us commentary that the vle has been “has been highly successful in enabling the administration of learning but less so in enabling learning itself” (educause, 2015, p.2). seery (2015) develops this, pointing out that using vles to support student learning (as opposed to dissemination of notes and managing classes) is “the exception rather than the rule”. indeed he argues for the removal of the dependence on the vle, “a catch-all den of discontent”. so, as weller (2007) memorably summed this up over a decade ago, is the vle dead? feldstein (2014) points out that the vle is as it is because this is how the majority of academics want it to be, with rees (2015) commenting that academics would not continue to use by choice a vle if they were trained to teach online effectively. following a summary of research methods, this article presents and discusses an analysis of students’ experiences of a vle, and specifically of a vle app, in one higher education institution in leinster, ireland. this is placed in context from previous local iterations of #vleireland student surveys1. prior to conclusions, the findings are discussed along with other research and some implications are drawn. the discussion will also explore the potential for the flexible mobile access to the vle outside of class valued by students to be complemented by increased synchronous in-class use to engage learners. this discussion is in the context of the almost ubiquitous student access to mobile devices (rte, 2017), wi-fi (o’rourke, 2017, p.17) and vle apps (ibid, p.18); thus there is the potential for the vle to survive and thrive as an app to contribute to meaningful student learning in innovative ways. 2. methods the main analysis presents the responses to a survey of students at a higher education institute in leinster, ireland carried out in january 2017. context is provided by analysis of previous surveys at the same higher education institute. traditionally the main access to the vle was from desktop pcs on campus, either in openaccess areas or in computer labs. at the inception of the #vleireland survey, the flexible use of the vle was initially focused on off-campus access from home and internet cafes. in 2011 questions included use from laptops and mobile devices, then in 2013 specific mention of mobile phones and tablet devices. in 2015 a question was added gauging student attitude to the on-campus wi-fi coverage. in the most recent survey in january 2017, this was expanded with a section on the mobile use of the vle and specifically use of a vle app, and included some open-ended opinion questions. 1 i would like to acknowledge the valuable contributions of all the #vleireland collaborators (cosgrave et al, 2013 and risquez et al., 2013). irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 49 this article explores the 890 responses of fulltime students studying on campus during the day. the response rate is 21%, a slightly lower rate than previous iteration of the survey (the january 2015 survey had 1,066 respondents with a response rate of 25%; 777 respondents in april 2013, 20%; and 478 respondents in april/may 2011, 14%). note as the survey was administered online, the sample is self-selecting leading to potential sample bias with nonresponses systematically differing from those who responded (gorard, 2013, p.88). in this article, percentages are calculated out of those who responded to the question. these limitations are a caveat to the interpretation and generalisability of the findings presented. 3. findings 3.1 general use of the vle in 2017 the general findings of the 2017 survey strongly mirror those of the previous years. most of the students surveyed are positive about the vle and use it regularly. 93% of respondents use the vle regularly: 61% of respondents use the vle daily, with a further 33% using it a few times a week. 92% of respondents agree that systems like the vle are helpful whilst 81% agree that the vle is easy to use. almost all respondents use the vle to some extent, with over two in three students having all or most of their coursework in the vle: 21% of respondents had all, with 48% having most, 13% with about half, 16% with some and 2.1% (19 students) with none. the findings confirm previous results that the vle’s most popular use is still as a content management tool, with almost all respondents accessing lecture notes/handouts – see figure 1. however there is considerable use of, and apparent positive disposition of many students to, the use of online resources, assignment submission, turnitin and online quizzes. when asked what are the reasons for using the vle, most respondents find it useful to view class announcements (87%) and get copies of lecture notes/handouts (95%) and other course documents (85%), with a majority also finding the vle useful for reading lists and recommended online resources (65%). 37% of respondents do not use recommended videos, screencasts and podcasts, but of those that do, 72% find them useful. substantial proportions of students find the vle useful for submitting assignments (82%) and turnitin (77%), along with some use of online quizzes and discussion boards. 45% of respondents do not use online quizzes, but of those that do, 66% find them useful. similary 47% of respondents do not use online discussion, but of those that do, 50% find them useful. in open comments, students report using the vle to view grades and as a gateway to other services, such as email, library, past papers and timetables. students believe that the vle gives them more access to the lecturers, but not their fellow students. specifically 71% of respondents agree that the vle gives them more access to their lecturers, with 11% disagreeing. however, only 16% of respondents agree that the vle gives them more access to their classmates, with 51% disagreeing. d raftery 50 figure 1: student ratings of vle features in 2017. the students who responded to the survey were positive about the current use of the vle on their programme and would welcome more use of it. 61% of respondents agree that they would like their lecturers to make more use of the vle on their programme (6% disagree). 59% agree that there is good use of the vle by lecturers on their programme (14% disagree). even of those who disagree that there is good use of the vle, 82% of these respondents would like more use of the vle. 3.2 the rise of the phone: mobile access to the vle i can learn at home, even in bed (student comment). as can be seen in figure 2 below, consistently in student surveys in 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017 over 9 in 10 respondents access the vle from home. with a little more variation, about half of students access the vle from laptops on campus with a little more from open-access pcs. however the substantial growth, from a base of 16% for all mobile devices in 2011, is for mobile phone access to the vle to 75% in 2017 with 22% of respondents using tablet devices. the increasing use of mobile devices, in general and specifically for using vle via mobile phones and tablets, has contributed to greater demands for good wi-fi on campus. students had mixed responses when asked to respond to the statement “the wi-fi coverage on campus is good”, with 44% agreeing, 29% neutral and 27% disagreeing (this is slightly more positive than in 2015: 38% agreeing, 27% neutral and 35% disagreeing)2. 2 note that the 2017 survey was before a major upgrade to campus wi-fi. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 51 in 2017, 88% of respondents agree that they have adequate access to the web (computer, bandwidth) from outside college, with 4% disagreeing. this is similar to findings from previous years, with just under 9 in 10 students consistently agreeing. figure 2: substantial growth in mobile phone access to the vle (note in 2011, there was 16% access from mobile devices). 3.3 the vle app used by 7 in 10 students surveyed the app is so handy. i can access lecture notes anywhere at any time. i also receive notifications about new material or when a new assignment has been up. it is also a way of communication between the lecturers and students. i love the app (student comment). almost all, 98%, of respondents own a smart phone. of these smart phone users, 72% of indicating that they have installed the vle app. despite the limitations of the vle app as of january 2017 (there was a major upgrade of the app in the summer of 2017) of those that responded to the statement “the [vle] app is useful”, two thirds agreed as can be seen in figure 3 (with 14% in disagreement). figure 3: substantial agreement that the vle app is useful. there were 442 meaningful responses to the open-ended question “what aspect of the [vle] app do you find most useful?” most comments related to the benefits of notifications straight to the student’s phone (170), the access to lecture notes/slides (122) and the convenience of d raftery 52 easy, flexible access to the vle (124). some students value the ability to instantly access grades (43), and to timetables and notifications of class changes or cancellations (26). selected student comments:  very mobile-friendly and easy to use  makes it easier for me to keep up with my courses by letting me access them whenever and wherever i want  that i always have my phone on me therefore always have access to [vle]  notifications about announcements i would usually miss if i did not have the app, such as when a lecture is cancelled/postponed or a request to bring specific set of notes to a lecture  easy to bring up notes in class  information is easily accessible and easy to find  can access notes anywhere, makes studying outside of college hours easier  easy to access and navigate  [vle] desktop does not display well on smartphone web browser. app much better for the open-ended question “installed the [vle] app: if no, why not?” there were meaningful 195 responses. the main reasons given were poor design and working of the app (35 responses) and limitations of phone, specifically lack of memory (34). some students did not know about the app (27), didn’t know how to install (4) or had problems with installing (8). other frequent responses included a preference for using the vle on other devices (25) or via the browser on the phone (16). some indicated that they had no need of the app (23), sometimes because the vle is not used a lot on their programme (7). a few indicated that they had an old phone (4), lacked wi-fi on campus (3) or wished to keep their phone separate from their studies (3).  it's not on my smartphone, so am not aware when i receive messages. hence i don't think of checking it or use it as often. how do i put it on my phone?  unreliable, often crashes and it is hard to navigate through  you would get a notification but it would not open in the app, then the app would crash. good for alerts to say something new is posted but not to see what that new content is  too hard to install and takes up a lot of space  i downloaded it but it's difficult to use  my phone is too small to view any notes posted on [vle]  wi-fi in campus is not good enough to access it on my phone in campus  because i prefer access to [vle] with my laptop. receiving notifications on your phone can be stressful sometimes  no real push to download this. what is the benefit? there were 242 meaningful responses to the open-ended question “is there any change that you would recommend to improve your [vle] app experience?” the main focus of comments were on the need to improve the user interface (78), reliability (46) and speed (44). some respondents wanted easier access to grades (15) and timetable (5), and the design and features to be similar to the full web version (13). a few suggested more help / orientation for new users.  make it easier to use  make it more similar to the desktop version  many functions do not work or take you to the desktop version  when you get a notification and you click on it, you only get brought to the main menu and not to the notification irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 53  sometimes a lot of notifications come through at the same time, making it less likely for me to check them all as sometimes i get multiple notifications for the same thing  add more features that are available on the web version but not the app  i don't stay logged in and have to re-enter my login every time i open it  course announcement isn't shown as a category in each course. i have to access via homepage which is linked back to website and not very presentable  make every file mobile friendly these findings, including the comments from students, will be discussed in the next section. 4. discussion online, mobile, and blended learning are foregone conclusions. if institutions do not already have robust strategies for integrating these now pervasive approaches, then they simply will not survive. an important step is tracking how these models are actively enriching learning outcomes (adams becker et al., 2017). in 2015 for irish higher education, the time-to-adoption for bring your own device (byod), flipped classroom and mobile learning were all identified as one year or less (johnson, adams becker, estrada & freeman, 2015). more recently in 2017 for international higher education, the time-to-adoption of mobile learning was also stated as one year or less (adams becker et al., 2017). this report also highlighted improving digital literacy as a solvable challenge, advancing digital equity as a difficult challenge and redesigning learning spaces as a mid-term trend (ibid, 2017). there are major strategic and practical implications of widespread use of mobile devices for learning, taking into account also the specific mobile use of the vle on phones (via a vle app or mobile browser) to support teaching and learning. these include redesign of both formal classrooms and informal learning spaces, and requirements for supporting campus infrastructure such as wi-fi. almost all students have smart phones, with the vle app used by 7 in 10 students surveyed and two-thirds finding it useful. the themes from the student comments highlighted the benefits of notifications on the student’s phone and the convenience of easy, flexible access to the vle, specifically to lecture notes, grades and other resources. barriers to the use of the vle app included poor design and working of the app and limitations of the student’s own phone. there were many suggested areas for improvement, focusing mainly the vle app itself: improve the user interface, reliability and speed with features comparable to the web interface. there is potential for flexible mobile access to the vle outside of class to be complemented by increased in-class use to enrich innovative approaches to engage learners. through using the vle app (or mobile browser) previously underused vle features such as online discussions and quizzes may enable active learning in the classroom. the current vle app integrates discussion boards prominently, an opportunity to address that about half of students surveyed disagreed that the vle gave them more access to their classmates (only 16% agreed). despite its user-friendliness, the technical limitations of not being able to format text, add hyperlinks, embed images or videos, may severely limit the usefulness in the classroom. students being able to complete formative, and possibly summative, online quizzes on their phones brings multiple advantages: engaging for students, a support for active learning via d raftery 54 the testing effect and spaced practice (brown et al, 2014, didau 2015), and a knowledge check on work required prior to class (including supporting flipped learning approaches). as the quiz is within the vle, the students’ marks and attempts are recorded in the grade centre, giving potentially valuable feedback to the lecturer on areas of general difficulty plus possibly identifying individual students who are struggling. an institutional benefit that may accrue is that that the data may be valuable in a learning analytics system. as the vle is an official institutional system, the lecturer does not need to deal with any general data protection regulation (gdpr) issues that may arise with third-party systems. however, for online quizzes to be useful in the classroom, the student experience needs to be such that the technology is sufficiently user-friendly so that the students’ focus is on the subject matter being assessed and not on any limitations of the interface. experience of a limited pilot of a formative in-class online vle quiz late 2017 is that although almost all students were able to complete the quiz on their phone (a small number experienced phone and wi-fi issues), there were a number of limitations of the vle app itself. in particular, in the vle app but not the vle via a browser on the phone, an image inserted in the question nor a mathematical expression containing a superscript showing a power were not displayed properly. also many students submitted after only answering one question, partly because of there being no warning in the vle app that not all questions had been completed unlike the experience of using the vle via a browser. the experience for students of using the vle app or mobile browser for active learning in class – particularly using discussion boards, taking online quizzes, sharing output of group discussions or individual explorations by uploading images and multimedia, adding reflections to the journal, … – needs to be easy and seamless so the focus remains clearly on the learning tasks and not on technical frustrations. to be useful, the vle app needs to offer rich features that support learning. 5. conclusion … the spaces we create for fostering learning experiences matter, and that one size cannot fit all. therefore, teachers and students should have a great deal of control in shaping their learning environments. to the degree that it is possible, technology platforms should get out of the way and avoid dictating choices. this is a really hard thing to do well in software, but it is a critical guiding principle for virtual learning environments (feldstein, 2014). despite the many limitations of the current vle app, the students surveyed both use and value the flexible access to the vle on their smart phone. a major implication of increasing mobile access is that the vle design needs to be more responsive for users, that the vle itself be fully functional and user-friendly on small touch screens. this increased mobile vle usage has consequences for how lecturers use the vle and they need to be conscious of this mobile use when designing, creating and using their vle course as well as digital pedagogies. institutions need to support students’ digital literacy and meet the challenges of digital equity. important issues to explore include: mobile use of the vle to enable active approaches to learning; data analytics of mobile access of vle; mobile use of vle to enable flexible submissions including uploading of images/audio/video and contributions to discussion boards in class; and, using the vle app for formative and summative flexible quizzes in class. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 55 the vle continues to survive and evolve, with the stable base of curated access to lecture notes and other learning resources complemented by assignment submission and communications. for the vle to thrive, it needs to enable and enrich student engagement and learning outcomes – active learning approaches in well-designed spaces and flexible fullfunctionality via responsive, well-designed interfaces. as smithers (2016) rightly points out, we need to “think of the experiences that we want as learners and educators”. d raftery 56 references adams becker, s., cummins, m., davis, a., freeman, a., hall, giesinger, c., & ananthanarayanan, v. 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(2013). an investigation of students' experiences of using virtual learning environments: implications for academic professional development. in c. o’farrell & a. farrell (eds.). emerging issues in higher education iii: from capacity building to sustainability. athlone: edin (educational developers in ireland network). retrieved from http://www.edin.ie/?page_id=112 ryan, d and risquez, a (2018): ‘lessons learnt’: the student view in the #vleireland project [special issue, mcavinia and risquez]. irish journal of technology enhanced learning, 3(2), 1-10. https://www.nmc.org/publication/nmc-horizon-report-2017-higher-education-edition/ https://library.educause.edu/~/media/files/library/2015/4/eli3035-pdf.pdf https://library.educause.edu/~/media/files/library/2015/4/eli3035-pdf.pdf http://mfeldstein.com/dammit-lms/ https://www.nmc.org/publication/nmc-horizon-report-2015-higher-education-edition/ https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/final-infrastructure-report-with-doi-web-ready.pdf https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/final-infrastructure-report-with-doi-web-ready.pdf http://www.edin.ie/?page_id=112 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 57 rees, j. (2015) cut the professor a check and walk away. retrieved from http://moreorlessbunk.net/technology/cut-the-professor-a-check-and-walk-away/ rte (2017). 90% of irish population have access to smartphone, survey finds. retrieved from https://www.rte.ie/news/2017/1205/925007-smartphone/ seery, m. (2015). we need to talk about vles. rsc blog, retrieved from http://www.rsc.org/blogs/eic/2015/06/vle-virtual-learning-environment smithers, m. (2016). why university learning management systems are the temporary classrooms of today. retrieved from http://www.masmithers.com/2016/06/why-universitylearning-management-systems-are-the-temporary-classrooms-of-today/ weller, m. (2007). the vle/lms is dead. retrieved from http://nogoodreason.typepad.co.uk/no_good_reason/2007/11/the-vlelms-is-d.html http://moreorlessbunk.net/technology/cut-the-professor-a-check-and-walk-away/ https://www.rte.ie/news/2017/1205/925007-smartphone/ http://www.rsc.org/blogs/eic/2015/06/vle-virtual-learning-environment http://www.masmithers.com/2016/06/why-university-learning-management-systems-are-the-temporary-classrooms-of-today/ http://www.masmithers.com/2016/06/why-university-learning-management-systems-are-the-temporary-classrooms-of-today/ http://nogoodreason.typepad.co.uk/no_good_reason/2007/11/the-vlelms-is-d.html irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 1, 2018 28 using learning analytics to improve online formative quiz engagement irene o’dowd *1a a. hibernia college (received september 2017; final version received april 2018) abstract this paper describes the findings of a small research study, conducted in a third-level online college, using learning analytics to examine the implementation of formative quizzes in a blended-learning post-primary teaching programme. using historic data captured in a virtual learning environment (vle) for a single cohort (n=126), patterns of use of formative knowledge check quizzes were analysed with particular regard to completion and retakes. three hypotheses were tested using appropriate data correlation methods. completion levels for quizzes were correlated with completion levels for other online tasks to see whether an increase in online task workload resulted in a decrease in quiz engagement. a second test compared levels of quiz re-attempts with completion levels for other online tasks, to see whether different patterns of quiz attempts were linked to different levels of online engagement. finally, the data was analysed to ascertain the relationship, if any, between student gender and different patterns of quiz attempts, to see if gender might be a factor in quiz engagement. the findings of this study suggested that the decrease in engagement with quizzes was not significantly related to online task workload increase, and that there is a relationship between quiz re-attempts and higher module engagement. the findings are presented and discussed in the context of student engagement with online formative strategies in humanities-based subjects. options are considered for enhancing engagement and formative value in this teaching and learning context; the potential of learning analytics in informing evidence-based improvements in digital learning design is also assessed. 1. introduction the professional master of education (pme) post-primary programme offered by the thirdlevel online college in which this study was conducted is a two-year blended education programme. students complete a range of ungraded tasks in the moodle virtual learning environment (vle) each week, including viewing presentations, contributing to discussion forums, completing quizzes, writing reflective content and participating in live webinars. * corresponding author. email: iodowd@hiberniacollege.net irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 i o dowd. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 29 however, academic staff have reported a consistent decrease in students' engagement with online activities throughout the programme lifecycle. as a starting point to find out more about this decrease in online engagement, this study will examine patterns of student engagement with formative quizzes at two different stages across the programme. these formative knowledge check quizzes enable students to monitor their own understanding of the course content and revisit and retake the quiz as needed. unlike classical knowledge checks, which usually occur within the narrative or expository content (lewis, 2010), these quizzes take place at the end of the session and are similar in format to a multiple-choice formative test (simkin and kuechler, 2005). the knowledge checks are ungraded but scored: that is, a student who completes the quiz receives a quiz result expressed as a percentage of questions answered correctly, but this result does not affect their overall grade for the course. a typical knowledge check contains between 6 and 10 questions, usually multiple-choice. students can take a quiz multiple times until they feel they have understood the content and have received a mark they are happy with. the questions provide instant correct/incorrect feedback, specific to the options chosen, as well as general feedback that is given once the quiz is submitted. there is a substantial body of research validating the efficacy of using quizzes as a learning tool, as distinct from their use in summative assessment (see salas-morera et al., 2012; cohen and sasson, 2016; tuttle, 2010; nicol and milligan, 2006; kearns 2012). the theory behind formative quiz use emphasises their utility in student motivation, engagement, feedback and self-monitoring (boud, 2000; arend, 2007; tuttle, 2010). these qualities are particularly important in online learning environments, where all or part of the instruction is engaged in by the student without a teacher or lecturer. the formative quiz is an iterative learning tool that requires both engagement and repeated use to realise its full potential. recent research (hoskins and van hooff, 2005; richardson and newby, 2006) highlights the importance of cognitive engagement – the engagement of students’ learning strategies and motivations – in the successful design of online instruction. freasier et al. (2003) suggest that students are motivated to do formative quizzes if they perceive that the quizzes benefit their learning and if they can access them at any time; this is shown to be the case even when students understand that the formative quiz grades do not directly affect their course grade. moreover, there is good evidence of positive correlations between students’ engagement with formative non-graded online quizzes and their final course grade. for example, kibble (2011) finds that nonparticipation in formative quizzes is a consistent predictor of poor performance on summative examinations. the provision of instructive feedback is a key feature of formative quizzes, and most online quizzes are designed to provide this in some form. they provide an effective way of giving ongoing feedback on learning progress and enabling both tutors and students to identify gaps in knowledge of the content (tuttle, 2010). the design of feedback is an important consideration in online formative quizzes: lewis et al. (2010), from an examination of the literature on feedback from formative knowledge check quizzes, suggest inter alia that delayed feedback may be of greater benefit than immediate feedback, and that both can be provided if the content can be reviewed and the quizzes retaken. cohen and sasson (2016) inquire as to whether many attempts on an online quiz benefit the students’ learning, concluding that quiz designs that feature multiple permitted attempts (combined with randomisation) enable students to take responsibility for their own learning, reflect on their understanding, implement strategies to increase their understanding, and re-attempt the quiz to ascertain whether they have been successful. an important aim of online learning is to foster learning autonomy among its participants; nicol and milligan (2006) and others cite i. o’dowd 30 feedback as a key tool for doing this. interestingly, some research considers gender as a factor in online quiz engagement, in particular in the number of times a formative quiz is attempted. gunn (2003) found that male students may have a tendency towards nonengagement with quizzes due to overconfidence in their abilities to meet course requirements, manifesting in a lower number of formative quiz attempts among other online behaviours. however, research in this area is far from unanimous: hoskins and van hooff (2005) found little difference between the numbers of males and females making two or more attempts at self-assessment quizzes. similarly, fill and brailsford (2005), in a large study of online formative quiz engagement, analysed possible gender distinctions in the number of quiz attempts made, and found no evidence of difference. the research landscape thus indicates that the examination of quiz use patterns may provide useful information regarding learner engagement and autonomy. not only is quiz completion a signifier of engagement, but quiz re-attempts also serve as an indicator of whether the quizzes are being used formatively – that is, the feedback from the first attempt is encouraging learners to retake the quiz as a form of revision and knowledge consolidation. the user data available in moodle for tasks such as quizzes is an obvious starting point for such an exploratory study, as it captures a wealth of information on engagement such as quiz reattempts. the inferential analysis of this data, following the “exploratory data analysis” approach that influences modern quantitative methods (connolly, 2007), aims to build a picture of how and why engagement might decrease over time. the questions that this study aims to answer can be summarised as follows: • does an increase in online task workload over the lifecycle of the programme result in a decrease in quiz engagement? • are different patterns of quiz attempts linked to different levels of online engagement? • is gender a factor in quiz engagement? 2. methods the sample chosen for the study consisted of the entirety of a single programme cohort (n=126), which was selected on the basis that it has now completed the online component of the programme, including the two online modules selected for the study. one module, foundations of education 1, was selected from early in the students' first year; the other module, foundations of education 2, was selected from early in their second year. these modules were selected because they are foundational modules taken by all students in the cohort, and also to facilitate comparison between student activity rates at the start of the programme – when students' workload is light – and at the start of year 2 when workload is heavier. two types of data were extracted from the college's moodle vle for the selected cohort: activity completion data for all tasks in the two selected modules, and usage logs for all knowledge check quizzes in those modules. in each case, the raw data was exported in excel format and saved as excel worksheets for cleaning and preparation. the data was anonymised by replacing student names with case numbers and removing all additional information on student identities such as e-mail addresses and ip addresses. any unnecessary data was removed from the worksheets and codes were added to denote specific values. the final dataset was then imported into spss for descriptive and inferential analysis. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 31 the study tested three hypotheses as follows: • completion levels for quizzes were correlated with completion levels for other online tasks, to see whether an increase in online task workload over the lifecycle of the programme resulted in a decrease in quiz engagement. • levels of quiz re-attempts were correlated with completion levels for other online tasks, to see whether different patterns of quiz attempts (that is, single attempts or multiple attempts) were linked to different levels of online engagement. • a correlation was conducted to ascertain the relationship, if any, between student gender and different patterns of quiz attempts, to see if gender might be a factor in quiz engagement. 2.1 validity and reliability for the purposes of assessing the validity and reliability of this study, some observations should be made about the nature of user interaction data captured by the vle. dietrichson (2013) claims that current analytics methodology is as yet unable to conduct effective evaluation of most of the data captured by vles such as moodle, particularly for the improvement of constructive pedagogical design. it is thus important to understand the limitations of data analytics, while at the same time appreciating its potential for providing insight into some key areas. for example, a simple and effective way to analyse student engagement with online content is to look at the activity data captured by the vle. a study by heinrich (2015) suggests that user access logs provide a good indicator of engagement with vle content, while acknowledging that evidence of having accessed the content does not tell us much about the extent of engagement with the content once accessed. in moodle, when an activity is logged as completed, this means that the action denoting activity completion, as defined in the activity settings, has been completed by the student. the nature and level of granularity available for this setting varies according to the type of activity. for example, a ‘passive’ activity such as a downloadable document for reading is assumed completed when the student is recorded by the vle to have viewed the document. there is no way of verifying through data analytics alone whether the student actually read the document. the quiz activity, which we are concerned with here, enables the capture of somewhat more meaningful engagement data. completion of a quiz can only be logged if the student both attempts the quiz and submits the attempt to obtain a score, so the activity data for a quiz is comparatively straightforward and unambiguous. we can tell from the data whether or not (and how many times) a student has answered the questions and submitted them, all of which enable a valid measurement of overall quiz engagement. regarding reliability, the design of the study was aimed at ensuring a stable set of findings as the tests were conducted on data from two separate modules at different stages of the programme. the stability of the test results across both modules thus provides a strong indicator of reliability. 2.2 ethical considerations no face-to-face or direct collection of participant data was involved in this study; the data used for the research was collated entirely from the logs of the college's moodle vle, a fully secured online learning environment that adheres to international data protection standards. the data, captured from previously completed online activity in specific modules, was subject to a stringent anonymisation process, ensuring that no personal information was retained or discernible. as this research has been undertaken with a view to improving the i. o’dowd 32 design of online content, it falls under the college’s specification of “aggregate or anonymised information gathered [and] used/published to feed back into internal academic research [...] and overall programme enhancements including programme design, content, delivery and validation”, and thus participant consent has been obtained through the students’ signing of a data protection form at enrollment. 3. results table 1 shows that a maximum of 4 knowledge check quizzes was available for completion in module 1 and a maximum of 9 for module 2. there were 30 tasks available for completion in module 1 and 70 in module 2. module 2 contained a greater number of sessions, hence the larger number of task components. variable n min. max. mean standard deviation number of knowledge checks attempted in module 1 126 0 4 2.27 1.627 number of tasks attempted in module 1 126 0 30 21.71 8.355 number of knowledge checks attempted in module 2 126 0 9 2.92 3.518 number of tasks attempted in module 2 126 0 70 33.92 23.947 table 1: average numbers of knowledge checks and tasks attempted in modules 1 and 2 a series of histograms (figures 1, 2, 3 and 4) shows the distribution of quiz and task completions across both modules. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 33 figure 1: distribution of knowledge check quiz completions in module 1 i. o’dowd 34 figure 2: distribution of task completions in module 1 figure 3: distribution of knowledge check quiz completions in module 2 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 35 figure 4: distribution of task completions in module 2 it can be seen that the distributions for both sets of data are skewed, right for module 1 and left for module 2, and therefore the use of the mean and standard deviation in table 1 do not adequately convey the average values of the data. the median and interquartile ranges in table 2 give a more accurate indication of these. variable median iqr number of knowledge checks attempted in module 1 3 3 number of tasks attempted in module 1 24 10 number of knowledge checks attempted in module 2 1 6 number of tasks attempted in module 2 36.5 46 table 2: median and interquartile range for distribution of task and knowledge check attempts in modules 1 and 2 as can be seen by comparing the median values between both modules, on average fewer knowledge check quizzes were attempted in module 2 than in module 1. the boxplot graphs in figure 5 show the median and interquartile ranges in graph form and also show some outliers in the distribution of task completions in module 1 that would otherwise have skewed the mean value. figure 5: boxplots showing distributions of quiz and task completions in both modules the pie charts in figure 6 describe the percentages of the cohort who retook quizzes in both modules. the charts represent measurements of the same cohort at two different stages of i. o’dowd 36 their programme: the foundations 1 module at the start of year 1 and the foundations 2 module at the start of year 2. as can be seen, a higher percentage of students (36.51%) retook quizzes in module 1 than in module 2 (17.6%). figure 6: percentages of cohort who retook quizzes in modules 1 and 2 4. findings hypothesis 1: there is a correlation between the number of quizzes completed and the number of tasks completed in both modules. to test this hypothesis, a bivariate correlation test was conducted between the number of knowledge check quizzes completed in both modules and the number of tasks completed in both modules, with this relationship displayed in scatterplot graphs (figures 7 and 8). the statistical significance and correlation coefficient between the two variables was calculated using a pearson correlation test. a positive correlation was found in relation to the number of knowledge check quizzes and the number of tasks completed in module 1, and the correlation was found to be statistically significant (p < 0.001, r = 0.812). irish journal of technology enhanced learning 37 figure 7: scatterplot of correlation between task and quiz completion, module 1 a positive correlation was also found in relation to the number of knowledge check quizzes and the number of tasks completed in module 2, and the correlation was found to be statistically significant (p < 0.001, r = 0.810). figure 8: scatterplot of correlation between task and quiz completion, module 2 i. o’dowd 38 this finding rejects the null hypothesis and confirms that across both modules there is a statistically significant positive correlation between the number of quizzes completed and the number of tasks completed. increases in knowledge check quiz attempts were positively correlated with increased numbers of attempts on module tasks. hypothesis 2: there is a correlation between the incidence of re-taking of quizzes and the number of tasks completed in both modules. this analysis involved correlating whether or not quizzes are retaken (that is, taken more than once) with the number of tasks completed across both modules using an independent samples t-test. the statistical significance, t-value, degree of freedom and equality of variance between the variables were calculated by comparing the means of the two nominal variable categories: the number of knowledge checks re-taken (>1 times) and the number of knowledge checks taken only once. for the first module, the difference between the mean number of tasks completed by those who retook quizzes and those who attempted quizzes only once was found to be statistically significant (p < 0.001, t = -8.077, df = 108.386). for the second module, the difference between the mean number of tasks completed by those who retook quizzes and those who attempted quizzes only once was found to be statistically significant (p < 0.001, t = -8.560, df = 67.042). the finding thus rejects the null hypothesis and confirms that, in both year 1 and year 2 modules, the mean level of engagement in module tasks was significantly greater among participants who attempted quizzes more than once than among participants who attempted the quiz only once. there is therefore a statistically significant correlation between high levels of engagement with module tasks and multiple quiz attempts. hypothesis 3: there is a correlation between the re-taking of quizzes and the gender of the participants in both modules. this analysis involved correlating student gender with whether or not quizzes are retaken (that is, taken more than once) using a chi-square test. no statistically significant evidence was found in either module as to difference between male students and female students, in terms of whether or not they took the quizzes more than once (module 1: p = 0.05, chisquare = 3.850, df = 1; module 2: p = 0.1, chi-square = 2.588, df = 1). the findings thus failed to reject the null hypothesis. 5. discussion in online education, as in any other kind, predictors of student success vary greatly between institutions and learning situations. however, research does seem to suggest that many institutions find online engagement, even if this is measured by just logging on to the vle, a key predictor of student success, particularly in the early weeks of the first year (sclater and mullan, 2017). an examination of the findings of this study suggests that online engagement with quizzes and other tasks decreases from year 1 to year 2 of the programme. the fact that fewer knowledge check quizzes were attempted in module 2 than in module 1 suggests that these quizzes might not be seen by many students as a formative learning tool to help them through the other tasks. on the other hand, the positive correlation between task completion and quiz completion across the modules examined in this study suggests that the problem of irish journal of technology enhanced learning 39 engagement with quizzes might be a symptom of a problem with online engagement more broadly. the findings of this study do not suggest that quizzes are being ignored because of workload caused by other tasks. indeed, the number of quizzes attempted by the cohort increases with the number of online tasks attempted, even in the module which takes place in year 2 when students’ workload would be heavier. however, as this study did not control for other variables such as offline workload and the nature of the tasks, it would be unwise to overstate the causality of this relationship. it is also worth mentioning that the study did not investigate the possibility of an upper cut-off point for number of tasks and quizzes for which the correlation remains true, although it would be reasonable to assume that such a cut-off point exists. the positive correlation between the incidence of students re-taking quizzes and the level of engagement across all tasks suggests that students who engage more with online content are also more likely to be using the quizzes in way they are intended – as formative tools for learning rather than as tests. the study failed to find any link between gender and likelihood of re-attempting quizzes, suggesting that if there are differences between how men and women interact with online content, these are not apparent in the formative use of quizzes online. 6. conclusion the area of learning analytics is seeing rapid growth in institutions providing online education as the value of user data for informing evidence-based improvements in course design becomes apparent. this study was an attempt to begin to provide an evidence base from which to explore whether current methods of using and engaging with quizzes could be improved. the findings provide an evidential foundation for the acceptance or rejection of some assumptions regarding students' online engagement, such as the influence of task workload and gender on quiz engagement. the findings also showed that although online quizzes are intended and designed as formative assessment, in practice many students do not engage with them as a formative tool for iteratively improving their understanding. that the study suggested a strong relationship between formative use of quizzes and online engagement is well noted – although this connection needs to be interrogated further as it is unlikely to be a straightforward causal link. future, possibly experimental studies might consider exploring different approaches in feedback and scaffolding, using alternatives to mcqs, using branching and pathways to encourage re-attempts, and looking at the frequency and distribution of quizzes across modules. i. o’dowd 40 references arend, b. 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(2005). investigating gender bias in formative and summative caa, in proceedings of the 9th caa conference, loughborough university, uk. retrieved from https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/dspace-jspui/bitstream/2134/1994/1/fillk_brailsfords.pdf [accessed 30/03/2018] freasier, b., collins, g. and newitt, p. (2003). a web-based interactive homework quiz and tutorial package to motivate undergraduate chemistry students and improve learning. journal of chemical education, 80(11), 1344-1364. doi: 10.1021/ed080p1344 gunn, c. (2003). dominant or different? gender issues in computer-supported learning. journal of asynchronous learning networks, 7(1), 14-30. heinrich, e. 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(2017). jisc briefing: learning analytics and student success – assessing the evidence. jisc. retrieved from http://repository.jisc.ac.uk/6560/1/learninganalytics_and_student_success.pdf [accessed 30/03/2018] simkin m.g. and kuechler w.l. (2005). multiple choice tests and student understanding: what is the connection?. decision sciences journal of innovative education, 3, 73–97. doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4609.2005.00053.x tuttle, h.g. (2010). 10 reasons to use online practice quizzes (formative assessment). education with technology blog. retrieved from https://eduwithtechn.wordpress.com/2011/04/04/10-reasons-to-use-online-practice-quizzesformative-assessment/ [accessed 30/03/2018] http://davidlewisphd.com/publications/2010-lewisetal-edmediabestpracticesfinal.pdf http://repository.jisc.ac.uk/6560/1/learning-analytics_and_student_success.pdf http://repository.jisc.ac.uk/6560/1/learning-analytics_and_student_success.pdf https://eduwithtechn.wordpress.com/2011/04/04/10-reasons-to-use-online-practice-quizzes-formative-assessment/ https://eduwithtechn.wordpress.com/2011/04/04/10-reasons-to-use-online-practice-quizzes-formative-assessment/ d raftery & a risquez 24 engaging students through the vle: comparing like with like using the #vleireland student survey damien raftery, institute of technology carlow angelica risquez, university of limerick1 abstract virtual learning environments (vles) provide the core infrastructure for the digital learning experiences for many students in irish and international higher education institutions. hence the student experience and voice offer an important perspective to understand to what extent this proves a strategic choice, and investment of institutional resources and lecturers’ time. however, surveys comparing a diversity of institutions at different moments in time offer serious methodological limitations to data analysis. in this paper, results of the #vleireland student survey are presented for four irish higher education institutions, which were surveyed using the common questionnaire with 3,332 student responses in 2011 and 5,170 when the survey was repeated in 2013. to some extent, this allows us to analyse the data while relatively controlling for institutional influences. this snapshot of students’ use and perceptions at two points allow for tentative trends to be drawn as to any changing patterns over time. the comparison of results indicate a consistent finding of high frequency of use (with almost half using daily in the more recent findings). the vle thus provides a stable base for sharing learning resources, managing assignments and student communications. the consistency of the findings indicate a certain maturity of use of the vle, albeit with a continued emphasis on disseminating notes and other learning resources to students. as the student vle experience is largely determined by their lecturers’ use, a continued emphasis on the development of digital capacity of lecturers (as well as students) is needed. irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 raftery, d. & risquez, a. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. 1 the basis for this article stems from a conference paper (cosgrave et al., 2013) and we would like to acknowledge the valuable contributions of all our collaborators. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 25 1. introduction in ireland, the use of digital tools and the internet both within and beyond formal teaching environments has become a normalised and expected dimension of the teaching and learning experience (o’rourke, 2017, p.13). in irish higher education institutions as well as internationally, virtual learning environments (vles) have matured from early pilots in the early 2000s to now being widely used and considered core infrastructure. to justify this widespread investment in vle technology, it is important to study patterns of actual student vle use and student satisfaction (naveh, tubin & pliskin, 2010) and indeed it was commented that irish higher education lacks an evidence base in relation to vle usage (devine, 2015, p.16). it is essential to allow the student voice to inform the use of vles and the continuous improvement of their learning experiences. irish students, along with staff, have an expectation of “ubiquitous connectivity, access to online resources and the availability and use of digital tools in almost every aspect of their work” (o’rourke, 2017, p.21). this paper contributes to this gap in the literature. following a summary of research methods, this article presents and discusses students’ views on the use of vles across higher education in ireland. in particular, we focus our analysis on a comparison between the responses from students of four irish higher education institutions which took the survey simultaneously in a two year gap (in 2011 and 2013 respectively). to some extent, this allows us to analyse the data while relatively controlling for institutional influences. these snapshots of students’ use and perceptions at two points allow for tentative trends to be drawn as to any changing patterns over time. prior to conclusions, the comparison analysis is discussed along with other research and some implications are drawn. 2. methods as described elsewhere in this special issue (ryan & risquez, 2018), students were surveyed using the standard questionnaire with a common set of questions. to enable comparisons over time, changes have been kept to a minimum in the survey through the multiple administrations year on year. in this article, the analysis compares the 3,332 student responses in 2011 for four institutions in which the survey was repeated in 2013, at which time 5,170 students responded. the four colleges represent both universities and institutes of technology, and a variety of vles are used. the response rates in the four colleges varied and, as the survey was administered online, the sample is self-selecting leading to potential sample bias. a specific limitation in interpreting any change between 2011 and 2013 overall for the four colleges is that there has been no attempt to control for changes in the relative composition of the overall sample (proportion of respondents from each institution in 2011: 38%, 31%, 18% and 13%; in 2013: 37%, 39%, 19% and 6%). similarly, there may be other changes in demographics or the nature of the students surveyed that may distort the overall change reported (for example, gender and age of respondents from each institution in 2011: 42% female, 63% aged 23 and under; in 2013: 56% female, 69% aged 23 and under). in part, due to differences in vle terminology, there may be substantial non-responses to certain questions. these limitations are a caveat to the interpretation and generalisability of the findings presented. this being said, the overall sample surmounts 8,400 responses, which offers a degree of reliability to the data presented next. d raftery & a risquez 26 3. findings the 2013 student responses are, on average, strikingly similar to those of 2011 indicating relatively stability in student attitudes and use of the vle. there seems to be a general increase in the routine usage of the vle, with the continued predominant, almost universal, use of the vle to solve the problem of disseminating learning resources to students. the main difference is in where and when students are accessing the vle from, with a marked increase in the use of mobile devices. there is also a continued increase in the use of the vle for submitting assignments and for academic integrity/plagiarism detection. the analysis below is presented under key themes that emerged in previous reporting of our research including the vle as a content distribution platform, the need for consistency of use, the potential to enhance student communication and the expansion of flexibility (risquez et al., 2013) and can be compared with results reported in the paper by ryan and risquez (2018) in this special issue. 3.1 vle as a content distribution platform if i can't attend college because of being sick, or family commitments, i don't feel completely lost as i can keep track of everything in [the vle]. makes me revise more and allows me to prepare for labs more efficiently as my lecturer posts videos online in [the vle]. students use the vle frequently. this is consistent: slightly up in 2013, 48% of respondents use the vle daily with a further 40% using it a few times a week and 7% once a week. this compares to 43% using daily in 2011, with 42% a few times a week and 7% once a week. reported use % broadly useful % 2011 2013 2011 2013 lecture notes/handouts 89 99 87 96 other course documents 94 97 87 90 reading lists & online learning resources 68 90 60 77 submitting assignments 81 89 76 83 plagiarism detection/turnitin 58 70 46 54 class announcements 75 85 67 65 online discussions 47 56 30 28 quizzes 56 62 44 45 table 1: proportion of students self-reported use and rating as broadly useful (useful or very useful) the basic use of the vle is as a simple, stable transmission system for lecture notes and other learning resources. as can be seen in table 1, there is a general increase in reported vle use across all categories asked. a substantial majority of students reported that they found the vle broadly useful for getting course material from the lecturer – either lecture irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 27 notes/handouts (96% in 2013, up from 87% in 2011) or other course resources (90% in 2013, up from 87% in 2011). there is substantial and continued growing use of the proportion of students who report finding the vle useful for submitting assignments (83% in 2013, up from 76% in 2011) and for academic integrity/plagiarism detection (54% in 2013, up from 46% in 2011). there is stable rating of usefulness (about 2 out of 3) of class announcements. respondents consistently had high levels of agreement with the statement that the vle gives them more access to resources and learning materials (89% in 2013, 88% in 2011). the vle provides a content management system with increasing use for an efficient process for managing and grading assignments and as an additional communication forum for students. the increased submission of assignments may be due to the integration of systems such as turnitin within the vle. despite being substantially more demanding of lecturer time, there seems to be a substantial minority finding quizzes and online discussions useful, a finding consistent with the findings of surveys with lecturers reported in this issue (farrelly, raftery & harding, 2018). 3.2 consistency of use only one of my lecturers uses [the vle] which is great for that subject. unfortunately i don't get to use it for other subjects. some lecturers put material up in a fairly disorganised manner which can be frustrating when trying to access material quickly. students consistently agree that the vle is helpful and easy to use, about 94% and 83% respectively in both 2013 and 2011. there was a general increase in the proportion of coursework that had material in the vle from 2011 to 2013. 22% of respondents in 2013 reported all their coursework had material in the vle compared to 10% in 2011 whilst there was a reduction having none to 2% in 2013 from 7% in 2011. only a small proportion of respondents reported not using the vle, about 1% in both 2013 and 2011. the overwhelming barrier given as a reason is the lack of use of the vle by lecturers rather than any technical issues such as system reliability or access. students clearly would like their lecturers to make more use of the vle: in 2013, 68% of respondents still strongly agreed or agreed with this statement (consistent with the 69% in 2011). students want comprehensive and consistent basic usage that facilitates easier navigation within the vle. this has implications for academic development, to ensure all staff are consistently using the basics. there is a modest increase in the level of agreement that lecturers make good use of the vle, from 57% in 2011 to 62% in 2013. this continues an upward trend, implying that digital capacity is gradually being developed in the academic community and this needs to continue. indeed, when asked “what is the most important thing you would like to see improved about the vle?” in 2013 56% of students chose better usage by lecturers compared to 68% in 2011. note that the second most popular choice is consistently more use of audio/multimedia, which rose to 19% in 2013 from 13% in 2011. there was also a small increase for making the vle easier to use, from 8% in 2011 to 13% in 2013. coupled with a consistent 6% level of disagreement that vles are easy to use and about 10% disagreement that the respondent can get adequate help and support to use the vle, this indicates that supporting students in using the vle remains important. d raftery & a risquez 28 3.3 enhancing and sustaining student communication my course is very time consuming and it's difficult to manage study around this. [the vle] allows me that time to concentrate my study in a precise way. it suits me just the way it is ... it provides you with a good picture of how the semester will look regarding assignments, thus allowing adequate planning. vles facilitate students communicate and engage with their lecturers and each other. there is a consistent agreement that the vle gives more access to lecturers (70% in 2011, 67% in 2013). relatively few students feel that using the vle makes it more likely for them to communicate with their lecturer, for example by asking a question online (25% in 2011, 22% in 2013). however the vle may be a valuable forum for students unwilling or unable to communicate with lecturers in class or in person, with the vle offering an ‘open office door’ for students to engage with their lecturers. note that consistently a much smaller proportion of respondents felt the vle increased their access to classmates (27% in 2011, 21% in 2013) but again this may be valuable to particular students. figure 1 aspects of the vles perceived contribution to learning as can be seen in figure 1, students seem to feel that the vle provides a genuine aid for learning. there is a consistent majority that report that using the vle makes it easier for them to learn (67% in 2011, 72% in 2013), as well as adding to and clarifying what is covered in class. in addition, almost half feels the vle helps them understand how well they are doing (44% in 2011, 41% in 2013). irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 29 3.4 meeting flexibility requirements i have access to [the vle] from my phone. all notes are portable and when i have a free moment i can go online and study. i can learn at home, even in bed. figure 2: where students access the vle from most respondents access the vle from home as can be seen in figure 2, with substantial numbers accessing from laptops on campus and from open-access pcs. the biggest change is in the use of mobile devices to use the vle: in 2013 41% accessed from a mobile phone and 14% from a tablet device, compared to 14% from mobile device in 2011. the rapid change in technology has major implications for the provision of wi-fi on campus and the use of such devices to support learning both inside and outside of the classroom. in 2013, 36% reported using wireless access outside campus compared to 5% using an internet café in 2011. (note that in 2013 survey the options related to internet café and mobile devices were updated to reflect changes in technology use.) respondents were asked to indicate what times they used the vle. although such selfreporting is much less reliable than access logs, there was a dramatic increase from 2011 to 2013 in the level of access reported across a broad range of hours. as well as high usage during the day, this change is most pronounced from 7am to 9am (from 7% in 2011 to 21% in 2013), from 6pm to 10pm (from 36% to 81%) and during the night from 10pm to 7am (from 10% to 29%). this increase is largely outside of conventional study and office hours and may have implications for support. this increased flexibility of location and time (anywhere, anytime), coupled with broadly positive student attitudes that the vle is helpful and makes learning easier, is a key outcome of the use of vles. although beneficial for all students the d raftery & a risquez 30 remote availability of vles is particularly important for part-time and distance learners, enabling ubiquitous access to learning materials and communication tools. mobile access, including vle apps, provide useful new ways to easily communicate with students and enable the use of the vle to support learning activities in class (see raftery (2018) in this issue for further discussion). 4. discussion [the vle] has been very important to my studies throughout the years, when on erasmus the lack of a useful and easily accessible system like [the vle] was very noticeable. i feel that the use of online quizzes and video links on material covered in lectures helps with my learning of subjects and feel that all lecturers should be making more use of this feature. these quotes illustrate aspects of how students value the vle and its positive impact on their learning. the comparative analysis in the findings have highlighted the stability in student attitudes and use of the vle. there has however been a general increase in the routine usage of the vle, with a substantial increase in the student use of mobile devices. the vle’s predominant role as a content distribution platform has been complemented with increasing use of the vle for managing and grading assignments. the comparative analysis above confirms a stability in students’ view on the need for lecturers to use the vle consistently, and highlights how the vle enhances student communication and flexibility. survey respondents consistently consider that the vle is helpful (about 94%), consistent with findings of heaton-shrestha et al. (2009) that, in a uk university, students felt the vle enhanced their performance, effectiveness and experience. individual students commented that “[the vle] gives you direction”, “i’d be lost without [the vle]. it’s really helpful” and “i could not survive academically without [the vle]”. there is stable agreement that the vle is easy to use (over 80%), but small levels of disagreement indicate continued importance of appropriate initial induction and ongoing support. students like the flexible and structured access to learning resources that the vle offers – being able to access from wherever and whenever, with substantial access from home and in the evenings. consistency in the layout, terminology and design of courses within the vle is wanted and valued by students. the increased use of mobile devices has implications for campus infrastructure (such as the provision of wi-fi and flexible learning spaces) and vle design (including apps), as well as demand for mobile access via the vle to rich multimedia learning resources (irish examples: marcus-quinn & cleary, 2015; mitchell, 2014; fannon, kelly, macblain, raftery & brennan, 2015). there is a general increase in students’ reported vle use. a key determinant of students’ use of the vle is the amount and type of use by lecturers. an increasing majority of respondents agreed that their lecturers made good use of the vle, with consistently about 7 out of 10 wanting their lecturers to make more use of the vle. despite heavy workloads (especially in context of increased teaching and administration including working with more students), academics are demonstrating increasing effectiveness in basic vle use. this can be understood as part of a trend where lecturers tend to make, on average, only incremental changes to their practice when faced with new technology in the form of a vle (dutton, cheong & park, 2004; jenkins, browne & walker, 2005; kirkup & kirkwood, 2005). naveh et al. (2010) suggest that “instructors can maintain their conservative teaching habits except irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 31 for posting their course content … this can be done at low cost, yielding relatively high student satisfaction” (p. 132). this is consistent with brown’s argument that, despite almost universal adoption by institutions in the uk, “vles have had only a relatively slight impact on pedagogy in higher education” (2010, p.7). for continual improvements as well as substantial or innovative changes in teaching practice, both national and institutional strategic vision is needed, coupled with a renewed emphasis on fostering digital literacies, academic professional development, and pedagogical and technical support (for further discussion of staff attitudes to, and use of, the vle see farrelly, raftery and harding (2018) and of the importance of staff development see harding (2018), both in this special issue). indeed, the national forum report building digital capacity in higher education directly links the under-utilisation of current digital infrastructure with the need for strategic and pedagogical guidance, and the development of digital literacy within the teaching community as follows (2014, p.7): the constant emergence of newer and better tools has often resulted in confusion among staff regarding the best tools to recommend and use, and to develop and learn about in their teaching and learning practices. this may go some way towards explaining the emerging evidence suggesting that key digital resources (for example, virtual learning environments) are not being used to their full pedagogical capacity. our findings that in 2013 almost 9 in 10 students report finding the vle useful for submitting assignments has been corroborated by findings in the irish survey of student engagement, where 86% of respondents stated they used a vle to discuss or complete an assignment sometimes, often or very often (2015, p. 18). thus as the vle is increasingly used to manage aspects of assessing students (submission of assignments, online quizzes, discussions and journals), the administrative requirements to retain student work mean that formalised policies and procedures are required. policies are also needed to ensure adequate privacy and data protection, whilst enabling analysis of student data within the vle (such as a data source for learning analytics projects such as dessi (national forum, n.d.); see logan-phelan (2018) in this special issue for further discussion of learning analytics). 5. conclusion the consistent finding of high frequency of use (with almost half using daily and a further four in ten students using the vle at least a few times a week in 2013), and the greater flexibility of access and communication via mobile devices, combines to reinforce that the vle provides a stable base for sharing learning resources, managing assignments and student communications. the consistency of the findings indicates a certain maturity of use of the vle. as indicated by the rapid rise in the use of mobile devices to use the vle, advances in technology and the uses of that technology can facilitate major and profound changes in practice and use. however, this is by no means guaranteed. indeed technological developments, combined with wider changes in higher education, will affect the evolving nature of use and future role of vles, perhaps disruptively. in this context, national and institutional strategic engagement is important as is that of departments, and individual and groups of academics. the support and continued academic professional development of d raftery & a risquez 32 lecturers is needed with appropriate emphasis on digital literacy and digital pedagogy to enhance student learning. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 33 references brown, s. 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(2018). ‘lessons learnt’: the student view in the #vleireland project [special issue, mcavinia and risquez]. irish journal of technology enhanced learning, vol 3(2), 1-10. http://www.teachingandlearning.ie/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/digital-roadmap-phase1may282014.pdf http://www.teachingandlearning.ie/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/digital-roadmap-phase1may282014.pdf https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/learning-analytics-educational-da%20ta-mining-learning-impact/dessi-information-booklet/ https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/learning-analytics-educational-da%20ta-mining-learning-impact/dessi-information-booklet/ https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/final-infrastructure-report-with-doi-web-ready.pdf https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/final-infrastructure-report-with-doi-web-ready.pdf http://www.edin.ie/?page_id=112 microsoft word 04_telireland_issue1_lcuffe.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 1, issue 1, 2014 17 digital literacy: web search ecology and some surprising conclusions about finding and promoting educational resources on the internet laurence cuffe1 national college of ireland (received march 2014; final version received september 2014) 1. introduction an ecology is a system of interacting and or competing organisms or entities. alternatively, it may also describe the study of such interactions or competition. in this paper i loosely consider the system of educationalists searching for content to use in their teaching practice to form such a system. having returned from a course on ict for social and group learning delivered by the company smart solutions (vassallo 2010) in malta, i decided to use what i had learnt to build a number of websites publicising the computer tools i had learned about. in choosing free websites, i was choosing platforms which would be available at no cost to educators, as i was hoping to promote teachers’ active participation in the online community, which had been a theme of the course. using free internet sites, i built a wiki (cuffe 2011a), on wikispaces (anon 2010b), a blog (cuffe 2010a) on the wordpress.com site (anon 2011g), a google group (cuffe 2010c) , on google groups (anon 2011c), and a trailmeme (cuffe 2011c), on the trailmeme site (anon 2011e). i also built a second blog (cuffe 2010b) on blogger (anon 2011a) and shot a number of videos (cuffe 2010d) which i placed on the you tube site (anon 2011i). finally, i built a prezi (cuffe 2010e), which i placed on the prezi site. some of the sites i created initially placed highly in google search however web traffic did not seem to correspond in any clear way to my sites rank in search. this was surprising, however i noted that traffic would peak whenever i mentioned a specific site on an online forum, or on an email chat group, and this peak could be many times larger than the regular level of traffic coming in, presumably, from general search (see figure 1). the rest of this paper describes what i did to explore this further. 2. methodology initially i looked at the usage statistics, where they were available, for a number of web resources i built. in examining the traffic data for these sites with a view to estimating their relative effectiveness, i noted that in web search both prezi and trailmeme sites ranked highly, even when there appeared to be little traffic passing through them. stand-alone blog entries did not fare well. a more detailed examination of traffic logs revealed that promoting the site via other channels such as mail rings and focused email groups such as the cesi list (computer education society of ireland 1 corresponding author. email: cuffe@mac.com irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2014. © 2014 l. cuffe. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. l. cuffe 18 2011) resulted in a sharp spike in user traffic which then trailed off over the next day or two (figure 1). figure 1: unique visitor numbers for my wiki spaces website for 2011, showing the peaked nature of the distribution. the peak around day 165 corresponds to a promotion of the website via the computers in education society of ireland mailing list other peaks correspond to similar mentions on other media. other strategies such as promoting the resource via twitter (anon 2011f), and in comments on popular educational blogs were less effective for me, though the effectiveness of such methods would depend very much on the prominence of a user’s digital identity. as i currently have only 227 twitter followers, the twitter result is unsurprising, though twitter might be more effective for lady gaga, who currently has 24,000,000 followers. this conclusion also held for the use of bulk email. a mail shot to a select group of 70 educationalists involved in higher education resulted in no detectable increase in site traffic. the use of facebook, pinterest, or google+ also has potential for users with a sufficient number of followers on these platforms. as these peaks could be many times larger than the traffic which was arriving at my educational sites via generalized search, i then set out to determine if this behaviour was normal for other educational web sites, or was anomalous. to perform this analysis i looked for other educational web sites for which traffic statistics were freely available. because wikispaces gave the most comprehensive breakdown of web traffic and was, as far as i could tell, the most popular platform i used to disseminate this information (table 1), i concentrated my analysis on looking at the traffic statistics available publicly for a sample of wikis built on the wikispaces site (anon 2010b). 2011 cumulative figures site total visitors % of total wiki 9325 77.31% trailmeme 1400 11.61% blog2(wordpress) 537 4.45% youtube 557 4.62% prezi 177 1.47% blog1(blogger) 64 0.53% google group 2 0.02% total 12062 100.00% irish journal of technology enhanced learning 19 table 1: a comparison of traffic flows to a selection of websites built to disseminate information about tools for social and group learning. this phase of the traffic analysis, looking at daily statistics for 43 educational wikis for 2011 covered 2.7 million visits to this collection of sites, by so called “unique visitors”. i used this data to establish that arrival statistics were significantly more peaked than one might expect if visitors were arriving at random, and were thus more likely to result from specific mentions or promotions of the resources, as opposed to resulting from generalized random search. after completing this analysis, it occurred to me that perhaps by looking at just educational wiki sites, i was being too focused in my research. i then used needlebase, which allows you to automate data collection from a set of websites to collect data from 28 other educational web sites over a 45 day period. these sites included educational videos, university websites, online collections of resources and educational blogs. this data set covered about 1.6 million site visits, and supported my previous conclusions. 2.1 details of data analysis educational wikis visitor statistics were gathered from a purposive selection of the online list of educational wiki’s created by steve hagedorn, (hargadon 2011) using the following procedure. wiki descriptions on this site were initially analysed to determine if the primary role of the wiki was to disseminate information about web based educational resources to educators, if wikis matched this description, i then downloaded the unique visitor daily visits numbers for the year 2011 and transferred this data to excel for further analysis. the description was analysed before usage statistics were viewed or downloaded, so as to avoid any data driven bias in deciding which wikis to include in the data collection phase. 1. statistical expectations of web site traffic visual inspection of website traffic graphs showed sharp peaks superimposed on a baseline of random activity as shown in figure 1. if traffic arrived at a website purely as a result of random searches i would expect such traffic to show a poisson distribution. this distribution represents a good model for human activity where individual decisions to act are not related to others’ immediate actions. for the poisson distribution the mean and the variance of the traffic data should be equal. this provides a simple test for the presence of such a distribution. the data collected shows that traffic to the educational web sites under consideration was highly episodic, and came in very peaked flows. in an effort to characterise this statistically, i computed the mean and the variance of each sites visitor figures. this revealed that the variance of the traffic was at times orders of magnitude larger than the mean. i have taken the ratio of these two figures for each of the wiki spaces’ data sets, and plotted the log of this in figure 2. l. cuffe 20 figure 2: plot of log(variance/mean) for daily incoming unique visitor numbers for 43 educational wikis. note: if traffic arriving at these wikis was poisson in character, the ratio of these two statistics would be one and the points would plot on the x axis, as log(1)= 0.. in all the data sets for which this ratio is plotted above, the variance exceeds the mean, and the distribution shows more variability than would be expected if the distribution was poisson. this plot represents the activities of 2.7 million site visitors. this plot is consistent with the hypothesis that traffic was being driven by specific promotions of the web site contents leading to very pronounced peaks in traffic as opposed to being a function of their position within search results. data for the other educational websites examined are plotted in figure 3, below. figure 3: plot of log(variance/mean) for daily incoming unique visitor numbers for a selection of 28 educational (non-wiki) websites. note: if traffic arriving at these sites was poisson in character, the ratio of these two statistics would be one and the points would plot on the x axis, as log(1) = 0. in all the data sets for which this ratio is plotted above, the variance exceeds the mean, and the distribution shows more variability than would be expected if the distribution was poisson. this graph represents the activities of 1.6 million site visitors. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 21 other literature supports this conclusion. a paper (kumar & tomkins 2009) which analysed 50 million browser page views concluded that only 20% resulted either directly or indirectly from search engine results. here an indirect arrival refers to a user who may click on a search result and follow the link deeper into the web to arrive at the final web page. in kumar and tomkins paper data was gathered from logs of all internet activity of users who installed web-tracking software in their browsers. the high variability of educational website traffic is also supported by earlier work (meiss et al. 2005). meiss et al. analysed large scale (740 million data transfers) traffic flows on the academic internet2 network, where they found that for such a distribution, the second moment: eventually diverges; the standard deviation is not an intrinsic value of the distribution and is only bounded by the size of the statistical sample. (meiss et al. 2005, p.513) this sample is interesting because it is very large, and consisted solely of educational traffic. the website traffic i analysed covered a year for the wiki data, and 45 days for the other educational website data. this data could well be describable over the long term by the same sort of scale free behaviour as that described in the quotation from meiss et al, given above. this analysis supports the conclusion that educational website traffic is not, at this point in time, derived primarily from search engines. this conclusion could have been drawn from website analytics, looking at the referring site information for arriving visitors, however the conclusion reached above is more robust, insofar as it would capture data for visitors arriving via referral chains, referred to above, as well as direct arrivals. 1. survey in addition to this statistical analysis, nine short structured interviews of educators were carried out. data from these interviews was used to triangulate the information gathered in the previous phases of the research. a purposive sample was devised (silverman 2000) sampling a cross section of educators and trying to avoid the bias which could arise by either enrolling educators via online forums, or those who were active in an e-learning context. the sample was chosen to provide a broad cross section of educators using the web to teach today, and consisted of individuals drawn across a range of educational contexts. with this in mind one primary teacher, two secondary teachers three third level lecturers, and three adult education teachers were chosen. all interviews were conducted confidentially, and the names of interviewees are withheld by mutual agreement. this group were asked about their internet use in teaching and were then queried as to how they located resources which they used in class. in asking specifically about resources used in class, i wished to exclude search methods and methodologies used in educational research as distinct from teaching practice. 4.1 results only one respondent indicated that google was their primary method for locating resources. when asked whether they would locate video material via google, this respondent said that they would go directly to you tube. this was the only respondent for whom generalized search was the primary source of teaching material. all other respondents indicated that they located resources via personal recommendations or “via a web site”. as this research progressed i became fascinated by the low ranking that google had in educators’ research strategy and i asked more specific questions as to why it was not used. responses varied, but l. cuffe 22 are perhaps best summed up by one respondent who said “it’s all a load of rubbish; you get nothing but rubbish sites when you use it”. this, i think, captures a general sense of frustration with the large number of not very useful sites which you get if you put in search terms such as “mathematics” and “educational sites”. while these data support my conclusions, one very informal additional piece of research provides a small counter note, but also increased my understanding of why this result seemed surprising. at a conference for adult educators i asked a group of the participants about their strategies for locating educational material. an informal show of hands in a workshop with 18 educators present indicated that about half of the participants identified with google or another search engine as being their primary source of educational material. in explaining this divergent result, i note that this group were active researchers attending an international conference. i would expect this group to be more skilled in choosing appropriate search words, and using search engines effectively to gather information. no respondent mentioned more subject specific web portals, etc.; however i am certain that a number of them would use more specialized web portals for identifying research literature as part of their academic research. 2. search engine optimization existing received wisdom (fetterly et al. 2004), (stanford school of medicine 2011), (wilson 2011) suggests that the most effective way to maximise web site traffic is to maximise the sites exposure via search engines such as google and bing, there is a lot of research and advice available (king 2008), (langville & meyer 2006),(evans 2007) on how to improve your page rank with google, and google themselves also have an excellent publication on this topic, the “google search engine optimization starter guide” from google (anon n.d.). in my initial search results both the prezi and trailmeme sites ranked very highly, while the wiki spaces and blog based sites did worse. from this i would conclude that using prezi or trailmeme to present an educational idea or resource will give higher initial visibility in google search results than presenting your ideas via a blog post. wiki spaces initially did not rank as well as did either of the two sites mentioned above, however as increasing traffic moved through the wiki spaces site and as other authoritative educational sites linked to the wiki spaces site it rose in the rankings. parenthetically one of my wikis (cuffe 2011b) has shown up consistently at or near the top of irish google’s searches for irish educational resources, but has received little search directed traffic. a year later neither the prezi nor the trailmeme site rank as well which suggests that using the new hot platforms such as pinterest, or “scoop it” might receive the same novelty value boost as did the aforementioned sites, which were located on then quite novel and “trending” platforms. i did not feel that high search rank was a key element in attracting site visitors, and, as this is a constantly changing domain of activity, i refer the reader to the previous publications and will not comment further. 3. discussion it seems that google or bing with farms full of servers surveying millions of websites should dominate any effective search for web resources. that this is not so is supported in part by the statistical analysis, and more strongly by the interview results. i revert to the ecology analogy introduced at the start of this paper, and a well-known result from ecosystem modelling, fisher’s fundamental theorem (fisher 1930, p.37), (price 1972). it states that “the rate of increase in fitness of any organism at any time is equal to its genetic variance in fitness at that time”, and this can shed some light on my conclusion. in a biological context, this theorem describes how a species in which succeeding generations have high variability, is more likely to irish journal of technology enhanced learning 23 produce a particularly successful variant, which will come to dominate succeeding generations. i now apply this to web search. if we consider the ecology under consideration to be the pool of educationalists searching for resources on the internet, and we partition this pool into two segments, those users using general search, and those using other means, fisher’s theorem implies that those using other means will have an advantage over those using general search, because of the greater range in the effectiveness of search using other means. this increased effectiveness often takes the form of a symbiotic relationship between us, as educators, and our data sources, as we fine tune our data sources to favour those which are consistently useful, while discarding those sources which waste our time. the general search landscape also changes. if similar work had been carried out five years ago you tube (anon 2011i) would have been a relatively unknown start up and altavista, (anon 2011h) would have played a much more prominent role. moving on to the survey results i found in the interviews that trust and the ratio of high to low quality seemed to be an important factor in educators’ choice of search strategies. arrival statistics are also governed by zipfs principle of least effort (zipf 1949) which is significant in library science. zipfs principle states that users are looking for the maximum amount of useful information in return for the least effort. this early statement about information seekers’ behaviour has much in common with later models based on a foraging analogy (chi et al. 2007). following a link supplied by a known good source is in general more rewarding that using a generalized search engine such as google. it must be kept in mind that the survey referred to a very specific search exercise, looking for material which can be used in class. this is a distinct task from the academic literature search, or product search with a view to purchase, about which there is an extensive literature. when i looked at website traffic data i sought to identify the factors which drove traffic to the websites i built on tools for social and group education. high search engine visibility was not a major factor. this conclusion comes from the observation that even when search engine rank was high, traffic remained low. an observation that peaks in website traffic correlated well with mentions in online communities of practice (wenger 1998, 2006) such as nings (anon 2011d), and mailrings such as teachers net (anon 2010a), was explored by looking at daily unique visitor statistics for a selection of 43 other wiki websites whose purpose was the dissemination of educational information and resources, as well as a 45 day sample of traffic to a diverse selection of 27 other educational websites. a comparison of these statistics with search traffic statistics for 40 educational terms gathered from a google search statistics site, google trends (anon n.d.), supported the conclusion that traffic and search are not strongly correlated for these educational sites. traffic on the educational websites was much more sporadic and showed a much higher variability than was seen in the statistics for search traffic where educational terms were used as key words. having arrived at this conclusion, i then asked why this should be so. here the data is not as robust, being based on an examination of traffic logs for my own web sites and a series of semi structured interviews with nine other educators. the traffic data for my website indicated that traffic peaked in response to mentions of these websites either in online discussions or via twitter. the interviews showed that users found generalized search engines such as google frustrating due to the large number of irrelevant results returned. for example, a particular issue within the irish context was the large number of results which had a poor fit to the irish curriculum. many results were described as being “american” in focus. this regional issue is probably representative of a larger problem, which is the difficulty of encoding in the search specific search target characteristics, such as appropriateness for a given curriculum. l. cuffe 24 one exception worth noting to the bias against generalised search was you tube. all respondents indicated that if they were looking for a video clip to use in their teaching they would use you tube to find it. in the interviews respondents indicated that as an alternative to general search they found resources through recommendations from friends, or while on training courses. the interview data is consistent with my previous conclusions, and indicates that practitioners prefer to use sites which have been recommended to them by people or sites which they trust, either face to face, online, or while on courses. trust is a significant issue, and has been discussed in the literature (sharratt & usoro 2003) and more recently by the same authors (usoro et al. 2007) who examine the factors contributing to effective knowledge sharing in online communities of practice. my interview sample was small, and was chosen specifically to try and capture practitioners who did not use the internet a great deal. results for a more web-proficient group of users would probably differ from those for the sample given above, as i would expect more proficient users to be able to use general search tools more effectively, and thus to use them more. 7. conclusions the traditional community of practice (wenger 1998, 2006) based around a mailing list is still alive and well. while google is often used to find short pieces of online material such as java applets, short video footage, or copies of standards, larger tools such as wiki software or websites with collections of educational resources are more likely to be discovered via a recommendation by a colleague, mention at a conference, or via online mailing lists or specialist websites such as facebook (anon 2011b). trust and the ability of friends and acquaintances to filter the torrent of web content effectively seemed to be the factors driving this choice. this conclusion is supported 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institutions here are currently in the midst of large-scale vle projects, evaluating existing platforms and investing heavily in their new vle choice1. despite the arrival of numerous social media platforms and the smartphone era, use of these centrally supported platforms to facilitate technology-enhanced learning is very much alive. for ten years, a multi-institutional group of educational developers in ireland has collaborated to gather student and teaching staff views on the use of vles across irish higher education. in this special issue of the irish journal of technology enhanced learning, we present findings and analysis of this work. the body of work we share with you contributes to the debate around the vle’s state of health with a large amount of evidence and our experience at the coalface of technology-enhanced learning. we have sought an appropriate medium to communicate the body of work as a sequence, allowing freedom to present results but also to discuss analysis and identify key trends and themes. in the papers presented here, we aim to do exactly this by cross-referencing the different articles and taking full advantage of ijtel’s open access format whereby readers can find out more about any of the related research. we are very grateful to the editorial committee of ijtel for the opportunity to do this through a special issue. the papers presented here focus on the use of the vle by students and teaching staff in irish heis. for our purposes, vle refers to the institutional web-based systems used to support teaching in most heis. these systems (sometimes called lms or learning management systems) generally offer online access to course materials, discussion boards, and online assessment tools. in this research, a survey of students has been undertaken in 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2015 using a common set of questions. the institutions which have participated thus far represent a diversity of organizational histories and vle systems, and results to date include the responses of more than 23,000 students. more recently, a staff version of the survey has been developed and piloted in some of the participating institutions. the 1 the past year has seen a swathe of high-level vle projects around the island of ireland. for example, ucc, dit, cit and queen’s university belfast have all launched large-scale consultations with staff and students to consider changing their vles. in at least one case a change has been decided, with migration to a new system underway. irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 mcavinia, c. & risquez, a. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. c mcavinia & a risquez ii resulting database constitutes the largest collection of information on student experience related to technology enhanced learning in ireland to date. as a result, the roadmap for building digital capacity in irish higher education by the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning (2015) quoted this study, in order to support the claim that vles are not being used to their full pedagogical capacity. previous confident predictions made about the end of the vle also suggested it was not being used as fully as it could be. vles have been strongly critiqued as “shovelware” and as the dumping ground for notes and slides rather than the transformative online space to which educators had aspired at the end of the 1990s (stiles, 2007). the newer vles and upgrades of the ‘traditional’ brands offer features such as integrated social media tools and e-portfolios, and have lost the visual cues tying them to the classroom, such as book and blackboard imagery. the regeneration of the vle is remarkable, and we argue in this special issue that research into its adoption and use is therefore even more timely. it is essential to listen to those teaching and learning with these systems which are unique in their reach and in the extent to which they have become part of campus life. the results and arguments that will be presented through this issue will provide a valuable platform to help deconstruct some of the claims and myths made about vles, deriving many positive conclusions from findings. in this editorial, we present the rationale, history of the vle research project and its methods, which has been dealt with in more detail through previous dissemination efforts (see also risquez et al., 2013a). we will also introduce briefly the papers to follow. context: drivers for change and the evolution of the vle the most significant policy statements published in ireland in the past decade point to the expansion of higher education, while maintaining and improving the quality of learning and teaching, offering opportunities for engagement with communities and enterprise, and promoting increased equity of access as well as lifelong learning. these statements have pointed to the role of new technologies in realising our ambitions for higher education. technology has certainly changed the ways and means by which all people can potentially be educated and fundamentally changed the sense of where people can be educated. the national strategy for higher education to 2030 (des, 2011) clearly articulated the role which technology should play in the provision of teaching and facilitating the learning experience. it describes a system which must be responsive to the needs of an increasingly diverse student population. the strategy acknowledges the advances which have occurred in irish higher education in the past decade including developments in technology-supported learning which include the increasing use of vles to support learning (des, 2011). there is a clear focus on the provision of flexible learning options for students including blended and online learning while acknowledging the requirement for the development of teaching skills and the provision of on-going opportunities to develop these skills. ambitious targets have been set for the numbers engaging in higher education in ireland between now and 2030 (des, 2011). enhanced use of technology as a means of assisting expansion of provision has also been called for (hea, 2011, p.33). however, one should be mindful of accepting at face value the claims that the proponents of technology enhanced learning have sometimes made. as articulated in our submission to the group involved in the preparation of the national strategy (national forum, 2014, p.53), we must instead avail of opportunities to integrate research with teaching in order to enrich and enhance student learning. the desire to listen to the student perspective and use students’ voices to inform the continual improvement of their learning experience underpins the research presented in this special issue. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 iii it is important that, in addition to considering the local context for this research, we also consider the international research charting the adoption of vles elsewhere. initial surveys in the early 2000s reflected the adoption of the vle across further and higher education in the uk (browne & jenkins 2003; jenkins, browne & armitage 2001; jenkins, browne & walker, 2005). by 2010, vles or lms were in use in 90-100% of higher education institutions in the us and uk (brown, 2010; williams van rooij, 2011). however, by the end of the 2000s researchers who analysed critically the use of the vle were beginning to suggest that its capacity to support innovative and active teaching and learning methods was extremely limited. blin and munro (2008) questioned why the vle had failed to disrupt traditional lecturing practices. conole, de laat, dillon and derby (2008) suggested that vles were supporting and replicating lectures and notes distribution, rather than encouraging educators towards group learning or project-based assessment of students. kirkup and kirkwood (2005) found that technologies were in general adopted (at least in the first instance) to align with existing practice, and that evolution rather than revolution could be expected in the adoption of the vle. however, research into the adoption of the vle had limitations and gaps. there has been a tendency towards case studies of the use of the vle in a particular discipline or with a particular group. there have been few studies which focus on the use of the vle over a period of time: we tended to see snapshots and census-like countable data, rather than studies which give us a picture over a number of years of how a particular technology has been used. in the late 2000s and early 2010s, researchers began to reflect on what their own expectations of technology might have been, and whether these correspond with those of the users and practitioners in their universities. for example, guri-rosenblit (2005) has questioned whether we were measuring the impact of technologies in a reasonable way, when we tended to compare their use in campus-based institutions with that in distance institutions. she has argued convincingly that we need to take a different perspective on how online learning fits into a campus-based institution, when there are face-to-face teaching events comprising a large part of the timetable. these questions motivated a group of educational developers and technologists in the irish higher education sector to evaluate whether there were some forms of ‘conventional’ vle use that might well be appropriate to students and lecturers in the third level sector in ireland, and to continue this evaluation over a period of years. the next section describes the research project that originated as a result. #vleireland: a sustained and sustainable collaborative project the project that we came to call #vleireland (https://vleireland.wordpress.com/) was born out of a persistent common need for better information on student perceptions of vles. it developed organically in response to this need, with operating structures at flexible levels of formality. there was no official project leader, and different team members contributed in proportion to their interests and capabilities. the research received no direct grant funding, had no fixed costs, and the work was done at the fringes of each team member's own role. as such, we operated as a peculiarly sustainable group, relying only on the continued interest of participants to maintain it. in 2014, we received a small grant through network funding awarded to the irish learning technology association (ilta) by the national forum for the https://vleireland.wordpress.com/ c mcavinia & a risquez iv enhancement of teaching and learning. we acknowledge this support for our work here as the funding afforded us an opportunity to meet face-to-face and discuss potential avenues for dissemination of the large body of data that we had collected to that date. our dissemination efforts now materialise in this special issue, in order to contribute to the evidence base available to heis in ireland planning for the development of technology-enhanced learning over the next number of years. next, we will present a short story about how the project originated and grew. in 2008, robert cosgrave, then a researcher and educational developer under the umbrella of nairtl2 in ucc, launched a call to the irish he sector to collaborate with others around a survey of student attitudes and usage of vles. after an open invitation to all irish tertiary institutions through ilta, five institutions collaborated in the design of the survey and committed to running it and pooling the data. participating institutions, on condition of anonymity, pooled their results for comparison. data protection issues were addressed by stripping all individual identifiers out before pooling the data and ensuring the students were aware of what the data was being used for. in subsequent years, additional institutions joined the group, which currently includes 12 institutions and operates under the auspices of ilta. ethical issues in research with students and staff have been considered at each phase of the project and permission sought from the relevant institutional committees. the survey data has provided each institution with useful information on how their uptake and usage patterns compared with other institutions, in a framework which prevented abuse of the findings for marketing or public benchmarking. research results have been disseminated through the years in order to generate impact, always preserving these ethical guidelines (for example, presentations and publications were to be approved by all members). outputs have included a number of papers and keynotes in the edtech national conference organised by ilta, and at other national and international conferences, as well as publications (cosgrave et al. 2011; cosgrave et al. 2012; cosgrave et al. 2013a, 2013b; farrelly et al., 2015; farrelly, raftery & harding, 2016; risquez, raftery & costello, 2015; risquez et al. 2013a, 2013b). the research has survived in hibernation for long periods as partner institutions run their internal surveys and gather data using the common survey tool, but it has also moved forward very quickly at times using a variety of remote collaboration tools (skype, wikis, google docs) to develop and share insights. the project developed a high degree of implicit sustainability by accident, because of its built in leanness and redundancy, and its ongoing value to the participants. much of the value of this research is internal to each organisation, as it provides participants with a sense of how their own work and issues fit into a wider context of their peers. we anticipate that the survey created by the #vleireland project, which is currently integrated in the research strategy of ilta3, will remain in use indefinitely as long as vles remain a subject of interest. overview of research the research reported in this special issue draws on data from a survey instrument distributed first to students, and later adapted for distribution to staff in the participating institutions. the student survey instrument has evolved with time, and it currently consists of 24 questions, some of which have large numbers of sub-questions. the design incorporated a mix of yes/no and 2 network for advancing the integration of research, teaching and learning (http://www.nairtl.ie/) 3 http://ilta.ie/activities/research-projects/ http://www.nairtl.ie/ http://ilta.ie/activities/research-projects/ irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 v likert question styles, often addressing similar issues in different ways in different questions to accurately triangulate the students’ perspectives, and a mix of positive and negative questions to avoid common survey design bias pitfalls. the staff survey instrument was similarly constructed, to support comparisons where appropriate between staff and student responses. it consists of 22 questions, incorporating yes/no and likert question styles, addressing the use of the vle and touching on the use of other learning technologies, training and support available to staff and any barriers to their use or developing further their use of technology in their teaching. here again, efforts were made to construct the survey instrument to afford some triangulation of perspectives and responses. in both surveys, there were also a number of open-ended questions that enabled the respondents to provide more depth to their input. once coded, these responses provide a very useful qualitative addition and thus offer a greater degree of insight into the students’ and staff members’ perceptions and opinions. this special issue draws on a total of 23879 student responses across 12 institutions, collated from 31 survey instances from early 2008 to date. when the survey has been applied synchronously more than one (as is the case for nine of the institutions), some of the discussion compares data from their previous administrations. finally, it is important to mention some inherent limitations that must be considered when interpreting the results presented in this special issue. like all datasets, this one comes with specific caveats and biases which must be noted. surveys were conducted online, with the survey instruments generally disseminated via both email and announcements within the vle system. response rates varied between institutions, which necessarily creates biases. students with high digital literacy are more likely to respond, but there were few predictors of response rate amongst staff. as this is a survey on vle usage, non-users of the vle are likely to be under-represented in the sample. the data has not been weighted in any way, so institutions with large numbers of respondents may be over represented. the limitations of survey data need to be kept in mind when interpreting the findings. therefore, response bias is acknowledged as a key limitation; we only have information from a relatively small subset of students, who are probably more likely to be more technically capable. to transcend this limitation, we believe it is important to draw on system data captured by the vle itself, for example, the proportion of registered students who log in regularly, the proportion of modules with activity and so on. the details of these metrics will differ from system to system, and there is a substantial body of technical work in developing common metrics which can be used to draw comparisons. this work strand could draw the project in the direction of learning analytics, and deepen our collective understanding of system data and how it can be used to guide our professional development programmes and improve the overall student learning experience. it must also be noted that the initial survey was designed as one element of a much larger piece of work in one of the partner institutions, which drew on system data, staff survey data, student focus groups, key informant interviews and random sample staff interviews. while it is not practical to conduct such a detailed project on such a grand and open-ended scale, there is scope to add additional methods to the student to add depth and robustness to the data set moving ahead. papers presented in this ijtel special issue this special issue contains eight papers presenting analysis of the data from the #vleireland student and staff surveys over the past ten years. ryan and risquez present lessons learned from the perspective of student use of the vle as reflected in the full dataset of some 24,000 responses and addressing myths around the use of the vle as well as its pedagogical potential. farrelly, raftery and harding present analysis of the staff survey data, examining the tools and c mcavinia & a risquez vi features of the vle used by lecturers, the barriers to use and emergent issues and concerns such as intellectual property ownership. raftery and risquez present a further analysis of the student data addressing student engagement, but controlling for some of the diversity of institutions involved in this research overall by conducting in-depth analysis of similar institutions from within the dataset. harding’s paper focuses on the “digital turn” and how educational developers might address some of the issues faced by lecturers as they adopt and use the vle in their teaching. mcavinia, ryan and moloney take a subset of the staff data to examine the discussion of time, and the lack of time available to staff to work with the vle and other new technologies. raftery examines what this research tells us about the use of mobile learning in conjunction with the vle, and how student interaction with educational technologies is evolving at present. logan-phelan then turns to the issue of learning analytics in education, and taking relevant data from this research, examines the challenges to effective use of analytics including the need for effective design of blended learning in the first instance. mcavinia and risquez conclude with an examination of the position of the vle in relation to open education as reflected in the relevant data from this research. conclusion this editorial has introduced and described the project on which the research presented in this ijtel special issue is based. at the outset, we expected to learn if our vles were doing ‘better’ or ‘worse’ than those of our peers. instead, we have learned from the wealth of data provided by our students that we are all facing very similar issues, against which technical and organisational factors are much less important than we thought. the staff perspective is also very enlightening, as many of the authors have an internal requirement for staff survey instruments to help guide the planning of professional development programmes. as with the student survey, the development and deployment of a common staff survey instrument has recently enabled a broader understanding of the issues. review of our survey tool is a key piece of work moving forward. our initial question set focused on the vle itself, and was implicitly framed around the undergraduate, lecture-centric learning paradigm. potential uses of vles in support of project based learning or practical learning are not captured well, and will need to be considered. similarly, technology moves on, and in light of that, the question set will need to be reviewed, to strike a balance between the value of being topical and current, and the need for consistency over time in a longitudinal study. this being said, the instruments, and the project as a whole, has proven to be of immense utility in our daily practice. the claims made by proponents of e-learning can induce feelings ranging from incredulity to paroxysms of hope for the future. on the face of it technology-enhanced learning certainly appears to offer ways and means of widening educational participation making education lifelong and lifewide. with the support of education developers, we have found overwhelming support for the view that vles seem to offer a useful platform whereby content, teaching and learning can be married into one meaningful alternative learning environment; and not just an environment regarded as supplemental to traditional learning. however, e-learning platforms exist within a milieu that is reliant on issues such as connectivity, access, lecturer and student experience and abilities, all of which impact on the potential effectiveness of said platforms. whatever policies, protocols, think tanks, committees, legislation, commissions or memorandums are drawn up, designed or implemented, the reality for most learners and lecturers on the ground is frequently very different from the aspirations of such instruments or bodies. it is quite clear that aspirations and mission statements need to be turned into concrete executive decisions and actions. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 2, 2018 vii we have the pleasure to introduce the work of all the team who have contributed to this project through this special issue. we welcome additional participants to join the project team, from ireland or overseas. if your institution is interested in becoming involved, please contact any of the authors. c mcavinia & a risquez viii references blin, f. & munro, m. 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(2011). higher education sub-cultures and open source adoption. computers and education, 57, 1171-1183. http://www.ucisa.ac.uk/groups/tlig/vle/vlesurvey.pdf http://www.ucisa.ac.uk/groups/tlig/vle/vlesurvey.pdf irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 174 looping everyone into the conversation: the use of eportfolio as a multistakeholder feedback tool roisin lyons*1 ciara lynch2 eoghan mcconalogue3 1 university of limerick 2 dublin city university 3dublin city university abstract at its most fundamental, entrepreneurship involves discovering, evaluating, and exploiting opportunities to create future goods and services (shane and venkataraman, 2000). acknowledging that characteristics, emotions, cognitive biases, and past experiences influence entrepreneurial activity and decision making (shepherd and patzelt, 2017; de winnaar and scholtz, 2019), many propose that active reflection is an important facet of the entrepreneurial curricula (nabi et al., 2016; santos et al., 2016). for the entrepreneurial student, learning to make rationale decisions is paramount, and this is vitally linked to their ability to reflect and be self-aware. this study recounts the use of the eportfolio within a new large class (over 600 students) module in enterprise education. the module utilised an eportfolio reflective assignment to allow students express their feelings and knowledge about a series of attended entrepreneurial events and guest speaker seminars. in this paper, we present a novel insight into the efficacy of this curricular approach. external stakeholders who acted as mentors and speakers were asked to review a number of these student portfolios, and provide their thoughts on the assignments themselves, and the e-portfolio construct more generally. as such, this study highlights the multiple feedback loops of reflection which can be obtained from the eportfolio when used as a carefully considered pedagogical tool. it also highlights the integral role that industry stakeholders play in the enterprise curriculum. 1. introduction this article discusses the value of the eportfolio as an assessment tool to depict student learning and development in the enterprise education space. it also highlights the usefulness of the tool at showcasing student innovation and reflection to external stakeholders, and as a feedback mechanism to engage in wider curricular review. within a large undergraduate enterprise module, students attended an external entrepreneurship festival, and participated in a social irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 175 innovation hackathon event as part of their course, both of which were highly attended by industry representatives and entrepreneurs (as mentors, judges, speakers and attendees). following these events, students were asked to create academic reflections about these experiences on their personal loop reflect¹ eportfolio pages, tying together a range of visual, literary, and personal aspects. a selection of excerpts and student blogs posts emanating from this experience were shown to six innovation industry experts, who were asked to comment on the experience and their impression of the eportfolio submissions. the innovation experts noted that the reflective approach provides students additional space to connect with the entrepreneurs and their relevant academic reading. furthermore, the experience provided additional food for thought for these stakeholders, thereby encouraging them along a reflective journey of their own. we argue that eportfolio generate multiple opportunities for layered and nuanced feedback, peer and stakeholder engagement, and functionality that extends far beyond the assessment domain. 2. reflective practice in the enterprise classroom enterprise education helps to develop business-related soft skills and competencies in a wide range of students, not just those intent on starting a venture. aimed at creating ‘entrepreneurs’, ‘entrepreneurial’ and ‘enterprising individuals’ the broadest consideration of this subject domain aims to develop a self-reliance and enterprising mind-set regardless of career path (fayolle et al., 2006). lackéus (2017) suggests that enterprise/entrepreneurial education allows a student to become more creative and innovative. while the subject is constructed to impart knowledge and develop skills, it is also intended to foster an ecosystem conducive to effective entrepreneurial growth. in their study, charney and libecap (2000) found entrepreneurship graduates are three times more likely to start their own business; three times more likely to be self-employed; have annual incomes 27% higher, own 62% more assets; and are more satisfied with their jobs. entrepreneurial modules and courses within a university setting are predominantly taught via traditional business lectures blended with experiential activities and assignments. educators often utilise novel teaching and assessment methods to allow students to enhance student development of innovation, ideation, and abstraction (dong, garbuio and lovallo, 2016; garbuio et al., 2018). recent developments see courses which include themes such as effectuation, business model canvas, lean start-up and design thinking (lackéus, 2015; ramsgaard and christensen, 2016); hackathons (clinton and lyons, 2020); and mentorship (hägg and politis, 2017). at the curriculum level, most irish entrepreneurship courses use the creation of a business-plan as the major focus (clinton and lyons, 2020). reflective practice is a useful pedagogical choice for the enterprise educator for a number of key reasons. noting that there are fewer tangible benefits to enterprise education modules, it is essential that the changes in student confidence, intentionality and other factors are also seen and celebrated. we consider that the use of reflection, using a platform such as the eportfolio, is well-suited to capture both the performance aspects related to an enterprise module, and the cognitive and affective developments of the individual student also. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 176 for a student to become a self-regulated learner, the development of the capacity to make judgements and decisions is aided by their ability to reflect and be self-aware (harms, 2015; hägg, 2021). the applied and experiential activities which are synonymous with entrepreneurial education give students exposure to pseudo real-world experiences of entrepreneurship (kirby, 2004; neck and greene, 2011). these simulated journeys can provide them with a safe space to learn about themselves as potential innovators and venture creators or risk takers. reflection in this context allows the learner the freedom to evaluate and justify their own decision-making, which promotes metacognition (shepherd et al., 2014). classroom instruction about specific entrepreneurial knowledge (for example feasibility, financial theory, marketing, legal implications or funding) provides an occasion for learners to consider and benchmark their own skillset (or lack thereof). it may provide them with a basis for selfreflection and pause to evaluate their own entrepreneurial skills, attitudes and proclivities, noting their reservations and skill development plan in a reflective blog or planning exercise. reflective practice in the enterprise classroom can also aid the student entrepreneur in their future decision making through the instruction of entrepreneurial frameworks and thinking models. in academic literature, the study of entrepreneurial cognition is fundamental to examine how and why the entrepreneur thinks, reflects and acts (michell et al., 2002). the teaching of entrepreneurial frameworks and structures are considered to be elements of cognitive entrepreneurship education, with the premise that “by teaching our students the characteristics, patterns and processes of thinking related to entrepreneurship, it is possible to shape their thinking patterns accordingly” (santos et al., 2016, p. 90). by implementing these as modes of assessing choices, the use of heuristics in the decision making of entrepreneurs could be reduced. without better practices in knowledge sourcing, data collection and accountability, there may be more risk of poor decision making due to cognitive bias (de winnaar and scholtz, 2019). thus, the fundamental act of reflective thinking and the awareness of one’s own decision making processes could have significant benefits for the enterprise student, in the short and longer term contexts. from the perspective of the educator the eportfolio and reflective process offers a novel opportunity to observe student development over time and to assist in real time (mcmanus, 2021). most instances of the eportfolio and reflective process involve multiple student diary entries across over time (hägg, 2021). educators, therefore, have an opportunity to observe student reflection and development. this allows the educator to analyse student ability to both consume the practical experience and their ability to relate this experience with theory, as it occurs. as such, in many cases an educator can facilitate ‘vygotsky scaffolding’ or simply a scaffold learning experience (shvarts and bakker, 2019). if an educator observes a student struggling to link theory and the practical learning, they can assist the student in developing this skill in real time, an opportunity that is not often available in traditional methods of business education. 3. methodology this paper is contextualised within the third-level level education system in ireland, focusing on ee at undergraduate level. the student sample group are from a large enterprise module of irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 177 over 600 first year students. this module itself exposes participants to multiple modes of learning including online learning, conference seminars, applied projects and reflective writing. students develop their enterprise skills and knowledge via lectures, teamwork, online learning, applied project work, and industry speaker events. students gain insight into the reality of the business world across a range of organisational types from corporate business to sme or family business, entrepreneurship to non-profit contexts. they investigate processes of bringing new ideas into action within these contexts, through the lens of enterprise and innovation. the module is designed to highlight the spectrum of business career options open to our students upon graduation. the mission of the module is to develop innovative and enterprising competencies in business students, develop their enterprise self-efficacy, and allow them to witness the importance and applicability of these competencies in all enterprise contexts. figure 1: student portfolio sample as part of the curriculum, students attended an external entrepreneurship festival, and participated in a social innovation hackathon event, both of which were highly attended by industry representatives and entrepreneurs (as mentors, judges, speakers, and attendees). following these events, students were asked to create academic reflections about these irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 178 experiences on their personal loop reflect eportfolio page, tying together a range of visual, literary, and personal aspects (see figure 1 of a student reflection including their discussion and addition of images and multimedia). to facilitate students in this process, the reflective blogs were templated with question boxes to guide student open responses. for example, “how do these experiences link to your previous reading or knowledge (please refer to specific academic sources)”, and “what did you learn about the entrepreneurial process from this experience?”. students were provided with workshops on reflective thinking and academic writing, a recommended reading list of just five academic articles to limit quality and search issues for the first-year group, and online support videos. these assignments were graded by the module staff as per the specifications of the marking scheme, and the students received their marks and feedback on their blogposts. once the module had been completed, and to gain a new and fresh reaction to the student contributions, a selection of these student blogs posts were presented to six innovation industry experts, who were asked to comment on the experience and their impression of the eportfolio submissions. to assess the shareholders’ perception of the student learning experience, we organised 4 eportfolio into 8 different folders. each folder held 4 eportfolio of differing grades, ranging from 43% to 82% (note: marks were not shown or released to the external reviewers). each eportfolio was randomly chosen based on the grade that the student received and all confidential information, or personal information which affected student anonymity, was removed or redacted. each eportfolio was assigned a number, for which the corresponding name of the student and link to their eportfolio were kept in a separate file, only accessible to the research team. ethical permissions were provided to conduct the study within the college. the study was conducted one year after the students submitted work, and the data collection process took approximately 12 weeks in total. the industry experts were contacted by email to be a part of the study. once they were in agreement, they were sent a folder containing the files as a shared google file (view only), and asked to submit their responses via a google form. these experts were asked to spend some time reading and reviewing the samples, then answer some questions about their impression of the quality of the submissions, their views on the curricular method itself, and the importance of industry in enterprise education. once the study was completed, guest access to these files was revoked for the external reviewers. 4. results and discussion the panel was made up of a range of six experts from the innovation and business field, ranging from academia to consulting. the group collectively have an impressive level of experience and are a high-calibre expert panel for the study. firstly, the group were asked to provide their reaction to the reflections they had read (see table 1). all statements were positive, with members stating they were impressed or pleasantly surprised, or were interested the aspects which were salient to the students. one member noted that “it was very interesting to read about what the students thought and what resonated with them”, highlighting the value of such an exercise in connecting these industry leads to the student psyche. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 179 role what was your perception of the reflections you read? professor & innovation consultant i was impressed with the ability of the students to articulate the impact the experiences had on them. business consultant i was pleasantly surprised with quality of these reflections particularly as these are first year students. lots of openness and honesty on display on their before and after understanding of starting a business and entrepreneurship. allowing the students to choose their events, tapped into their own interests which (after reading) and provided role models who also seem to have inspired many of the students. it was also refreshing to read about failure and how it is important to recognise failure as a learning opportunity on the entrepreneurial journey. education and health innovation manager overall, the students appeared to be engaged and although some have gone to extra lengths to provide references and further research all seem to have input an effort into the work. the secondary questions appear to provide more useful self-reflection opportunities for the students. economic development researcher it was very interesting to read about what the students thought and what resonated with them. for me it was clear that the experience had a strong impact on each of the four students. the students greatly appreciated the honesty among the entrepreneurs and stated various key learnings that they would seek to personally take on board going forward. lecturer (business) the reflections showed a varying degree of interaction with the reflective process. the differences displayed are identical to the differences displayed in my own cohort of students, using a similar method of reflection. certain students have a greater ability to create connections with literature/prior knowledge and the events that they have attended head of programme & engagement (social enterprise initiative) i thought they were really interesting. it is clear that the students took a lot away from the events they attended. table 1: expert perceptions of student reflections next, reviewers were asked to provide their thoughts on the importance of industry to the enterprise student (see table 2). many referred to the value that students obtain in connecting with the real-world context of the entrepreneur, or a live business project, providing them with the opportunity to develop practical skills for the workplace. three of the review panel also noted that it is advantageous for industry to connect with students also, to gain insight about this generation and their needs. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 180 role why do you think it is important for industry to get involved with enterprise students? professor & innovation consultant it is important for students to be exposed to the start-up community to get the perspective of entrepreneurs who are implementing much of what they are learning in class. business consultant i think it is win-win for both with the university acting a bridge. the students benefit with doing work that is related to 'live' projects (and applying their learning) and industry (smes) benefit from being part of the continuous learning ecosystem and getting fresh perspectives from the next generation of leaders. education and health innovation manager it provides authentic learning experiences and is mutually beneficial. students learn how to communicate and work within the boundaries of a firm and organisations keep in touch with the minds of a new generation of workers. economic development researcher i think it is absolutely vital for industry and enterprise students to engage with each other so that students can learn directly about what is actually involved in being an entrepreneur or developing an enterprise and also so that industry can stay in tune with trends in the future labour and consumer markets. i think when students get to engage directly with industry, they can much more easily apply concepts, academic models, and theories and also learn a great deal. lecturer (business) while theoretical learning is important, industry interaction with students enhances the practical learning experience. when the practical experience is introduced in the correct manner this can enhance student ability to appreciate the theoretical aspects of course content, something that can be challenging for some students. head of programme & engagement (social enterprise initiative) one of the biggest things is education. it appears that the students learned a lot in their classes but took a lot away from the personal experiences of the guest speakers. it is clear their insights have made an impact on the students. table 2: expert opinion on industry engagement lastly, reviewers were asked to reflect on the activity of attending the guest seminar and the eportfolio assessment itself as a pedagogical tool (see table 3). all reviewers were in favour of the approach. members stated the assessment type was ‘novel’, ‘valuable’, encourages more deep level thinking and in fact, may encourage more engagement in the enterprise network and events. the call to connect the experience with academic reading was commended as a way to bring the theory to life, and the guiding questions were also commented on as a good way to move students past rote descriptions of the event. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 181 role do you think that this type of assessment is valuable for students? why/ why not? professor & innovation consultant yes. 1. they participate in a unique and engaging learning experience. 2. they are required to reflect on the experience which enhances and integrates the learning. business consultant i think this 'reflections' assessment exercise was very worthwhile and valuable for the students learning. while the students were required to attend online events/ watch recordings, they also had to stop and think and apply the learning to better understand the concept of entrepreneurship. the requirement to apply learning from the academic literature brings the subject matter to life. education and health innovation manager yes. john dewey mentions that we learn from our reflections on doing and i believe this is a good way to do this. the secondary questions guide the students away from mindlessly listing what someone has said and instead focus them on the application in their own personal context where there is more value. economic development researcher yes, i think it is very valuable as it: 1. enables students to learn directly from peers / role models / real life examples of relatable business people 2. encourages students to link theory / academic reading to practice / real life 3. asks students to state how the new knowledge learned / experience will benefit them (impact). lecturer (business) it is invaluable. for the reasons given in the answer to the previous question, but also because this type of assessment gives students insights to challenges not always experienced until their first venture into full time employment. such insight is beneficial not only to the student (industry knowledge prior to employment, for example) but also to a prospective employer (prospective employees have ready to use insights / speeds up training, for example). head of programme & engagement (social enterprise initiative) absolutely it gives the students an opportunity to reflect on what they have learned. this might then prompt them to register for another event, sign up to volunteer for a society or do more research into that specific area of interest. table 3: expert opinion on reflective pedagogy 5. conclusion industry engagement in the form of guest speakers, industry judges and mentors are commonly used to inspire, motivate, and build self-efficacy in students (bosma, hessels, schutjens et al., 2012). when used in enterprise education, they can help to create positive perceptions of entrepreneurship as a career (nabi et al., 2016; nabi et al., 2017). the entrepreneurial classroom becomes a controlled environment to engage in trial-and-error behaviours and experience the emotions inherent in low-risk failure (shepherd, 2004). armed with a greater awareness of the ‘bigger picture’, students can internalise and assimilate their entrepreneurial experiences, fostering an entrepreneurial mindset (santos et al., 2016). we suggest the use of reflection (via reflective eportfolio blogs) is an effective way to develop the entrepreneurial irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 182 mindset in an enterprise education context. moreover, we consider that this pedagogical approach is feasible and useful in both the large-class context, or small. in a smaller group, more time can be spent in facilitated classroom discussion about the industry examples, allowing students to learn from the reflective thinking and argumentation of their peers. in a larger context, much of this content can be moved to a blended format, with online videos about reflective practice and template examples. as a scaled model for larger classes, eportfoliobased assessment is readily accessible for module staff, negates the need for paper-based assignments, allows for multiple grader access in parallel, and allows students to showcase their creative, innovative, and multimedia competencies far more than a traditional document submission format. while vastly beneficial, industry involvement in courses such as enterprise education can pose a burden to staff and guests alike, increasing the administrative burden on all stakeholders. thus, any involvement must be carefully considered to ensure industry experts feel involved, but not over-committed. increasingly, institutions try to involve industry in the planning and creation of relevant modules and subjects to arm our next graduates. by integrating external voices in multiple dimensions of the educational process, more novel insight can be gained, and potentially more impact can be achieved than the traditional didactic guest seminar approach. we find that by drawing these experts into the final stages of an enterprise module, and by allowing industry guests to see the student output, they become more informed about student talent, student needs, and more aware of the pedagogical foundations at play within the module. our research found the panel to have a deepened appreciation for the curricular methods of the module, which may lead to more informed future guest speakers, and a more robust link between industry and academia. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 183 references bosma, n., hessels, j., schutjens, v., van praag, m. & verheul, i. 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(2019). the early history of the scaffolding metaphor: bernstein, luria, vygotsky, and before. mind, culture, and activity, 26:1, pp. 4-23. roisin lyons*1 ciara lynch2 eoghan mcconalogue3 1 university of limerick 2 dublin city university 3dublin city university 1. introduction irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2016 1 the future of technology enhanced learning (tel) is in the hands of the anonymous, grey non-descript mid-level professional manager tony murphy1 university of lancaster (received october 2016; final version received october 2016) abstract much of the research into the implementation of tel has centred on teaching approaches and the change (or not) in the role of the academic, which is reflective of the importance of the academic to what takes place in a higher education institute (hei). technology enhanced learning (tel), however, poses a considerable challenge to how the higher education (he) sector operates, as it has done with numerous other sectors. typically, technology confronts existing practices and boundaries. for heis, tel has accelerated the move away from the discipline-based academics as being at the centre of the education process and replaced them with students. this displacement of the academic for the student has been complemented by changing approaches to teaching, (the growth of network learning for example) and the introduction of new work practices from the private sector in the guise of new managerialism. with the academic’s role reduced from controller to that of participant, the space left is being filled by client-focused mid-level professional managers. distinct from academic managers, mid-level professional managers are situated between academics and senior management, which is a key position for the implementation of tel at a time when its future rests on bridging the gap between the bottom up initiatives of the past and the institute-wide initiatives of the future. this discussion piece reflects on the changing role of the academic in a new managerialist tel he sector and argues for the overdue recognition of the importance of the mid-level professional manager to the future of tel. 1. introduction this discussion paper emerged as an aside to a literature review that is part a doctoral thesis looking at the management of blended learning courses in higher education in ireland. much of the recent literature on management in heis has been dominated by the debate on collegiality and new managerialism (clegg & mcauley, 2005; ramirez & tiplic, 2013; stensaker, välimaa, henkel, & sarrico, 2012), and the literature review for the thesis took place within that context. in conducting the literature review, it emerged that with idea of the advent of technology enhanced learning (tel) and new managerialism, the role of the academic in he is changing which appears to be a particularly interesting development when juxtaposed against the rising influence of the non-academic professional manager in he. what this discussion paper seeks to do is to consider how the roles of 1 corresponding author. email: t.murphy1@lancaster.ac.uk irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2016. © 2016 t. murphy. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. t. murphy 2 both the academic and the professional middle manager are changing in light of the influence that both tel and new managerialism in he. moreover, it seeks to ask what these changes might mean for academics in the future as technology becomes more incorporated into teaching practices in he. 2. helping the academic there has been considerable research into what tel means for the academic and how best to help transition the academic into the tel world. much has been written about how, for example, academic staff may find considerable demands on their time as a result of tel (chao, saj, & hamilton, 2010; graham, woodfield, & harrison, 2012; gregory & lodge, 2015; njenga & fourie, 2010) and may need to be compensated or incentivised to embrace tel (hanson, 2009; porter, graham, spring, & welch, 2014). it is unusual to come across a research piece on tel that does not have as one of its recommendations the need to train and develop academic staff in tel and reinforce their existing role with increased support. the argument has also been made that, with the impact of tel, academics need to defend their role as central to the teaching and learning process by protecting their ownership of the development process (davis & fill, 2007; georgouli, skalkidis, & guerreiro, 2008) and taking responsibility for driving tel initiatives (porter et al., 2014). concern has been expressed with regard to the possible displacement of staff from their academic selves as a result of the opportunities offered by tel (hanson, 2009) and that, as a result, there is a need to protect the sanctity of independent scholarship. also, there is a sense that academics need to be protected from encroachment on their space by other professional by ensuring that support for academics to engage with technology exists only on their terms and when they want it (davis & fill, 2007). the assumption appears to be that the best way to approach the change and opportunities offered by tel is to spend considerable time, effort and money loading up the academic with all the knowledge and skill they need not only to function in the tel world but also retain their control of the teaching process. 3. technology changes the way heis operate however, technology, and most specifically the internet, has had a dramatic effect on processes involved in teaching and learning, as it has done in a number of other sectors. tel in the form of digital teaching and learning, elearning, blended learning or online education has had a disruptive effect on the sector and given he an opportunity to reflect, thereby presenting the chance to take an alternative look at many of the age-old assumptions about he (christenson, 2011). rossiter (2007) takes that reflection a step further by claiming that sustainable and appreciated online education will require radically different strategies and processes than those currently employed in he. to look at how teaching and learning is designed, developed and delivered, bass (2012) highlights the merits of team-based design, while soars (2013), vasser, (2013) and bates (2014) have each expounded on the idea that online education will demand a collaborative effort from, among others, instructional designers, educational developers, graphic designers, project managers, subject matter experts, voice over specialists and embedded librarians. bass (2012) highlighted the kind of challenge that such a collaborative approach poses to the traditional authority of the academic, while the divisions of labour significance of an e-learning policy was also noted by de freitas and oliver (2005). in terms of faculty, folkers (2005) notes that online education can involve a redistribution of power which challenges the authority of the academic. bass (2012) puts it more dramatically when stating that “the power of innovation in the co-curriculum and flexible learning, particularly afforded by the internet are making colleges and universities run headlong into their own structures, into the way we do business” (p. 24). as well as blurring traditional professional relationships, tel challenges the norms, structures, processes, hierarchy, views, perspective and understanding of the hei (jones and o’shea, 2004). tel’s need to be formalised and specified (oliver, 2012) means that online education demands a level of transparency (soars, 2013) and introduces an almost accountability by the back door that irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 those who are delivering education were not previously subjected too. online education also raises legal issues--copyright and intellectual property--that also have previously not needed to be addressed (jones and o’shea, 2004). these forces, together with the emergence of open social learning create pressures on models of educational provision at all stages of education “from childhood into workplace learning” (buckingham and ferguson, 2012, p. 8). 3.1 technologies challenge to teaching how specifically is tel challenging the process of teaching? coomaraswamy (2014) argues that advances in information and communication technologies (ict) are driving a major change in he from instructional paradigm to learning paradigm. technologies have moved from being merely supportive of learning to actually changing how learning takes place and how the learner interprets learning (säljö, 2010). garrison (2011) echoes these thoughts by claiming that heis have recognised a need to move away from passive lectures and that technology is simply the catalyst to make that move possible. for bass (2012), the formal curriculum is being squeezed by the power of experiential learning and th.8e potential of informal learning. in other sectors, ict has afforded the opportunity for the consumer to move to become a producer or at least a co-producer (humphreys & grayson, 2008), with the term ‘user generated content’ becoming almost ubiquitous. education is no different, as ict has allowed the learner to become a producer of knowledge as much as a consumer (cerratto-pargman, järvelä, & milrad, 2012). while laurillard (2009) looked to existing educational theories to challenge digital technologies to deliver on a more enhanced learning experience, she argues that technology is facilitating a move away from teacher-focused to learner-focused activities associated with constructivism and social learning. it would appear that tel and a social learning paradigm are working hand-in-hand to remove academics from the centre of the teaching process and replace them with the student. 4. new managerialism the advent of new managerialism into the he sector is another development that undermines the idea that the academic retains central control of the teaching and learning process. a management ideology based on neo-liberal principles (carvalho & santiago, 2010; deem & brehony, 2005; v. meek, goedegebuure, santiago, & carvalho, 2010), new managerialism is realised operationally with practices from the corporate world (carvalho & santiago, 2010; deem & brehony, 2005) that include quality assurance, downsizing and outsourcing, budget diversification, privatisation, performance appraisal and benchmarking (v. meek et al., 2010). there has been a change in the makeup of professional and academic staff in he. .in most four-year colleges in the u.s, “the average number of faculty and staff per administrator declined by roughly 40 percent between 1990 and 2012” (desrochers and kirshstein, 2014 p. 3). the introduction of these practices has had an impact on how an academic functions. the academic enjoys less freedom and autonomy in an environment that is becoming more structured, monitored (kolsaker, 2008), reviewed and measured (hedley, 2010; teelken, 2012) against such factors as value for money (hedley, 2010) and client satisfaction (v. meek et al., 2010). while these practices may not be a result of tel, they are contributing, along with tel, to the displacement of the academic as the central controlling figure in course development and delivery. 5. the need for a new manager rethinking the conceptual approach to teaching and learning in he as a result of the opportunities of tel (christensen, horn, caldera, & soares, 2011; marshall, 2012; salmon, 2005), while adjusting to the onset of new managerialism in he, is seen as relocating the academic away from the traditional central and controlling role in teaching and learning. if that is the case, then a vacuum has emerged that will inevitably be filled. for garrison (2011), the response to the changes brought on by tel t. murphy 4 should be to tackle strategic planning, infrastructure and leadership issues if he is to take ownership of the innovation. this idea of a new type of manager or leader is echoed by jones and o’shea (2004), whereas jameson (2013) has gone as far as to call for a fifth age of educational technology research dedicated to e-leadership. stepping into the void to take on the mantel of e-leader or emanager are the mid-level professional managers, who are distinct from academic managers (bacon, 2009) in that they perform generalist roles and situationally are more likely to identify with the institution than any specific discipline. goolnick (2012) argues that middle professional managers are using various methods to promote the characteristics of new managerialism. whoever is responsible for embedding tel into a hei, whether they are agents for new managerialism or not, will have to pick apart and gain an understanding of the challenges and issues highlighted above while functioning in an increasingly new managerialist he sector. 5.1 what does the mid-level professional manager do? not an awful lot is known about mid-level professional managers (de boer, goedegebuure, & meek, 2010; hedley, 2010). it is debatable as to whether or not they are a distinct group within a hei (hedley, 2010; trowler, 2010), and, if they are, what they do (de boer et al., 2010; rudhumbu, 2015). in the absence of research, one way of suggesting the typical tasks mid-level professional managers are doing is to recap on the issues raised by tel above. these managers could be facilitating cross-function and cross-discipline collaboration and ensuring that there is a consistency offered in the delivery of digital teaching and learning. they could be managing the outsourcing of tasks to individuals and organisations separate to the hei or even separate to the he sector. there is also the management of the training and development of academic staff in tel, the project management of the development of asynchronous content for online courses and the effort to ensure that online content is cognisant of the legal requirements imposed by copyright law and intellectual property rights. allowing for student feedback and student contributions as co-producers to be embedded into course development and delivery is another task. if academics are to be compensated and incentivised to participate in tel, it will be the role of the mid-level professional manager to get approval for the resourcing of that compensation, while convincing the financial powers of the hei that tel is a worthwhile investment by providing cost/benefit analysis and risk assessment. utilising the tools to convince stakeholders that value for money is being achieved is only one of the many new managerialist activities to be facilitated by the mid-level professional manager; ensuring that quality assurance guidelines are drawn up and met is another as is the monitoring of performance. when it comes to tel, there is an argument to suggest that the academic, or even the academic manager, lacks both the skill base and the inclination to take on such challenges. carrying out these tasks will inevitably bring the mid-level professional manager into the realms of curriculum design and assessment strategy, where the academic retains an important but arguably no longer a central and controlling role. rather, it could be argued that the role of the academic starts and ends with working with the other members of the development team to ensure the educational integrity behind tel, which is much more of a mix of consultative and tutoring activities. 5.2 the downside to the mid-level professional manager academics might question the business that a non-academic manager has in getting involved in assessment strategy and curriculum design. the argument being that when it comes to the activities of teaching and learning all other priorities take a back seat to the learning objectives and path to achieving those objectives as determined by the academic. teaching and learning has always accepted other priorities along with the learning objectives, however. commerciality, internal politics, the needs of industry, the strategic objectives of the hei, the availability of resources all factor in how a course is developed and delivered. such non-teaching priorities are multiplied with the inclusion of tel in whatever format it takes. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 pushing back against these non-academic priorities is the concept of academic freedom. according to the irish universities act of 1997, 14 (2) a member of the academic staff of a university shall have the freedom, within the law, in his or her teaching, research and any other activities either in or outside the university, to question and test received wisdom, to put forward new ideas and to state controversy or unpopular opinions and shall not be disadvantaged, or subject to less favourable treatment by the university, for the exercise of that freedom. similarly, the institutes of technologies act of 2006 states that 5 (2) a member of the academic staff of a college shall have the freedom, within the law, in his or her teaching, research and any other activities either in or outside the college, to question and test received wisdom, to put forward new ideas and to state controversial or unpopular opinions and shall not be disadvantaged, or subject to less favourable treatment by the college, for the exercise of that freedom this freedom allows the academic to preserve an impartial and objective approach to teaching and learning, free of any non-educational influences. to deny academic freedom by supplanting the academic with a professional manager is to remove the primary protector of the purpose of any hei, which is to provide for learning. the potential marginalisation of the academic and the rise of the mid-level professional manager as highlighted above endangers academic freedom and then, by consequence teaching and learning. if the academic is no longer central and controlling, how then can academic freedom be protected against the pressures of new managerialism? 6. the future while goolnick (2012) highlighted the new managerialist tendencies of the mid-level professional manager, clegg & mcauley (2005) would argue that there is more complexity to the role. they point to the diversity of routes and locations into he middle management as well as the diversity of motivations behind the actions of the middle manager. trowler (2010) agrees, claiming the “the manager’s professional identity and the discourses he or she draws on are dynamic and protean” (p. 205). while they might look to new managerialist ideology, mid-level professional managers will also draw on ideas that “flow from their disciplinary background as well as from an earlier humanist, collegial set of understandings of higher education” (trowler, 2010, p. 204). it has been argued that mid-level managers have the potential to subtly influence different local strategies and institutional programmes, as they act as mediators who evaluate and dissolve tensions (carvalho & santiago, 2010; marini & reale, 2015) allowing for information to flow smoothly between departments and within the institution (rudhumbu, 2015). it could be argued that these middle managers are perfectly placed within the organisation to influence academics and encourage commercial, new managerial activity (trowler, 2010; winter, 2009), while also addressing the issues of embedding tel into a hei and, at the same time preserving academic freedom over teaching and learning. 7. conclusion whether or not the mid-level professional manager holds the key to the future of tel in he is debatable, but what is true is that the impact of technology on he is not going to subside or dissipate. similarly, new managerialism is not going away and is becoming even more entrenched in he. with an appreciation of how tel is changing the nature of teaching and learning and an understanding of what new managerialism can mean for process and operations in he, the mid-level professional manager appears to be ideally positioned to guide the process of transitioning bottom-up to institutewide tel initiatives. what then for the academic? to what extent will academics be able to retain a central and controlling role in teaching and learning? even if new managerialism morphs into a form of neo-collegiality, as has been argued (bacon, 2014; burnes, wend, & by, 2014; elton, 1995; t. murphy 6 rixom, 2011; teelken, 2012), where broader more collective decision making is restored and a compromise is struck between the decentralised disciplines and centralised control, there will still be considerable challenges for academics—tel will continue to require a collaborative, planned and structured approach, social and open learning will continue to 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(2009). academic manager or managed academic? academic identity schisms in higher education. journal of higher education policy and management, 31(2), 121–131. doi: 10.1080/13600800902825835 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2016 17 sharing professional practice – tutors have their say michael hallissy1 h2 learning, digital exchange, crane street, the digital hub, dublin 8, ireland (received october 2016; final version received october 2016) abstract this paper analyses the theoretical construct of professional practice knowledge; the ‘tacit knowledge’ that all teachers use when engaging with digital technologies. to reach this end and to gather the views of tutors, a framework developed by mishra and koehler –technological pedagogical and content framework (tpack) – was employed. this was used in parallel with the flanders interaction analysis category (fiac) framework to collect semi-structured interview and interaction analysis data. this paper will present a selection of the data gathered and analysed using the tpack framework. the research found that faculty need ongoing training opportunities where they can develop their professional practice in order to use synchronous computer mediated conferencing (scmc) tools to design interactive sessions that are not teacher dominated. the paper recommends that he institutions design a signature pedagogy for academic staff and students on how scmc technology can be used within specific online interactive programmes. it also found that there is a need for academic staff to capture their own professional practice; to sit back and ask, what is going on here? having reflected on their practice, tutors should then be encouraged to share their own experiences, or their tacit knowledge, with their peers. institutions can then begin to capture and reflect on this ‘hot action’ around the use of scmc technologies. ultimately this information may help faculty to design learning experiences that will improve studentlearning. 1. introduction there is growing evidence (allen & seaman, 2015) that many higher education (he) institutions are moving some or all of their course offerings online. over the past few years, there has also been a growing trend, of he institutions offering live online learning opportunities to their learners. typically, these online sessions are made possible by the use of synchronous computer mediated conferencing (scmc) technologies, such as adobe connect and blackboard collaborate. the increased use of these technologies has generally led to a positive ‘hype’ within he institutions (veletsianos, 2010), because these technologies are thought to facilitate traditional face-to-face interaction. there are even claims that they recreate the face-to-face classroom online and yet, there is currently a lack of shared professional practice in relation to how teachers are using these tools to 1 corresponding author. email: mhallissy@h2.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2016. © 2016 m hallissy. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. m. hallissy 18 design engaging learning experiences for their learners (laurillard, 2012). thus, this paper attempts to capture the practices colleagues engaged in during a series of online live tutorials and to consider how they and their educational institutions could potentially enhance professional practice in the future. 1.1 background this paper explores the practices a group of online tutors, teaching on an online masters programme for teachers, engaged in while teaching on scmc sessions. the masters programme, was entirely online and it consisted of three distinct elements – pre-recorded digital content (the lecture); an online forum and live tutorials which took place weekly at a scheduled time in the course calendar (see figure 1). figure 1: components of the online masters programme students were expected to attend these live events where tutors and students were online together at the same time. these events were facilitated by a scmc tool, at&t connect, and the events were described, as tutorials, in the course handbook where students would have opportunities to unpack the pre-recorded lesson content. therefore, these events were expected to explore and deliberate on the rich lesson content that students were expected to have engaged with in advance of the tutorial. however, having led several tutorials i began to question if indeed these events were being used as opportunities to ‘unpack’ the lesson content and if students were engaging in critical discussion. i thus surveyed the students to ascertain their perceptions of the purpose of these live events (see table 1). the survey data appeared to suggest that students, who were all practicing teachers, primarily saw these events as opportunities to revisit content and to ask questions. however, the data also suggested that only a minority of teachers, circa 20%, saw these events as providing opportunities for them to work in small groups or to present their work to colleagues. this finding raised several concerns, as it suggested that students viewed these events as predominantly teacher-led and that students were relatively passive observers, rather than active participants. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 19 table 1: student perceptions of the purpose of tutorials tutorial purpose percentage opportunity for the tutor to present new content 57% opportunity for the tutor to revise content presented in the recorded session 93% opportunity for students to raise questions and discuss the lesson content 100% opportunity for students to work in small groups 20% opportunity for students to present their work to colleagues 21% these responses seemed at odds with much of the literature associated with teaching online, that advocated the use of social-constructivist teaching approaches (rovai, 2004; pallof and pratt, 2007 and 2011; stavredes, 2011). therefore, it was decided to investigate what was taking place in these ‘online tutorials’ and to capture the professional practices tutors engaged in during these live events. 1.2 teacher professional practice knowledge professional practice knowledge is often referred to as the ‘tacit’ or ‘craft’ knowledge that teachers use to carry out their daily work as teachers (eraut, 1994 and loughran, 2010). eraut (1994) took a broad view of professional knowledge and defined it as including “procedural knowledge, propositional knowledge, practical knowledge, tacit knowledge, skills and know-how” (ibid, p.16). unfortunately, professional knowledge, in contrast to scientific knowledge, is often “little studied and little discussed” (eraut, 1994, p. 39). though, other professions, such as medicine, place great store on codifying and sharing such knowledge, it appears that education places less value on this type of knowledge (loughran, 2010). furthermore, eraut noted that professional practice can be very difficult to capture, particularly where verbal activities are prevalent and he noted that, “the unscripted and intuitive nature of much verbal action makes attempts to describe or criticise it equally different” (p. 42). it raises the question of how do we catch it while it is in the ether, because once the moment has passed the evidence is gone. in addition, he noted that it is particularly challenging to capture such knowledge within ‘performing’ professions, like teaching, where immediate action is required. he uses the term “hot action” to describe what goes on in such settings and he notes that: the teacher has no time at all to reflect: choices made during the preparation of teaching may be decision-governed, but those made during the course of teaching are largely intuitive. the pressure for action is immediate and to hesitate is to lose. (eraut, 1994, p. 53) in the case of live tutorials this is particularly the case. tutors can prepare for the tutorial by developing slides on the key concepts they wish to present or discuss, but when the event begins they must depend on their ‘tacit’ knowledge to engage their students by providing opportunities for interaction. live tutorials can be unnerving for an inexperienced tutor speaking into the ether for the first time and awaiting a response from students they can’t see. there is often a delay in receiving student responses and this ‘wait time’ can be unsettling for many tutors, who often rush to fill the silence. thus, live online tutorials require tutors to engage in ‘hot action’, because if they don’t there is a danger their students will disengage and they may even leave the event. m. hallissy 20 eraut notes that to survive and function in such complex environments professionals require routines and rituals to enable them to operate and to cope with this complexity. he argues that it is too stressful for them to just rely on their instincts in such settings. therefore, teachers require complex practice knowledge to successfully mediate these events and it typically requires them to have high levels of knowledge in several domains. they should have well developed knowledge: of the subject matter, they are teaching; of how to teach such knowledge and how to use scmc technology effectively to engage their learners. thus, it appeared that teachers needed to have a sound knowledge of all three areas if they were to successfully navigate the ‘hot action’ of an online tutorial without it becoming an overly stressful event. 1.3 tpack the work of lee shulman (1986) and his notion of pedagogical content knowledge (pck), that is the knowledge teachers require to transform their subject matter for their teaching seemed very appropriate to this study as it is “a concrete example of thinking about the knowledge of practice” (p. 45). shulman’s work has been extended to include digital technology in recent years by the work of mishra and koehler (2006) who have built on pck to create the technological pedagogical and content knowledge framework (tpack) to facilitate philosophical discussions around the nature of knowledge and technology usage. figure 1: tpack framework (reproduced by permission of the publisher, © 2012 by tpack.org) the tpack framework consists of seven constructs of knowledge that make-up tpack. these are as follows:  content knowledge (ck);  pedagogical knowledge (pk);  technological knowledge (tk);  pedagogical content knowledge (pck);  technological pedagogical knowledge (tpk);  technological content knowledge (tck); and  technological pedagogical and content knowledge (tpack). there are three core types of knowledge; ck content knowledge, pk pedagogical knowledge and tk technology knowledge. the interaction of these three types of knowledge creates four additional constructs. when a teacher has all three types of knowledge we can say that they have tpack and such knowledge is context dependent. for example, if a psychology tutor has strong levels of irish journal of technology enhanced learning 21 tpack they are knowledgeable; about their content or subject knowledge; about the strategies and approaches to teaching this content using digital technology. tpack is an emerging theoretical framework and some have questioned whether tpack is a singular entity or a composition of all seven constructs. though it is an emerging conceptual framework it was used in this study to categorise the issues tutors discussed during their semistructured interviews and not to measure the level of knowledge tutors possessed in relation to each of the constructs. while recognising tpack has limitations (for example cox and graham, 2009 and graham, 2011), it was hoped to add to theory in this area by testing the suitability of the framework, particularly in the context of synchronous online tutorials. 2. methods thus, this study set about capturing the routines and practices tutors typically engaged in during their live tutorials by asking the following questions:  how were tutors and students interacting during these events?  what professional practice knowledge did tutors possess to design and lead these tutorials?  were there clear ground rules in relation to online tutorials? it used a case study design to illuminate what was going on in the tutorials and the following definition by schramm (1971 in yin, 2009, p. 17) appeared very appropriate for the study. the essence of a case study, the central tendency among all types of case study, is that it tries to illuminate a decision or set of decisions: why they were taken, how they were implemented, and with what result. [emphasis added by yin] ultimately, i wanted to illuminate the decisions tutors made in relation to how they structured their tutorials, why they structured them as they did and what impact these decisions had on the subsequent interactions with their students. therefore, i wanted to observe at firsthand how tutors interacted with their students and to discuss with them the consequences of these decisions. yin (ibid, p. 11) stated that case study facilitated “direct observation of the events being studied and interviews of the persons involved in the events” in his critique of this approach. thus, it seemed well suited to this study because so little was known about the interactions that took place during the tutorials and the case study strategy appeared to provide the flexibility necessary to study what took place. 2.1 semi-structured interviews i decided to interview the tutors about their professional practice because interviews are, “a conversation with a purpose” (robson, 2002, p.228) where data tends to occur naturally and the conversation can be treated as an analyzable text (silverman, 2000). semi-structured interviews were selected as the most appropriate interview method as they provide the interviewer with a shopping list of questions and provide greater freedom (robson, 2002) and flexibility (gillham, 2000) in the sequencing and wording of questions. such a method allows the researcher to develop different question lists across a range of interviews and it facilitates the probing of interviewee answers. furthermore, it is recognised to work well in case study, particularly if one is working with a small number of people who are accessible and if the questions are open and allow for extended response (ibid). though a clear structure is critical the interviewer does need to be ‘flexible’ when interviewing participants. the interview schedule (appendix 1) contained twelve questions based on issues identified during a review of the literature on teaching online. for example, in designing the instrument the following question was formulated from reviewing the literature: m. hallissy 22 what kind of learning and by extension what type of interaction would you like to see in your tutorials (soo and bong, 1998)? the question was re-structured as follows in the interview schedule to read as follows: discuss what type of learning behaviour or activities she would like to witness during the tutorials. this question was designed to engage tutors in a discussion around the types of behaviours they expected from students during the tutorials. thus, the interviews revolved around the pedagogical approaches tutors employed when using the scmc software. table 2: interview schedule tutor name data collected comment tutor 1 (t1) preand postinterview data tutorial 1 = 90 minutes tutor 2 (t2) preand postinterview data tutorial 1 = 60 minutes tutor 3 (t3) preand postinterview data tutorial 1 = 60 minutes tutor 4 (t4) preand postinterview data tutorial 1 = 60 minutes tutor 5 (t5) 1 interview tutorial 1 = 60 minutes tutor 6 (t6) 1 interview tutorial 1 = 60 minutes tutor 7 (t7) 1 interview tutorial 1 = 60 minutes seven tutors were interviewed and of these four were interviewed on two occasions, once at the outset of teaching their module and the second time once the module had concluded. three other tutors were also interviewed but this only occurred once, as they were not tutoring at the time the study was conducted. thus, there were a total of eleven interviews recorded with seven tutors. in this paper, i have focused on the interview data of two tutors, tutor 1 and tutor 2, to illustrate the issues that they encountered. 2.2 tpack analysis each interview was transcribed and was subsequently analysed using a set of pre-defined tpack descriptors (appendix 2) using nvivo 9. the descriptors were applied to chunks of text that discussed tpack constructs and they were applied in a holistic rather than a narrow way. the interviews were imported into nvivo and then coded using the tpack codes, which were also irish journal of technology enhanced learning 23 preloaded. for instance, the following chunk of text was coded technological pedagogical knowledge (tpk) because the tutor spoke about generating a good debate using at&t connect. i got some reasonable interaction, i got different people to raise their hand and give their opinion on stuff … the other would be if we had a good debate about their particular research projects in predefining this code, i had stated that tpk would apply to the following types of statements: i will be looking for statements where tutors discuss general pedagogical activities that a tutor can or does engage in using digital technologies. i will be looking for statements that apply generally to learning and not specifically to their module content. thus, in the example above the tutor discussed the strategies she or he used to interact with students and therefore it was coded as tpk. it proved difficult on occasion to differentiate between tpk and tpack and this appears to support the concerns of others (cox and graham, 2009 and graham, 2011) as to the validity and reliability of the individual constructs. however, the tpack framework did allow me to code the discussions that took place with the tutors using the descriptors developed in appendix 2. in addition to conducting semi-structured interviews with tutors i also analysed the level of interaction that took place during the tutorials using the flanders interaction analysis framework (flanders, 1970) and this captured how much talking tutors and students engaged in. this data is referred to as fiac data in the results section and was used to recreate the ‘hot action’ that took place during the tutorials but is not the focus of this paper (for more see hallissy, 2014). 3. results tutors reported that they had found it challenging to mediate a live tutorial and they reported often feeling tired and drained after the event. i will illustrate some the main themes that emerged during the interviews by sharing some of the views of two tutors, t1 and t2. 3.1 challenges encountered tutor 1, t1, encountered several challenges in conducting his online tutorials and chief among these was the engagement of learners. his tutorials were dominated by tutor talk and he believed the lesson content was challenging and that this contributed to the low level of interaction. i suppose the big challenge and still the big challenge today is how to get them engaged online, how to get them talking? i think a lot of the students were a little uncomfortable with the subject matter because it is a tricky concept … he declared that he failed to engender any “healthy” discussion around the topics covered in the lessons. he wondered if this was down to his skill as a teacher because despite his best efforts there was little or no deliberation. maybe it is to do with the skill of the tutor … to foster an online debate … we have not fostered enough healthy debate or even heated discussion around some of the research topics we could have done. he spoke at length of the challenge to engage students and even commented “some students don’t say anything at all”. this lack of interaction often led to periods of silence as captured in the fiac analysis, though he stated he had become comfortable with this over time. m. hallissy 24 doing the live tutorials … i certainly felt more comfortable this time around. and more comfortable with the silence, if you get the little bit of silence and being able to take it in a different direction and go with the flow t1 stated that he structured the tutorial in fifteen-minute segments so as to engage his students. in addition, he also noted that the natural tendency for the tutor is to talk and for students to sit back and listen. because the tendency is actually to … keep talking, particularly if they want to listen because they will consume this stuff because you know what, it is easy and it gets them off the hook. tutor 2, t2, did not have the same challenges in relation to student participation, though an she reported being absolutely terrified when she went online initially. last year was my first year so i was absolutely terrified – it is just this whole new thing, putting on headphones and saying good evening and hoping the laptop won’t explode in front of you. 3.2 instructional strategies although he stated that the online tutorial was not a lecture, his fiac analysis indicated that tutor-talk dominated these events and he struggled to give students voice. because the other thing to remember is, and this is the hard bit as well, this is not a lecture right [small laugh] it is a tutorial so it’s about them getting a handle on stuff not you reiterating the hour lecture that you have already recorded and given. he referred to issues, such as time and structure, regularly during the interviews. he was conscious of the medium, of being “on air”, and of how he could engage learners during his fifteen minute blocks. t1 viewed his powerpoint slides as essential in guiding the flow of his tutorials and he stated you can’t just “rock up to an online tutorial”. in his view, he needed to ensure he had sufficient material to cover the allocated time, as the alternative was “too stressful”. the other reason for structure or scaffolding is that you can’t ad lib this stuff. you can’t rock up to an online tutorial having done zero preparation you might get away with that in a f2f class. you could put up a few questions on the board … i don’t think you can do it with this stuff, you need a signpost for yourself, it is just too hard, it is too stressful is my honest view of that tutor 2, t2, in contrast had a different experience in relation to the online tutorials and she appeared to bring her beliefs and experience from face-to-face teaching to her online tutorials. went into building an interactive classroom, like i would do in a traditional classroom and i was very surprised that [it] worked so well …. build up that sense of team with them because it gives a kind of a warmth and there is this saying that “real learning comes from the heart not from the head”. furthermore, she stressed the importance of structure within her tutorials. i suppose you have to plan, you have to prepare, you have to know generally what you are doing and i feel i would have done that, … there is no way you would face any group like that without knowing what you were about she also promoted student voice, as opposed to tutor voice as she was keen for all students to contribute and teach during the tutorials. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 25 i don’t like the sound of my own voice too much [nervous laughter] so i love to give voice to others and to build up the team and that everybody in the classroom is teaching, like using all the resources in the classroom, that it is not just one teacher but everybody has something to teach and to share and to try and draw that out. rather than lecturing she utilised questioning strategies to build a sense of community and to give students voice. i do it by question rather than by expanding on the lecture and i ask them, i tell them, that i am always teaching them listening skills to model for the classroom. i try to model for the classroom all the time. so because of that i would say “ask your partner rather than tell your partner”, so they would ask their partner [about] their ideas. 3.4 sharing and developing professional practice knowledge t1 was of the view that tutors had to experience online tutoring themselves and no amount of preparation could prepare them for the event. thus experiential learning was essential in his view to developing one’s practice. … you actually have to go through it and learn it and do it and make a mess of some of the stuff furthermore, t1 suggested that the college could collate examples of tutor practice and allow tutors to review these with a view to improving their own practice. this archive could then be made available to tutors. it could consist of: examples of good [tutoring from] across the last number of years some really good, bad and ugly [examples]. and it probably would be no harm to sit in and listen to a very good one and maybe you could model your own stuff on it … just so you get a sense of what it is like, what worked and what strategies the tutor was employing to engage with the students he would welcome a shared pedagogical approach where all tutors agreed to a particular approach where there were shared expectations and ground-rules. i do think a standard approach that we all try and use as tutors to put some consistency and standardisation would be very beneficial or at a very least we should sit down and have a discussion about it. i would be very interested to hear how other tutors actually approach this stuff as well, it can only make us better tutors … because there is a different skill as a tutor online as compared to f2f. t2 also echoed this idea of tutors sharing their knowledge and sharing what worked and didn’t work for them with colleagues. i think community is huge, learning from each other. and so that kind of sharing with other tutors, i would say sitting down and creating a shared meaning and a shared vision and a shared structure and not quite shared strategies for the tutorials. 5. discussion this study suggests that there are several implications for institutions and for teaching professionals in relation to how they design and mediate live online tutorials. it appears that it is not enough to just provide staff with ‘training’ on how to use the scmc technology (tk), even though such an approach appears to be widespread. teachers need to be provided with opportunities to engage in more professional learning activities over time where they learn from colleagues and share their m. hallissy 26 experiences regularly. in this study the semi-structured interview schedule (appendix 1) afforded tutors the chance to reflect on their practice and to engage in such professional conversations with their colleagues. the faculty found such professional conversations extremely beneficial in articulating the ‘hot action’ that occurred during their tutorials. tutors found that such discussions afforded them a space where they could talk about what worked and what didn’t work for them during the online tutorials. all tutors found the experience quite daunting and challenging at first and some suggested that tutors should have an opportunity to coteach with a colleague, to have “flying hours” in advance of teaching on their own. in particular, they noted the challenge of students remaining silent because, as barrows stated they learned a long time ago that it is best to stay silent if he does not know the answer, or is unsure of it, for he knows that an admission of not knowing would be used as evidence of inadequate study or lack of intelligence. (barrows, 1992; p. 22) thus, the challenge of students remaining silent and declaring that their “microphone was not working” was a common one that tutors reported. tutors found that strategies such as “clicking in on students”, whereby they clicked on a student’s name and asked them to contribute were relatively ineffective. instead, strategies such as putting students in teams and in asking them questions were much more successful in enhancing the level of interaction that took place during these live events. tutors agreed that there was a need for a shared vision for such events so that all tutors and students were clear in terms of what was expected during tutorials. there was a need for clear ground-rules in terms of what goes on around here. tutors felt that previously there was ambiguity and a wide variance in terms of the experiences tutors and students had during these events. they were of the view that the college should develop a signature pedagogy for the tutorials so that people knew what was expected of them during tutorials. while recognizing that no two tutorials would be the same there was a consensus on the need for a shared vision for such events. shulman (2005; p. 52) defined signature pedagogies as follows: they are the forms of instruction that leap to mind when we first think about the preparation of members of particular professions – for example in law, the quasisocratic interactions so vividly portrayed in paper chase. thus, this study found that institutions should have clear ground-rules for live online tutorials so that students are engaged and are ready and on their toes to contribute (ibid) when called upon. 6. conclusion this study has found that the espoused theory of online tutorials, that of a dominant social constructivist approach, is not always present in such events. this study found that all too often live tutorials are dominated by teacher talk and by students remaining passive with limited opportunities for interaction. therefore, there is a need for institutions to review what is going on in such spaces and to speak to faculty and students to hear what is going on and to work with them to design more interactive learning sessions where critical discussion is to fore. all too often institutions overly focus on the scmc technological tools that they procure to facilitate the ‘delivery’ of online tutorials but there is also a need to focus on how these tools are used. it is the people, the staff and the students, who will inevitably dictate the type and quality of interaction that takes place. therefore. institutions should devote time and resources to ensuring staff have tools to reflect on their practice and to share this with colleagues in a safe and non-threatening way. by capturing and sharing their professional practice irish journal of technology enhanced learning 27 they will be able to share their ‘tacit’ knowledge in relation to what works and what doesn’t work with their students, which ultimately should lead to enhanced student performance. by capturing professional practice knowledge there is an opportunity to enhance the learner experience during live online events and to further develop our understanding of these events. references allen, e. and seaman, j. 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(2000). doing qualitative research a practical handbook. london: sage publications. stavredes, t. (2011). effective online teaching: foundations and strategies for student success. san francisco, calif.: jossey-bass. veletsianos, g. (2010). emerging technologies in distance education. edmonton, alta.: au press. yin, r. k. (2009). case study research design and methods. (fourth ed.). (vol. 5). thousand oaks, ca: sage irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 flipped learning in a civil engineering module: student and instructor experiences bryan a. mccabe *a a senior lecturer, civil engineering, college of engineering and informatics, national university of ireland, galway. (received march 2018; final version received august 2018) abstract flipped learning is a form of active learning in which the basic content and concepts are assimilated before scheduled classroom sessions, enabling more productive use of classroom time to cultivate problem-solving ability, a key requirement of engineering graduates. while the flipped learning approach has increased in popularity over the last five years, there are relatively few case studies for civil engineering modules in the literature, and none in the irish educational context. the author’s experience (over the past six years) of delivering a third year soil mechanics module through flipped mode at nui galway is presented in this paper. the manner in which the flipped approach has been interpreted is described, including the development of short videos, the workshop format of the classroom sessions and the assessment methods used. survey results have indicated that students found it to be a more convenient, engaging and effective learning experience, and surprisingly comfortable given the expectation of much greater activity in the classroom than would be typical of lectures. finally, reflections from the instructor’s side, on both the benefits and the challenges, are conveyed. * corresponding author. email: bryan.mccabe@nuigalway.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2019. © 2019 mccabe, b a. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irishbased professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. mailto:bryan.mccabe@nuigalway.ie http://www.ilta.ie/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 b. a. mccabe 2 1. introduction and literature review an accredited engineering degree is a professional qualification intended to produce graduates who can ‘do’ things, rather than merely ‘know’ things, from the outset of their careers. this ability to ‘do’ is best fostered through exposure to active learning within engineering modules/courses at university. extensive research has shown that active learning strategies are associated with increased student engagement, critical thinking and improved attitudes towards learning (e.g. o’dowd and aguilar-roca, 2009) and improved academic performance (e.g. freeman et al., 2014). one emerging form of active learning is the ‘flipped’ or ‘inverted’ learning approach; according to lage et al. (2000, p. 32),“inverting the classroom means that events that have traditionally taken place inside the classroom now take place outside the classroom and vice versa”. applied to a university setting, students assimilate the basic module content and concepts outside the lecture room (through prescribed reading, or increasingly in a technology-enhanced format such as videos or podcasts), freeing up classroom time for activities aimed at developing their critical thinking and problem-solving skills. consequently, the role of the lecturer is different in this model; the ‘sage on the stage’ (the instructor in didactic mode) is replaced by a ‘guide on the side’ (the instructor facilitates independent learning) (king, 1993). mcwilliam (2008) advocates an alternative ‘meddler in the middle’ role, where the instructor supports self-managed learning but challenges students’ ideas to enrich the experience. importantly, with increased contact time to circulate among students, instructors are better placed to respond more directly to specific learning needs (bergmann & sams, 2012). most of the literature on flipped learning is very recent (since 2013), largely documenting modes of implementation used by academics and corresponding student perceptions. in separate studies, bormann (2014) and o’flaherty and phillips (2015) reviewed over 30 and 28 peer-reviewed journal articles respectively on flipped learning, spanning a variety of subject areas (five studies were common to both). the key conclusions from these reviews were as follows: (i) the flipped learning approach was implemented in a variety of different ways, with no clear preference emerging for any one configuration or set of resources over another. however, the common thread was the emphasis on learning of a higher order (on bloom’s taxonomy, for example) in the classroom than is possible in the traditional lecture format. lower order activities were relegated to outside the classroom. (ii) students perceived that flipped classroom activities were more engaging than lectures; this engagement arose from longer periods of higher-order cognitive activity. (iii) prior experience of critical and independent thinking meant that students felt better prepared for the work environment and more confident in facing new challenges. (iv) there is little statistically significant evidence from quantitative studies that the flipped learning environment has an impact on student academic performance. in the context of (iv), bormann (2014) advised the need for more comparative studies in which a common cohort of students is used, such as that of willey and gardner (2013), where the first half of a module was delivered in traditional lecture mode and the second half was delivered in flipped mode. as an alternative means of comparing the two approaches, bormann (2014) suggested that two sections of the same module might be taught irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 concurrently in different modes. however, in this author’s opinion, there is no perfect comparative study; with the first method, the comparison is based on different content, some of which may call upon prior material learned through the other mode, while the second method is impractical in most research-intensive third-level institutions. in both scenarios, some ‘convergence’ of the two approaches is likely when delivered by the same instructor. karabulut-ilgu et al. (2017) synthesised findings from 62 publications on flipped learning specifically in engineering education. of the 29 publications which compared the flipped and traditional learning approaches, 15 papers concluded that ‘flipped (learning) is more effective’, 4 papers concluded that ‘flipped (learning) is more effective and/or no difference’ and 8 papers concluded ‘no difference’. an analysis of variance was performed by karabulut-ilgu et al. (2017) based on average scores reported in 25 studies, which indicated that the average score for flipped instruction exceeded that for traditional instruction. the difference was not statistically significant when all studies were considered in a single data pool, but when they allowed for the fact that the authors were an inhomogeneous group, the difference was statistically significant (p = 0.042). based on their review, these authors also summarized the benefits of the flipped model as flexibility, student engagement, increased interaction and development of professional skills; while staff workload, student resistance, technical issues and neglected material were among the particular challenges identified. interestingly, only four of the 62 publications considered in the karabulut-ilgu et al. (2017) review relate explicitly to civil or environmental engineering modules, so further recounts of the application of the flipped learning approach in civil engineering modules are likely to be of great interest to instructors. in this paper, experience from six years of delivering a third year geomechanics module (at the civil engineering department, national university of ireland, galway) through flipped mode is presented; this is believed to be one of the first such deployments on an engineering programme at an irish third level institution. the manner in which the flipped approach has been interpreted is described, including the development of short videos, the workshop format of the classroom sessions and the assessment methods used. while a comparison of examination results before and after the switch to flipped mode is inappropriate due to a number of background factors, general feedback from student surveys (tailored to the flipped learning approach) has been assimilated. finally, the author’s experience of the process from the instructor’s side, both the benefits and the challenges, is considered in the paper. 2. implementation of the flipped learning model 2.1 introduction geomechanics (or soil mechanics), the study of the engineering behaviour of earth materials, is a core topic on civil engineering degree programmes and is generally considered by students to be one of the more challenging modules. the introductory topics covered include (i) origin and classification of soils, (ii) phase relations, (iii) plasticity and grading, (iv) compaction, (v) effective stress, (vi) groundwater, seepage and permeability, (vii) consolidation, (viii) shear strength and (ix) lateral earth pressures. effective stress is a particularly challenging concept which underpins topics (vi)-(ix) which relate to the design of foundations, retaining walls, slopes and embankments. b. a. mccabe 4 the flipped approach was first adopted for the introductory 3 ects ce312 soil mechanics module at nui galway in the 2012/13 academic year. the module content has remained substantially unchanged since 2012/13, despite the module name changes in table 1. however, an institutional change to credit weightings arose in 2013/14, and student numbers and groups taking the module have changed over the past six years. changes have been made to assessment formats and weightings partially in response (table 1). unfortunately, a comparison of examination marks before (up to 2011/12) and after flipping the classroom is considered inappropriate due to the following: (i) changes in participant groups as shown in table 1 from 2012/13 onwards, and (ii) a gradual decline in cao minimum and median points for the largest cohort (civil engineering students – 3be) over a decade, in response to the declining appetite for the profession since the onset of an economic recession in ireland. upon initial contact with the students, the flipped model is explained and their engagement with the process is explicitly requested. in addition, a one-page briefing document is made available, which includes a link to a document by educause learning initiative (2012) describing flipped learning. feedback surveys indicated that 5% of students in the 2012/13 group had heard of flipped learning in advance of taking the ce312 module. interestingly, only 17% of students in the 2016/17 group had heard of it, despite the substantial increasing publicity it has received (academic literature and online blogs) in the intervening period. table 1: details of six years of teaching soil mechanics/geomechanics in flipped mode a c a d e m ic y e a r m o d u le c o d e /n a m e e c t s 2 p a r ti c ip a n t g r o u p s3 e x a m w e ig h ti n g e x a m fo r m a t h o u r s p e r w e e k × n o . o f w e e k s 2012/13 ce312 soil mechanics 3 3be (43), 3bse (17), 3bcm (4), total 64 80% q1 + 2/3 3 × 8 2013/14 ce337 introduction to geomechanics 5 3be (29), 3bse (7), 3bcm (7), total 43 60% 3/3 3 × 8 2014/15 ce3101 geomechanics and geology 1 5 3be (17), 3bcm (9) total 26 50% 3/3 3 × 8 2015/16 ce3101 geomechanics and geology 1 5 3be (26), 3bcm (5) total 31 60% 3/3 3 × 10 2016/17 ce3101 geomechanics and geology 1 5 3be (32), 3bcm (5), 4bse (14), total 51 60% 3/3 3 × 10 2017/18 ce3101 geomechanics and geology 1 5 3be (45), 3bcm (10), 4bse (12), total 67 60% 3/3 4 × 8 1 6 hours of geology delivered by another lecturer, not part of this flipped learning study. 2 ects refers to european credit transfer system; 60 ects per academic year. 3 be = civil engineering, bcm = project and construction management, bse = energy systems engineering (civil stream); number (3 or 4) refers to the stage (year) of study. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 2.2 videos and pre-class activity a total of 15 videos were produced to cover both threshold concepts and basic content for the topics listed in section 2.1 (the set of videos can be requested by contacting the author directly). the combined duration of 110 mins (average of 7.4 minutes per video) was arrived at organically; this short duration relative to the time spent lecturing previously (24 hours) was somewhat discomforting to the author before the first iteration of the module in flipped mode. however, it transpired that there was ample opportunity for significant development of the basic concepts through the workshop problems, so the total duration of the videos was not a concern after the first iteration. the videos were narrated ms powerpoint files produced using camtasia studio software. scripts were used in the preparation of all videos, most of which were produced to screencast.com. the remainder of the videos was produced to youtube once a space limitation on screencast.com was exceeded. from 2013/14 onwards, the videos were also made available as .mp4 files through blackboard virtual learning environment (vle). a review of over half a million videos by fishman (2016) showed that engagement is independent of duration for videos up to 2 minutes long, while there is a decay in engagement between 2 and 6 minutes. however, most people who watch videos for 6 minutes are as likely to continue to watch up to 12 minutes, after which there is another drop off in engagement. 13 of the 15 videos produced had durations between 6 and 12 minutes. it is interesting to note that google analytics data for one of the groundwater, seepage and permeability videos on youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvibr8wwyji , 9:59 in duration, with 101,676 views as at 23/8/2018) suggested that the average view length was only 2:25 (24%). this viewing percentage is fairly typical of all six videos on youtube. a series of online quizzes (through blackboard vle), comprising 3-4 questions per video, was introduced in 2013/14, to enable students to explore if they had comprehended the new concepts/knowledge in preparation for the classroom problems. these quizzes contributed to the overall mark. however, student feedback that year indicated that the workload expected compared to other 5 ects modules (continuous assessment comprising worked problems, quizzes and laboratories) was excessive, so these quizzes were left as optional/formative from 2014/15 onwards, in keeping with the approach of willey and gardner (2013). while this was believed to be a welcome development by all students, disappointingly, engagement with these quizzes since has been by and large limited to the high-achieving students. 2.3 classroom workshops engineering students tend to be visual, inductive (i.e. learn by exposure to examples) and active learners (felder & silverman, 1988). therefore, the higher-order activity chosen for the classroom workshop sessions entailed discussion about and solution of geomechanics examples/problems, requiring the application of the concepts/basic knowledge assimilated in the videos. a workbook comprising 17 no. calculation-based problems is provided to the students at the outset of the module, two of which (related to seepage of water through soil) are shown in figure 1. the set of problems was deliberately chosen with the breadth and depth of coverage of the module and some cross-referencing of topics in mind. in addition, they are used to provide a frame of reference for technical and practical discussions beyond the calculations, such as what soil compaction plant is used in earthworks projects, how sheet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvibr8wwyji b. a. mccabe 6 pile or secant pile walls are constructed, or the role of geotechnical software in design. the students were provided with the parent powerpoint files (with which the videos were produced) as a supplement, due to the impracticality of reverting to videos for diagrams or equations needed in the classroom environment. figure 1: sample workbook problems related to seepage in soils any temptation to review the key points of the videos at the start of the workshop sessions was resisted by the author. however, students were encouraged to pose specific questions arising from their study of the videos either through the discussion board on blackboard vle or at the start of the classroom sessions, although they very rarely availed of these opportunities. this was not perceived to be a major problem, as any lack of understanding emerged and could be addressed during the workshop. the approach taken to solving each problem was student-led; students were invited to volunteer their ideas/rationale on how to tackle each stage of a problem to the class, sometimes after conferring with neighbouring students. formal structured group work was difficult, owing to the presence of inflexible furniture in the classroom. the author helped tease out these ideas, as mcwilliams’ (2008) “meddler in the middle”, often asking leading questions to tease out problems, questions from the perspective of others (client, contractor, consultant) or playing devil’s advocate to challenge initial erroneous perceptions. after some discussion, students then worked through the calculations in stages, while the author followed with partial solutions on a whiteboard. unlike a tutorial, solutions only followed after significant student effort was confirmed (by walk-around or show-of-hands) and were deliberately left with some gaps, encouraging students to take responsibility for preparing a useful set of solutions themselves from which they could revise the material. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 for variety, some additional videos were shown in classroom time to support the learning outcomes, such as one produced by the norwegian geotechnical institute on the rissa landside, norway, in 1978 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3q-qfnlep4a), another conceptualizing effective stress using a physical model by prof. john burland (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-6ybkzj5uy) and other videos showing sheet pile wall installation and piping failures. 2.4 assessment in the 2012/13 academic year, the continuous assessment comprised five problems of a similar style and standard to those covered in the workbook, accounting for 20% of the overall mark (laboratory reports were included in a separate module in 2012/13). since 2013/14, the module weighting for ce337/ce3101 increased to 5ects with the laboratory reports now incorporated. as mentioned in section 2.2, summative quizzes were introduced for the 2013/14 academic year, but were used as formative assessment thereafter. 3. student feedback feedback on the flipped learning approach was solicited at the end of each teaching period through a survey tool embedded in blackboard. findings from the 2012/13 (n=37 responses, 58%) and 2016/17 (n=36 responses, 71%) academic years are presented in the form of pie charts in appendix 1. the trends are largely consistent for the two class groups. the feedback is considered under three headings: videos, workshops and overview. 3.1 videos typically around three-quarters of students accessed the videos through personal laptop and/or pc and over one-in-five though a university pc suite. the relatively limited use of smartphones or tablets was a surprising finding, given their greater portability. notwithstanding the mode of access, 82% (2012/13) and 84% (2016/17) of students believed that the opportunity to watch the videos in their own time was either ‘convenient’ or ‘very convenient’. the ability to revisit videos was also appreciated: “it was reassuring knowing that if i had difficulty in part of a module, there was a video to explain it back” (ce337 2013/14). replaying sections of videos may be responsible in part for the low average viewing durations referred to in section 2.2. nevertheless, flexibility is one of the most widely-cited benefits of the flipped learning approach (e.g. velegol et al. 2015). 100% (2012/13) and 97% (2016/17) of respondents found that the quality of videos was ‘good’ or ‘very good’. the author would describe the videos as ‘fit for purpose’ rather than high quality productions; on the basis of the satisfaction levels with the videos, there is arguably little extra educational benefit to be gained from time spent to achieve the latter standard. this feedback has implications for the perceived ‘up-front’ investment in switching a module from traditional mode to flipped mode. a few students suggested that the videos would benefit from some simple worked examples. videos were watched with a view to learning by 78% (2012/13) and 91% (2016/17); the majority relied on the videos alone but about one-quarter of these used other learning resources (e.g. books, internet) in parallel. on the other hand, 17% (2012/13) and 6% https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3q-qfnlep4a https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-6ybkzj5uy b. a. mccabe 8 (2016/17) claimed to have watched the videos without any concerted effort to learn. in response to a query about video use by an external facilitator (grouped student evaluation of teaching, 2015/16), one class cohort suggested that some students reviewed the ms powerpoint documents (from which the narrated versions were developed) only, to save time; this tendency has also been noted by ossman and warren (2014). the author also believes that the spacing of classes in the timetable is a factor in whether or not students review the videos in advance of class; double classes and classes on successive days limit the amount of preparation time available to students. 3.2 workshops while some students respond openly (in front of the class) to questions posed in the workshops, others are either too reticent or insufficiently prepared for class to do so. nevertheless, it is evident that a large proportion of those students who do not speak openly still contemplate and complete the problems. approximately half of the students felt that they engaged fully with the problems during the workshop sessions (47% in 2012/13; 52% in 2016/17), while 37% (2012/13) and 42% (2016/17) claimed to have engaged partially. the workshop sessions always helped students understand areas with which they had difficulty in 39% (2012/13) and 31% (2016/17) of cases, and they sometimes helped in 56% (2012/13) and 55% (2016/17) of cases: “doing examples in class allows us to ask questions about concepts we don’t fully understand, whereas if this was the normal approach, we wouldn’t be able to ask questions as easily” (ce3101 2015/16 grouped student evaluation of teaching). it is suspected that those who engaged partially in the classroom sessions (37%/42%) is a subset of the latter group. almost 90% of students recognised the value of the workshop sessions compared to traditional lectures; 53% of students (both years) felt that the classroom sessions were ‘much more valuable’ than traditional lectures, while 34% (2012/13) or 36% (2016/17) felt that they were ‘more valuable’. some student quotations highlighting the benefits for understanding and problem-solving ability include: “the flipped approach in the classroom was great because working through examples and interacting with the material actually made me think about what we were doing. in contrast, i tend to drift in and out of lectures and find it difficult to concentrate on what’s being said” (ce312 2012/13). “i found doing examples in class greatly improved my understanding of the subject and i engaged more than i do in other classes” (ce312 2012/13). “the primary difference was the increased focus on problem-solving which was extremely helpful compared to the traditional learning approach, which tends to feel like ‘here’s the material, understanding it is your problem’ ” (ce3101 2017/18). 38% (2012/13) and 53% (2016/17) of students felt that they were ‘much more likely’ to attend the workshop sessions compared to traditional classroom sessions, while 41% (2012/13) and 28% (2016/17) were ‘more likely’ to attend. students felt that they were missing out on more than they would in traditional lectures by not attending: “in my opinion, all lecturers should try this method of teaching. it engages students as we are working out problems and thinking about them in class instead of just listening to lectures. the attendance at lectures is the highest of all 3 rd year modules, as people know they will learn by attending” (ce3101 2016/17). irish journal of technology enhanced learning 9 3.3 overview the flipped approach has met with overwhelming approval from most students such that the author has never contemplated a return to lecturing for this module: “overall, i found this method of teaching to be an improvement on traditional lecturing and would be happy to see more lecturers adopt this approach” (ce312 2012/13). as part of the survey, students were asked which they felt was the most valuable part of the flipped learning process: primarily the videos (2012/13: 8%; 2016/17: 6%), primarily the workshops (24%/39%), or both videos and workshops (66%/47%). it was encouraging to realize in 2012/13 that 66% of the class appreciated that both components work in tandem; the lower value of 47% in 2016/17 may reflect greater instructor experience in conducting the workshops (while the videos have remained unchanged in the meantime). despite the expectation of greater activity from students in the flipped format compared to a traditional lecture, 90% (2012/13) and 78% (2016/17) found the workshop learning environment to be either ‘comfortable’ or ‘very comfortable’, which is pleasantly surprising given that none of the class groups had prior experience of this approach. a number of students remarked that the flipped approach was a natural way of learning: “i was a huge fan of the flipped learning style of bryan’s course. the way the theory is learned in the videos and applied in class is a natural way of learning in my opinion” (ce3101 2016/17). 4. lecturer reflections over the course of his teaching career, the author has steadily increased the level of student activity in scheduled class time, and the flipped learning trial in 2012/13 was a natural progression in this regard. the switch to the flipped approach has been a very rewarding and enjoyable experience for the author, and the workshops have challenged him to think more about the subtleties of geomechanics than had he continued to lecture the material. over the last six iterations of the module, the maximum class size was 67 students; larger class sizes would undoubtedly render it more challenging to manage the workshop sessions effectively, and perhaps a teaching assistant would be helpful or indeed necessary in this respect. the initial time investment to switch a module to flipped mode was expected to be very high, on the assumption that 8-10 hours of videos would be needed to replace 24 timetabled ‘lecture’ hours. however, with the combined video duration of only 110 mins, and with some previous ‘lecture examples’ developed into workshop problems, this investment transpired to be much less onerous than anticipated. the emphasis on problem solving rather than lecture delivery has led to considerably reduced preparation time after the first year; and reminders have been made of topics for discussion or opportunities to ‘meddle in the middle’ from previous years. lage et al. (2000) also noted this reduced preparation time for flipped classroom sessions compared to lectures, once the process is established. unlike school teachers, most academics have no formal training in teaching, and therefore their ability to inspire a class through lectures can be limited in many cases. in the flipped model, the classroom time plays more to the strength of academics, which is their technical expertise, allowing them to address technical difficulties rather than lecture ‘delivery’. there is also an excitement about not knowing where the session is going to go and the time and flexibility to explore trains of thought (whether correct or incorrect) proposed by students b. a. mccabe 10 prompted by the workshop problems. for example, one notable student-led discussion focused around whether the over-consolidation ratio of soils, which has a theoretical minimum value of unity, is ever actually unity in reality. on the other hand, there can be slow days where it is difficult to get students to volunteer ideas openly to the class, even with classes that are generally well-engaged; this can be challenging for the lecturer to keep the session moving and there is potential for silences and wasted time. engagement of the students in the workshop sessions was sometimes sporadic when they worked as individuals, but improved when they worked in groups. the author believes that the greatest scope for increased student engagement in his classes is through greater emphasis on group work, facilitated by a flexible seating arrangement where groups can be changed from session to session, and even within sessions. this also allows the instructor to pose questions to groups rather than individuals, which may be more comfortable for many students. 5. conclusions the experience of flipped learning reported in this paper is overwhelmingly positive and student feedback suggests that the style of teaching/learning is appreciated by students and offers a more convenient, engaging and effective learning experience. flipped learning offers great potential for problem-based and calculation-based programmes such as science and engineering. the benefits of the approach can be maximized if the physical classroom environment allows for formal group work, which was not fully exploitable in this study. it is hoped that the experiences shared in this paper will encourage instructors in irish third-level institutions to consider this approach to facilitating student learning. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 11 references bergmann, j. & sams, a. 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(2014). active learning increases student performance in science, engineering and mathematics. proceedings of the national academy of sciences of the united states of america, vol. 111, no. 23, pp. 8410-8415. karabulut-ilgu, a., jaramillo cherrez, n., & jahren, c.t. (2017) a systematic review of research on the flipped learning method in engineering education. british journal of educational technology, vol. 49, no. 3, pp. 398-411. king, a. (1993). from sage on the stage to guide on the side. college teaching, vol. 41, no. 1, pp. 30-35. lage m.j., platt, g.j. & treglia, m. (2000). inverting the classroom: a gateway to creating an inclusive learning environment. the journal of economic education, vol. 31, no. 1, pp. 30–43. mcwilliam, e.l. (2009) teaching for creativity: from sage to guide to meddler. asian pacific journal of education, vol. 29, no. 3, pp. 281-293. o’dowd, d.k. & aguilar-roca, n.m. 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(2014) effect of flipping the classroom on student performance in first year engineering courses. proceedings of the 121 st asee annual conference and exposition, indianapolis, in. https://peer.asee.org/effect-of-flipping-the-classroom-onstudent-performance-in-first-year-engineering-courses https://scholarworks.uni.edu/grp/137 https://library.educause.edu/~/media/files/library/2012/2eli7081-pdf.pdf https://wista.com/blog/optimal-video-length https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/s109675161500038x https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/s109675161500038x https://peer.asee.org/effect-of-flipping-the-classroom-on-student-performance-in-first-year-engineering-courses https://peer.asee.org/effect-of-flipping-the-classroom-on-student-performance-in-first-year-engineering-courses b. a. mccabe 12 velegol, s.b., zappe, s.e. & mahoney, e. (2015) the evolution of a flipped classroom evidence-based recommendations. advances in engineering education, vol. 4, pp 1-37. willey, k. & gardner, a. (2013) flipping your classroom without flipping out. proceedings of the 41 st sefi conference, leuven, belgium. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 13 appendix 1: feedback responses academic years 2012/13 (left, n=37) and 2016/17 (right, n=36) which of the following is your principal means of accessing the videos? the opportunity to study the videos in my own time is: please rate the quality of the videos: which of the following describes how you engaged with the videos before the corresponding workshop session? 19% 80% 0% 1% university pc suite personal laptop/pc ipad of tablet device smartphone 25% 69% 3% 3% university pc suite personal laptop/pc ipad of tablet device smartphone 46% 36% 15% 3% 0% very convenient convenient neutral inconvenient very inconvenient 42% 42% 16% 0% 0% very convenient convenient neutral inconvenient very inconvenient 47% 53% 0% 0% 0% very good good neutral poor very poor 50% 47% 3% 0% 0% very good good neutral poor very poor 5% 17% 78% i did not watch them i watched halfheartedly i watched with a view to learning 3% 6% 91% i did not watch them i watched halfheartedly i watched with a view to learning 2012-13 2016-17 b. a. mccabe 14 to what extent have you engaged with the problems during the classroom sessions? do the workshop sessions help you understand the areas you had difficulty with from the videos? how do the classroom sessions compare to traditional lectures? how likely are you to attend workshop sessions compared to a traditional lecture? for me, the most valuable part of the flipped learning process was: 47% 37% 16% engaged fully engaged partially did not engage 52% 42% 6% engaged fully engaged partially did not engage 39% 56% 5% 0% 0% yes, always yes, sometimes neutral no, rarely no, never 31% 55% 11% 3% 0% yes, always yes, sometimes neutral no, rarely no, never 53% 34% 10% 0% 3% much more valuable more valuable neutral less valuable much less valuable 53% 36% 8% 3% 0% much more valuable more valuable neutral less valuable much less valuable 38% 41% 18% 3% 0% much more likely more likely neutral less likely much less likely 53% 28% 19% 0% 0% much more likely more likely neutral less likely much less likely 8% 24% 66% 2% primarily the videos primarily the workshops both videos and workshops no different to traditional format 6% 39% 47% 8% primarily the videos primarily the workshops both videos and workshops no different to traditional format irish journal of technology enhanced learning 15 how do you find the learning environment in the workshop sessions? 16% 74% 8% 0% 2% very comfortable comfortable neutral uncomfortable very uncomfortable 20% 58% 14% 8% 0% very comfortable comfortable neutral uncomfortable very uncomfortable microsoft word gleeson_v7_iss1.doc irish journal of technology enhanced learning volume 7, issue 1 the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organization. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0). a case study of computer science lecturer’s selection and use of digital tools in an irish technological university michael gleeson1 1south east technological university abstract this research explores factors that influence the selection and use of digital tools as part of computer science lecturer’s professional practice. the research takes the form of an intrinsic case study and as such the intent is to better understand and identify the uniqueness of the case by focusing on computer science lecturers professional practice. the author draws upon activity theory as its theoretical framework to expose explanatory and contextual insight, whilst not attempting to provide a complete overview of the domain. the primary data was gathered through semi-structured interviews with five computer science lecturers. it is evident from the literature that among others, user experience and compatibility with teaching pedagogy should be factors to be considered when selecting digital tools and this study offers confirmation these. furthermore, literature suggests that the overuse of too many digital tools or ‘digital tool sprawl’ is an emerging issue in higher education. this corresponds with a significant finding from this study, which reveals an unintended consequence of computer science lecturer’s digital agency, typically characterized as ‘positive’, can, as part of professional practice, actually exacerbate the issue of ‘digital tool sprawl’ in higher education. 1. introduction with the widespread acceptance of the use of digital tools in education, comes an expectation that lecturers should use digital technology as part of their professional practice. this expectation is now ubiquitous, regardless of the nature of delivery; face-to-face, fully online, blended or hybrid. furthermore with the proliferation of applications and other technology now available, further strengthened by the increased reliance on technology due to covid-19 restrictions, this posits a number of considerations for the practices of faculty. ‘digital tools’ is a broad ‘catch-all’ term to encapsulate the use of technology by faculty in higher education. generically, digital tools can be defined as “programs, websites or online resources that can make tasks easier to complete” (uk gov, 2022), while a more specific reference to digital tools as used in science is “[digital tools]... as used in scholarly work that 1 address for correspondance michael.gleeson@setu.ie 20 go beyond the individual computer and represent digital media or online-based, networked software systems” (albrect et al., 2021, p. 52). technological universities (tu) are relatively new in the irish tertiary educational landscape, having been formed through the amalgamation of two or more former institute of technologies (iot). there are now five tus in ireland, in addition to two existing iots. in this newly emerging environment, there is quite an amount of autonomy afforded to computer science (cs) lecturers in the selection of digital tools. the provenance of this research has emerged from recent observations of professional practice as a cs lecturer in an irish tu, where the activity of the selection and use of digital tools is not fully acknowledged or understood. the overall aim of this paper is to make a contribution to the understanding and motivation behind the selection and use of digital tools by cs lecturers and identify any significant consequences. this will be achieved by answering the following research questions. • rq1: what factors influence lecturers when selecting digital tools to use as part of their professional practice? • rq2: what (if any) significant consequences emerge as a result of this case study? this small scale case study provides a specific focus for cs lecturers in an irish tu, to reflect and inform their scholarly activity of professional practice. along with confirming findings from the literature, in this paper, the author argues that while the existing dominant body of knowledge related to digital agency is primarily viewed as a positive trait, this case study reveals that in practice, contradictions in activity theory show that digital agency in cs lecturers has an unintended consequence of exacerbating the issue of the overuse of digital tools. this research is further distinguished by its use of activity theory as its theoretical framework as opposed to more common frameworks such as tpack (mishra & koehler, 2006). it is important to note that this research is not offering a complete analysis of the domain, however the research does offer specific insight into the selection of digital tools and offers a number of paths to further research at the juncture of digital agency, technology integration and higher education. 2. literature review to explore the literature around the research domain, an initial search of scopus using the key terms of ‘digital tools’ or ‘digital technology’ and ‘digital agency’ or ‘digital competency’ and ‘technology integration’ resulted in 205 papers, subsequent inclusion of ‘higher education’ as a search term resulted in 57 papers, which were reviewed and reduced to 23 relevant papers. the examination of acm and ieee broadened the scope for relevant literature. finally, snowball referencing was utilized as an additional approach to identifying appropriate research to ensure a comprehensive review of the literature. 2.1 digital tool selection and use in educational settings digital tools have a number of uses and functions in educational professional practices. these range from ‘operational technology’, involving day-to-day uses such as managing and distributing content, to enhancing teaching and leaning through the use of ‘educational technology’ (davies et al., 2008). additionally, cs educators also have to contend with the irish journal of technology enhanced learning 21 learning and instruction of technology itself, ‘technology education’ (jones & rocco, 1999) which offers challenges such as professional development support and keeping up-to-date (mcgarr et al., 2020). literature suggest there are factors to be assessed when determining the selection and use of digital tools as part of teaching and learning. trust (2020) grouped four considerations to evaluate: 1) user experience 2) learning experience 3) accessibility 4) cost, privacy and data (trust, 2020). while educational technology is well-intentioned and educators have many reasons to implement educational technology such as, facilitating creative activities, providing flexible learning environments, increased student engagement and the ability to give instant feedback (haleem et. al, 2022), literature also suggests that the overuse and saturation of educational technology can create end user technology overload (harris et al., 2015). a recent edtech report stated that there was a 90% jump in the use of education technology products (edtech, 2022) and from a student perspective, a separate report found that 27% of learners felt that they were being assigned too many different digital tools (tophat, 2022). while it is accepted in the literature that educational technology can enable innovation in teaching practice (lai et al.,2018), as discussed by eguland et al, (2017), educators approaches to educational technology is essential for the integration and implementation to be successful as part of an academics professional practice. 2.2 integration of digital tools in educational settings the integration of digital technology and tools in education and teaching activities is challenging for educators (brooks & bengtsson 2022, viberg et al., 2020). while technology integration models such as samr (puentedura, 2006), tpack (mishra & koehler, 2009), digcompedu (redecker, 2017) are referenced throughout the literature and have been designed to evaluate and inform the selection of digital tools. kuhn (1996) however, states that “no [model] ever solves all the problems it defines,” and “no two [models] leave all the same problems unsolved” (kuhn 1996, p. 110). additionally, no single model may be universally valuable, understandable, or useful to all stakeholders (kimmins & hall, 2018). findings from mei et al., which utilized the tpack model as its theoretical framework, indicate that some educators “are more innovative than the majority in their use of digital learning tools” (mei et al., 2019, p. 26) and that there is a need to “ensure that both the individual teacher and the educational institution reach the goal of coordinating the use of digital learning tools” (mei et al., 2019, p. 27). these findings from the literature indicate that there is a discrepancy between individual lecturers and organizational capacity to cohesively integrate digital tools. 2.3 digital agency the terms ‘digital agency’ and ‘digital competency’ are increasing used in public discourse, however how these concepts are defined and understood is unclear (spante et al., 2018). plassey et al. (2018, p. 426) define digital agency as “consisting of digital competence, digital 22 confidence and digital accountability is the individual’s ability to control and adapt to a digital world”. in an educational context, agency is a “prerequisite for conscious transformation” (aagaard & lund, 2019, p.7) and the tendency of educators to integrate educational technology lies with the individual agency of the lecturer (omingo, 2019). by proposing a mentorship approach to developing teacher digital agency, kussen & agnew (2022) designates digital agency as desirable and this is supported by anand (2022, p. 64) stating that educators “need to have digital agency”. with the pervasiveness of digital tools and ict usage in daily life, which is reciprocated in an educational environment, digital agency benefits the integration of technology into professional practice in a “meaningful and capital enhancing way” and not simply “function with technology” (pearce & rice, 2017, p. 2). due to the ever evolving nature of the computer industry, there is a certain degree of inherent digital agency and autonomy afforded to cs lecturers to select and use digital tools as required. a survey of predominantly irish lecturers in mathematics, a discipline which is a fundamental pillar in all computer science programmes, shows that over 80% of lecturers selected the technology to use independently (ní fhloinn & fitzmaurice, 2021). even considered outside the the extenuating circumstances of covid-19 restrictions, this figure presents a though-provoking trend in terms of the individualistic and ad-hoc approach to selecting and using digital tools by academic faculty. 2.4 gaps in the literature the importance of technology in the classroom is reflected by the literature which reveals that there is much recent research related to secondary school teaching, focusing on teacher use of technology (yiannoutsou et al., 2022, yildiz, 2021, spiteri & rundgren, 2020). furthermore there is evidence of studies at third level, related to digital skills and teacher education (kussen & agnew, 2022, rodrigues, 2020). while literature does exist in the relative domain (falloon, 2020, sjöberg & lilja, 2019), there appears to be an under representation at the axis of digital agency of lecturers, technology integration and the selection of digital tools as part of professional practice, which this paper aims to address. 3. theoretical framework my ontological perspective is based in social constructivism, where there are multiple different realities created by individuals in groups. therefore, my epistemological position for this case study is to interpret the reality of cs lecturers selection and use digital tools as part of professional practice. i will achieve this through the use of an inductive methodology, developing truth based on observations from an empirical case study. the theoretical framework for this research was holistically guided by activity theory (at) which was pioneered by psychologists vygotsky (1978) and leontyev (1981). broadly aligned with social constructisvim, at has been used to describe human activity in a variety of contexts including education and teacher education research (ellis et al., 2010; feldman & weiss, 2010; thorgeirsdóttir, 2015). as part of this theoretical framework, the activity systems model (asm) models an activity using seven elements that play a crucial role within an activity. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 23 figure 1: the structure of a human activity system (engeström, 1987, p 78) cultural, historical activity theory (chat) is an adaptation of activity theory by engeström and is now a well established theoretical framework (engeström, 1999). asm focuses on 'the system' view, while also taking into consideration participants practices and beliefs (cultural) and situational context (historical). overall chat offers the ability to demonstrate the complexity of human activity and using asm it is possible to model cs lectures activities in the selection and use of digital tools, therefore is an appropriate theoretical lens to utilize for this case study. 4. methodology and methods this section identifies the overall research methodology implemented and offers reasoning for this selection. ethics was considered throughout, no personal identifiable information is provided and ethical approval was attained prior to undertaking the study. 4.1 case study a case study is a research method that allows the exploration and in-depth understanding of a single person, group, event or community. yin states that “case studies can be used to explain, describe or explore events or phenomena in the everyday contexts in which they occur” (yin, 2009, p. 3), as this research is centered on the investigation of scholarly activity it is an appropriate methodology to undertake this research. 4.2 data collection data for this case study was collected through semi-structured interviews with participants. as this case study is “driven by a desire to know more about the uniqueness of the case rather than to build theory or how the case represents other cases” (mills et al., 2010, p. 183), the participants were selected on the basis that they have direct experience with the case in question. all participants are cs lecturers, work in the same department of an irish tu and have experience using digital tools as part of professional practice. five semi-structured interviews was the principal means to collect primary data. the interviews were held online in june 2022 using microsoft teams. interviewees were provided with a copy of the questions in advance. from these interviews over three and a half hours of audio was recorded, once transcribed this data amounted to over thirty typed a4 pages 24 (approximately 750 words per page, over 25,500 words). ethnographic data was collected through an analysis of organizational communications, online service catalogue provided and historical departmental software requests. 4.3 data analysis initial examination of interview data was informed by thematic analysis and further analysis was guided by inbuilt structures within the wider at theoretical framework. coding was performed on the semi-structured interview data, this was performed to allow the researcher to become familiar with the data and the case being examined. thematic analysis was performed using the six-step approach proposed by braun and clark (2006), then grouped and organized to form themes. this process led to the identification of five themes, these are articulated in section 5.1. asm, a triangular activity system describing the structure of human activity (engeström, 1987) was employed to visually represent the activity using its seven constituent elements; subject, tool, rules, community, division of labour, object and outcome. interview questions were mapped to the elements to assist in the generation of the activity model in addition to being guided mwanza’s (2002) eight step model. this resulted in the visual representation of a human activity, the selection of digital tools as part of cs lecturers professional practice. this is presented and discussed in section 5.2. once an activity is modeled, asa provides an analytical framework to analyse the data. one of the primary benefits of at is the exposition of ‘contradictions’ that exist between elements. contradictions are tensions that exist within activity systems (or between multiple activity systems) and they manifest themselves as “problems, ruptures, breakdowns, clashes” (kuutti, 1995, p. 16). while contradictions are “always present although not always perceivable” (nunez, 2014, p. 70) they are “important for exploring possible shifts that may occur and learning that might emerge” (davis, 2012, p. 96). engeström (2001) identifies four layers of contradictions, primary, secondary, tertiary and quartenary contradictions. for the purposes of this case study, analysis will be bounded to secondary contradictions, which are contradictions that occur between different elements of the same activity system. 5. findings and validation five themes emerged as a result of thematic analysis, the first two themes are generalizeable and have previously been identified in literature. the final three themes are specific to this case study and are used to inform subsequent primary data analysis. 5.1 thematic analysis the first theme to emerge is that for digital tools to be considered or utilized, they must be compatible with pedagogy. from the data it is evident that for cs lecturers to invest time and effort into selecting and using a digital tool, it should have potential, replicate real world experience and must help support student learning. “[a digital tool]... must fit into pedagogy and not be used ‘just because’” (participant a) irish journal of technology enhanced learning 25 the second theme to emerge is that digital tools must have an intuitive and consistent user experience. digital tools should be clear and not distracting to students while also being cognizant of students who are not tech-savvy, to not overwhelm them. a related trait here is that cs lecturers preserve with existing digital tools that are the ‘status quo’ as students are familiar with the user experience of them. “most students appear happy with blackboard and while it is not perfect, it is consistent for most of my needs.” (participant d) the third theme that emerged is that there is a preference to pick and choose digital tools as required, to avoid digital tools that are proprietary and tend to have too many options and features. availability, composability and integration are important considerations which can be problematic with large scale digital tools. “i'm perfectly happy to use a combination of tools if each tool does its own job well... overall i will select whatever is easy, immediate and works.” (participant c) the fourth theme to emerge is how digital agency is palpable in the participants of this case study. all participants self identified as ‘early adopters’ or ‘innovators’ as part of rodgers (2003) diffusion of innovation model and this is also observable from the data where cs lecturers are interested in new technology, prefer independent learning and regularly experiment with ease. “i am very open to trying new tools and this is typically driven by my own readings and research” (participant e) the final theme to emerged was that of digital tool sprawl, this was particularly noticeable in communication where email, blackboard, teams, slack, discord, whatsapp and signal were all identified as in use. overall in the interviews, 48 different digital tools were identified from the primary data and from other ethnographic data, 86 different digital tools are requested by lecturers in the department each year. “i can see how it happens, you know, because you know guys just like a particular tool and then you expect somebody else to start using that tool.” (participant b) 5.2 selection and use of digital tools presented in the form of an asm, produced using primary data, figure 2, adapted from engeström (1987, p. 78) is a visual representation of the case of cs lecturers activity in the selection of digital tools to use as part of professional practice. 26 figure 2: activity system model (source: author, from primary data) figure 2 displays how each element in the activity system is composed of discreet constituent parts for this case. what is evident from this model is that while ‘community’ and ‘division of labour’ elements are significant to cs lecturers, the elements of ‘artifacts’ and ‘rules’ are clearly predominant in terms of their exposition of considerations for the activity. this asm was then utilized for further analysis through the identification of contradictions. while it is possible to identify a large number of contractions in this activity, it is not possible to examine all contradictions within the bounds of this case study, this is expanded upon and further explained in section 5.3. 5.3 relevant contradictions in this activity, cs lecturers are the subjects, motivated towards the attainment of the object (the selection of digital tools). the outcome of this activity is the use of digital tools as part of professional practice. the determination of relevant contradictions for further exploration has been informed by the results of thematic analysis, in order to offer an explanatory account, which corresponds to the aim of an intrinsic case study (stake, 1995). the contradictions identified to expose and examine for this study are secondary contradictions between a) rules and subject, b) division of labour and object and c) irish journal of technology enhanced learning 27 artifacts and object. these are visually represented in figure 3, adapted from engeström (1987, p. 78) and elucidated further below. figure 3: relevant contradictions (source: author, from primary data) the first contradiction to be examined is a contradiction between cs lecturers (subject) and informal rule to use university provided tools (rules). this conflict manifests itself where there is an array of provided digital tools available but there is no mandate to use them. the contradiction here is that with this requirement lacking, individual lecturers are free to pick and choose any digital tool. all participants in this case study have indicated that they have deviated from university provided tools for various legitimate reasons. however, the unintended consequence of this flexibility is the propagation of the use of different digital tools by cs lecturers. the second contradiction identified is between colleagues (division of labour) and the selection of digital tools (object), in this instance, in the case of shared modules, if a colleague is using a specific digital tool, you are obliged to also use this tool if you are part of the teaching team. the contradiction here is that, for a lecturer of a shared module, the choice of digital tool has already been made and therefore there is no selection of digital tools (object) to be made. all participants in this case study have had previous or current experience of this where the digital tool in use was either 1) not their choice and/or b) not their normal digital tool. this contradiction has lead to an increased diversity of digital tools that lecturers utilize. the final contradiction and the most significant one for the purposes of this case study is a contradiction between digital agency (a conceptual artifact) and the selection of digital tools (object). from the data gathered, cs lecturers have displayed an inherent digital agency to investigate, trial and incorporate a variety of digital tools based on personal preferences, philosophical beliefs and professional expectations. here, the unintended consequence of this contradiction is the proliferation of digital tools by cs lecturers, which has accentuated an identified theme of digital tool sprawl. 28 6. discussion to answer rq1, from the data it emerges that there are many factors that are considered by cs lecturers when selecting digital tools to use as part of professional practice. once categorized into themes, some emerge as common factors, such as supporting pedagogy and requiring a positive user experience, which have previously been identified (trust 2020, hirsh-pasek et al. 2015; koh, chai & tay, 2014). while other factors such as ‘one tool for one job’ appears to be quite specific to cs lecturers, perhaps a call back to the historical unix philosophy of doing one thing and doing it well (salus, 1994). of the technology integration models identified in the literature, the simplicity of samr (puentedura, 2006) is most reflective of what is occurring ‘one the ground’ with cs lecturers in an irish tu. however, it is important to note that the use of samr is not as prevalent across the literature as other models as it is not theorized or connected to any theoretical framework. samr is open to criticism as it is too simplistic and does not take into account context and overgeneralizes (hamilton et al., 2016). for cs lecturers in an irish tu, this study also confirms that selecting tools for operational and technology education purposes is for the most part predetermined as lecturers use institute provided tools as standard. however it is evident that there is also an individualized and ah-hoc approach to selecting digital tools by lecturers, specifically for teaching and learning purposes. this is representative of findings from a systematic review by lillejord et al. (2018) which found that “academics appear not be using a scholarly approach when implementing technology in education” (p. 4, emphasis in original). this reflective of, that while pedagogy is considered, it is in the context that digital tools are considered only as deployed tools, copying existing practices (orlikowski & iacono, 2001) rather than understanding how digitization affects pedagogy. to address rq2, a significant consequence that is observable as a result of this case study is the emergence of a correlation between cs lecturers digital agency and the overuse of technology. through the theoretical lens of activity systems it is possible to reveal contradictions, which assist in identifying “unintentional deviations from the script [which] cause discoordinations in interaction” (engeström et al., 1991, p. 91). this research has highlighted three such contradictions, which when viewed individually do not appear to be of consequence, however when viewed collectively offers an insight into how this non-scholarly approach can manifest to the detriment of an activity. indeed these contradictions would otherwise be difficult to identify as “they may not be easily acknowledged, visible, obvious, or even openly discussed by those experiencing them” (murphy & rodriguez-manzanares, 2008, p. 446). to illustrate this, one quote from the interview data stood out, where participant c stated “digital tool sprawl one is not one i'd be too concerned with” and then in the very next sentence proceed to explain how they were “perfectly happy to use a combination of tools if each tool does its own job well” (participant c), thus revealing how multiple digital tool usage can originate. the consequence illustrated by this contradiction, relates to digital agency, which is typically viewed as a ‘positive’, however as this case study has revealed, this ‘positive’ artifact can have a detrimental effect on the professional practice of cs lecturers by actively contributing to digital tool sprawl. this revelation goes in some way to addressing a gap identified in the literature review. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 29 7. conclusion this is a case study of the section and use of digital tools by cs lecturers in an irish tu. it confirms some common factors and identifies factors specific to cs lecturers that influence the selection and use of digital tools. furthermore, this case posits it that there is an individualized and ah-hoc approach to selecting and using digital tools by cs lecturers and that this non-scholarly approach has an unintended consequence of exasperating the issue of digital tool sprawl. this was achieved through the use of at as a theoretical lens, where a number of contradictions were identified that when examined offered insight into the consequences of these contradictions. of these, the most prominent original contribution is the identification of the contradiction between digital agency, a conceptual instrument of cs lecturers and the selection of digital tools. this leads to unintended consequences of the proliferation of digital tools by individual lecturers. this is further supported up by thematic analysis of the data, which identified the emergence of ‘digital tool sprawl’ as an issue. an understanding of digital tool sprawl would not have been possible solely through thematic analysis, however examination through at offers this valuable insight. future research options to emerge from this study are to expand the case study across faculty or across multiple institutions or to explore the possibility to design a scholarly approach to the selection and use of digital tools as part of lecturers professional practice. 30 references aagaard, t. & lund, a. 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(2009). case study research: design and methods (4th ed). sage publications. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 58 a higher education action research study on the effectiveness of an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote reflective professional development kate dunne*1 pauline logue² 1 galway mayo institute of technology 2 galway mayo institute of technology abstract within higher education, eportfolios have been demonstrated to enhance professional development and to promote critical thinking. in this context, one higher education level nine module, namely, the professional development framework portfolio module, was analysed. the module was piloted during the 2019-2020 academic year in one irish institute of technology. it was intentionally designed to align with the professional development framework promoted by the irish national forum for the enhancement for teaching and learning. the primary aim of this study was to explore the effectiveness of an eportfolio as a learning tool for professional development, in the context of the module’s delivery. an action research methodology was employed. data collection tools and processes included a learnerquestionnaire, an eportfolio mapping analysis, and a dialogical reflection on the part of two lecturer-researchers. salient findings were that the use of eportfolios for the purpose of professional development in higher education was evidenced, and the effectiveness of eportfolios to facilitate the mapping of professional development was established. the main recommendations to enhance this module for future action research iterations included: 1) to facilitate deeper reflection on personal professional development goals, 2) to support reflective practice and reflective writing skills, and 3) to provide a pre-module workshop on eportfolio web development prior to module commencement. more broadly, it was also recommended to revisit the time demands of the module and to research the extent to which the module might effectively promote a sustainable professional development community of practice framed around eportfolio development. 1. introduction in ireland, the adoption of eportfolios has been slow (farrell, 2019). however, in recent years, eportfolio ireland and the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning (nf) have advanced an understanding of the relationship between eportfolios and professional development (pd) in higher education (he) in ireland (donnelly & maguire, 2018; farrell, 2019; nf, 2019). pd is an all-embracing term for a multitude of developmental processes, experiences, and opportunitiesformal and informal (desimone, 2010; nf 2019). it refers to experiences of educational practice, in a broad sense, with a focus on enhanced performance and outcomes (darling, hammond & mclaughlin, 2011). ownership of learning, self-directed learning, and the application of learning in the real world of practice (otherwise referred to as ‘authentic learning’) are significant aspects of pd (hargreaves and irish journal of technology enhanced learning 59 fullan, 2012, p. 132). the nf professional development framework (pdf) aligns with the irish national strategy for higher education to 2030, which proposes that, in he “increased attention must be paid to core skills such as quantitative reasoning, critical thinking, communication skills, team-working skills and the effective use of information technology” (department of education & skills, 2011, p.35). the pdf refers to five domains of learning, namely, 1) the self, 2) professional identify, values and development in teaching and learning, 3) professional communication and dialogue, 4) professional knowledge and skills, and 5) personal and professional digital capacity. one vehicle to achieve this strategic goal is eportfolio-based learning and assessment. while the eportfolio can act as a showcase platform or a repository, it is potentially much more than that (farrell, 2019, p.13). building upon philippa butler’s literature analysis of eportfolios (2006), helen barrett defines an eportfolio as “an electronic collection of evidence that shows your learning journey over time” and involves a balance between process and product (barrett, 2010, p.6). in light of the above context, the research question addressed in this study was: ‘how effective is an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote reflective professional development? the study focused on a level nine staff development module, entitled, professional development framework portfolio (pdfp), which was piloted in a higher education institute of technology during the 2019-2020 academic year. participants of the pilot consisted of academic and support staff. the module learning outcomes mapped against the nfs pdf (nf, 2019) with a pdf teaching and learning eportfolio used to display the module learning processes and outputs. in line with the above research question, the primary aim of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote reflective professional development. the objectives were to: • provide a concise thematic literature analysis on the use of eportfolios in higher education, in the context of pd. • conduct primary research on the pilot of the pdfp module, with an emphasis on evidence-based pd, critical thinking, and technology-related learning. methodologically, this was an action research (ar) study, and the data collection methods included a learner microsoft (ms) forms questionnaire, an eportfolio mapping analysis process, using microsoft excel, and a videoed lecturer-researcher dialogical reflection. structurally, the article begins with a concise analysis of literature relating to eportfolios in he, most especially in the context of pd. it then outlines the ar pilot study and ends with a literature-informed discussion. 2. literature analysis the following literature analysis explores three dominant themes that emerged from the literature, in the context of eportfolios in he, namely, evidence-based pd, critical thinking, and technology-related learning. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 60 2.1 evidence-based pd the eportfolio is an effective vehicle to document evidence-based continuous pd (hampe & lewis, 2013). where used in he, eportfolios are presented as both learning tools and as an electronic collection of evidence of a learning journey in the form of a showcase that can enhance learning, pd and critical thinking (farrell, 2019). the nf refers to the importance of “evidence based, flexible, inclusive professional development for all those who teach” in their key strategic priorities (nf, 2019, pg.4). it is generally accepted that examples of pd evidence that might be included in an eportfolio include professional qualifications and credentials, continuous professional development, research or scholarship, membership of professional bodies and academic awards. mclean and bullard (2000, pg. 95) list other forms of evidence as lesson plans, teaching aids, accounts of being observed, minutes of meetings, extracts from a teaching journal and assessment criteria. as part of the nf pdf the need for the individual to carefully choose evidence representative of their pd is highlighted, as is the need to store that evidence (nf, 2019). critical thinking on evidence gathered is key to understanding where one is currently on the pd journey. 2.2 critical thinking and eportfolio developing an eportfolio can facilitate a “process of reflection, of organizing, prioritizing, analysing, and communicating one’s work and its value, which may prompt insights and goals” (zubizaretta, 2009, p.124). as such, it is rooted in pedagogy (chen & black, 2010, p.2; eynon & gambino, 2017) and can support developmental pedagogical reflection in personal learning environments (ples) (oakley, pegrum & johnston, 2013). critical thinking frameworks, such as the ‘critical folio thinking’ framework, is associated with eportfolios in the literature (bryant & chittum, 2013; farrell, 2019) and is aligned with authentic, student-centred and meaningful learning (baird et. al., 2016). farrell states that “effective learning portfolio practice can stimulate critical thinking…(and)… provide space for students to experiment and reflect on their learning journeys (farrell 2019, p.13). as such, they are spaces “focused on learning and growth” eynon & gambino’s (2017, p.1). while this learning and growth can be individual and independent – as in the case of professional academic development and promotion (winberg & pallitt, 2016) – eportfolio learning and growth is commonly aligned with the formation of learning communities, involving collaboration with peers, establishment of communities of practice and a structuring of peer support (farrell, 2019, p.96; shepherd & bolliger, 2014; tucker, 2012). 2.3 technology-related learning the relationship between digital learning and eportfolio development is also examined in the literature. rowley and bennett, exploring technical advantages of eportfolio development in the context of creative arts in one australian he institute, write that “many students see eportfolios as part of wider and increasingly developing educational and personal technoscapes”, and educators see advantages to eportfolio learning platforms, such as, easy access to materials for assessment, and collaborative learning (rowley and bennett, 2016, p.8). the literature also addresses pd in the context of online teaching and learning, not least digital capacity and training. digital capacity and training are foregrounded in eportfolio development in he pd. oakley, pegrum and johnston (2014, pg. 46) highlight technology as a barrier to building eportfolios that varies between the participants. this challenge needs to be addressed at an institutional level. in parallel literature speaks to the need for strategies pertaining to technical standards for effective eportfolio practice (hallam and creagh 2010, irish journal of technology enhanced learning 61 pg. 2). one of the key strategic enablers of the nf is to support the harnessing of the potential of digital technologies to enhance learning, teaching, and overall digital capability (nf, 2019, pg. 4). 3. research methodology, methods and analysis as indicated above, the research question addressed in this study was: how effective is an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote reflective professional development? to address this research question, the methodological framework employed in this study was ar. this approach was deemed appropriate since it relates to the practice of teaching: the researcherlecturers were applying ar to a specific teaching and learning context, seeking to transform teaching and learning practice in subsequent cyclical iterations. furthermore, it was an intentionally collaborative ar process, of dialogical action research, where the reflective process was situated in the context of dialogue or reflective conversations between the researcher-lecturers. the researcher-lecturers acted as mutual professional ‘critical friends’ and engaged in ‘dialogical reflections’ as adapted from costello et al. (2015). with respect to sampling, purposeful sampling was used, participants being the candidates who signed up as the first pilot iteration of the pdfp module. in this first pilot iteration of the module, funding allowed for a relatively small cohort (n=10), with a view to future expansion in future ar cycles, following the pilot (hence the small sample size in this case). mirroring the literature discussion above, data gathering was centred around three dominant themesevidence-based pd, critical thinking, and technology related learning. in the interests of triangulation, three data gathering methods, were employed: 1) learner questionnaire, 2) eportfolio mapping analysis, and 3) lecturer-researcher dialogical reflection, structured as a swot (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis. the data gathering and analysis processes were made up of three phases, each of which involved a cyclical process of data gathering and analysis. each phase in the sequence was informed by the preceding one. see figure 1. figure 1: data gathering and analysis phases the questionnaire (see appendix a) explored the three literature themes from the perspective of process and product (barrett, 2010, p.6). a mixed method approach was taken including questionnaire • ms forms • 8 learner respondents questionnaire analysis • thematic analysis • sub-theme identification eportfolio mapping • ms excel • 9 learners’ eportfolios dialogical reflection • ms teams • 2 lecturer-researchers mapping analysis • frequency analysis • content analysis reflections analysis • lessons learnt • action plan phase 1 phase 2 phase 3 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 62 quantitative and qualitative questions. an analysis of the questionnaire results led to the identification of sub-themes. those sub themes were then used to guide the gathering of pd evidence from the research participants’ eportfolios using a mapping analysis template (see appendix b). subsequently, a quantitative frequency analysis and a qualitative content analysis were conducted on the evidence gathered. phase three involved a dialogical reflection by the researchers based on a swot analysis of the findings from phase 1 and 2 using a swot analysis template (see appendix c). ethical approval was obtained for the research, as per institute policy. as indicated, the three dominant themes that emerged from the investigation were evidencebased pd, critical thinking and technology-related learning. in the case of evidence-based pd, the three main sub-themes identified were: pd action plan, reflective practice and the philosophy statement. for the second dominant theme critical thinking – the sub-themes were critical reflections on the nf five domains, multi-media reflections on teaching and learning and nf evidence based reflection model. the third dominant themetechnologyrelated learning had as its sub-themes digital content, usability and design. to facilitate weighting, the data was coded according to a likert quality 3-point scale system, based on poor evidence, fair evidence, and good evidence of the presence of the sub-themes in the participants’ e-portfolios (see table 1). analysis standardisation and validity across all eportfolios were provided for by means of a double cross-check involving both researchers. finally, a frequency analysis was carried out on these three categories of evidence, based on the incidence of evidence. table 1: eportfolio mapping analysis evidence key 4. results this section presents the results of the data gathering and analysis process addressing each dominant theme in turn. 4.1 evidence-based pd the ms forms questionnaire was electronically distributed to the module candidates (n=10) with a response rate of 8. this questionnaire, in part, explored the respondents’ general learning experience of building an eportfolio. the first three statements, as show in figure 2, indicate strong agreement that building an eportfolio gave them a clear understanding of the strengths and gaps in their pd, a clear plan for future pd aligned to the nfs pdf, and the pdf assisted the respondents to reflect on their own pd. one of the respondent’s comments on the process leading up to, and including, building an pd eportfolio was that “(t)he structure and motivation helped in reflection & research in areas i should as a professional degree of evidence poor poor evidence fair fair evidence good good evidence na not applicable irish journal of technology enhanced learning 63 educator have done anyway but have not due to lack of focus or urgency”. the fifth statement in the question also shows strong agreement that pd evidence covers both accredited and non-accredited pd learning. a respondent confirms that “the process helped me make things more clear [sic] and value not just academic achievement but industry and personal achievements as well”. figure 2: pd eportfolio building experience results learning activities within the pdfp module that supported an evidence-based approach to pd were considered in question five of the questionnaire. the results of this question are seen in figure 3. there was strong take-up of learning activities: reflecting on your pd to-date, individual journaling, developing a pd plan, and module submission formative reviews were identified as being very effective. on the other hand, in the case of learning activity 7 creating an audio reflection and learning activity 8 a key learning video the scores were lower, with one respondent indicating it was very ineffective for an evidence-based pd eportfolio. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 64 figure 3: effectiveness of module learning activity results a summary position of the eportfolio mapping analysis, based on the dominant themes, using the above eportfolio mapping analysis key, is outlined in table 2 below. table 2: evidence-based pd eportfolio mapping analysis irish journal of technology enhanced learning 65 as can be seen above, there was evidence of pd action plans in the eportfolios reviewed. all nine eportfolios had an action plan that aligned with the nf five domains, and all respondants had included short, medium and long term goals. emphasis was predominantly placed on short term goals. there was less evidence of medium term goals and very limited evidence of long term goals. a shortfall was found in the evidence of reflective practice, from the perspective of quality and depth. only one respondent demonstrated deep (or higher order) reflection on the nf ‘self’ domain, and six of the eportfolios analysed had poor evidence of reflections on their t&l practices. in terms of the philosophy statement sub theme, the majority of participants (n=6) were found to only have fair evidence of t&l theoretical underpinnings and all nine participants had little explicit evidence of the application of the philosophy theory to their t&l practice. the third and final data gathering method was a swot analysis that emerged from the lecturer-researcher dialogical reflections (see figure 4). figure 4: evidence-based pd swot analysis strengths included pd five domain reflections, pair/triad engagements, facilitator instructions and feedback. some weakness emerged including engagement in deep selfreflection, link between philosophies and t&l evidence, and medium and long-term action plans. opportunities identified were the provision of samples as criteria for success, the establishment and fostering of a community of practice and dissemination opportunities. lastly, threats included time-constraints, technical challenges to setting up an eportfolio and barriers to reflective practice. building on the evidence-based pd results the critical thinking domain results are presented next. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 66 4.2 critical thinking research participants provided insights into their general experience of using critical thinking during the pdfp module, in question 12 (see figure 5). a ‘strongly agree’ response was selected by n=5 of the participants for the statement that the module enabled them to critically reflect on, plan and contribute to evidence-based enhancement and transformation of their teaching and learning practice. the same response was found when participants indicated their self-perception of their level of reflective practice, as a result of undertaking this module. the support of the pdf to enable the participants to critically self-reflect and self-evaluate their current teaching and learning practices with a view to developing professionally was evident, with a 50-50 spilt between strongly agree and agree responses. figure 5: critical thinking skills development results participants corroborated the above findings with one stating “i feel i am now better at applying critical thinking and reflection to aspects of my teaching and exploring other eportfolio samples provided more material of which to consider”. a number of participants also indicated the challenges that they encountered when trying to engage in critical thinking and reflective dialogue with their peers. for example “(t)his is one area where i felt i lacked a bit as work was so busy at the end of semester (it was no ordinary semester) and the opportunities to really devote a chunk of time to the module were hard to come by”. and a second participant states “(w)orking to the last minute also detracts from deep reflection and learning as there is little time to reflect, digest and learn from what others may be doing / creating”. findings pertaining to the impact of the pdfp module on critical thinking on the pdf domains showed a very positive response with either strongly agree or agree selected by the participants for all five domains (see figure 6). the ‘self’ and ‘professional identify, values and development’ domains received particularly high strongly agree responses. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 67 figure 6: pdf domain critical thinking results results from the second data gathering tool, namely the eportfolio mapping analysis, are illustrated in table 3. table 3: critical thinking eportfolio mapping analysis eportfolio evidence of critical reflection on the pdf 5 domains was found to be generally of high quality, with n=5 for good evidence, and n=4 for fair evidence. reply posts to pair/triad posts about the 5 domains were found to be lacking in higher order thinking. only two of the eportfolios reviewed demonstrated good evidence with the majority in the fair category. multi-media reflections in the form of audio and blogs proved challenging for the participants with n=6 participants opting not to include an audio reflection, and n=5 opting not to include a blog reflection. those included in their eportfolio were generally found to be of poor quality. the third sub-theme under critical reflection analysed the application of the irish journal of technology enhanced learning 68 nf evidence based reflection model (ebr) in the participants eportfolios to be evidenced through a video and the participants t&l practice. seven participants did not include a video in their eportfolio, and five were identified as not applying the ebr model to their practice. it was particularly difficult to find any evidence of the latter with evidence implied rather than being explicit, and indeed absent in some places. the third and final data gathering method was a swot analysis that emerged from the lecturer-researcher dialogical reflections (see figure 7). in relation to the theme of critical reflection, a number of strengths were identified, including the quality of critical reflection posts, eportfolio development aligned to critical thinking, and critical thinking aligned to the pd five domains . some weaknesses that emerged during the dialogical reflection included the timing of the module introduction to the use of media for reflective evidence, inclusion of multi-media in the eportfolio and academic rigour of ‘reply posts’ to critical reflection. opportunities included facilitator expertise, engagement with institute learning technologists, and the development of a community of practice. lastly, threats included time constraints, clear communication of t&l focus to prospective students, and moderation requirements to develop critical thinkers. figure 7. critical thinking swot analysis findings of the third and final domain, technology-related learning are presented next. 4.3 technology-related learning the technology-related learning questionnaire identified findings around how eportfolio building problems were solved, as illustrated in figure 8. pair/triads emerged as the most popular support for problem solving. the was followed closely by the use of a step-by-step guide provided by the module, youtube/internet and module facilitator support. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 69 interestingly, the services of the institute learning technologist and the it services were not availed of by any of the respondents when problem-solving. figure 8: technology-related learning swot analysis one participant commented on the value of the pair/triad for problem solving, saying “i felt the pair/triad was a great place to start if i didn’t know something as there was someone there who directly understood what i was going through or was there to give help, ask questions of directly… who you had built up a working relationship with throught the course”. another respondent reported that they “(f)ound weebly a very straight forward platform to engage with”. when the participants were asked if they thought that an eportfolio is an effective learning tool to promote pd, n=6 responded ‘yes’ (see figure 9). figure 9: effectiveness of an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote pd results one participant reflects on the effectivness of using the eportfolio saying for me building an e-portfolio clearly shows to me and anyone looking at it what i have achieved as a professional both academic and non academic which giving me short medium and long term goals which will change as i reach each mile stone. i now feel more clarity in the direction i am going while better reflecting critical irish journal of technology enhanced learning 70 thinking and actioning on my goals and aspirations in both professional and non professional capacities. participant eportfolio mapping analysis results under the ‘technology’ theme are presenting in table 4. frequencies associated with the sub themes of digital content, usability and design can be seen. table 4: technology-related learning eportfolio mapping analysis in terms of digital content the majority (n=5) were found to have good evidence of content with high readability. a small number had display and conciseness issues. with respect to ‘useful content’, n=4 participant eportfolios demonstrated good evidence and n=5 had fair evidence. on the sub theme of ‘usability of the eportfolios’, n=4 had good evidence with a number of very comprehensive eportfolios identifed. however, there were some navigation issues with the remaining eportfolios. a finding of concern was the poor evidence of source referencing for content in the majority of the eportfolios: evidence for all eportfolios fell either into the poor or no evidence categories. the design aesthetics applied by some (n=5) of the participants were found to be good, with consistent themes applied. the remainder, however, lacked the professionalism expected of a pd eportfolio at level 9. lastly, there was a difference between those that strategically identified as a pd eportfolio (n=6) and those that did not (n=3). the third and final data gathering method was a swot analysis that emerged from the lecturer-researcher dialogical reflections (see figure 10). technology-related learning strengths included strong design aesthetics with consistent themes throughout, effectiveness of eportfolio development process steps, and the development of pd digital literacy domain skills. weaknesses under this theme consisted of a focus on technology rather than on pd content itself, lack of content variety and data access, and issues relating to security and privacy. institute technical support, internal expertise in eportfolio design and development, and eportfolio development workshop prior to module opportunities emerged as suggestions for a future iteration from the dialogical reflections. lastly, the threats identified included time, student technical abilities and institute provision of an appropriate eportfolio platform. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 71 figure 10: technology-related learning swot analysis having completed the data analysis, let us now turn to a discussion of the findings. 5. discussion acknowledging the wider context, this study addressed the research question: ‘how effective is an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote reflective professional development?’. the study focused specifically on the role of eportfolios in fostering evidence-based pd, critical thinking, and technology-related learnings. let us discuss each of these dominant themes in turn. 5.1 evidence-based pd literature-research on pd modules testifies to a number of professional advantages for learners (gormley, o’keefe & bruce ferguson p. 2017, p.104), not least that accredited pd effects transformation (maguire, harding, noonan and o’connor, 2017, pp. 8-14). this study indicated that the accredited pdfp module contributed effectively to pd collation, development and future planning. on the the effectiveness of the eportfolio as a learning tool to promote pd, one participant writes: “(i)t gathers all your information in one central location. a single source of truth!”. the questionnaire, in part, explored the respondents’ general experience of building an eportfolio. in line with hampe & lewis (2013) there was strong agreement that the eportfolio is an effective vehicle to document evidence-based continuous pd. moreover, building an eportfolio gave learners a clear understanding of the strengths and gaps in their pd and assisted future pd planning. the lecturer-researchers identified “very detailed action plans, particularly around the area of their short-term action… maybe not so detailed when it came to the medium and long-term plans”. there was substantial evidence of pd action plans in the eportfolios reviewed, with the majority including short, medium and long term goals. all eportfolios reviewed had an action plan that aligned with the nf 5 domains. emphasis, however, was found to be placed irish journal of technology enhanced learning 72 disproportionately on short term goals, indicating the need for more focused exploration on medium and long-term timeframes, in future implementations of the module. 5.2 critical thinking critical thinking on the pd evidence gathered is key to understanding where one is on the pd journey. farrell (2019) argues that “effective learning portfolio practice can stimulate critical thinking…(and)… provide space for students to experiment and reflect on their learning journeys (farrell 2019, p.13). this study found that participants value the opportunities provided to critically reflect, and there was evidence of critical reflection aligned with personal philosophy statements. one participant writes: “ i reflected on how my teaching philosophy has evolved over my career and how my values on teaching and learning impact on my approaches to teaching and student engagement.” barriers to critical reflection, including collaborative reflection, was an issue that emerged over the course of the study. one participant said that “(t)iming and circumstances have prevented … dialogue with peers … but the intention would be to visit this regularly in the future”. one respondent demonstrated deep and profoundly philosophical personal/profession critical reflections on the ‘self’ domain, however, others strugggled to achieve and/or articulate a depth of critical reflection, particularly in relation to the‘self’domain. the lecturer-researchers observed a discipline-related pattern in relation to perceptions of, and the practice of critical selfreflection, and identfied the need for specific supports for discipline-specific cohorts in the future. 5.3 technology-related learning international studies have identified key factors for fostering eportfolio learning in he including technical standards (hallam & creagh, 2010). this study identified varying competencies in the use of technology and the need for technological support in the context of eportfolio development, mirroring the statement by oakley, pegrum and johnston (2014, pg. 47) that “since technology avoidance is not an option the participants undertaking an eportfolio need to be supported through ‘how to’ and ‘troubleshooting’ workshops”. while the skills obtained and the expansion of digital learning and “personal technoscapes” is valued by learners (rowley and bennett, 2016), the process is highly time consuming and pressurized. significant supports are required. furthermore, excessive focus on technical skills development can detract from deeper pd learning. one participant struggled with a focus “on the acrobatics and performance and frills” of techology and suggests that “there may be less focus on process and [more] perhaps on content.” another commented: “sometimes there was a risk … technology … become more important than the actual content. reflecting on this concern, researcher-lecturers proposed, as a solution, a pre-module web development workshop. it is to be noted that, apart from the three dominant themes focused on above, a further emerging theme was the potential of eportfolio development to foster an institute (and wider) eportfolio community of practice. eportfolio learning and growth is commonly aligned with the formation of learning communities (farrell, 2019, p.96; moran et. al, 2014; shepherd & bolliger, 2014; tucker, 2012). a potential follow-on area of research investigation is the role played by eportfolios in forming learning communities or communities of practice (cops) within the pdfp module, and beyond. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 73 6. conclusions & recommendation this research set out to investigate the effectiveness of an eportfolio to promote professional development. three dominant themes emerged from the investigation: evidence-based pd, critical thinking, and technology-related learning each with corresponding sub-themes. salient conclusions from both literature and primary research are that eportfolios are effective in promoting pd, critical thinking and technology-related learning in he contexts. with respect to this ar study, challenges included web development skills, medium and long-term pd planning, limited self-reflection skills, and a competing demanding workload for module participants. the recommendations that arose from this study, in relation to module delivery, included: 1) to provide a pre-module workshop on eportfolio web development and design prior to future delivery of the pdfp module, 2) to facilitate a deeper pd reflection on medium and longterm pd action planning, and 3) to provide increased supports on personal and professional reflection, in the context of the nf ‘self’ domain, 4) to re-visit assessment demands in light of module workload, and 5) to investigate the extent to which the module might effectively promote a sustainable pd community of practice framed around eportfolio development. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 74 references baird, k., gamble, j. and sidebotham, m. 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(2000). becoming a university teacher: evidence from teaching portfolios (how academics learn to teach). teacher development, 4(1), 79-101, doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13664530000200104 maguire, m., harding, n., noonan, g. and o’connor, t. (eds). (2017). teachers as learners: exploring the impact of accredited professional development on learning and teaching in irish higher education. maynooth: aishe. nf (national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning). (2019). pact commitment to pd. accessed 18th june 2021 from https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/ourpriorities/professional-development/open-access-professional-development-courses/pactcommitment-to-pd/ nui galway. (202). teaching portfolios in nui galway. accessed 11th june 2021 from https://www.nuigalway.ie/media/celt/files/teachingportfolio/teachingportfolios.pdf http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&authtype=ip,sso&db=e000xww&an=1453411&site=eds-live&scope=site http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&authtype=ip,sso&db=e000xww&an=1453411&site=eds-live&scope=site http://www.tara.tcd.ie/bitstream/handle/2262/85988/orna%20farrell%20phd%20full%20final%20post-via%2024-1-2019.pdf?sequence=1&isallowed=y http://www.tara.tcd.ie/bitstream/handle/2262/85988/orna%20farrell%20phd%20full%20final%20post-via%2024-1-2019.pdf?sequence=1&isallowed=y https://doi.org/10.1080/00049670.2013.771766 https://doi.org/10.1080/13664530000200104 https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/our-priorities/professional-development/open-access-professional-development-courses/pact-commitment-to-pd/ https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/our-priorities/professional-development/open-access-professional-development-courses/pact-commitment-to-pd/ https://www.teachingandlearning.ie/our-priorities/professional-development/open-access-professional-development-courses/pact-commitment-to-pd/ https://www.nuigalway.ie/media/celt/files/teachingportfolio/teachingportfolios.pdf irish journal of technology enhanced learning 76 oakley, g., pegrum, m. and johnston, s. (2014). including e-portfolios to pre-service teachers as tools for reflection and growth: lessons learnt, asia-pacific journal of teacher education, 42(1), 36–50. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1359866x.2013.854860 rowley, j. and bennett, d. (2016). eportfolios in australian higher education arts: differences and differentiations, international journal of education & the arts. 17(19). accessed 17th june 2021 from http://www.ijea.org/v17n19/ shepherd, c.e. and bolliger, d.u. (2011). the effects of electronic portfolio tools on online students' perceived support and cognitive load. internet and higher education, 14 (3), 142-149. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.01.002 tucker, v. (2012). listening for the squeaky wheel: designing distance writing program assessment. online journal of distance learning administration, 15(5), 1-10. accessed 14th january 2021 from https://digitalcommons.odu.edu willis, j.w. (2007). foundations of qualitative research: interpretive and critical approaches. california, sage publications. doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781452230108 winberg, c., and pallitt, n. (2016). ‘i am trying to practice good teaching’: reconceptualizing eportfolios for professional development in vocational higher education. british journal of educational technology 47(3), 543–553. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12440 zubizarreta, j. (2009). the learning portfolio: reflective practice for improving student learning. (2nd ed.), san francisco: jossey-bass. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1359866x.2013.854860 http://www.ijea.org/v17n19/ https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.01.002 https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/ https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781452230108 https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12440 irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 77 appendix a: questionnaire irish journal of technology enhanced learning 78 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 79 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 80 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 81 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 82 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 83 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 84 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 85 irish journal of technology enhanced learning 86 irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 87 appendix b: mapping tool irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 88 appendix c: swot analysis tool swot analysis theme : add theme title strengths weaknesses opportunities threats s w o t a higher education action research study on the effectiveness of an eportfolio as a learning tool to promote reflective professional development kate dunne*1 pauline logue² 1 galway mayo institute of technology 2 galway mayo institute of technology abstract 1. introduction 2. literature analysis 2.1 evidence-based pd 2.2 critical thinking and eportfolio 2.3 technology-related learning 3. research methodology, methods and analysis 4. results 4.1 evidence-based pd 4.2 critical thinking 4.3 technology-related learning 5. discussion 5.1 evidence-based pd 5.2 critical thinking 5.3 technology-related learning 6. conclusions & recommendation references appendix a: questionnaire appendix b: mapping tool appendix c: swot analysis tool irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) volume 6, issue 1 194 participant engagement with eportfolio on the pact digital badge: an explanatory sequential mixedmethods analysis marie o’ neill*1 ken mccarthy2 1cct college dublin 2waterford institute of technology abstract this paper explores participants’ perceptions of eportfolio on the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning’s pact digital badge in which eportfolio is a central component of the teaching and learning experience. the pact badge was launched in 2018 by the national forum to promote engagement with their national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education (national forum, 2016). a small but growing body of studies indicates that the pairing of eportfolio with digital badges increases participant engagement with course content, facilitates the open evidencing of skill acquisition as well the transfer of knowledge beyond the life span of the course (kehoe and goudzwaard, 2015; ambrose and anthony 2016; nilson and dewiyanti, 2019). in january 2021, an explanatory, sequential mixed methods approach comprising a survey and focus group was employed to obtain and analyse feedback from graduates of three iterations of the pact digital badge in relation to their perceptions of the eportfolio component. data indicated a range of benefits including enhanced digital literacy, an enhanced ability to reflect, a more engaging learning experience, more robust evidencing of professional development and increased engagement with the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education. seventy-eight percent of respondents stated that eportfolio was an important part of the pact course. a key recommendation of the study is the additional front loading of support materials in relation to eportfolio engagement in week 0 of the course in response to feedback in which pact participants indicated that eportfolio could be technically challenging and time consuming. the findings of this exploratory study could be tested at larger scale across a wider range of national forum digital badges that incorporate eportfolio. 1.introduction this paper explores participants’ perceptions of eportfolio on the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning’s pact digital badge in which the construction of an eportfolio is a central component of the teaching and learning experience. the pact digital badge promotes engagement with the national forum for the enhancement of teaching national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education (national irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 195 forum, 2016). a small but growing body of studies indicates that the pairing of eportfolio and digital badges into the design and delivery of courses increases participant engagement with course content, the open evidencing of skill acquisition as well the transfer of knowledge beyond the life span of the course. this study seeks to augment the body of literature on eportfolio use in the irish context with specific reference to digital badges and the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education (national forum, 2016). 1.1 background the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning’s pact short course was launched in 2018, with the term ‘pact’ symbolising professionals’ personal pact or commitment to professional development. the badge promotes engagement with the national forum’s national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education (national forum, 2016). the framework recommends the pursuit of professional development according to four domains and five typologies. see fig 1 & 2. fig. 1 the domains of the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education (national forum, 2016, p.5) irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 196 fig 2: typologies of the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education. the pact course is structured, non-accredited, non-formal (national forum, 2016, p.2) the pact course which culminates in the awarding of a digital badge, is a part of a suite of open courses developed by ireland’s national forum which recognises engagement through a “peer triad digital badge ecosystem” (donnelly and maguire, 2020, p.1). donnelly and maguire (2020, p.6) observe that: the open courses with digital badges were developed for a national rather than an institutional context and for recognition rather than formal accreditation, and is an important initiative for irish higher education. the courses are short (25 hours of learner effort), accessible (allowing participant choice across three modes: face-to-face/blended; self-study; online) and provide recognition to participants who have meet agreed criteria by awarding a national forum digital badge. this national endorsement supports staff employment mobility by giving credibility to these badges. referencing the work of hickey et al (2015); donnelly and maguire (2020) state that stronger connections between digital badges, eportfolios and credit for prior learning, seem like promising directions for increasing the perceived value of badges. participants of the pact badge must complete an eportfolio to evidence learning on the programme. the construction of an eportfolio during the course is also designed to promote and scaffold participants’ on-going engagement with the national forum’s professional development framework for all those who teach beyond the lifespan of the course. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 197 this paper seeks to explore the perceptions of participants on the pact digital badge course in relation to the eportfolio component. the study will explore whether the eportfolio component of pact enhanced the learning experience and supported on-going engagement with the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning digital badge upon cessation of the course. 2. literature review digital badges are electronic symbols used to document performance and achievement. open badges are intended to provide additional information via metadata in order for viewers of badges to verify issuer details, evaluation criteria, and evidence such as the actual work product used to earn the badge (parker, 2015). parker also describes digital badges as an effective form of alternative assessment which support collaboration and engagement; enables students to reflect upon their progress as well as evidence skill attainment to employers. farrell (2018, p.154) describes eportfolio as fulfilling a range of functions as “a tool or technology, a practice, a pedagogical model, an assessment method and a framework for learning.” farrell, (2020, para. 45) in her exploration of the history of eportfolio identifies two key areas in relation to recent developments in higher and further education. the first relates to the impact of eportfolio on student learning and the second on “pairing eportfolios with emerging edtech such as digital badges, block chains and massive open online courses.” eynon and gambino (2017) identify the pairing of eportfolio and digital badges as an important area for future eportfolio research. this study also explores the convergence of digital badges and eportfolio and its impact on the learning experience and professional development of participants. four principle themes have emerged in the small but growing body of literature on the pairing of eportfolio and digital badges. articles explore the role of digital badges and eportfolio in underpinning the open evidence of learning; in promoting student motivation and persistence; in synthesising and transferring learning beyond the campus environment and the pedagogical challenge of integrating eportfolios into digital badges. ambrose and anthony (2016, para. 24) indicates that the integration of eportfolio with digital badges makes “learning visible” and “brings “mooc learners alive with a face and a story that shows proof of performance competency.” a 2019 case study by nilson and dewiyanti highlights how digital badge metadata can be used to evidence achievement which can in turn be “uploaded and displayed in the students’ peddlepad eportfolios demonstrating the students..core skills.” weller (2018) explores the role of blockchain with “the aim to provide an individual, portable record of educational achievement.” a 2015 study by kehoe and goudzwaard explores how the pairing of digital badges with eportfolios promotes integrative learning and identity development so that students graduate from “making simple connections among ideas and experiences to synthesizing and transferring learning to new, complex situations within and beyond the campus.” this is a particularly powerful finding in the context of this study which also seeks to explore whether use of eportfolio on the pact badge promotes engagement with the national forum’s national professional development framework beyond the life cycle of the pact badge. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 198 scully, o leary and brown in their 2018 review on learning portfolios describe some of the challenges of pairing digital badges with eportfolio. they highlight how the use of digital badges act as an incentive representing a form of extrinsic motivation to learn “but one of the ultimate goals of learning portfolio practice is to foster intrinsic motivation to learn.” (p.18) buchem 2016 cited in scully, o’leary and brown’s article, (2018, p.349) cautions against shifting the focus from learning to “badge-collecting”. gibson et al (2016) also cited in scully, o’leary and brown, (2018, p.349) advocates for the use of “inward facing” badges which are less formal and “can be awarded by peers or even by the learner themselves, and do not necessarily adhere to formal open badging infrastructures. it may be that this format is a better match for the pedagogy of the learning portfolio.” cheng and chau (2013) recommend that learners have dual goal orientation whereby they focus on both the process and product elements of their eportfolios which result in higher levels of persistence and reflective activity. the challenge of using eportfolio to openly evidence learning in a digital badge context versus engaging with eportfolio as a more introspective and personal exercise without outside incentive or pressure is also explored in this study. gibson’s description of the peer awarding of badges as a solution to this challenge is particularly interesting given the fact that national forum open courses are awarded by peer triads. 3. methodology exploring the perceptions of pact participants on eportfolio was deemed by the authors to be best served by a mixed methods research approach. creswell and plano clark, (2011) outline the numerous benefits of a mixed methods approach comprising qualitative and quantitative research methodologies, chief of which is the synergistic utilisation of data which will provide more indepth insights than the employment of one research method alone. this study employs an explanatory sequential design with an initial quantitative phase followed by a qualitative phase in which the qualitative data is used to elucidate quantitative findings (creswell and plano clark, 2018). mixed methods studies provide a breath of perspective and understanding with data grounded in individuals' lived experiences. they also increase the validity and rigor of findings through the triangulation of data. in a mixed methods sequential analysis, meta-inference is obtained through a narrative reporting process in which both qualitative and quantitative findings are explored concurrently on a theme-by theme basis (guetterman, fetters and creswell, 2015). the concurrent exploration of quantitative and qualitative data according to emergent themes in the data is executed in this study. bryant and chittum (2013) in their review of eportfolio research address the limitations of research focusing on student perceptions of eportfolio highlighting how students do not always prefer the instructional methods that result in the greatest learning gains. they state that that it is difficult to know whether those that had negative perceptions of an eportfolio’s impact on their learning felt that way because the tool itself was flawed, or because there were flaws in its implementation.” (p. 194). this insight was also considered when analyzing data emanating from the study. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 199 3.1 data collection and analysis one hundred and six individuals completed the first three iterations of the national forum’s digital badge between 2018 and 2020. to ascertain the perceptions of pact participants of the portfolio component of the badge, an anonymous survey using survey monkey comprising closed and open questions was distributed to all graduates of the three iterations eliciting a response rate of 30%. the consent process was integrated into the survey tool, incorporating background information to the study and information on the use and storage of data. a focus group was subsequently conducted comprising a range of higher and further education personnel who were recruited using purposive sampling to ensure a cross section of insight and opinion. a consent form was disseminated to focus group participants prior to the execution of the focus group outlining the nature of the research and guaranteeing the anonymisation of data. focus group data was coded as part of a grounded theory approach to identify concepts and construct theory (corbin and strauss, 2008). grounded theory is inductive in its approach, attempting to identify and understand how and why people behave the way they do. ethics approval was obtained for the paper from the research committees of cct college dublin and waterford institute of technology respectively prior to the commencement of the study which took place between january and may of 2021. 4. findings 4.1 demographics feedback to the survey emanated from a wide range of higher and further education institutions. the two largest groups were the university and the institute of technology sectors representing 27% and 33% of responses respectively. see fig.3. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 200 fig. 3 what type of academic institution are you working in? fifty-six percent of respondents were lecturers followed by librarians at 16%. responses were also obtained from educational developers, academic managers and learning technologists. fig. 4 which of the following describes your role in education? 27% 33% 15% 9% 6% 3% 6% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 56% 3% 3% 3% 0% 19% 16% lecturer academic manager educational developer learning technologist it professional librarian other (please specify) 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 201 focus group members comprised professionals from the university, private higher education and etbi sectors in a range of roles. the authors were not successful in recruiting participants to the focus group from the iot sector however. please see table 1 for details pertaining to the composition of the group. focus group member role 1. student success manager and ict lecturer 2. quality assurance officer 3. senior academic manager 4. lecturer in library science 5. assistant librarian 6. instructional designer 7. librarian 8. professional learning and development coordinator 9. senior academic librarian table 1: focus group members the largest proportion of survey responses were from the science and engineering disciplines followed by social science, technology, business and technology. see fig. 5. fig. 5 if you are a lecturer, please indicate which discipline you teach in? 0% 14% 5% 10% 0% 0% 10% 0% 5% 0% 10% 5% 0% 10% 14% 19% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 202 4.2 themes this study employs an explanatory sequential design which comprises an initial quantitative phase followed by a qualitative phase. qualitative data is used to elucidate quantitative findings (creswell and plano clark, 2018). meta-inference has been obtained through a narrative reporting process in which both qualitative and quantitative findings are explored concurrently on a side by side and theme-by theme basis (guetterman, fetters and creswell, 2015). the following themes emerged from this methodological approach. 4.2.1 the underutilisation of eportfolio in higher education in ireland farrell, (2018) discusses how “eportfolio has not emerged at scale in irish higher education” (p.154), adding that this trend is “out of alignment with the ubiquitous nature of eportfolio in higher education worldwide”. farrell describes drivers of eportfolio use globally as concerted and includes government policy and flourishing communities of practice. farrell (2018) also describes a lack of “explicit government policy” (p.154) in relation to the adoption of eportfolio in higher education in ireland, “compared to the government policy drivers in the uk, u.s., australia and new zealand” (p.156). she describes how a rapidly expanding and energetic community of practice in ireland, along with the work of national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning is progressing eportfolio adoption in higher education in ireland. survey findings in this study reinforce farrell’s article. fifty-four respondents had not used eportfolio prior to starting the pact digital badge. of those who had used eportfolio, 59% had been using it for a year or less. only 15% stated that they had been using eportfolio for more than three years. additionally, 55% stated that their institution did not provide support for eportfolio use. twenty-four percent stated that they did receive support for training in relation to eportfolio; 18% in relation to hosting and 12% in relation to technical support. see fig 6. fig. 6 range of supports provided by respondents’ institutions in relation to eportfolio 24% 18% 12% 55% training hosting technical support my institution does not provide support for eportfolio 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 203 only 24% of pact participants used an existing eportfolio during the course. the remainder created a new one. wordpress was the most popular platform for those creating a new eportfolio with 45% of respondents choosing it compared to 21% of participants who chose to use the national forum’s mahara instance. see fig. 7. in response to the question what influenced your choice of eportfolio platform (participants were requested to select one or more reasons). seventy-five percent of respondents cited ease of use as the reason for their choice, followed by cost at 25%. twenty-two percent stated that they availed of the national forum’s mahara instance; 3% because the platform they chose integrated with an institutional license and 3% because of institutional support. fig. 7 please indicate which eportfolio platform you used during the pact course? the majority of focus group members had no prior experience of eportfolio prior to the start of the course. focus group members 1 and 2 were required to complete eportfolios as part of masters programmes that they undertook. having completed pact, they regretted not maintaining these earlier portfolios however. the majority of focus group members stated that eportfolio adoption within their institutions for teaching and learning and professional development purposes remained ad-hoc. focus group member 9 suggested that a strategic approach to eportfolio adoption was required nationally and institutionally. focus group member 2 stated that institutions involved in blended learning have been proactively using eportfolio for teaching and learning purposes for many years. its use within these institutions has also grown during the covid-19 pandemic. she was less aware of eportfolio being used as extensively by staff for professional development purposes. 21% 45% 0% 9% 24% the national forum's mahara platform wordpress pepplepad weebly other (please specify) 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% 50% irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 204 4.2.2 the complexity of mahara as an eportfolio platform the national forum’s pact digital badge provides access to course participants to the mahara platform in perpetuity. the mahara instance drew mixed responses however with just 22% stating that they managed it from the outset. fifty-six percent of respondents stated that they found the mahara platform confusing initially but worked their way through it, whilst 11% found it difficult to use throughout. finally, 11% of respondents stated that they did not like the platform and had abandoned it. open ended survey responses in relation to mahara reinforced these findings. responses included the following statements: “i had to invest a huge amount of time in learning how to use it. i didn't find it user friendly….i ended up with many folders/subfolders and a portfolio that was poorly laid out.” “lots of potential in this platform especially re sharing content with other people. i think that it needs more scaffolding (even two hours of instruction) prior to the start of the badge.” “pact was my third attempt at mahara across different institutions. it had not gotten any better so i stuck with wordpress” “ i use mahara in my teaching, as it's the platform my institution supports. i hate the interface, it is very inefficient” “it was difficult to navigate” the majority of focus group members also found mahara difficult to use. focus group member 3 stated that she reviewed mahara in relation to possible institution wide adoption but feedback from staff and students, indicated that they found it clunky and difficult to use. google sites was chosen instead. she had also found mahara difficult to use as a student on the pact badge to the point that it occasionally undermined her intention to complete the course. focus group member 6 stated that she didn’t like the aesthetics of the mahara platform and found the customisation aspect burdensome. by contrast she has maintained a wordpress eportfolio which she established on an alternative programme of study. she also used this eportfolio during pact. 4.2.3 time management issues a dominant theme in the survey and focus group findings was the difficulty of finding time to engage with eportfolio during the pact digital badge course. both survey respondents and focus group members felt that the time spent on eportfolio detracted from their engagement with course content on the pact digital badge. open ended survey comments also indicated a frustration with the time spent on constructing an eportfolio. one participant described how ’a lot of time’ was spent ‘trying to learn how to use wordpress,’ which was “disappointing as i had invested so much time and energy into the course with the intention of having my eportfolio for professional irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 205 development ready to go.” another described how “eportfolio set up can be very time consuming as a novice. it can detract from reflection on the actual content” all focus group members found engagement with eportfolio on the pact course time-consuming. focus group member 8 stated that if you were a novice who gave serious consideration to your professional persona and identity, the amount of time it took to configure the portfolio appropriately, compromised engagement with course content. focus group member 2 also felt that the time that she devoted to the eportfolio aspect of the programme eroded her ability to engage with course content. she undertook the course “to reflect” and “not to take a digital badge in eportfolio”. focus group member 2 used a wordpress eportfolio during the pact digital badge and didn’t maintain it upon completion of the course. she now uses a spreadsheet to maintain a list of her professional development activities in which she maps entries to the national professional development framework. focus group member 2 stated that it would have been helpful to have ready-made templates for those who do did not have the time to be too creative with the eportfolio aspect of the badge. these templates would support the pact participant to create an appropriate eportfolio for the course and for on-going professional development in an efficient and time effective manner. 4.2.4 sustainability sixty percent of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that they planned to use eportfolio going forward to engage with the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education. survey data revealed the reasons why the remaining pact participants stated that they wouldn’t. reasons included lack of time and technical expertise. see fig.8. open ended survey comments included: “more scaffolding of support at the start and end of the course to ensure effective engagement during the badge but also beyond the lifetime of the badge. perhaps where a nf course has an eportfolio dimension students should have to complete a badge on eportfolio first.” focus group member 9 highlighted the growing importance of linkedin for capturing and evidencing professional development activity as a potential threat to eportfolio. she uses onenote for her eportfolio but has struggled to maintain the platform due to time constraints. focus group member 2 now tries to reflect on themes as opposed to individual conferences and events which she finds a more time effective approach. stating that she “loves a deadline”, she wonders if the national forum would prompt pact participants to “write a reflection on a theme every quarter”. this would support the sustainability of eportfolios beyond the life span of the course. irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 206 focus group member 3 found the process of maintaining a portfolio and aligning entries to the national forum’s professional development framework helpful in terms of reflecting on her professional development but she has struggled to maintain the eportfolio over the last year. focus group member 6 stated that the covid-19 pandemic eroded her motivation to maintain her eportfolio with the extra demands placed on staff professionally during this period. focus group member 8 stated that the pandemic made staff much more strategic about what they maintain and what they don’t. she felt that she struggled with the eportfolio aspect of the digital badge and that she wanted to get more comfortable with eportfolio before she rolls it out to staff. she added that the pandemic has made “people more experimental but also more focused”. fig 8. if you plan not to continue with eportfolio after the pact course to engage with the national forum's national professional development framework, please indicate why. 4.2.5 earlier provision of support for eportfolio on the pact digital badge in response to open ended questions on how interaction with the eportfolio component of the course could be improved, survey respondents and focus group members stated that the front loading of training prior to the commencement of the badge was critical. open-ended comments included: “more instruction on eportfolio before the course starts. “ 47% 6% 18% 6% 0% 24% lack of time lack of training lack of technical expertise lack of institutional support lack of confidence other (please specify) 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% 50% irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 207 “spend one session doing a workshop showing how to attach material to it. demonstrate how to structure it to get a good layout.” “demonstrate it in a simple way.. a noddy's guide!” “if exercises were submitted on mahara that would have encouraged me to use it” “demos of pros and cons of different portfolio software” “need to survey pact participants prior to course and to offer an eportfolio basics course to participants who have no prior experience of eportfolios.” “i think a skeleton of components that can make up a functional eportfolio would be helpful. it's not easy to start from scratch without knowledge of the platform.” focus group members also advocated the front loading of additional training and resources in relation to eportfolio use on the pact digital badge. in comparison to survey respondents, several focus group members highlighted the educational and support role of eportfolio communities of practice in ireland. focus group member 6 observed that there was a much higher prevalence of literature and events pertaining to the embedding of eportfolio into teaching and learning practice. much of this insight and guidance is disseminated by experts on social media platforms such as twitter. all focus group members were aware of eportfolio ireland as an example. focus group member 4 highlighted the importance of institutional champions to increase engagement with and support the adoption of eportfolio. focus group member 1 described how the eportfolio aspect of the pact digital badge commences in week two or three advocating that engagement with eportfolio should commence in “week 0”. focus group member 3 facilitated an iteration of the pact badge and promoted google sites due to its ease of use, producing an accompanying video which was provided to participants prior to the commencement of the programme. consequently, complaints about the eportfolio component of the course were less prevalent on this iteration of the badge. 4.2.6 eportfolio promotes engagement with course content and with the national framework for all those who teach in higher education seventy-two percent of survey respondents said that they better understood the national forum’s national professional development for all those who teach in higher education as a result of the eportfolio component of the course. 63% of survey respondents agreed or strongly agreed that eportfolio helped them to capture and document course work for the peer triad discussions. less positive scores were elicited for the role irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 208 of eportfolio in promoting collaboration. forty-four percent agreed or strongly agreed that eportfolio facilitated collaboration with other learners. fifty-four percent agreed or strongly agreed that eportfolio facilitated the submission of assessment tasks. forty-four percent agreed or strongly agreed that eportfolio underpinned feedback from facilitators. thirty-six percent of participants strongly agreed and 42% agreed that eportfolio was an important part of the pact digital badge. overall, 62% of respondents stated that the learning experience on the pact course was enhanced by use of eportfolio. eight-one percent agreed or strongly agreed that eportfolio promoted reflection. open ended survey comments included: “it was a good way to work your way through the framework. i would have liked to see more sharing via the portfolio. there was very little interaction on the actual mahara portfolio platform. most of the interaction was through the moodle platform for the course. although i am sure that people did go in and view each others’ portfolios.” “the eportfolio offers huge potential to engage with the national framework for the professional development of all those who teach in higher education” “eportfolio on the pact digital badge provided a structure to unpick the complexity of the framework and the many different elements” “it gave a focus and a space to consider cpd activities under the framework, and without it i would have been much less inclined to recognise the influence of informal, collaborative activities.” “useful to have a resource that you can continue to update if you wish that's why i keep my on my own squarespace site” “there is more reflection when using an eportfolio so it gets you thinking what you want to do career wise.” open ended survey data indicated that pact digital badge reinvigorated portfolios that participants had prior to the start of the course. comments include: “yes, i added more content and grew in confidence re eportfolio use “yes, as i revisited my eportfolio and after reflection on the npdf i made changes.” “just in relation to the categorisation of posts. my writing of content continues as normal on a monthly basis (mostly).” “it did result in my adding to my previously completed eportfolio” irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 209 “yes. it caused me to look back at it and reflect on how i was using it. i had not been updating it as often as i felt i should have been.” “ yes, as i revisited my eportfolio and after reflection on the npdf i made changes. “yes, i added more content and grew in confidence re eportfolio use” “i already had a portfolio, nothing fancy but it supported my learning. the framework allowed me to categorise my learnings and update all my posts over the previous three years.” the majority of focus group members felt that eportfolio promoted reflection. focus group member 6 felt that the triads were a more effective mechanism for reflection however. focus group member 5 felt that having a pre-existing and established eportfolio prior to the commencement of the pact badge made the learning process far more beneficial and rewarding. 4.2.7additional skills provided by eportfolio on the pact badge survey and focus group participants highlighted the acquisition of a wide range of additional skills and opportunities as a result of the eportfolio component of the pact digital badge. see table 2 for survey and focus group feedback on additional skills acquired. statement provided in the survey percentage of survey respondents that agreed or strongly agreed focus group feedback eportfolio enhanced my digital skills 69% focus group member 6: “as an instructional designer, i was interested to learn new eportfolio platform” eportfolio enhanced my critical thinking skills 66% focus group member 3 “i do like the eportfolio. it made me think in a structured way. i want to empower learners and faculty.” eportfolio enhanced my ability to reflect 81% focus group member 2: “eportfolio provides a space for reflection” focus group member 8: “eportfolio provides space for structured reflection” irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 210 eportfolio gave me a stronger sense of professional identity 81% eportfolio enhanced communication with peers 63% focus group member 9 – “i enjoyed networking and connection with other people particularly librarians” eportfolio helps me to evidence learning outcomes 75% focus group member 4. “eportfolio provides a space to consolidate all your pd and learning” eportfolio helps me to capture and document course work 81% eportfolio gives me a platform to demonstrate my career/pd development 75% focus group member 5 “eportfolio provides a record of everything that you have done” the learning experience on the pact course has enhanced my use of eportfolio as part of my professional development activities 62% focus group member 1 “eportfolio provides a push to engage with pd” eportfolio is an important part of the pact course 78% focus group member 3. eportfolio helps you to put the “national professional development framework into practice.” table 2: additional skills from the eportfolio element of the pact badge 4.2.8 the inclusion of eportfolio on the pact badge promotes engagement with eportfolio in teaching and learning sixty-nine percent of survey respondents agreed that their knowledge of eportfolio had increased as a result of their participation on the pact course whilst 60% agreed or strongly agreed that their confidence with eportfolio had increased as a result of being on the pact course. sixty percent of survey respondents agreed or strongly agreed that they planned to use eportfolio going irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 211 forward to engage with the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education. sixty-two percent agreed or strongly agreed that the learning experience has enhanced use of eportfolio in their own teaching practice. sixty-five percent of survey respondents agreed or strongly agreed that they planned to take knowledge they had acquired as a result of participating on the pact digital badge back to their institutions. seventyeight percent of survey respondents stated that eportfolio should remain a central component of the pact digital badge. eighty-four percent of survey participants felt that integration of eportfolio into professional practice courses is an effective way to promote engagement with eportfolio by staff in education. open comments include: “eportfolios were a useful tool to demonstrate professional development in pact” “using an eportfolio was a great way to complete this course however i think using mahara has taken away from the course. you should look for a better alternative. even a simple blogging tool would be better i think” “the eportfolio was a fantastic repository for my pd and helped me develop an action plan. “ “while it was a challenge and the process was uncomfortable at times, and finding the time was not easy, it overall was a very positive experience. it really helped to take the experience and learning to a deeper level, and to have a real sense of personal ownership of the process.” “i think eportfolios are a useful tool for this type of learning” “it has helped me document and reflect on my learning.” “i enjoyed looking at the eportfolios of the other participants to see how they approached it” “provide a separate 'how to' open course on creating an eportfolio for those who teach” focus group members 4 and 9 are working with the national forum and the library association of ireland to produce a version of the pact digital badge to promote uptake amongst library personnel at all levels sector wide. focus group member 3 stated that she encourages all new programmes within her institution to incorporate eportfolios. having the facilitator badge for pact made her more aware of promoting eportfolio generally. 5. conclusions an explanatory sequential mixed methods design has served a number of functions in this paper providing a more in-depth analysis of themes from the survey data as well as the triangulation of findings for additional rigor and validity. in this study, focus group findings and the literature irish journal of technology enhanced learning (2021) 212 review corroborate and expand upon a number of key concepts emanating from survey data supporting the generalisation and transferability of findings which is particularly important given the relatively small survey sample size. this study has found that the pairing of eportfolio with the pact digital badge enhances the learning experience, promotes reflection and additional skill acquisition as well as on-going engagement with the national professional development framework for all those who teach in higher education. these findings could be tested on a larger scale across national forum open courses that have an eportfolio component. bryant and chittum (2015) in their review of the eportfolio literature indicates that learners do not always appreciate a teaching approach or tool even if it is beneficial for them. in the context of this paper, this was not the case. this may be in part because of the nature of the learner on the pact course which is a higher or further education professional. seventy-eight percent of participants deemed the eportfolio component of the pact badge as central to the delivery of the course and the learning experience. data emanating from both the survey and focus group did not indicate a tension between the extrinsic motivation of a digital badge and the more intrinsic, introspective and reflective elements of an eportfolio. 6. recommendations a key finding of this study is that eportfolio on the pact badge enhances the learning experience, develops other key skills such as reflection and digital literacy and promotes engagement with the national framework for professional development for all those who teach in higher education. survey and focus group participants indicated that the time and technical knowledge required for platforms such as mahara in the context of a short six-week course are key challenges however. a key recommendation of this study pertains to the additional front loading and scaffolding of information and training on eportfolio prior to the commencement of the programme in week 0. another key recommendation is the provision of eportfolio templates or components as per focus group feedback to underpin more effective and efficient eportfolio engagement on the pact course. whilst 60% of pact participants indicated that they would maintain engagement with their eportfolio upon cessation of the course, 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(2018). the learning portfolio in higher education: a game of snakes and ladders. dublin: dublin city university, centre for assessment research, policy & practice in education (carpe) and national institute for digital learning (nidl). available at: https://www.dcu.ie/sites/default/files/carpe/docs/eportfolioreport.pdf. accessed 29th march, 2021. weller, m. (2018). twenty years of edtech. educause review, 53(4): 34–48. available at https://www.educause.edu/ https://www.dcu.ie/sites/default/files/carpe/docs/eportfolioreport.pdf https://www.educause.edu/ participant engagement with eportfolio on the pact digital badge: an explanatory sequential mixed-methods analysis marie o’ neill*1 ken mccarthy2 1cct college dublin 2waterford institute of technology abstract this paper explores participants’ perceptions of eportfolio on the national forum for the enhancement of teaching and learning’s pact digital badge in which eportfolio is a central component of the teaching and learning experience. the pact badge was ... 1.introduction 1.1 background 2. literature review 3. methodology 3.1 data collection and analysis 4. findings 4.1 demographics 5. conclusions 6. recommendations references irish journal of technology enhanced learning 1 “i kind of feel resigned to the fact”: a foucauldian perspective on data privacy and social media * michael flavin *1 1kings college london abstract social media technologies are popular and pervasive. they also entail the submission of personal data which is sold on to third parties. users trade their personal data in return for free access to social media services. this paper uses michel foucault’s work on panopticism, from his book of the mid-nineteen seventies, discipline and punish, to analyse users’ practices on social media and their thoughts and feelings regarding the usage of their personal data. an online survey and semi-structured interviews were used to gather data. twenty-one participants, most of whom were postgraduate students, completed a survey and four attended a follow-up, semi-structured interview. the paper argues that users adopt a fatalistic position regarding the submission of their personal data, and that users value social media services. the paper makes a significant contribution to the literature by surveying social media usage in general rather than one social media provider; by showing how users tend to curate identities on social media as a defensive strategy in relation to the fact that the data they submit does not belong to them and may be sold on; and by arguing that social media users tend not to hold social media companies responsible for the data they extricate from users. social media; data privacy; foucault, michel; panopticon; online surveillance. 1. introduction this paper uses the panopticon as a means to analyse the question of data privacy on social media. the paper defines social media as interactive online platforms enabling connection and the production, distribution and consumption of material produced in a range of modalities, including text, images and video. the paper aims to analyse users’ practices with social media, to evaluate what users know about surveillance on social media and to analyse how they respond to the climate of surveillance on social media. the specific question addressed by this research is: to what extent do social media users accept loss of privacy? a similar question was posed by krasnova et al. (2010). we are now more than a decade later and social media has risen rapidly in popularity. now is therefore an apt time to analyse users’ thoughts and feelings about data privacy. moreover, using foucault’s work on panopticism offers particular insights on users’ attitudes towards privacy infraction and how surveillance might alter behaviour. using a sample of predominantly postgraduate students, the paper considers the extent to which users are aware that their practices on social media are recorded; that their data are being sold on to third parties; the extent to which they accept a data privacy trade-off in return for access to social media services; and the extent to which they construct authentic personae on social media. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 2 following a summary of foucault’s reading of the panopticon, the paper summarises its methodology and presents its findings. the paper argues that users accept, albeit reluctantly, the trade-off of their privacy in return for free access to services which are often considered necessary for their professional and social lives. users also curate digital identities which are not always authentic but which can offset some aspects of online surveillance. in addition, users cite disparate stakeholders whom they consider responsible for data privacy, not necessarily centring on social media providers. michel foucault’s discipline and punish was first published in 1975. it was translated into english in 1977. the book argues that systems of judicial punishment in western societies (specifically, france) shifted from physical retribution to corrective, disciplinary treatment. moreover, the changes coincided with the development of a capitalist economy which required plentiful, physically able and compliant labour. one of the key concepts in the book is the panopticon, a form of prison design which enables constant scrutiny of inmates without the inmates themselves knowing if they are being observed. the very presence of the panopticon exerts an influence on behaviour. it is a low cost means of surveillance and control. the panopticon is a useful way of thinking about surveillance in the digital age. as cabeston (2020) notes, “panopticon theory has witnessed a genuine revival precisely because of the growth of digital surveillance.” the pre-digital panopticon, “only allows the monitoring of actions, of behaviour; it precisely does not afford insight into prisoners’ minds” (fludernik, 2017, p. 10). however, online observation can and does give insights into what people think. users publish their thoughts and feelings on social media. that said, users curate their online personae and therefore the information published on social media is not necessarily comprehensive and authentic: schonebeck et al. (2016) show young people are conscious of their online identities, undertaking “retrospective impression management” (p. 1482). nevertheless, access to thoughts and feelings is a capacity of social media that was not available to the panopticon as a form of architecture for incarceration. 2. literature review in discipline and punish, in the chapter titled “panopticism,” foucault uses jeremy bentham’s panopticon (a model of prison design proposed in the late-eighteenth century enabling constant scrutiny of inmates) to analyse how the threat of constant physical observation can be used to induce individuals to self-police their behaviour without direct oversight. foucault’s reading of the panopticon does not conflate exactly with bentham’s idea (safaei 2020; weinreich 2021). however, despite the distinction between foucault’s application of the panopticon and bentham’s original design, it is a valuable way of thinking about how constant online surveillance effects individual’s behaviour. manokha (2018) argues for, “the usefulness of the metaphor of panopticon for the analyses of modern surveillance practices… not only is it still relevant but it is actually more relevant today” (pp. 230-231). the panopticon is useful for analysing how surveillance and even just the possibility of surveillance can modify behaviour. the panopticon as described in discipline and punish becomes a metaphor for a widespread system of surveillance in the digital age. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 foucault comments on the cellular structure of bentham’s panopticon: “they are like so many cages, so many small theatres, in which each actor is alone, perfectly individualized and constantly visible” (2020, p. 200). social media, like theatre, can be a site for performance. users can present a curated self to the world. social media is also a state of constant, potential visibility to the network voluntarily entered into by the user; to the provider of the social media services; and to third parties to whom social media companies sell-on information. panopticism is well-suited to neoliberal societies encouraging individualistic perspectives and competition. individuals connect and network on social media but they do not own the data they produce. the presence of individually targeted advertisements and political canvassing on social media evidence an individualised approach whereby advertisements are tailored to the individual’s profile. riemer and peter (2021) state, “facebook had, in 2007, already allowed companies and brands to create their own pages on facebook... but from january 2012, in preparation for its initial public offering…, it allowed them to advertise those pages in users’ newsfeeds. facebook now found itself under increased public scrutiny to actively search for more ways to monetise activity on its platform. this monetisation came in the form of targeted advertising.” the exploitation of users’ data was determined by a commercial imperative. individuals are targeted on social media because of the commercial necessity to sell-on their data to third parties, to make, in turn, social media more attractive to investors and to make social media companies profitable. the relationship between the watcher and the watched on social media is ultimately a relationship of power: “in the peripheric ring, one is totally seen, without ever seeing; in the central tower, one sees everything without ever being seen” (foucault 2020, p. 202). data contributed to social media by users are sold-on to third parties. the data create a profile which can be used by providers of goods and services and by political interests. users make themselves available for retail and political targeting, a practice which is not the purpose of their engagement on social media but is its outcome. foucault states, “the panopticon functions as a kind of laboratory of power” (2020, p. 204). the position of dominant specularity held by the social media provider enables the collection of data which support targeting for commercial and political purposes. the social media panopticon is a laboratory by allowing for experimentation, with different types of targeting being aimed at users. retailers and political stakeholders purchase and accrue knowledge which is then put to work. foucault also defines the panopticon as, “a figure of political technology” (2020, p. 205). it is a political technology because it enables and exemplifies the distribution of power in a neoliberal society. users connect with each other but are under constant potential scrutiny with each unit of data they contribute. users are a means of making profit thanks to a commercial alliance between the social media companies and other enterprises. additional profit can be made by selling data to political interests: manokha (2018) elaborates on the panopticon as a figure of political technology to identify, ‘“technologies of the self’—the manner in which panoptic settings make individuals perform on themselves, without coercion, different operations and exercises of power” (p. 220). the panopticon consolidates and condenses power, influencing practice by virtue of its presence. foucault further describes the panopticon as, “a design of subtle coercion for a society to come” (2020, p. 209). the coercion is subtle because, in the context of social media, a user does not see the connections that precede the appearance of an advertisement or item of political canvassing on their social media feed. foucault published discipline and punish in irish journal of technology enhanced learning 4 the mid-1970s: the future society it anticipated is with us two generations later. the covert organisation of power on social media is crucial to its effects: “in appearance, it is merely the solution of a technical problem; but, through it, a whole type of society emerges” (foucault 2020, p. 216). the effects of social media are widespread. data are accrued, packaged and sold. targeted communications aim to shape spending patterns and political allegiances. foucault states, “it is not that the beautiful totality of the individual is amputated, repressed, altered by our social order, it is rather that the individual is carefully fabricated in it, according to a whole technique of forces and bodies” (2020, p. 217). identities on social media are, to a greater or lesser extent, curated, but the online persona can have greater visibility and presence than the person. the aggregated social media profile is the face the user presents to the world. the profile is also a data set for exerting commercial and political influence. foucault identifies three criteria evidencing what he terms a tactics of power: “firstly, to obtain the exercise of power at the lowest possible cost (economically, by the low expenditure it involves; politically, by its discretion, its low exteriorization, its relative invisibility, the little resistance it arouses); secondly, to bring the effects of this social power to their maximum intensity and to extend them as far as possible, without either failure or interval; thirdly, to link this ‘economic’ growth of power with the output of the apparatuses (educational, military, industrial or medical) within which it is exercised; in short, to increase both the docility and the utility of all the elements of the system” (2020, p. 218). social media has utility, offering value to its users. it also offers use value to businesses who can segment their audiences and target their advertising. in addition, use value is available to political canvassers who can target messages based on users’ individual profiles. from a foucauldian perspective, social media can comprise, “a power that is manifested through the brilliance of those who exercise it, a power that insidiously objectifies those on whom it is applied; to form a body of knowledge about these individuals, rather than to deploy the ostentatious signs of sovereignty” (foucault 2020, p. 220). if social media compels individuals to regulate their behaviour it comprises a form of policing but without any evident enforcement. data contributed to social media comprise an ever-growing body of knowledge. moreover, it is useful knowledge to those who own the platforms because it is sold on to commercial or political stakeholders. foucault’s analysis of the panopticon is not transferable unproblematically to the digital age. for example, foucault states, “the arrangement of his room, opposite the central tower, imposes on him an axial visibility; but the divisions of the ring, those separated cells, imply a lateral invisibility” (p. 200). one of the most fundamental features of social media is the capacity to connect with other users. while the panopticon has monopolistic specularity, social media has diverse specularity but it also has a hierarchy of spectators, with the providers of social media services having access to all the material thereon. moreover, the collection of data on social media and its usage thereafter is not made transparent to the individual user, even as they produce the data. laval (2017) states, “the panopticon is… a maximizing device which, with limited means, produces very great effects. its force is a mental, imaginary one; it lies in its power to penetrate the minds of individuals by establishing a permanent relationship between what one might do and what one would risk if one did. and this is due to the simple fact that it introduces a dissymmetry between the watcher and the watched” (p. 48). the panopticon can control practice by the fact of its presence. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 subsequent to foucault, krasnova et al. (2010) found a tension between the convenience and enjoyment of social media on one hand, and data privacy concerns on the other, though they argued the pros of social media usage outweighed the cons. moreover, users self-disclosed more if they were looking for common ground with other users. in addition, romele et al. (2017) suggest social media users voluntarily submit to a system, contributing profitable information, and marwick and hargittai (2019) argue social media users are largely resigned to privacy violation. afriat et al. (2020), in a study of facebook usage, argue, “users perceive privacy not as an integral component of one’s civil rights but as a negotiable commodity traded according to societal norms” (p. 116). privacy is itself a tradeable commodity, an abstract noun reified into an instrument in commercial exchange: privacy in exchange for access, the entrance charge for social media services. moreover, hafermalz (2021) argues users’ fear of observation is relegated beneath users’ fear of exile: users would prefer to be observed than to be excluded from the services and communities to which social media provides access. brown (2020), in a study of facebook users in the aftermath of the cambridge analytica scandal, found users accepted facebook’s practices because of the benefits offered. usage of the service was traded for personal data. furthermore, afriat et al. (2020) show that user numbers for facebook increased in the year the cambridge analytica scandal broke (p. 116). this section has focused on foucault’s usage of the panopticon in discipline and punish. the next section outlines the method deployed to gather and analyse data. 3. methods this research analyses the extent to which social media users accept a loss of privacy, using foucault’s reading of the panopticon as a theoretical framework. the research obtained institutional, ethical approval. it comprised an online survey followed by online, semistructured interviews (an online survey was also used by krasnova et al. [2010] in a survey of self-disclosure practices on social media). this approach, of survey followed by interviews, was taken so that the initial findings could be elaborated upon by more in-depth questioning. the overall methodology relates to the research question by first identifying users’ social media practices and then by exploring the thought processes and choices underpinning their practices. questions in the survey and the interviews were intended to gather data concerning participants’ awareness of what can happen to information on their social media accounts; their thoughts and feelings about what happens to their data; and their continued usage of social media despite the loss of privacy. the research approach allowed for both surface level and richer data for analysis. a convenience sample was used. the online survey was issued to a closed linkedin group in october 2021, comprising present and former students of a module led by the researcher. an invitation to undertake the survey was posted on the closed group. a total of 393 members were registered on the group during the time period the research was undertaken, most of whom showed little or no engagement with the group. following the initial invitation to undertake the survey, a further two reminders were posted over a three week period. the survey was open from mid-october to mid-november 2021. a total of twenty-one responses were received. the survey questions feature as an appendix to the paper. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 6 at the end of the survey, participants were asked if they would be willing to undertake a follow-up, online interview. a total of five students responded positively. in a follow-up query, four re-stated their willingness to participate and one declined. four semi-structured interviews therefore took place in december 2021. the questions were written after the survey results had been read and analysed, to ensure points relevant to the research and the data gathering thus far were raised and elaborated upon. the interviews began with a warmup question asking participants which social media platforms they used and what they used them for, an approach which was also taken by schoenebeck et al. (2016) in a study of students’ facebook usage. the first question framed the area of enquiry and was also intended to put participants at ease. the interview questions for this paper feature as an appendix. the results of the survey were analysed over repeated readings to identify overall patterns of social media usage, to indicate awareness of data privacy and the relationship between the two. the interview transcripts were produced contemporaneously on microsoft teams and were saved. initial codes were drawn from the interviews using the panopticon as a theoretical framework, including fatalism regarding surveillance, the curation of digital identities, and reflections on responsibility for data privacy. content analysis (bryman 2016) was used to analyse the interviews. the analysis was interested in both manifest and latent content: bryman (2016) argues content analysis is as interested in omissions as in what does get reported (p.287; see also, krippendorff [2013, p.360]). the content analysis in this paper has a directed approach (hsieh & shannon 2005); foucault’s chapter on panopticism in discipline and punish was used to frame the analysis of participants’ practices on social media. overall, the research methodology enabled a detailed account of the participants’ usage of social media, awareness of data privacy and the relationship between the two in practice. the qualitative data from the interviews illustrated the findings from the survey. the interviews allowed for the exploration of the processes that lay behind the practices revealed by the survey findings (bryman 2016, p. 645). the analysis fed forward to the conclusion which returned to the research question. having discussed the research method, the next section summarises the results of both the survey and interviews. 4. results the sample of twenty-one comprised predominantly postgraduate students (n.15). there were also three undergraduate students, one postgraduate researcher, one in employment, and one participant neither in employment nor studying. a significant majority were in the age group 18-30 (n.16); the other five were 31-49. the sample featured eleven different nationalities, the most numerous being indian (n.7), though the analysis did not segment the data by nationality, as not all participants were resident in their home country. moreover, two respondents did not state their nationality. the most commonly used social media apps in the survey were instagram and youtube (n.17); whatsapp (n.16); linkedin (n.15); and facebook (n.14). irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 sixteen respondents stated they were worried about what happens to the data they enter on social media, and six replied “not at all” in response to the question, “to what extent do you trust social media platforms?” (the other responses were “partly” [n.7] and “slightly” [n.8]). eighteen respondents stated they were more cautious about what they said online than they were in everyday communication. eleven had deleted at least one social media app over privacy concerns; twelve had made purchases that had been advertised to them on social media. nine of the respondents stated that their support for a political cause had been sought on social media. eleven of the sample were currently in some form of employment, of whom eight used social media in their job. twenty of the sample were currently studying, of whom sixteen used social media to support their learning. nineteen used social media to support their social lives. in response to the question, “how important is social media to you?”, two (10%) said “very important”; thirteen (62%) said “quite important”; three said “neither important nor unimportant” (14%); two said “not very important” (10%) and one said, “not important at all” 5% (figures rounded to whole percentages). the responses were weighted towards social media apps being at least quite important in respondents’ lives, as shown in figure 1. over 70% of the sample said social media was either “very important” or “quite important” to them (71.4%, to one decimal place). figure 1. respondents’ evaluation of the importance of social media to them. in response to the question, “are you content to contribute your personal data in exchange for social media services,” seven respondents stated “yes” and thirteen stated “no” (one did not respond). sixteen of the full sample of twenty-one were aware that data they contributed on social media did not belong to them. eighteen were also aware that social media companies can sell-on their personal data to providers of goods and services, and to political interests. social media importance very important quite important neither important nor unimportant not very important not important at all irish journal of technology enhanced learning 8 following the survey, four semi-structured interviews were undertaken in december 2021. for the purposes of this paper, the participants are labelled a, b, c and d. one of the most notable traits in the interviews was fatalism. participant a stated: “it's kind of this inevitable decline of privacy… i don't like it because i can find myself in some ways self-censoring. of course i don't like people knowing what i am searching or doing because i do appreciate privacy. but likewise, i kind of feel resigned to the fact.” participant b stated, “i feel like i'm never free from that kind of um, like, monitoring... because it's inevitable for me as someone living in the city to live with a laptop or mobile phones, internet, social media and so forth in order for me to connect with others and do my work… uhm, monitoring, like, me on the digital space is something that i am, i don't like… so yeah, overall i'm very uncomfortable, like my hope will be they will not track me down, like, my activities online, but that's not the reality, they always do.” participant c stated, “the way they are tracking your phone, your whatever you do, your location, everything, that's very very scary for me.” participant d stated, “my information, what i like, what i don't like, i wouldn't want it to be known and kept in a database, but that's what you know social media does. and so i try to keep it a bit, uh, concealed as much as i can, but i'm not very good at doing it. i try not to think about it too much because it leads me to paranoia. like i, i'm aware of it, i know that it's there and i know that… but i think that's just how the world has become like, just this is the new way of communication. this is what's happening in the world right now, and i don't know how much control we can have over it.” the participants also spoke of the curation of digital identities. with regard to their own digital identity, participant a stated, “you're not painting a fake picture of your life because these things have actually happened, but you're only showing the big positives and you're sort of implicitly avoiding all of the negative aspects, so you're sort of painting the best possible picture of your life.” participant d stated, “i only post when there's something remarkable that i want to share, like i make a conscious decision to share something with my friends.” the participants were judgmental of how others curate their digital identities. participant a stated, “in most cases it's not fake, but, uh, i think again, it's a very idealized image, what they want to share with the world.” participant b stated, “they tend to share moments that are extraordinary, happy or interesting in their lives.” participant c stated, “putting in some pictures or some personal content to get validation from an outside world. that is not something that drives me” and, “i know of a few friends who wake up at night just to check how many views their recent status or recent stories... i mean, you know when we go out for dinner, they are busy clicking the pictures of the dishes instead of enjoying it with the company.” participant d stated, “i see, you know, the profiles. i understand that some people use instagram as a business and they, you know, project a certain persona so that they get more likes and more followers and more, you know, like profit out of it.” participants were clearly aware of the value of social media. participant b stated, “like even a decade ago, we had to pay a lot of money to make international calls or had to put a lot of effort and energy in order to find my friend or friends who lost contact years ago and i think social media allowed me and many other people to restore that kind of relationship naturally,” and participant d stated, “i use it [instagram] to find different destinations, like i use the hashtags a lot just to see what people are doing in like different parts of the world and always when i have like a holiday coming up, i would browse photos and see, you know, what are the places that are worth traveling to. i feel instagram gives a more recent account of irish journal of technology enhanced learning 9 that.” participant c stated, “we can survive, you know we can live without social media, but i feel that it makes things much easier, especially for example, in my case, a lot of my friends are abroad or almost 80% of them are abroad and so i feel it's really, uh, interesting, like it's a really useful tool to keep connected to those, uh, in your network… and even connect with other people you know across the world… so it's a tool that we can use to our benefit, but it also has, you know, many things we should be aware of.” in the interviews, participants gave different answers when it came to the question of who was responsible for data privacy on social media. participant a stated, “i think it is the responsibility of the company, but i think it's the responsibility of the state to legislate to make sure the company is protecting the privacy and also i suppose it's the responsibility of the state to punish in cases in which there is misuse of my data.” participant c stated, “i think when it comes to data, no one can work in isolation. companies cannot take full responsibility because they want money and then government wants the data of its citizens as well. so partly it's dependent on them. i mean, in the sense they should be more open and more vocal about what they're collecting... but they are not.” conversely, participant d stated, “i feel that i am responsible for any content that i put online, so i need to be managing that with, you know, consciousness, with greater awareness that, you know, as to how it's going to be available and for how long it's going to be available as well. but i feel that for example facebook, i stopped using it. i used to post a lot on facebook and then i stopped using it because i found out that some default settings, they just change by themselves. like sometimes there's an update on the app and then you have to manually go in and check.” participant d added, “social media tries to kind of get as much information and as much data from you as possible as they can get their hands on. but you have to be aware of how you manage that.” 5. discussion & conclusion this paper analyses the extent to which social media users accept their loss of privacy. the paper argues the practice of surveillance is quotidian and accepted, albeit reluctantly, as a de facto cost for access to social media services supporting professional and personal practice. the participants in this research largely exempted social media companies from responsibility for data privacy. foucault identifies, “a machinery that is both immense and minute, which supports, reinforces, multiplies the asymmetry of power and undermines the limits that are traced around the law” (2020, p. 223). power is asymmetrical on social media because users do not own the data they contribute and cannot determine how their data are sold on, or to whom, or for what purpose. each contribution to social media is a potential addition to an immense body of information which can be used for purposes over which users have no control. control, instead, rests in, ‘a handful of transnational, profit-seeking panoptic networks’ (kwet 2020, p.1). the usage of social media can be politically progressive: it played a role in the arab spring (lance-bennett & segerberg 2012) and in the campaign against the violent excesses of the special anti-robbery squad in nigeria (akinyetun 2021). however, wolfsfeld et al. (2013), in a study of the arab spring, argue social media followed protest rather than catalysing it. social media also played a role in the growth of the black lives matter movement (hockinboyers & clifford-astbury 2021) following the murder of george floyd in 2020, enabling support for the movement to be scaled up (mundt et al. 2018). the participants in this study are aware of the drawbacks of using social media but continue to use it anyway, making costirish journal of technology enhanced learning 10 benefit calculations and using social media services extensively, albeit with discomfort and apprehension. the curation of distinct digital identities is one way of managing the tension between data privacy and access to social media. participants in this research sculpted their own identities and were aware of others undertaking similar curatorial practices. the surface appearance they presented to the social media interface was a conscious act of construction. furthermore, participants could and in some cases had deleted apps over privacy concerns, itself an act of digital identity curation. participants were resigned but not inactive, creating digital personae rather than broadcasting unadorned experience. however, online surveillance has access to layers beneath the surface, such as searches undertaken by the user, and thus the face presented to the social media service is only a veneer for the corpus contributed to the providers of social media services and the third parties to whom they sell on data. identities on social media are constructed and curated but they produce a substantial residue which is still visible to the providers. the interview participants were divided over who was responsible for looking after their data: responses mentioned the government, the social media companies and the individual user, suggesting neoliberal principles are not ubiquitous but neoliberal practices, of individual actions unsupported by governmental protections, are recognised as a fact of existence. personal data are sold on and individuals are commodified. interview responses suggested the social media companies have some responsibility for privacy but not full responsibility, nor were the social media companies held to be primarily, predominantly responsible for users’ data privacy. users in this study, in common with afriat et al. (2020), stated individuals are responsible for data privacy, yet the present study also shows users attributing responsibility to governments and, to a lesser extent, social media providers. the fact that social media providers are partly or largely absolved from responsibility implies a level of acceptance of their data gathering practices as a feature of their composition and as an exemplification of their ongoing activity. users know they are being watched but tend not to hold the watchers responsible. users’ exculpation of social media companies may reflect effective corporate communication on the part of the companies, but it may also reflect a perspective on the part of users which is neoliberal in the sense that the individual has to take responsibility for their actions in a largely unprotected online space, despite not having produced the social media services or their data gathering practices. the use of a college-educated, predominantly postgraduate sample in this paper is not representative of wider populations: schonebeck et al. (2016) argue, “a college-going population may have been better educated about appropriate online behaviour” (p. 1484). the sample, however, is useful for considering how users in higher education interact with social media and questions of data privacy. social media can be and is used to support learning. furthermore, using proprietary, university technology enhanced learning systems requires the submission of personal data. higher education providers might usefully reflect on the ethical aspects of social media usage for education, given that the data are scrutinised, packaged and sold on. individual educators have to manage a balance between privacy and openness (cronin 2017). this paper works from a small sample; a larger sample would be necessary to enhance the reliability and validity of the research findings. that said, this paper does show that the research participants were aware of how their data were used yet continued to use the services. in practice, the price of exclusion was perceived as greater than the value of their irish journal of technology enhanced learning 11 personal data. most of the survey respondents (n.13) were not content to contribute personal data yet the interview transcripts indicated that they did make the trade based on an evaluation of the costs versus the benefits. foucault (2020) argues “visibility is a trap” (p. 200). the findings of this research suggest visibility is a trade-off more than a trap, but a trade-off made from a negotiating position of weakness because the cost of exclusion is perceived as greater than the cost of intrusion. social media companies are established and mature businesses. they are highly popular and pervasive. their profitable practices of selling-on personal data are also entrenched. political struggles, as evident on social media, have more of a wildfire quality, though they also hold the potential for co-ordination and transnational, even global alliances. however, at present, this study argues that social media services are more commonly sites for the expropriation of data which are sold-on for profit, rather than for politically progressive networking, though social media retains progressive potential. participants in this study traded their personal data for access to services, yet their disposition in so doing was often reluctant and apprehensive. as participant c stated: “even though… all my privacy settings were, uh, you know, set to very very private mode, it was still tracking all the information. it was still seeing all those things.” judging from participants’ practices, exclusion from social media services was a price they were unwilling to pay because of the extent to which they relied on social media to support their personal, educational and professional lives. users can feel objectified but accept, on a practical level, their objectification. foucault (2020) argues, “the ideal point of penalty today would be an indefinite discipline: an interrogation without end, an investigation that would be extended without limit to a meticulous and ever more analytical observation, a judgement that would at the same time be the constitution of a file that was never closed” (p. 227). in the era of the pandemic, the scope and penetration of personal data and online surveillance intensified (couch et al. 2020). social media is regarded as a necessary asset, not a nuisance or penalty, but it has the potential to penalise because it comprises a file that is never closed, gathering information ceaselessly. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 12 references afriat, h., dvir-gvirsman, s., tsuriel, k., & ivan, l. 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facebook instagram twitter linkedin youtube whatsapp weixin / wechat tik tok snapchat other none of the above 5. do you worry about what happens to the data you enter on social media? yes/no 6. to what extent do you trust social media account platforms? fully/partly/slightly/not at all/don’t know or no opinion 7. are you more cautious about what you say online than you are about everyday communication in person? yes/no 8. have you ever deleted a social media app over privacy concerns? yes/no 9. have you ever purchased anything that was advertised to you on social media? yes/no 10. has your support for a political cause ever been sought on social media? yes/no irish journal of technology enhanced learning 15 11. if you are in employment, do you use social media in your job? yes/no/not currently in employment 12. are you studying? if so, do you use social media to support your learning? yes/no/not currently studying 13. do you use social media to support your social life? yes/no 14. how important is social media to you? very important/quite important/neither important nor unimportant/not very important/not important at all 15. are you content to contribute your personal data in exchange for social media services? yes/no 16. are you aware that data you enter on social media does not belong to you? yes/no 17. are you aware that social media platforms can sell-on your details to providers of goods and services, and to political interests? yes/no we may conduct follow-up interviews, which will be conducted online. are you willing to participate in a follow-up interview? if so, please provide an email address. do you have any further comments? thank you for completing this form. appendix 2 – semi-structured interview questions can you start by summarising what social media apps you use and what you use them for? are there any social media apps you used to use but have stopped using, or use a lot less? why is that? have you ever deleted a social media app? if so, why? how do you feel about the fact that your data on social media can be sold on? to what extent do you accept the trade off between access to social media services and the selling-on of your personal data? thinking about the personae you maintain on social media apps, to what extent are they authentic? how authentic are other people’s social media personae? do you need social media? do you think you could easily do without social media? who do you think is responsible for managing your data privacy? overall, how do you feel about being the subject of digital surveillance? microsoft word 02_telireland_issue1_mokeeffe.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2016 1 exploring higher education professionals’ use of twitter for learning muireann o’ keeffe1 dublin city university, dublin, ireland (received october 2016; final version received october 2016) abstract twitter has become a hot topic of conversation in professional learning circles. however much of the commentary related to professional learning and twitter is at best circumstantial rhetoric, which fails to illustrate the real experiences and complexities of professional learning in online spaces. this case study explored how eight higher education professionals engaged with twitter for professional learning purposes. data was collected and analysed from participant twitter profiles and subsequent interviews explored professional learning on twitter with participants. using the visitor and resident typology this paper highlights that participants were involved in a range of types of participation on twitter. participatory activities on twitter were considered using wenger’s (1998) concepts of participation and non-participation. although participants of this research supported twitter for professional learning, this study indicates that professionals were hesitant to establish presence and participate in social networking activities via twitter. consequently, further research is needed to unpick the complexities of participation in online spaces. introduction in recent years online social network sites (sns) have become hot topics of conversation in professional learning circles (hart, 2015). indeed, claims that sns such as twitter support informal learning among higher education professionals have gained increasing attention (beckingham, 2015; mcpherson, budge, & lemon, 2015). yet to date endorsement of open online spaces as places of learning for professionals is based on circumstantial and anecdotal evidence. emerging social practices on sns have been surprisingly under-researched and it is for this reason that that deep qualitative research to explore the uses and implications of using sns professionally have been called for (lupton, 2014; o'keeffe, 2014; veletsianos & navarrete, 2012). furthermore, some criticisms exist that much of the emerging research on use of online social networks is situated among those who are positively disposed to online spaces and technologies (skyring, 2013). moreover, technology is frequently framed as having a benign presence in education (selwyn, 2016) with others advocating for the uncritiqued benefits of using sns for learning. thus while there is much common rhetoric on how online social networks are transforming the functions of university life, alternative viewpoints about using social networks are 1 corresponding author. email: muireann.okeeffe@dcu.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2014. © 2016 m. b. o’keeffe. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/. this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. m. o’keeffe 2 given limited attention. therefore, it is timely to explore and capture how higher education professionals use twitter for learning purposes. this study, which describes findings from the first phase of completed doctoral research, explores how higher education professionals (lecturers, academic developers, student support staff, and learning technologists) use twitter for professional learning. the purpose of learning in this research is toward the enhancement and development of teaching and learning practices among those who teach and support teaching in higher education. this paper emphasises the informal and social features of professional learning and explores how one such sns, twitter, can potentially support professional learning. to this end, a case study approach was designed which investigated twitter data of eight higher education professionals and followed up with interviews to explore how twitter was being used for professional learning. development of teaching and learning practices in higher education teaching is viewed as a core and legitimate constituent of higher education work (boyer, 1990; boud & brew, 2013) and in the last forty years activities to support and develop teaching practices within higher education have become more commonplace (gibbs, 2013; kandlbinder & peseta, 2009). while some describe the process of learning how to teach in higher education as an unsupported and isolating experience (gourlay, 2011), continuing professional development (cpd) has become increasingly expected so that those with teaching duties can deepen their knowledge and skills and stay abreast of important developments for improvement in learning and teaching practices (day & sachs, 2004; eraut, 1994; gibbs, 2013; national forum, 2015). furthermore a variety of factors have increased the need for cpd including ensuring the quality of education (gibbs, 2013), the emphasis on a student-centred approach to learning (biggs & tang, 2007); and technological changes which broadened the scope of access to higher education. thus, there is a need for higher education professionals to be learning professionals (nixon, 2008) and higher education institutions should be involved in cultivating learning environments for professional development (trevitt & perera, 2009). professional learning learning is at the heart of enhancing practice (eraut, 1994) and is a key activity in developing professional values, codes and practices (evans, 2008). professional learning is acknowledged to occur informally and socially among professionals (engeström, 2001; eraut, 1994; marsick & watkins, 1990; wenger, 1998) and is crucial to enhancement of professional practice and performance at work (eraut, 2004; felstead, et al., 2004). indeed, dialogue and collegial discourse among practitioners is said to be an important activity in the learning of teaching professionals (palmer, 1998; thomson, 2015; wenger, 1998). to this end, searching for solutions to issues encountered in practice through involvement in professional communities has proven helpful for professionals (heinrich, 2015; nussbaum-beach & ritter hall, 2012; pataraia et al., 2015) and learning from other educators and extending to outer networks beyond immediately available peers enables ‘informal support from people on the spot’ (mcnally, 2006, p. 82). informal learning so it seems that learning for professionals is not confined to engagement in formal educational or specialist training and is often unplanned (dochy et al., 2011; eraut, 2004; mårtensson & roxå, 2015; rienties & hosein, 2015). rather, professional learning about practice takes place through collaboration where practitioners work together, share knowledge, and engage in cooperative inquiry irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 to instigate change and growth as professionals (dochy et al., 2011; eraut, 1994; wenger, 1998). additionally, deep-seated motivation is important for professionals to develop themselves and pursue collaboration and cooperation amongst colleagues (day & sachs, 2004; eraut, 2004). informal learning events are important development opportunities for higher education staff (gibbs, 2013; mårtensson & roxå, 2015). peer-professional discussion, joint problem solving, and opportunities that offer professionals a chance to engage in networks, partnerships and learning communities can offer occasions of reflection and learning on practice, in turn enhancing learning about teaching practice (gibbs, 2013; loads & campbell, 2015; lunt, 2008; pataraia et al., 2015; sharpe, 2004). also in current times where resources in higher education are tight and staff are timepoor, new flexible and informal opportunities for professional development are needed (hunt, 2011; national forum, 2015; slowey, kozina, & tan, 2014; trevitt & perera, 2009). at the same time, the national forum recognises that informal learning development opportunities play a significant part in developing the practices of those who teach and support teaching in higher education (national forum, 2016). social learning and personal learning networks co-construction of knowledge occurs within relationships between people (lave & wenger, 1991) and can influence practice and knowledge and ultimately become embedded in practice. while learning is regarded as a social practice, it is also dependent on the context and situation of the learning and much learning occurs with peers in workplace or professional settings (billett, 2006; eraut, 2004; marsick & watkins, 1990). furthermore learning about teaching has been acknowledged to occur in community settings (hollins-alexander, 2013; hughes, 2007; mårtensson & roxå, 2015; o’keeffe, cashman, & o’regan, 2008), providing linkages to wider circuits of knowledge and experts (nerland & jensen, 2014), and enabling collaboration and effective opportunities to learn from others. moreover, recent studies have highlighted that personal networks offer opportunities to interact with pools of knowledge concerning teaching influencing practice (pataraia et al., 2015). learning through participation in communities social energy combined with opportunities for engagement situated in solving problems of practice contributes to learning (wenger, 1998). through practice, members of the community establish “what it is to be a competent participant, an outsider, or somewhere in between” (wenger, 1998, p. 137). wenger’s concepts of participation and reification illustrate that participation enables the negotiation of meaning, turning experience into “thingness” (wenger, 1998), learning becomes visible and tangible, in turn enabling the discernible communication of ideas and artefacts. this is apparent in online social spaces where participants reify meaning in online expressions through tweets, blogs, and other virtual artefacts (bell, 2014). online social networks for learning in the last decade, with the rise of the social web, there has been much discussion about how online social networks contribute to expanding opportunities for informal and social learning (gee, 2005; ito, et al., 2013; seely brown & thomas, 2011; siemens, 2006). some argue that the participatory web (costa, 2014) expands the capacity to learn from greater audiences by offering access to information and to knowledge communities that can be harnessed anywhere, at anytime, and by anyone with internet access (ito, et al., 2013; johnson et al., 2015). indeed, some studies indicate that learners enjoy and appreciate the social learning experience afforded by online social networks (veletsianos & navarrete, 2012) while others assert that personal learning environments (ples), supported by social media, can potentially marry formal and informal learning (dabbagha & kitsantas, 2012). m. o’keeffe 4 furthermore, cook & santos (2014) assert that sns, used in well-designed ways, can support informal learning. additionally, jenkins, ito, & boyd (2015) reported on findings from a large-scale longitudinal study arguing that sns support participatory practices, enabling creative and selfdirected learning. similarly, ito et al. (2013) in their framework of connected learning portrayed youths motivated to seek out mentorship in online spaces to satisfy their learning needs. so it seems that twenty-first century networking technologies can facilitate and stimulate online communities providing environments for sharing knowledge and practice leading to learning. nonetheless, some writers exercise caution indicating the over-emphasis and exaggerated benefits of technology for learning (oliver, 2012; selwyn & facer, 2013). also some question the radical claims of openness offered by social online technologies as reinforcing idealistic thinking (gourlay, 2015) while others argue that claims about sns use are predominantly for impression management and political gain (rheingold, 2010; selwyn, 2012) rather than for open and democratic scholarly practices (veletsianos, 2012). how is twitter used for professional learning? mainstream conversations about professional learning report twitter as a top tool for learning (hart, 2015). an american survey of faculty, reported twitter as useful for learning (gerstein, 2011) and twitter has been proclaimed as a medium that can sustain professional learning for k-12 educators (holmes, preston, shaw, & buchanan, 2013). in the higher education context costa’s (2014) research indicated that participation in online social networks potentially contributed to change in perspective and practices, thus contributing to learning for higher education scholars. nonetheless, the research literature is scant on how twitter is used for professional learning purposes among staff in higher education. an investigation of studies existing on twitter practices in academic life (costa, 2013; veletsianos & kimmons, 2012; fransman, 2013; ford, veletsianos, & resta, 2014; lupton, 2014) revealed that many studies in the higher education context to date focus on how scholars use twitter to complement research duties. indeed, networked participatory scholarship (veletsianos & kimmons, 2012) describes how academics digitally disseminate “specialism in a field” (weller, 2011, p. 5). veletsianos (2012) found that sharing of practice, of information and requesting assistance were among the social activities of academics on twitter. similarly, lupton’s (2014) research established that social networks helped academics to connect with other academics but urged for more research to move “beyond surveys and using qualitative research to produce thick descriptions of use” (lupton, 2014, p. 32). finally, much of the existing literature investigating social networking use in higher education (costa, 2013; lupton, 2014, veletsianos, 2012) has been broad-based in nature. to this end, this research, situated within an initial phase of a doctoral study explores the topic of professional learning with those who teach and support teaching in higher education. a particular group of higher education professionals whom had completed a formal qualification in technology-enhanced learning were identified as using twitter to extend their personal learning networks. thus the aim of the remainder of this paper is to explore the activities of these higher education professionals on twitter and to capture how these activities assist their professional development toward the functions of learning and teaching. this aim is addressed by the following research questions: 1. what are the activities of higher education professionals using the social networking site twitter? 2. how are activities on twitter supporting the learning and development of these higher education professionals? irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 methods yin (2014) and robson (2011) have noted that case study design is particularly suited to exploratory studies that asks ‘how' and ‘why’ questions. thus the case study design was chosen as it suited conditions of this research project allowing for in-depth study of phenomena in a fluid and iterative sense (dowling & brown, 2010). also the case study approach allowed the design to “emerge” (robson, 2011) during data collection and analysis and to spot interesting insights not known prior to the initiative (buchanan, 2012). the eight participants were graduates of an academic development programme focussed on technology-enhanced learning. the participants had endeavoured to extend their personal learning networks beyond the formal walls of the classroom, into virtual spaces by using twitter. other selection criteria for this research required that they worked in the higher education sector and were using twitter for professional learning purposes. ethical approval for this research was granted through the institute of education, university college london ethics review board. furthermore, completion of the survey was entirely voluntary, with informed consent. pseudonyms were used. while anonymity was pledged to participants it became apparent during analysis that twitter data was searchable and identifiable. this ethical incident corresponded with challenges discussed by others pertaining to ethics and internet research data (boyd & crawford, 2012; markham & buchanan, 2012). participants were notified about this potential risk to anonymity to which they responded, confirming they felt comfortable to proceed and be included in the research. twitter data was collected using twitter archiving google spreadsheets (tagsexplorer2 version 5.110) and data collection was limited to the month of may 2014 (bruns & stieglitz, 2014). taking veletsianos’ (2012) study as a guide one hundred tweets per participant were downloaded. data analysis of tweets got underway using veletsianos’ (2012) seven types of twitter activity to accelerate the coding phase. however, some of veletsianos’ codes did not align with the data and became redundant and new codes were created. also during analysis of tweets it became apparent that some participants had not tweeted during the time frame of the data collection. an investigation of twitter profiles showed that one participant had never posted on twitter while three participants had posted an inconsequential volume of tweets. thus analysis of tweets for these participants was not possible. at this point the visitor-resident typology (white & le cornu, 2011) was adopted to illustrate different modes of engagement among participants in the online space of twitter. following this process interviews were organised to explore how activities on twitter were influencing professional learning. semi-structured interviews of all eight participants could gain rich data that could be sewn together to tell a story of the phenomena (schostak, 2006). interview participants were asked for their understanding of professional learning and how they perceived twitter as helpful to professional learning. thematic analysis was used to analyse the interview data and braun & clarke’s (2006) six-phase guide identified themes in a systematic way. leading from this the twitter codes and the interview themes supported the development of case descriptions (buchanan, 2012; miles, huberman, & saldana, 2014), which helped highlight findings in this study. findings 2 tagsexplorer is an application-programming interface (api) that collects data from twitter. it downloads, organises twitter data in bulk using a readable format. this software is free for educational use and developed by hawksey (2013). see https://mashe.hawksey.info/2013/02/twitter-archive-tagsv5/ . m. o’keeffe 6 the visitor and resident continuum (figure one) highlighted that participants had involved themselves in a spectrum of engagement on twitter. participants that demonstrated an absence of presence (rourke et al., 2001) on twitter were mapped to visitor attributes (white & le cornu, 2011) while those displaying more presence and participation on twitter were matched with resident attributes. figure 1 participant cases mapped to the visitor-resident continuum while the visitor-resident mapping process was useful for highlighting similarities and differences in activities of participants on twitter, wenger’s (1998) modes of participation was used to problematise various types of online participation. non-participation or peripheral participation were matched with visitor attributes while richer participation on twitter matched with resident attributes. rather than report on data from all cases, three of the eight participants are highlighted in this paper. these participants denise, louise, and ben demonstrated various levels of engagement with twitter and are presented here to show the significant differences in twitter participation within the research cohort. denise denise, an experienced learning technologist, had never posted on twitter, indicating an absence of social presence on twitter at the time of data collection. thus she was mapped to the visitor end of the continuum. conflictingly, she described professional learning as a social process of learning from more experienced colleagues: “those kind of undefined or ill-defined ways of interacting with colleagues who know a lot more than i do in an area and just watching what they do to understand the strategies they employ”. professional learning for her was social and she participated in various face-to-face learning opportunities. the interview data revealed she found twitter useful but did not want to post because she was: “hypersensitive around putting thoughts and feelings online”. in the interview, denise made it clear she did not want to make posts on twitter at any time into the future. nonetheless, denise explained that twitter was useful in gathering information from educational sources and she described how twitter enabled the locating of resources and irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 announcements from knowledgeable sources and organisations such as the jisc3 and the hea4. while she followed other educators on twitter she was cautious about initiating social contact with other tweeters, thus she refrained from posting tweets. for denise twitter was an informationgathering tool and she shunned the social network features offered by twitter. louise louise, an early career learning technologist, described professional learning as learning from others and believed that twitter was important to this process. she reported that twitter helped her keep upto-date and indicated a perceived loss if twitter ceased to exist: “it would leave a big hole. i can’t see how you could continue to learn at the same rate without it”. she described herself as a ”lurker” strategically following educators, observing tweets, and gathering information to help with her work: “it enabled me to do all the things you’re meant to be able to do, to connect to the right people.” she considered how to apply new information from twitter to practice and had created a toolkit of technologies from information retrieved via twitter. she subsequently implemented this toolkit in elearning design work. while the data showed she engaged in some twitter discussions (figure two), louise expressed her preference to observe and gather new information. figure 2louise's twitter activities she primarily used twitter to retrieve information from other professionals in the area. louise regarded herself as an observer on twitter indicating she was not fully comfortable in expressing her voice online, however, contrastingly her tweets show that she established participation by making posts, establishing presence and involving herself in conversations. further research is needed to tease out the reasons for louise’s preference for observing rather than participating and also to gain insight into denise’s feeling of uneasiness in posting knowledge or opinion via twitter. 3 joint information systems committee (jisc): an organisation in the united kingdom providing leadership in the use of information and communications technology in learning, teaching, research and administration. retrieved from https://www.jisc.ac.uk. 4 the higher education authority (hea) leads the strategic development of the irish higher education and research. retrieved from http://www.hea.ie. digital_identity making_connections misc_ed_post sharing_resources social_commentary m. o’keeffe 8 ben ben, a lecturer, discussed informal social learning opportunities as enabling his professional learning. hearing viewpoints of professionals from other academic disciplines was essential to learning: “...the coffee room is a great place for [learning] as well because we’re on like a three school campus we actually meet people that are from different areas, and they would see things with a different perspective, views, and teach in different ways and i find that’s a great way to learn as well, just to bounce ideas off them, listen to their conversations and seeing what they’re doing in their class that i can try and apply”. informal conversations inspired him to think about adopting new approaches and experiment with teaching practices. opportunities for listening, sharing ideas, reflecting, and brainstorming with others were important. similarly, twitter helped him tap into new information and connect socially with others. figure 3ben's activities on twitter ben perceived and used twitter differently to denise and louise; he highlighted twitter as valuable for collaborating and making links with other educators teaching in higher education. there’s a chemist, x[person], over in x[place]. she was kind of tweeting a good bit last year about her x[project], that’s the name of her project … i made a connection with her. ben gave examples of establishing teaching and learning collaborations with educators in other universities via twitter, which in turn contributed to changes in pedagogical practice and enabled peer forms of learning among his students. ben described feeling comfortable in participating in social network activities on twitter and gave examples of how collaborations initiated on twitter contributed to innovation in pedagogical practice. data from three participants highlighted here have provided rich insights into understandings of professional learning and uses of twitter for professional learning. denise’s data exemplifies twitter engagement of those situated on the visitor end of the continuum whereby twitter was used a tool to gather professionally relevant information. furthermore ben represents those demonstrating similar resident activities of online engagement, social communication, and development of collaboration with other educators. louise was hesitant to explicitly participate but nonetheless had established social presence on twitter. the data of three participants highlighted here indicate the variety of types of engagement with twitter that require further investigation and explanation. making_connections misc_ed_post sharing_resources social_commentary irish journal of technology enhanced learning 9 discussion earlier it was noted that professional learning is largely a social and informal process (eraut, 1994, marsick & watkins, 1990; wenger, 1998) and in this study when asked about professional learning, all participants described the vital social and informal nature of learning from other professionals. however, what was most interesting about the data was that while social learning was strongly advocated by all participants, social presence and participation on twitter differed among the research participants. participants with visitor attributes preferred to read and gather information on twitter and avoided using the social networking features of twitter to connect or interact with others online, thus positioning themselves at the margins of communities on twitter. much of the literature associated with online, informal or professional learning refer to learning as social and collaborative (eraut, 1994; gee, 2005; ito, et al., 2013; siemens, 2006). however, despite opportunities presented by twitter for social modes of learning, denise and those with visitor attributes commonly used twitter as an online bulletin board which enabled them to read information useful to their practice needs but chose not to share their comments or opinions on twitter. they expressed a preference for inhabiting peripheral spaces of twitter, observing other peoples’ activities at a safe distance. indeed, stewart’s research asserts “participation makes us visible to others who may not know us, and makes our opinions and perspectives visible to those who may know *us*” (stewart, 2014, para. 9). thus, further discussion and thinking is required in relation to denise’s absence of presence and her choice to shun participation on twitter. denise had made a firm decision not to participate or establish presence on twitter. louise, however, while she regarded herself as a “lurker” on twitter, showed that she established presence and made connections with other educators via twitter. ben was unmistakably more social on twitter than other participants and had established collaborations with other universities, which had impacted on pedagogical practices, showing that twitter was contributing to development of teaching and learning practices. however, while there were differences in levels of sociality among participants it can be said that learning was accomplished by all participants. indeed, data in this study demonstrates that peripheral participation (lave & wenger, 1991) was useful to learning about practice for these participants. additionally jenkins, ito, & boyd’s (2015) ideas on participatory learning echo this interpretation: at any given moment there are many different modes of engagement: some are watching and observing, waiting to participate, while others are on the floor dancing and others are much more peripheral watching from the balcony (jenkins, ito, & boyd , 2015, p. 6) by positioning themselves at the margins of twitter spaces, participants of this study were enriching their professional knowledge and practices by visiting twitter “for immersion and broader exposure” (wenger, 1998, p. 122) to new knowledge. nonetheless, wenger (1998) cautions against peripheral modes of participation that involve acquisition alone and forgo interactions with others in communities or networked spaces. he claims that “information does not build up to an identity of participation, it remains alien, literal, fragmented, unnegotiable” (wenger, 1998, p. 219). additionally the core properties of the connected learning framework include production-centred outcomes for learning (ito, et al., 2013), where the products of learning are tokens of meaning and practice. however, in this study some participants chose not to post on twitter, thus they avoided potentially testing the validity of their knowledge on twitter. through explicit tweeting of thoughts or opinions visitor participants might have reified their m. o’keeffe 10 knowledge about practice and initiated opportunity for further conversation on twitter. moreover, choosing not to post on twitter became a barrier to establishing conversation with others that might have led to the negotiation of meaning, which in turn, may have enhanced their understanding and learning. on the other hand, ben tweeted, thereby exhibiting his knowledge and practice. he participated more centrally in communities, having conversations on twitter. ben found information about new pedagogical approaches via twitter and initiated collaborations with others interested in this pedagogical strategy. he subsequently contributed knowledge back to the community through a journal article on the topic. so it can be said that, for ben, tweeting about teaching and learning practices, led to collaboration and other opportunities. he was invited to write journal articles, blog posts and make presentations at conferences, thus extending learning and construction of knowledge. overall, in this small-scale study, it seems that twitter was useful for professional learning which links to other findings that describe personal networks as beneficial for developing teaching and learning practices (pataraia et al., 2010). conclusion this sample of participants is small, so findings may not be generalisable to other contexts but yet provides rich data to reflect on and inspire further questions about how twitter is used for learning by practitioners in higher education. further research is necessary to tease out answers and reasons pertaining to preferences of some research participants for non-participation or peripheral participation on twitter. other studies show the respect that educators have for twitter (holmes et al., 2013) in enabling informal and social learning. they indicate positive and endorsing perspectives of using twitter for professional learning purposes. indeed, this research makes a case for using twitter for professional learning and that peripheral participation as well as highly social participation can be valuable for developing learning and teaching practices of higher education staff. nevertheless, this study highlights hesitancy expressed by two participants in posting to the open online space of twitter, therefore it is essential that further research explore the reasons behind decisions not to establish presence or participation on twitter. the next phase of this doctoral research will explore and problematise more thoroughly the barriers, enablers, and implications of using twitter for professional learning purposes. references beckingham, s. 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(2014). case study research: design and methods (5 ed.). california: sage publications. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 11 technology enhanced learning (tel) intercultural competence: a phenomenological exploration of trainees’ experiences within global virtual training environments. chris o’ toole *a a. technology enhanced learning specialist and adjunct lecturer national university of ireland galway, phd candidate lancaster university (received september 2017; final version received january 2018) abstract research suggests that a crucial aspect of communication for successful interactions between online trainers and trainees of different cultures is intercultural competence. a question is therefore posed: “to what extent and in what ways does the trainee experience trainer intercultural competence within a global virtual training environment?” it is important to answer this question to understand and enhance intercultural competence of trainers within a global virtual training environment (vte).this phenomenological study explored the lived experience of three trainees (one being the researcher) within two professional global vtes. data was collected through short written reports of participants’ experience of the phenomenon and through an in-depth semi-structured interview. findings revealed low levels of intercultural competence within global vtes. however the data collected also suggested that enhanced intercultural communication on behalf of the trainers would improve training. three themes described the participants’ experiences; substantial intercultural biases held by trainers towards trainees; frequent communication problems between trainers and trainees; and a preference by trainees for trainers to enhance their intercultural competence within global vtes. limitations included the relatively low number of participants. * corresponding author. email: chris.otoole@nuigalway.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 o’ toole, c. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irishbased professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. mailto:chris.otoole@nuigalway.ie http://www.ilta.ie/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 c o’ toole 12 1. introduction with the current trend of globalisation, professionals are moving across national and cultural borders to a greater extent (trede et al., 2013). thus we face an increasingly diverse workforce (varner & beamer, 2011). intercultural communication has subsequently become an increasingly important field. this is particularly true in online training and education (zhao, kuh, & carini, 2005) delivered with virtual training environments (vtes) by globally based trainers from wide ranging cultures, where the successful delivery of training depends on the trainee in their own culture understanding the training as communicated by the trainer, frequently from a different culture (finder, 2005; tomozeiu, 2016). within a vte, communication problems among trainers and trainees arise due to difficulties with languages pronunciation by non-native speaking trainers, inability for trainees to learn new languages to reply to trainers of that language, challenges in developing pedagogical skills, and the complexities of intercultural communication (finder, 2005; gravois, 2005). the researcher has not experienced these same issues manifesting themselves in face to face training where the trainer is nearly always from the same culture as the trainee. in this study, the researcher addresses one crucial aspect of communication that is essential for successful interactions between vte trainers and trainees, namely the development of intercultural competence (chen, 2005; morley, 1991), which deardoff (2006) notes as the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations based on one’s intercultural knowledge, skills and attitude. making an assumption that we all think alike because of similar superficial online appearances may cause misunderstanding in communication because people could still be different at a deeper level (jandt, 2010). in a global vte, communication between trainers and trainees is often complicated and at times problematic. trainers and trainees alike from different cultures do not attach the same meaning to nonverbal language, thus the interpretation by the trainee may not be the same as that which was intended by the trainer (matsumoto & juang, 2008; varner & beamer, 2011). understanding the role that intercultural competence of the trainer plays in enhancing the global intercultural learning experience here becomes an important issue. few published articles, to any extent focus on the phenomenon of trainer intercultural competence in vtes and none focusing on the lived experience. thus the researcher asks, “to what extent and in what ways does the trainee experience trainer intercultural competence within a global virtual training environment?” 2. definition of terms intercultural communication the term intercultural communication is defined as “a symbolic, interpretive, transactional, contextual process, in which people from different cultures create shared meanings” (lustig & koester, 2007:46). in this paper the term intercultural communication is used to mean “the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately with people of different cultures”. intercultural competence irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 13 deardorff (2004, p. 194) points out that a generic definition accepted by intercultural scholars defines the term intercultural communication as “the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations based on one’s intercultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes”. in this paper the term intercultural competence is used to mean “the ability to discern and experience relevant cultural differences”. intercultural pedagogical approach according to gogolin (2011), the term intercultural pedagogical approach means “dealing with the diversity of circumstances and experiences of abilities and dispositions of students: thus, with the constellations of multicultural teaching and learning”. in this paper the term intercultural pedagogical approach is used to mean “an approach that strives to include all learners in the education regardless of what culture, identities or nationality they are from”. lived experience according to (moustakas (1994) the term lived experience means “emphasising the importance of individual experiences of people as conscious human beings”. in this paper the term lived experience means “the first-hand accounts and impressions of living as a global vte trainer”. technology enhanced learning according to kirkwood & price (2014), the term technology enhanced learning means “the application of information and communication technologies to teaching and learning”. in this paper the term technology enhanced learning is used to mean “any online facility or system that directly supports learning and teaching”. virtual training environments fardinpour (2016), defined the term virtual training environment as “a training-specific vle that creates a safe, immersive, authentic and accessible training environment in which to practise, re-assess, and master skills”. in this paper the term virtual training environment is used to mean “a virtual leaning environment for training where training is delivered by a combination of text based discussion forums and virtual labs in conjunction with synchronous video with voice interactive training”. 3. literature review the researcher considered various theoretical framework models of intercultural competence which address attitudes, skills and knowledge as the components of intercultural competence: facework-based model (ting-toomey & kurogi, 1998); pyramid model of intercultural competence (deardorff, 2006; 2009); global competencies model (hunter et al., 2006). c o’ toole 14 however the researcher chose the pyramid model of intercultural competence 1 (deardorff, 2006; 2009) as the theoretical framework for this study as it emphasises that an individual can be more effective and appropriate in one’s intercultural interactions acquiring the necessary knowledge, skills and forming the requisite attitudes. the exploration of trainer attitudes, skills, knowledge and comprehension as components of intercultural competence, in achieving the goal of training, are best placed within this research framework. deardorff’s framework breaks down intercultural competence into the following sub categories: (1) desired external outcome, (2) desired internal outcome, (3) knowledge and comprehension, (4) skills, and (5) attitudes (see figure 1). the core principles 3, 4 and 5 match the core components of intercultural competence being explored. the model will thus be used to explore the trainee experience of trainer intercultural competence based on trainers intercultural knowledge and comprehension, skills and attitudes and desired outcome to “behave and communicate effectively and appropriately […] to achieve one’s goal to some degree” (deardorff, 2006). figure 1 pyramid model of intercultural competence (deardorff, 2006, 2009) deardorff’s (2006) study found that it is possible to assess degrees or levels of intercultural competence using qualitative methods in the assessment, including interviews, observation, and judgment by self and others. more specifically, ninety percent of the panel of expert interculturalists agreed that interviews, mixed measures, qualitative measures, self-report instruments, and triangulation were effective ways to assess intercultural competence (deardorff, 2009, p.478). 1 the researcher deeply appreciated dr. deardorff’s permission of using this conceptual framework in the study. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 15 lauring (2011) examined the area of intercultural competence in relation to global organisational cultures, but from the point of view of the communications supporting the employees’ general work place tasks rather than the employees’ personal experience of intercultural competence within global vtes. in general, the literature has focused much more on the intercultural communication technology (chiper, 2013) and the communicative pedagogy itself than how trainers can enhance the intercultural communication and improve training within global vtes. a review of the research focused on intercultural competence and global online training helps to illuminate the current study. specifically the areas of required skills, experience, global awareness, good communication, intercultural development and a supportive environment were chosen based on deardorff’s desired external outcomes. studies on culture and trainers of vtes reveal that they may lack the required skills as many trainers question the value of addressing culturally related objectives, have minimal experience carrying out cultural explorations (sercu, 2005; dimitrov & haque, 2016) or question their preparedness to train culture specific content (sercu, mendez & castro, 2005). professional development for global vte trainers therefore could adopt an approach that addresses these required skills in culture and pedagogy. in particular, we need to build on the developing base of work on intercultural language studies where there is language hegemony of some kind (goodfellow, et al., 2009). the global trainer should have the background required to effectively ‘read’ a second culture: “to interpret its symbols and negotiate its meanings in a practical day-to-day context” (heyward, 2004, p. 51). trainers increasingly have to master crucial 21st century skill sets which include global awareness (stewart, 2007; morris, savani, & roberts, 2014) and competence (jackson, 2009; scarboro, 2012; sperandio et al., 2010). it takes a crossculturally competent trainer to diversify vte experiences to include global dimensions and engage students in cross-cultural experiences (diller & moule, 2005). larsson (2010) notes that in today’s multicultural training environments it is essential to be a successful communicator. in addition, in order to effectively communicate in intercultural vtes, trainers need to be competent users of foreign languages; therefore, incorporating an intercultural approach into training (young & sachdev, 2011). as highlighted by many researchers (byram et al. 2002; sercu 2010), intercultural communicative competence involves the ability to use a foreign language appropriately in various intercultural situations. elola & oskoz (2008) have shed light on the beneficial effects for intercultural trainers engaging in online intercultural development. both technology enhanced learning and outside cultural experiences that intercultural trainers engage in may also contribute to an increased willingness to communicate with foreigners, openness to other cultures and deepened intercultural understanding (schuetze, 2008; zeiss & isabelli-garcı´a, 2005).it is important to note however that development of intercultural competence takes place over time (deardorff, 2006). a supportive environment is required to derive intercultural understanding from an intercultural vte experience. such experience should help create a welcoming environment (cognitive and affective), otherwise trainees may become jaded and disillusioned with the c o’ toole 16 experience and may derive no benefit from it (sen, 2003). both perry and southwell (2011) and (trede et al., 2013), note that incorporating intercultural competence within training strategies can have a profound influence on global training outcomes. therefore, a study which carefully looks at the lived experiences of trainees within global vtes deserves serious exploration. focusing on the lived experience is powerful for understanding subjective trainee perceptions of the trainer enhanced intercultural training experience, gaining insights into their motivations and actions, and cutting through the clutter of taken-for-granted assumptions and conventional wisdom. 4. philosophical approach to understand the purpose and position of this research, it is necessary to outline the researcher’s own ontological and epistemological presuppositions (philosophical approach) underlying this study. the researcher’s position is taken from a constructivist/interpretivist paradigm where the view of the world is that knowledge is based on experiences that are socially constructed (creswell, 2009) and emphasises the importance of personal perspective and interpretation. thus the researcher sought a method that allowed exploration of the lived experience of vte trainees and consequently chose phenomenology. the research purpose has personal significance to the researcher given his own direct connection and experience of being a trainee and sometimes a trainer within global vtes. 5. research question this study aimed to explore the following research question: “to what extent, and in what ways, does the trainee experience trainer intercultural competence within a global virtual training environment?” 6. methodology research design in this qualitative research study, the researcher sought to understand the lived experiences of professional trainees within a vte, of trainer intercultural competence. creswell (2007) described five qualitative traditions as narrative, grounded theory, case study, ethnography, and phenomenological. having reviewed all the researcher employed the qualitative method of phenomenology as “a phenomenology provides a deep understanding of a phenomenon as experienced by several individuals”, (creswell, 2007, p.62). this study consists of an interpretivist narrative of the phenomenon based on the views of two independent participants as well as the views of the researcher, the third participant. the researcher subsequently conducted an analysis of themes in order to explore “the deep meaning of individual subject’s experiences” (rossman & rallis, 1998, p.72). irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 17 according to giorgi (2009), the aim of the researcher is to describe as accurately as possible the phenomenon, refraining from any pre-given framework, but remaining true to the facts. accordingly, this study relied on detailed data from individual in-depth written accounts together with a semi-structured interview to investigate the research question. here analysis facilitates the researcher identifying/exploring themes emerging from qualitative data (cohen, et al., 2011). researcher’s and participants’ contexts participants were experienced employees within the financial services sector, on information technology (it) related training programmes delivered by a us based global training organisation. the first participant (who was also the researcher) was 46 years old, male and of irish decent. the second participant was 40 years old, female and of irish decent. the third participant was 45 years old, male and of indian decent but had been living and working in ireland for 20 years. the researcher was employed in an irish based life and pensions institution while the other two participants were employed in a financial payments corporation. therefore, the researcher’s insider position, background and perspectives have influenced the rationale, operationalization and interpretation of this research. however, insider mitigation techniques proposed by others (mercer, 2007) were employed. specifically the epistemological assumptions undergirding the methodological approach are made clear, the researcher’s biases are disclosed, the researcher situated himself and acknowledged his role (lincoln & guba, 1985). the researcher also worked to challenge his subjective tendencies through the process of researcher reflexivity (glesne & peshkin, 1992) and peer debriefing where he had a colleague review the research before and after the data collection. in addition open ended questions were used. participant sampling purposive sampling was used to select participants. according to patton (2002), this sampling method solicits participants who have experienced the phenomenon being studied and meet the inclusion criteria being researched. three participants were invited to take part in the study due to the limited time and scale of the research and also the need to gather in-depth experiences of the phenomenon. it therefore aligns to smith, flowers and larkin (2009), who advocate that a small sample size is acceptable as phenomenology deals with understanding specific phenomena in specific contexts. selection criterion was having more than five years’ experience as a trainee within virtual training environments of global training institutions. ethical and consent issues were duly considered given the nature of the data to be collected (kanuka & anderson, 2007, p.5). ethical approval was granted from lancaster university, and written permission to invite the trainees was not required as they were not representing their employers. participants were recruited through email invitation containing a link to the research project participant consent form as well as a participant information sheet. participants were informed that participation in the research was voluntary, and that they could choose not to answer specific questions. data collection written reports of the participants experience based on semi-structured questions were requested from two participants. the researcher obtained written consent to obtain the written c o’ toole 18 reports. the written report was piloted with experienced trainees and revised based on feedback. participants were given a total of five days to complete, with a reminder email sent after three days. they were informed that the data obtained would be anonymised and that they should not spend more than forty minutes on the written report. a semi-structured interview was undertaken with the third participant. the interview was conducted face to face and was limited to 30 minutes. the researcher obtained verbal consent to record the interview. the interview questions were piloted with experienced trainees and revised based on feedback. both written reports and the transcribed interview were initially reviewed for completeness by the researcher. this gave a closer look at the data collected, and provided some familiarity with the data. this was viewed as a first step in the analysis and, once reviewed the data was re-read systematically to allow for patterns and themes to emerge. the purpose of collecting data from three different informants using two different data gathering methods is an attempt to gather a diverse set of research data. that is, the researcher attempted to use diverse data to enhance the exploration of the same phenomenon in terms of person, space and time. here analysis facilitates the researcher identifying/exploring themes emerging from qualitative data (cohen, et al., 2011). data analysis the researcher performed an ipa analysis of the written report and interview data using a computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software (caqdas) tool called nvivo 9 to code the transcripts, identify themes and visualise models of the data. gibbs (2003) specifically supports the use of nvivo for ipa and other types of qualitative data analysis because of the way the software makes the original interview data easily accessible and the analyses well grounded in the data. another key benefit of using nvivo was that the researcher could minimise at least some researcher bias by visualising the texts as thoroughly coded and linked to themes. in this way, the researcher could see quite plainly what he addressed or did not address in the data. interpretive phenomenological analysis (ipa) was performed, including the following characteristics: (a) movement from what is unique to a participant to what is shared among the participants, (b) description of the experience which moves to an interpretation of the experience, (c) commitment to understanding the participant’s point of view, and (d) psychological focus on personal meaning-making within a particular context (smith et al., 2009). following the ipa process, the researcher conducted initial noting, which includes descriptive, linguistic, and conceptual comments (smith et al., 2009). after completing initial noting on each participant’s data, the researcher searched for emerging themes across all participants by examining discrete sections of the written reports and interview transcript and simultaneously recalling what had been learned during the analysis up to this point. the themes not only reflected the participants’ original words and thoughts but also the researcher’s interpretations. in the development of themes, the researcher supported each theme again by descriptive, linguistic, and conceptual comments made by each of the participants. the process produced a rich and varied description of the participants’ training experience, their perception of trainer intercultural competence and its improvement of training within vtes. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 19 data validation of the research themes involved triangulation, researcher acknowledgement of potential bias, member checks, peer reviews and comparison of descriptive data collected (hays & singh, 2012). 7. ethical considerations permission to conduct the research was obtained from lancaster university prior to data collection. the researcher then identified participants and provided them with informed consent forms, which informed them about the study and let them know about their rights as participants (creswell, 2013). using pseudonyms, anonymity protected the privacy of everyone involved, both for the participants and the heis. additionally, the data was stored in password-protected documents on secure servers. 8. limitations this study represents an initial exploration of the perceptions of trainees within a global vte of their trainers’ intercultural competence. as such it is foundation research in this area. given the time constraints with this short study, it was only possible to ascertain written reports from two participants and interview one other participant for a short time. in addition, all three trainees (one being the researcher himself) were known to the researcher. they were it trainees based at global offices of financial institutions within ireland receiving professional training from an it training company providing training on a global scale using its vte. future research could widen the context to include cross-sector studies with larger sample sizes in order to perform further analyses to confirm whether intercultural competence makes a significant difference to training within global vtes for trainees from all industry sectors and receiving training other than it training. the researcher acknowledges the possibility of researcher bias within this study given his involvement as both author in the original paper and a participant, and the professional relationships that have been sustained over time with the other selected participants. where the source of bias could have appeared in particular was in conducting the interview (cohen et al., 2011) and soliciting written reports. because of this, every effort was taken to ensure questions were phrased in an open manner, without pre-empting responses. opportunities were also offered for participants to elaborate on experiences that the researcher would have knowledge of. 9. findings and discussion the findings section is organised by three themes identified in the data analysis section: 1) substantial intercultural biases held by trainers towards trainees 2) frequent communication problems between trainers and trainees 3) the need for trainers to enhance their intercultural competence the themes developed in this study illustrate to what extent and in what ways the trainee experiences trainer intercultural competence within a global virtual training environment. c o’ toole 20 the section below will describe each of these in more detail, and support these with extracts from the written reports and interview transcript. written reports are identified as [w1*] 2 and [w2]. the interview transcript is identified as [i1]. 1) substantial intercultural biases 3 held by trainers towards trainees the researcher found that all of the participants in this study experienced substantial intercultural biases on behalf of their trainers towards them. “where i have experienced poor training with the inability of the trainer to communicate effectively and appropriately with myself, i can categorically say that i have felt significant biases towards me. in one such instance, a trainer assumed that within the financial services industry in ireland, the it term ‘switch’ had the same meaning to that in the trainer’s culture. the resulting miscomprehension led to the trainee making a fundamental mistake when putting his training into practice.” [i1] another participant further identified biases in the context of preconceptions trainers had as regards the ability of trainees using virtual training labs that required keyboard input. as this participant put it, “… when attempting a task specified by the trainer, i entered ‘alt and q’ which caused the lab software to stop working. this was due the fact that in the trainer’s culture, a different keyboard character configuration applies. once the trainer checked and realised the need on their part to ensure that trainees from each different culture were given instructions appropriate to the keyboard configuration of their culture, they were able to perform the allocated training tasks,…” [w2] 2) frequent communication problems between trainers and trainees all three participants highlighted the difficulty with communication between the trainee and trainer speaking different languages. “to be honest, trainers can rarely communicate the information first time, due to difficulty with foreign language pronunciation. i will very rarely interrupt the trainers as they have a similar difficulty with my pronunciation. i prefer to refer to the manual myself…“ [w1] “i don’t like to be seen to be ignorant throughout the training session, so i don’t highlight my communication issues.” [w2] one participant recalled an occasion when there was miscommunication regarding the submission deadline for a virtual lab assignment, which resulted in a student failing a task. “on one occasion, i posted my assignment by 12pm. however the trainer incorrectly assumed i was residing in a mst zone, but i was in a gmt zone and so my assignment was late.” [w2] 2 the asterisk after w1 indicates that this participant was the researcher. 3 trainee’s interpreting and judging phenomena by standards inherent to their own culture (douglas, 1982). irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 21 these participant perceptions seem to support the idea of how vte trainers could consciously use a foreign language appropriately in various intercultural situations (byram et al. 2002; sercu 2010). it is interesting to note that, in order to effectively communicate in intercultural vtes, trainers need to be competent users of foreign languages; therefore, incorporating an intercultural approach into training (young & sachdev 2011). 3) the need for trainers to enhance their intercultural competence all participants in this study experienced great benefit to enhanced trainer intercultural competence by means of comparing their experience of receiving training on different parts of the same course, formally assessed and delivered by trainers displaying higher levels of intercultural competence. one participant recalled the first training session where the trainer was more competent with the differing cultures, and noted the increased activity, the higher standard of critical analysis and discourse, and overall the much improved training scores. “i could immediately see how my level of knowledge increased. it was euphoric. we began to communicate much more and my overall understanding and level of knowledge on the subject increased greatly.” [w2] all participants noted that the initial negative feelings associated with the extra time required to comprehend information from a trainer of lower intercultural competence gave way to many positive emotions associated with the increased knowledge gain from receiving training delivered with a greater level of intercultural competence. “initially i felt that there was a huge effort required to comprehend and undertake the training tasks as the trainer was not competent as regards my own culture. however it soon became apparent that my additional effort was not required, when i recognised the improved intercultural competence held by the second trainer who was substantially more competent regarding my own culture specific methods of comprehension.” [i1] all participants indicated a preference for global training organisations to enhance their trainers’ intercultural competence as a primary objective of their role within the industry. “… and i now have a preference to require any trainers working with a training corporation providing virtual training globally to enhance their level of intercultural competence to enable optimum training and i see this as a primary goal of their training role. i have stipulated this requirement to three such corporations and they have confirmed that they are ensuring their corporate strategy is such aligned.” [i1] this indicated that global training organisations had consciously made a shift towards an intercultural pedagogical approach to their training provision. this is further evidenced by one participant who explained that the training schedule for all trainees in a global training organisation he had received training from, were “…including a development plan for their trainers to develop intercultural competence by means of both formal academic qualifications and spending periods c o’ toole 22 working in various globally located centres with different cultures”[w2]. in this particular research, using the qualitative methods of written accounts and interview, the researcher assessed vte trainer intercultural competence by self and others (the participants) as was suggested by deardorff (2006). trainees perceived global trainers of vtes having low levels of intercultural competence. this is specifically so with regard to not having acquired the necessary skills, knowledge and requisite attitudes required for satisfactory intercultural competence as outlined in deardorff’s pyramid model of intercultural competence. in addition the study showed that these trainees also see the benefit of and wish to set the requirement for on-going trainer intercultural competence development as they perceive it improves training. this agrees with elola and oskoz (2008) and with by perry and southwell (2011), in that trainers should be made aware of the benefits of enhancing intercultural competence and how it can improve training. it also strengthens the view of diller and moule (2005) who assert that trainers should ensure that they diversify vte experiences to include global dimensions and engage students in cross-cultural experiences in order to improve the training. the findings show that in the hands of this researcher, trainers have substantial intercultural biases towards trainees. the frequent misunderstanding together with preconceptions held by trainers of trainees is aligned to sercu, mendez and castro (2005) who question their preparedness to train culture specific content. in agreement with the opinion of larsson (2010), the findings recommended that in today’s multicultural training environments with frequent communication problems between trainers and trainees, it is essential to be a successful communicator. this is also aligned with the view of young and sachdev (2011) who assert that trainers need to be competent users of foreign languages, in order to effectively communicate in intercultural vtes. in this research global trainees appear to experience benefit from a welcoming environment where trainers derive intercultural understanding. this finding supports sen (2003) who asserts that trainer enhancement has a positive effect on the training experience. consequently, there is a clear requirement by trainers to master critical 21st century skill sets which include global awareness. “in my opinion the positive welcome and constant effort on behalf of the trainer to ensure the technical terms were understood by trainees from cultures other than his own, in a manner that was not condescending towards trainees, had a direct and definite positive affect on the trainees’ learning within the vte.” [w2] this substantiates the need for trainers to enhance their global awareness as asserted by stewart (2007) and intercultural competence by scarboro (2012). the results are particularly exciting because as this comment indicates, the trainee lived experience of enhanced trainer intercultural competence within vtes is that it leads to improved training, which they perceive as worth the additional trainer effort. the results further scaffold those found by perry and southwell (2011) and shows that the use of intercultural competence skills and pedagogies by trainers has a profound influence on vte training outcomes. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2018 23 10. conclusion and practical implications this qualitative study attempted to explore how intercultural competence is experienced within global vtes, through the lens of trainees. it is an important complement to the existing literature on intercultural competence. this is particularly so as regards globalisation and intercultural communication within the context of technology enhanced learning. although the study had its limitations, in the hands of the researcher the findings are compelling. the key things to take from this study are as follows. firstly to be aware of the need to reduce and eliminate intercultural biases towards trainees. secondly to improve intercultural communication between trainees and trainers. and lastly for global trainers to proactively enhance their intercultural competence as they continue as practicing global training professionals. this alone may go a long way toward helping to improve the training within global vtes. based on the findings of this study, it is vitally important to promote and allow for a fundamental belief on the part of the trainer of the value of intercultural competence within global virtual training environments for enhancing the intercultural training experience. as gorski (2008) advocates, we should abandon the path of least resistance and to choose a more authentic intercultural education. in this regard the researcher has the following recommendations for practice. global trainers need to consider ongoing intercultural skills training and development; have cultural awareness in the training context; recognise variation in learner expectations; develop intercultural learning styles; employ effective cross-cultural communication styles. the global trainer needs to have all the key intercultural competences and a lot of personal experience. they need to establish credibility and trust overcoming any power differential and provide honest feedback whilst taking account of the role of language and the complexities of communication in cross-cultural interactions. the global trainer should be flexible, open-minded and creative and have the ability to accept the controversies and divergences that may emerge in addition to refraining from providing stereotypical answers. an experiential learning approach may be applicable. 11. recommendations for future research this study represents an initial exploration of the perceptions of trainees within a global vte of their trainers’ intercultural competence. what is still unknown is how trainers themselves experience their level of intercultural competence and how easily they feel they can and are willing to proactively enhance their intercultural competence. carrying out this research would provide a complimentary view of trainers’ intercultural competence within a global vte. it would also provide a more balanced view having researched the perceptions of both sets of key stakeholders, both the trainers and trainees. in addition, as this small scale study was subject to time constraints and a very specific context (it trainees based at global offices of financial institutions within ireland receiving professional training), further research over a longer period, in a wide context, involving a greater sample would help to affirm or otherwise the current findings. such findings would be more generalizable. c o’ toole 24 for example the context could be widened to include cross-sector studies with larger sample sizes in order to perform further analyses to confirm whether intercultural competence makes a significant difference to training within global vtes for trainees from all industry sectors and receiving training other than it training. acknowledgements this research was undertaken as part of the phd in e-research and technology enhanced learning in the department of educational research at lancaster university. i am pleased to acknowledge the contribution of dr. murat oztok in supporting the development of this study and 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(2005). a comparison of international student and american student engagement in effective educational practices. the journal of higher education, 76(2), 209-231. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14675986.2013.825578 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 2, issue 1, 2017 irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2017. © 2017 g conole. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irishbased professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. research through the generations: reflecting on the past, present and future gráinne conole 1 consultant & visiting professor of dublin city university, dublin, ireland (received april 2017; final version received may 2017) abstract the paper provides a reflection on the past and present of research on the use of digital technologies for learning, teaching and research, along with an extrapolation of the future of the field. it considers which technologies have been transformative in the last thirty years or so along with the nature of the transformation and the challenges. research in the field is grouped into three types: pedagogical, technical and organizational. the emergence and nature of digital learning as a field is considered. six facets of digital learning, and in particular digital technologies, as a research field are described: the good and the bad of digital technologies, the speed of change, the new forms of discourse and collaboration, the importance of understanding users, the new practices that have emerged, and finally a reflection on the wider impact. 1. introduction on the 1 st november 2016 dublin city university hosted ‘the next generation digital learning research symposium.’ this paper fleshes out the keynote given as part of the symposium. the title i was given ‘research through the generations: reflecting on the past, present and future, was an interesting and challenging focus. in particular looking back at the emergence of a field is useful and can give an indication of where the field is going in the near future. 2. emergent technologies a number of reports track emergent technologies. perhaps the best know is the new media consortium horizon report series (nmc, 2016). the 2016 report for higher education indicates which technologies are likely to have the most impact in one, three and five years time, along with trends in the short, medium and long term. 1 corresponding author. email: gconole@gmail.com http://www.ilta.ie/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 mailto:gconole@gmail.com g. conole 2 in one year’s time bring your own device and learning analytics/adaptive learning are likely to be most important. in three years’ time augmented and virtual reality and makerspaces are listed. the concept of makerspaces needs unpacking. the question of how to renovate or repurpose classrooms and labs to address the needs of the future is being answered through the concept of makerspaces, which offers tools and learning experiences to help people carry out their ideas. the driving force behind makerspaces is rooted in the maker movement, a following comprised of artists, technology enthusiasts, engineers, builders, and people with a passion for making things. and in five years’ time affective computing and robotics are likely to have the most impact. in terms of trends, in the short-term there is likely to be a growing focus on measuring learning and on increased use of blended learning designs. in the mid-term, redesigning learning spaces and a shift to deeper learning approaches will be the focus. in the long-term advancing cultures of innovation and rethinking how institutions work will be important. solvable challenges are blending formal and informal learning, and improving digital literacy. difficult challenges include dealing with competing models of education and personalized learning. finally, wicked challenges include balancing our connected and unconnected lives, and keeping education relevant. the open university uk have an innovating pedagogy series of reports, which describe ten ways in which digital technologies are going to affect education (innovating pedagogy, 2016). the report identifies the following as the best ways of facilitating learning to equip learners for the future: cooperative learning, collaborative and social learning, feedback for learning, active and constructive learning. the first is learning through social media, which reflects the increasing importance of social media in education. this is particularly relevant for learning outside of the formal learning context. tools such as twitter and facebook are being used to share ideas and engage in conversations, enabling learners to access expert advice and receive feedback on ideas so that these can be improved. however, a downside of social media is separating useful information from ‘white noise’ and having the digital literacy skills to assess whether information found is relevant, correct and of good quality. the second is productive failure, not a new concept, but one that has developed in the digital age. this method of teaching gives learners complex problems to solve; by struggling and sometimes failing to find a solution, learners gain a deeper understanding of the nature of the problem. the focus is about embracing challenge and uncertainty; important skills learners need to develop. we are educating learners who face an uncertain but constantly changing future, and who will be doing jobs that do not even exist today. therefore, we need to shift the focus from knowledge recall to development of transferable skills and competences, such as critical thinking, problem solving, and team work. the third is ‘teachback’ where learners learn from each other. one person (who may be a teacher, an expert, or another student) explains their knowledge of a topic to a learner. then, that learner attempts to explain, or teach back, what they have understood. this offers two benefits. it helps learners to understand a topic or problem by reframing it in their own terms. they also need to explain what they have learned in a way that is understandable. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3 design thinking is listed as the forth innovation. design thinking solves problems using the methods and thinking processes used by designers. these include creative processes such as experimenting, creating and prototyping models, soliciting feedback and redesigning. again these are all important transferable skills that are needed to equip learners for the future. the fifth is learning from a crowd. through social media learners are now part of a global community of peers and experts, providing them with unprecedented access to information and expertise. crowdsourcing can be used to collect and curate learning and teaching resources, and provide learners with opportunities to share and discuss their work. learning through video games is listed as the sixth innovation. it has long being known that games can make learning fun, interactive and stimulating (gee, 2003). so it is interesting to note that both productive failure and making learning fun are important and when designing learning interactions it is important to give consideration to what is the appropriate balance to these two seemingly counter-intuitive concepts. the importance of learning analytics as a new branch of research the use of digital technologies for education has emerged in recent years (ferguson, 2013). the focus to date has been on measuring and predicting the learning processes of learners by tracing their behaviour and making inferences about their learning. summative learning analytics enables teachers to identify which learners might need support. the seventh innovation in the report highlights formative analytics, where the focus is use of the analytics by the learner. the analytics can help the learner reflect on what they have learned, and enable them to set and measure progress against their learning goals, as well as identify what can be improved. the report argues that ‘learners need to be educated not just for today but for the future. they should acquire skills and dispositions that will enable them to cope with an uncertain life and a complex work environment’. hence the eight innovation is a focus on learning for the future. therefore the focus shifts from knowledge recall to helping learners develop transferable skills such as critical thinking and problem solving and to help them to learn, unlearn and relearn. an interesting concept of ‘translanguaging’ is listed as the ninth innovation, which refers to the ability to move flexibly and fluidly between languages. many argue that learners develop different cognitive skills when learning languages (deák, 2014). however, it is interesting to see how this concept develops as automatic language translation tools become increasingly sophisticated (henry, 2014). the final innovation is the concept of ‘blockchain’ learning. a blockchain stores digital events securely on every user’s computer rather than in a central database. blockchain learning explores how this approach could be applied to education, shifting from central records of student performance held by schools and universities to a more democratic model in which achievements are recorded by a wider range of participants. blockchain technology allows any participant to add a new record such as an exam score to a single digital chain of events. this chain is stored across many computers, yet cannot be altered or undone. this arguably has the potential to transform education, enabling a learner to control their learning and demonstration of achievement of learning outcomes, and helps learners become lifelong learners. g. conole 4 3. transformative technologies figure 1 shows an e-learning timeline of the technologies that have had the most impact on education over the last thirty years or so, from the emergence of tools for creating rich multimedia learning through to learning analytics to help teachers better support their learners and to help learners better understand how they are learning and to help them improve their learning strategies. arguably these have had a transformative impact on education, changing the way we learn and teach. the concept of transformation refers to something that causes a marked change in something or someone. and it is interesting to reflect on the fact that transformation is an inherent characteristic of learning. laurillard (1993) argues that knowledge is information already transformed: selected, analyzed, interpreted, integrated, articulated, tested evaluated (1993: 123). the notion of transformative technologies can be traced back to mcluhan’s seminal work ‘understanding media’ (mcluhan, 1964). he argued that we cannot learn anything of importance about a media by looking at its content, and that instead it is important to explore how the technological characteristics of the medium shape our lives. he argues that: the medium is the message. this is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium-that is, of any extension of ourselves -result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology (1996: 7). the concept of transformative technologies can be related to the concept of disruptive innovation developed by christensen (1997). although controversial it is a useful concept as it also emphasizes transformation, as well as the idea of disruption and in particular disruption of the established. in educational terms, disruptive technologies challenge the established in terms of: practices (thinking about how technologies have enabled more open practices through social media, and how this has changed the way learners access information and communicate with others), business models (in a world where content and expertise is available for free through oer and moocs, what are the implications for traditional institutions?), and pedagogies (what new pedagogies are arising as a result of technologies and what new pedagogies are needed to prepare learners for the future)? irish journal of technology enhanced learning 5 figure 1: an e-learning timeline of transformative technologies table 1 lists five examples of disruptive technologies and what they have replaced. these result in new practices. for example, the emergence of word processors meant that text did not have to been written in perfect form, text could be ‘cut and pasted’ and moved around, resulting in a different way of writing and cognitive development. owston et al. (1992) explored the effect of word processing on students’ writing quality and revision strategies. wikipedia has replaced paper-based encyclopedias, providing an ongoing body of knowledge created by thousands of participants. wikis more generally are great tools for collaborative learning and co-construction of knowledge. tools like google drive are increasingly replacing standalone office software and again are great tools for collaboration. mobile phones have practically replaced landlines, and mean that learning anywhere, anytime is now a reality. finally, if not replacing exactly, oer and moocs are complementing existing resources and courses. disruptive innovation replacing word processers typewriters wikipedia encyclopedias google drive office software mobile phones landlines oer/moocs resources and courses table 1: examples of disruptive technologies 3. five transformative technologies g. conole 6 the talk focused on five relatively recent transformative technologies: the web/wi-fi, learning management systems (lmss), mobile devices, open educational resources (oer) and massive open online courses (moocs), and social media, and consider what were the characteristics that made them transformative, along with the challenges to their use. the transformative characteristics of these technologies include: access to rich interactive resources, immediacy, many ways to communicate and collaborate, enabling more open practices, and portability across devices and locations. 3.1 the web/wi-fi the web has transformed every aspect of our lives; from looking up information, to booking services online, to learning through online resources and courses, to communicating with family and peers globally. it is amazing to think that the web is less than 25 years old. the web, and in particular social media has empowered individuals, enabling them to have access to information that they would not have been able to access in the past. the participatory nature of social media means that users are no longer passive recipients but active producers of information. some of the advantages of the web include: it enables access to mainly free information, there is now a relatively low cost of connection, it facilitates rapid interactive communication, it enables the exchange of high volumes of data, it is accessible anywhere, and it has become a global media. 2 practically all organisations have some level of webpresence and searching the web is usually the first way in which people find out about an organization, for example a student making decisions about which courses to take and which institution to go to, or an applicant looking at a company’s website. given the importance of the web, access is crucial and we now expect near ubiquitous access. public services and private organisations alike have recognized the importance of good wifi. for example most hotels provide free access to wi-fi, wi-fi is increasingly available on trains and even planes, and most homes have their own wi-fi network. the advantages of wi-fi include: convenience enabling users to access content and communicate from a variety of sources via different mobile and laptop devices, mobility – users can not just get online from their workplace or home, but in hotels and coffee shops, productivity – enabling users to carry on doing work-related activities from a variety of locations, cost – wireless networking hardware is not expensive and hence is accessible to most. 3 3.2 learning management systems the year 1993 marked a watershed in terms of the emergence of learning management systems (lmss), which provided holistic learning environments that mirrored teacher practice in terms of how they support learning. lmss consist of a set of tools to enable teachers and learners to: upload content, communicate and collaborate, and to provide a mechanism for uploading and providing feedback on assignments. in addition, lmss now have a rich set of learning analytics tools to provide teacher and learners with feedback on learner interactions in the system and progression. lmss were important because they enabled teachers to create holistic learning environments for their learners, but also they 2 adapted from https://lorenapomposodraft.wordpress.com/2008/10/16/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-theworld-wide-web/ 3 adapted from https://ipoint-tech.com/wireless-networking-wi-fi-advantages-and-disadvantages-to-wirelessnetworking/ irish journal of technology enhanced learning 7 marked a turning point in terms of institutions seeing technologies shift from peripheral innovations to part of the core technical infrastructure provided to students. 3.3 mobile devices increasingly, access to content and communicating with peers and family is done via mobile devices (smart phones, tablets and laptops), to such an extent that many predict the death of desktop computers in the near future. 4 mobile devices are relatively cheap now, generally have good screen interfaces, enable alternatives to keyboard input such as touch and voice input (particularly useful for those with accessibility problems and low-literate users). the advantages of mobile devices include: being able to access information and to communicate anywhere and anytime. furthermore, there are now many sites and apps for entertainment from simple apps enabling a user to play card games, to apps enabling you to play games with others online, to apps given you access to audio and video (for example netflix). other benefits include online banking and shopping, safety in terms of individuals being able to call for help in an emergency and taking photographs to record special events. 5 3.3 oer and moocs unesco argues that education is a fundamental human right and essential for the development of society and eradication of poverty and low literacy skills. 6 as such organisations like unesco and the hewlitt foundation have been active promoters of the development and use of oer. the announcement of mit that it was making a significant amount of its course content available online was quickly followed by the development of the openlearn respository in the open university uk. there are now literally thousands of high-quality oer repositories worldwide. more recently the concept of moocs have emerged. initiated through the connectivism and connective knowledge (cck08) mooc in 2008, which aimed to harness the networking affordances of social media to facilitate connectivist learning (siemens, 2005). later organisational like edx, udacity and coursera developed more didactic moocs, called xmoocs, which were more individually focussed and consisted of interaction with resources and videos and feedback via e-assessment. oer and moocs are challenging traditional educational business models and resulting in the emergence of new ways of recognition of non-formal and informal learning (witthaus et al., 2016). 3.4 social media o’reilly (2005) used the term ‘web 2.0’ to emphasis the more participatory nature of the new digital technologies that were beginning to emerge at that time. since then the breadth and variety of web 2.0 tools has expanding rapidly (conole and alevizou, 2010). conole (2013) lists the characteristics of social media as: the ability to peer critique and openly comment on others peoples’ work, tools to enable user-generated content, mechanisms and tools for collective aggregation, being part of a global, distributed community, creation of tailored digital personas and individualised digital identities. de frietas and conole (2010) also argue that there has been a shift in the use of tools, which emphasises the more 4 https://www.russharvey.bc.ca/resources/isthedesktopdead.html 5 http://www.ibuzzle.com/articles/advantages-of-mobile-devices.html 6 see for example g. conole 8 participatory and communicative capabilities of new technologies. these enable content and information to be distributed in a variety of different ways and hence the nature of content, both in terms of production and distribution, has shifted with greater control for the individual as producer and user. 4. the characteristics of transformative technologies 4.1 access to rich interactive resources a key feature of the web is that it provides access to an abundance of information; arguably anything you need to know is available on the web. this has resulted in a shift from a situation where knowledge is expensive and privileged to an ‘ecology of abundance’ (weller, 2011a). this had profound implications, particularly in the developing world in terms of giving people access to an unprecedented amount of information. carr (2008) argues that: as the internet becomes our universal medium, it is reshaping what might be called the economics of culture. because most common cultural goods consist of words, images, or sounds, which all can be expressed in digital form, they are becoming as cheap to reproduce and distribute as any other information product. many of them are also becoming easier to create, thanks to the software and storage services provided through the net and inexpensive production tools like camcorders, microphones, digital cameras, and scanners…. the shift from scarcity to abundance in media means that, when it comes to deciding what to read, watch, and listen to, we have far more choices than our parents or grandparents did. weller (2011a) argues: the economic model which has underpinned many content based industries has been based on an assumption of scarcity. with a digital, open, networked approach we are witnessing a shift to abundance of content, and subsequently new economic models are being developed which have this as an assumption. 4.2 immediacy coupled with the fact that digital technologies enable learners to have access to rich interactive resources is the immediacy of technologies; i.e. access to knowledge is immediate. the answer to virtually anything is only a google click away. tapscott (1994) describes the ‘age of network intelligence’ as all encompassing and revolutionizing arising from today’s digital technologies and their associated affordances. he argues that this new age is forcing us to rethink the traditional definitions of economy, wealth creation, business organisations and other institutional structures. he says this offers immense possibilities but also dangers. mobile devices, good connectivity and sms mean we can access information immediately and keep constantly in touch. a downside of this is that we are awash with information, arguably drowning in a sea of information and particular digital literacy skills are needed to find valuable resources amongst the ‘white noise’ created through a plethora of communication tools. 4.3 communication and collaboration irish journal of technology enhanced learning 9 digital technologies offer a rich variety of ways in which learners can communicate with peers and tutors, and enables them to be part of a global community. the horizontal affordance of social media is resulting in a breaking down of hierarchies so that learners feel more empowered to connect with experts. dialogic learning and collaboration are well known as important ways in which we learn. communication with peers and tutors enables learners to articulate their understanding and offers opportunities for co-construction of knowledge and allow teachers to provide feedback to develop understanding. bandura (1997) developed a social learning theory which argued that people learn from each other via observation, imitation and modeling. the dialogic relationship between learners and teachers is nicely illustrated in laurilllard’s conversational framework (1993). it is derived from pask’s conversation theory (pask 1975), which centres on the idea that learning occurs through conversation and the notion of ‘teachback’ where one person teaches another what they have learned. this is related to, but distinct from, the concept of vicarious learning, which cox et al. (1998) define as: the potential benefits to learners of being able to observe or ‘listen in’ on experts or their peers as they discuss a new topic (p. 432). laurillard (1993) describes the stages involved in the dialogic interaction between a teacher and student, demonstrating the way in which concepts are internalized and adapted by each in the process (figure 2). figure 2: adapted from laurillard's conversational framework collaborative learning is where two or more people work towards a shared goal and learner together. the benefits are that they can learn from each other, utlising each other’s skills and g. conole 10 resources, and reflecting on each other’s understanding. at the simplest level collaborative learning can be defined as learners working together to achieve a joint learning goal or outcome. jones et al. (2007) make a distinction between the terms collaboration and cooperation. they reference topping, who defined cooperation by studying its roots. comeans together in company, jointly, in common, equally, mutually, reciprocally, while operate means to work, act, influence, effect, accomplish, cause or carry out (topping 1992:151). dillenbourg (1999) distinguishes between cooperation and collaboration in the following way. in cooperation, partners split the work, solve sub-tasks individually and then assemble the partial results into the final output. in collaboration, partners do the work ‘together.’ (p. 8) collaboration is a process by which individuals negotiate and share meanings relevant to the problem-solving task at hand…. collaboration is a coordinated, synchronous activity that is the result of a continued attempt to construct and maintain a shared conception of a problem. 4.4 open practices one of the ways in which digital technologies, and particularly social media, have transformed learning, teaching and research is by enabling more open practices. open practices refers both to the growth of free resources (open educational resources) and courses (massive open online courses), but also to the ways in which through digital technologies our practices and discourses can be more visible. teacher and research presence is more visible through social media, from asking questions, developing ideas and sharing resources using tools like twitter, facebook and linkedin. blogging can be particularly beneficial for scholarly discourse (weller, 2011b) and reflection and the extent of reach through social media is exponentially greater than through traditional forms of dissemination. in summary, there are three facets to openness. firstly, because increasingly academic outputs are digitised they can be made available to a far greater audience than ever before. secondly, networking – academics are now part of a global, distributed community of peers. thirdly, open – in addition to the technical aspects of the concept of openness (such as open source software, open standards, open access and open educational resources), new technologies are enabling more open practices. we are beginning, for example, to see a shift from publication in closed journals or books to more open practices of sharing research outputs via blogs and other open platforms. 4.5 portability across devices and locations two factors are important in terms of portability, the increased prevalence of mobile devices and the emergence of cloud computing. particularly through cloud computing resources can be made available across a range of devices. for example, purchasing an electronic englishspanish dictionary through itunes means the resources can be made available on an iphone, irish journal of technology enhanced learning 11 ipad and mac. using tools such as google drive means that documents can be available across different devices and locations and can be accessed by a group of people, facilitating collaborative writing. another advantage of cloud computing is that it means data can be backed up automatically to the cloud. the exploring digital literacies in higher education project looked at students’ engagement with and orientation towards digital technologies. 7 the portability of students’ personal digital devices (mobile phones, tablets) supports their spatial mobility and they frequently use these devices to read, make notes and find information. pressed for time, students also use these mobile devices as opportunities to learn in ‘downtimes’, for example when travelling, sitting in the park, or relaxing in the bath. this portability, however, generates other issues: readability (screen size), access (connectivity, ability to download and store), health (tired eyes), etc. 5. challenges despite the evident opportunities digital technologies offer learning, teaching and research there are challenges. 5.1 the web and wi-fi in terms of the web and wi-fi, precisely because access is particularly ubiquitous, not having access is a major challenge. we expect to be able to be online all the time and not being online can have a severe impact on our productivity. furthermore, there is an expectation from others that we will be online 24/7. this is particularly an issue with students, so it is important to set ground rules in terms of what they can expect as a reasonable turn around to a query they have and that they cannot expect to get a get an immediate reply to an email sent at 5 pm on a sunday. 5.1 learning management systems learning management systems (lmss) have been criticised for being too institutionally focussed, with tools (such as blog and wiki tools) often being sub-standard to those that are freely available on the web. a second criticism is that often the discussion and content generated in an lms is not available post-course, or indeed from one year to the next on a course. this means that a student cannot go back and review content from a previous year. furthermore if the evidence for achievement of learning is collated in an e-portfolio, which is then switch off after the course finishes the student cannot present this to potential employees, negating the concept of the development of lifelong learners. as a consequence the concept of personal learning environments (ples) has emerged (atwell, 2007). ples harness the affordances of social and participatory media (conole, 2013) 8 and enable learners to: set their own learning goals, manage their learning, both content and process and communicate with others in the process of learning. learners can mix the tools available in their institutional lms with freely available social media to create their own personalised learning environment. those who are in favour of ples argue that they put the learner at the centre of the learning process, empowering them to take control of their learning. 5.3 mobile devices 7 http://libguides.ioe.ac.uk/c.php?g=482375&p=3298534 8 such as adopting open practices, peer critiquing, distributed cognition, networking and collective intelligence g. conole 12 given the importance of mobile devices discussed earlier on, a key issue is battery life. smart phones have increasing functionality, but this comes at a price in terms of the amount of memory needed and the impact on battery life. even some modern smart phones need to be recharged often up to three times a day. as a counteraction to this nokia has announced the return of the classic nokia 3310, instantly recognizable, however it is sleaker and lighter than the original and will be available in a variety of colours. 9 it has a range of basic functions for web surfing and taking pictures, but the key selling point is the battery life. mobile devices are also fragile, it is very easy to crack the screen of mobile phones and ipads and replacement costs are not cheap, costing between 100 and 150 euro. finally, there may be issues with web pages not being rendered correctly, but this is increasingly less of a problem as sites are usually designed to be mobile friendly. 5.4 oer/moocs precisely because there is such a rich variety of resources available online finding relevant resources (oer and moocs) for a particular learning need can be problematic. in addition, once found evaluating the relevance and quality of the resource requires specialized digital literacy skills. moocs have been criticized for having very high drop out rates, some of the reasons cited for this are: the lack of support, participants (particularly in cmoocs) are confused by the abundance of materials and the variety of ways of communicating, and the lack of a guided learning pathway. finally, there is a lack of clarity in terms of how to recognized learning through oer and moocs, although new models are emerging, such as accreditation of oer provided by the oeru, 10 and certificates of participation provided by futurelearn. 11 5.5. social media interaction through social media can exponentially increase the amount of access to information an individual has and degree of communication. those active in social media sites like twitter and facebook may often be connected to literally thousands of others worldwide. amplification mechanisms such as retweeting and liking further extend the reach. such high levels of interactivity can lead to significant confusion and cognitive overload and users often lack the necessary digital literacy skills to separate relevant information from the white noise. groupthink is a psychological phenomenon that occurs within a group of people in which the desire for harmony or conformity in the group results in an irrational or dysfunctional decision-making outcome. 12 group members try to minimize conflict and reach a consensus decision without critical evaluation of alternative viewpoints by actively suppressing dissenting viewpoints, and by isolating themselves from outside influences. nicols (2009) extends this idea to the digital context and argues that because of an amplification of certain information, there is a danger of a hegemonic approach, with valuable perspectives being lost. 6. researching digital learning 9 http://www.theverge.com/2017/2/26/14742150/nokia-3310-mwc-2017 10 https://oeru.org/ 11 https://www.futurelearn.com/proof-of-learning/statement-of-participation 12 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/groupthink irish journal of technology enhanced learning 13 having provided a backdrop in terms of key emergent transformative technologies, their characteristics and challenges this section will provide an overview of digital learning research. figure 3 illustrates the key components of researching digital learning. figure 3: the key components of researching digital learning at the heart of the figure are the key players, namely learners and teachers. it shows how they interact with resources, oer and moocs and engage with technologies and their associated affordances (gibson, 1979; conole and dyke, 2004). the right hand side shows examples of the types of interventions that are possible, such as implementing different pedagogical approaches through the use of technologies, putting in place strategies for supporting digital learning or introducing new approaches to designing learning interventions. on the left hand side the evaluations of these interventions are show, including the methodologies used to collect and analyse data and the theoretical perspectives used to interpret them. figure 4 unpacks this a little more showing that digital learning research consists of three types: research around the pedagogies of digital learning, research on underpinning technologies, and research at an organizational level. g. conole 14 figure 4: facets of digital learning research the emergence of a new research field can be classified as follows: 1. pre-subject areas – no perceived interest 2. beginnings – questions arising 3. emergence – more researchers moving into the field 4. diversification – different schools of thought, theoretical perspectives and methodologies emerge 5. established – there is a defined community and alignment with other research fields. in terms of this digital learning research is arguably between stages 4 and 5 for a number of reasons. firstly, there have been an influx of researchers into the area over the last ten years or so. secondly, there are now many established masters and phd programmes on digital learning. thirdly, there is a growth of dedicated research centres; such as the national institute of digital learning at dublin city university. fourthly, there are numerous specialized journals and conferences on digital learning. examples in ireland include the irish journal of technology enhanced learning and the established edtech conference now in its 18 th year. finally there is now a vibrant community of researchers using social media to discuss research ideas and to share resources. conole et al. (2010) carried out a research project looking at the nature of interdisciplinarity in digital learning research. they found that there were a variety of feeder disciplines, including: educational research, cognitive psychology, instructional design, computer science, business and management, philosophy, semiotics, and critical discourse analysis. the benefits of this were perceived to be the ability to draw on a wealth of methods and irish journal of technology enhanced learning 15 approaches and to look at research questions from different perspectives. the drawbacks were seen as the fact that there was no shared language or understanding, a lack of rigour, and little theoretical underpinning. it is also evident that the choice of research methodologies and methods will have an impact on the research outcomes. a criticism is that they tend to be based on previous experience and favoured methods, rather than experimenting with new approaches. 7. characteristics of digital learning research this section considers the characteristics of digital learning research. conole and oliver (2007) list six facets of e-learning research, which are also relevant for digital learning research. these are: the dynamically changing nature of the field, the inherent political nature of the field, the interdisciplinarity of the researchers, issues around inclusion and exclusion, the highly interactive nature of the area, and finally distilling out critical discourse from hype. six themes of digital learning research are discussed: the good and the bad of digital technologies, the speed of change, new forms of discourses and collaborations, the importance of adopting a user focus, the changing nature of practice and finally the importance of and wider impact of digital learning research. 7.1. the good and the bad of digital technologies any critique of digital technologies shows that in addition to the perceived advantages there are also disadvantages. five examples that illustrate this are: 1. the tension between institutional versus open systems 2. the affordances of technologies and how fit they are for purpose 3. the issue of copyright and ownership 4. how to simplify the complex 5. the balance between content and activities. 7.2 speed of change technologies are constantly changing and as users appropriate technologies into their everyday practices how they use the technologies change. we are constantly seeing a new wave of tools and resources being developed, including the use of generic tools and resources, as well as those that have been specifically developed for an educational context. as mentioned earlier we are seeing an ‘ecology of abundance’ which means a description based on economic models is no longer appropriate; an ecological perspective better describes the dynamic and changing nature of the interface of users and technologies. particularly useful in this respect is the concept of rhizomatic learning. cormier (2008) describes how a rhizomatic plant has no centre and no defined boundary; rather, it is made up of a number of semi-independent nodes, each of which is capable of growing and spreading on its own, bounded only by the limits of its habitat. he goes on to state that in a rhizomatic view of learning, knowledge can only be negotiated, and the contextual, collaborative learning experience shared by constructivist and connectivist pedagogies is a social as well as a personal knowledge-creation process with mutable goals and constantly negotiated premises. given the constant nature and speed of change, it is impossible to predict the g. conole 16 unpredictable (naughton, 2012). related to this is castell’s notion of ‘informed bewilderment. the 21st century will not be a dark age. neither will it deliver to most people the bounties promised by the most extraordinary technological revolution in history. rather, it may well be characterised by informed bewilderment. (1999: 4) finally we are seeing a blurring of boundaries: of real and virtual, of teacher and learner, of formal and informal. 7.3 new discourses and collaborations digital technologies offer a plethora of ways in which learners can communicate and collaborate and we are seeing new rich and distributed learning communities. the way in which we interact with digital technologies can be a form of distributed cognition, i.e. that knowledge is not confined to an individual but is distributed across objects, individuals, artefacts, and tools in the environment (salomon, 1993) and the related concept of person plus (perkins, 1993). as previously discussed, interaction and communication through social media can be confusing and individuals need to develop the necessary digital literacy skills to make sense of all this information, through the use of filtering mechanisms and curation, and through tailoring and contextualisation what is relevant to one person will not necessarily be relevant to another. finally, new forms of digital literacies and metaphors of understanding are needed to make sense of this complex new world. 7.4 the importance of understanding users never before has it being more important to understand users, how they interact with technologies and their expectations and perspectives of technologies. this is in part because of the individualized nature of interaction with technologies; the potential for adaptivity and personalization. to address this ethnographic approaches are particularly useful, as is designbased research and the notion of the perpetual beta (jarche, n.d.). this is important as we are developing for the unknowable. 7.5 changing practice we are seeing changes in practices as a result of interaction with digital technologies. more open and reflective practices through social media mean researchers can be much more reflective practitioners. bonk et al. (2015) provide a summary of moocs and open education. key themes from across the chapters are that it is clear that digital technologies enable more open practices, and we are seeing the increasing importance of oer and moocs. we are seeing roles changing. the internet has not resulted in the death of teachers, their role is more important than ever, but there is a shift from knowledge transmission to digital curation, designing effective learning interventions using technologies, and facilitating learning. we are also seeing new organisations structures and processes, and new business models are emerging. 8. conclusion irish journal of technology enhanced learning 17 this paper has provided an overview of the field of digital learning, highlighting some of the benefits of using technologies to support learning, along with some of the challenges. to summarise figure 5 visualizes the relationship between digital learning research and practice, resources, learning, technologies, strategy, policy, theory and development. figure 5: the centrality of digital learning research to conclude, it is worth stating that research in digital learning is essential, technologies are fundamental tools for learning and cannot be ignored. in terms of the wider impact and extrapolation of what is known now from the research, there are five aspects: the emergence of new models for education, a blurring of boundaries (spaces, roles, etc.), the value of ways to support compelling experiences and facilitate productive failure, and understanding that we operate in an uncertain world with a future we cannot imagine. we are seeing an unbundling of education, where learners in the futures may not choose to do formal threeyear degrees but may opt to pay for: quality content, guided learning pathways, support or accreditation. finally, technologies are here to stay and their impact on learners, on teachers and on institutions is likely to continue to have a significant and increasing impact. figure 6 argues that digital learning can be best enabled through effective approaches to designing for learning and through effective use of learning analytics. g. conole 18 figure 6: enabling digital learning the take home messages are that this is an exciting and important time for digital learning research, there are multiple theoretical research perspectives and methodologies, which have enormous potential but must be appropriately used. the papers has described some of the challenges, such as the balance of ‘noise’/relevance, finding quality resources, fragmented identities, new digital literacies, the need for professional development and the impact on assessment practices. finally, two key questions to reflect on: what are the key research questions we need to address moving forward, and how do we ensure the rich research findings from the field of digital learning research have an impact on policy and practice? irish journal of technology enhanced learning 19 references atwell, g. 2007, personal learning environments: the future of learning?, elearning papers 2(1). bandura, 1977, social learning theory, new york: general learning press, available online at http://www.esludwig.com/uploads/2/6/1/0/26105457/bandura_sociallearningtheory.pdf bonk, c.j., lee, m.m., reeves, t.c., and reynolds, t.h. 2015, moocs and open education around the world, london: routledge. carr, n. 2008, the great unbundling: newspaers and the net, post post on encyclopedia britannica blog, posted on 7/4/2008, available online at http://blogs.britannica.com/2008/04/the-great-unbundling-newspapers-the-net/ castells, m. 1999, the rise of the networked society: the information age: economy, society and culture, third volume, london: wiley blackwell. christensen, c. 1997, the innovator's dilemma: when new technologies cause great firms to fail, harvard: harvard university press. conole, g., 2013, designing for learning in an open world, london: sringer. conole, g. and dyke, 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(ed.). 1993. distributed cognitions pyschological and educational considerations. cambridge: cambridge university press. siemens, g. 2005. connectivism: a learning theory for the digital age. international journal of instructional technology and distance learning, 2(1), 3-10. tapscott, d. 1994, the digital economy promise and peril in the age of networked intelligence, london: mcgraw-hill. topping, k. 1992 cooperative learning and peer tutoring: an overview, the psychologist, 5, 151-161. weller, m. 2011a, a pedagogy of abundance. spanish journal of pedagogy, 249 pp. 223– 236. weller, m. 2011b, digital scholar: how technology is transforming scholarly practice, basingstoke: bloomsbury academic, available online at https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/the-digital-scholar-how-technology-istransforming-scholarly-practice/. witthaus, g., inamorato dos santos, a., childs, m., tannhauser, a.c., conole, g., nkuyubwatsi, b. and punie, y., 2016, validation of non-formal mooc-based learning: an analysis of assessment and recognition practices in europe (opencred), ipts report, available online at http://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/bitstream/jrc96968/lfna27660enn.pdf http://oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html http://oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html microsoft word taylor_v7_iss1.docx irish journal of technology enhanced learning volume 7, issue 1 the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organization. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0). a hidden benefit in the covid-19 pandemic: rethinking physical geography pedagogy in higher education using a flipped classroom approach. karen j taylor*1,2 1department of geography, university college cork, cork, ireland 2discipline of geography, university of galway, galway, ireland abstract a shift in geographical pedagogy has occurred in the last decade with greater integration of active and blended (hybrid) learning techniques in higher education. a ‘flipped classroom’ approach employs an active classroom and inclusion of pre/post asynchronous course content in replacement of a traditional lecture-based format. this pedagogical research paper investigates the effectiveness of an online flipped classroom approach in the field of physical geography through student evaluation and reflects upon the enforced transition to online learning during the covid-19 pandemic. an anonymous survey was distributed to final year physical geography students who experienced both on-campus and online education, to evaluate perceived technological skills, broadband access and module delivery preference. positive qualitative and quantitative results (66 respondents) showed an appreciation for an active classroom, increased student-staff engagement and the use of multimedia resources (i.e. using more than one medium of communication). sixty-nine per cent of students in this cohort preferred the online flipped classroom to other online lecture-based formats (synchronous or asynchronous). additionally, 59% of students chose an on-campus flipped classroom approach in replacement of a traditional transmissive lecture or option to remain online in a post-covid19 scenario. overall, this case study provided valuable insight into student experiences of online learning and illuminates a potential pathway to move away from traditional lecturebased methods in undergraduate physical geography. the dynamic, interactive learning environment created by this alternative approach is recommended to enhance learning, accessibility and improve student-staff interaction, particularly for large class sizes where fieldwork may not be feasible. keywords: blended learning; active learning; inquiry-based learning; problem-based learning; fieldwork; accessibility; student evaluation; large class sizes. 1. introduction the subject of physical geography is traditionally considered to be a field-oriented science (fuller et al. 2000; petch and reid 1988) as it concerns the ‘processes that shape the earth’s surface, the animals and plants that inhabit it, and the spatial patterns they exhibit’ (welford * corresponding author karen.jantaylor2@gmail.com irish journal of technology enhanced learning 2017). in the 1970s, physical geography was categorised into five main divisions: geomorphology, climatology, biogeography, soil science, and quaternary environmental change (welford 2017). the interdisciplinary subject now has an abundance of subdisciplines and specialisms and current undergraduate physical geography modules in higher education typically include a field or research-based component as a form of module assessment (day 2012). the dominant pedagogical paradigms in undergraduate physical geography are i) constructivism, where learners construct knowledge instead of passively taking in information, which can be traced back to piaget’s (1929) theory of children’s cognitive development. and ii) active learning, ‘any instructional method that engages students in the learning process’ (prince 2004, p.223). active learning builds upon the constructivist learning theory and posits that students ‘learn by doing’ (day 2012). the active learning umbrella also includes other pedagogical approaches such as inquiry and problem-based learning (day 2012). in the last decade, greater integration of active and blended (hybrid) learning has been incorporated into undergraduate module design. the goal is to enhance learning and accessibility and improve engagement with students (day 2012; godlewska et al. 2019; graham et al. 2017; holloway et al. 2021; moore and gilmartin 2010; tasch and tasch 2016). for example, research-led projects, laboratory and field work tutorials, the use of geographical information systems (gis), and online multimedia resources are frequently used to develop subject knowledge and understanding of physical geography. pre-covid-19, undergraduate physical geography modules incorporated active learning techniques but, in many cases, the traditional transmissive lecture (weekly, in person) remained the main method of knowledge transference between staff and students (day 2012). lectures were typically not recorded, and slide handouts and readings were the sole resources provided. health and safety regulations associated with the covid-19 pandemic enforced educators to reassess and redesign teaching strategies and delivery methods. higher education undergraduate modules and assessments transitioned to online platforms over a short space of time. educators essentially became content creators and were faced with many associated technological challenges such as software and compatibility issues, access to suitable technology (home laptops or desktops) and recording equipment (microphones, web cameras), and adequate broadband speeds. furthermore, educators had the difficult task of recreating the ‘engagement’ or ‘social’ aspect of a traditional lecture setting online to combat feelings of isolation, lack of support and disadvantage, which many students experienced in the transition to online education during the pandemic. a flipped classroom approach is a popular alternative teaching method (abeysekera and dawson 2015; bergmann and sams 2012; bishop and verleger 2013; mason et al. 2013; roehl et al. 2013; vereş and muntean 2021) which can be easily adapted to an online teaching scenario. this approach removes the “traditional transmissive lecture and replaces it with active in-class tasks and pre-/post-class work” (abeysekera and dawson 2015, 1) as a form of active and blended learning. the flipped classroom concept supports the cognitive constructivist and social constructivist learning theories (bruner 1966; long et al. 2016; vygotsky 1978), as it promotes student-centred learning under the guidance of professional educators. while traditional teaching pedagogies tend to promote a passive environment that channels ‘surface learning’ through rote memorization (ritchhart et al. 2011), the flipped classroom approach utilises ‘deep learning’ practices such as problem-solving tasks engendering a greater understanding and comprehension of knowledge (roehl et al. 2013). the alternative approach has multiple benefits for students including the ability to modify class activities to suit students' irish journal of technology enhanced learning learning needs (graham et al. 2017), promoting student-staff engagement (roehl et al. 2013), enhancing learning and student motivation (abeysekera and dawson 2015; elmaleh and shankararaman 2017; mason et al. 2013), and development of self-directed learning skills (fernández-martín et al. 2020). the approach also benefits staff alike, through efficient use of teaching hours (vereş and muntean 2021) and providing greater insight into student progress and understanding of course material (chickering and gamson 1987; roehl et al. 2013) (figure 1). the open structure of the active classroom component allows for multiple pedagogical approaches, including all forms of active learning techniques including inquiry and problembased learning, as well as the time and freedom to explore topics with students that conventional lecture-based approaches do not. the concept of a flipped classroom was developed by jonathan bergmann and aaron sams in 2007 (bergmann and sams 2012) and since then has been applied to many subjects areas (fernández-martín et al. 2020; graham et al. 2017; roehl et al. 2013). currently, several gaps exist in the flipped classroom literature regarding i) student evaluation (abeysekera and dawson 2015), ii) its use as a technique for dealing with large class sizes, and iii) through the subject-specific lens of undergraduate physical geography. regarding the latter, the literature focuses on geography as a general subject (azizah et al. 2022; zeren 2016; korson 2022) or geographical subfields such as human (graham et al. 2017), urban (aguado-moralejo et al. 2020), or geographical information systems (castellucci 2016; rudow and sounny-slitine 2015; tian et al. 2022). additionally, there are several studies from a secondary school perspective on geography (ekpoto et al. 2022; norman et al. 2018) and remote sensing earth and environmental sciences (lópez núñez et al. 2020), but again not specifically physical geography. given physical geography is a field-oriented science, it lends itself towards pedagogical approaches which allow for active learning inside the classroom setting. review and student evaluation of a flipped classroom approach through a physical geography lens would thus be highly beneficial, particularly in a large class setting. this case study of an undergraduate physical geography module aims to provide insight into student and staff experiences and share knowledge gained from the emergency online transition of teaching and learning during the covid-19 pandemic. findings also seek to enlighten the affordances of the alternative flipped classroom approach through a subject-specific lens of physical geography, bridging the gap in the current literature. irish journal of technology enhanced learning figure 1 – the educational benefits of a flipped classroom approach irish journal of technology enhanced learning 2. methods 2.1 project overview coastal and marine geomorphology (5 ects) is a third-year undergraduate course offered as part of a wide range of thematic modules by the department of geography at university college cork. over 130, national and international students enrolled in semester two of the 2020/2021 academic year from multiple ba and bsc undergraduate degrees. this physical geography module provided an overview of coastal dynamics and introduced students to basic concepts of coastal science, zonation, ecology, geomorphology, and management and planning. the closing section focused on current issues such as marine debris and pollution, climate change, sea level rise, coastal erosion and flooding with a focus on irish case studies. the module was assessed through continuous assessment (one online research-based assignment, worth 40%) and an online essay-based examination (worth 60%). pre-covid-19, this module was delivered through 24 1-h lectures, two laboratory practicals and an essay-based exam all of which took place on campus over a 12-week period. in compliance with covid-19 public health measures, the module transitioned to an online platform (canvas, learning management system (lms) and microsoft teams) using a flipped classroom approach (figure 2). the module was subsequently redesigned and utilised the alternative approach to improve engagement between students and staff as well as promote active, self-directed learning in an online setting. students were provided with the following asynchronous resources to be reviewed in their own time preand post-class: • twenty-four pre-recorded theoretical videos (powerpoint slides with recorded audio in mp4 format), approximately 20-30 minutes in length, were uploaded using the video management system panopto in canvas lms, three days prior to a live class activity. each video covered a separate topic, with two videos uploaded each week. the material was equivalent to one hour of teaching. • a pdf printout of the slides and audio transcript. • additional resources included academic readings, relevant youtube videos, links to other educational resources. in-class activities were conducted synchronously using microsoft teams and powerpoint, utilising the second weekly contact hour. the live in-class activities were developed from the theoretical content (videos) putting the theory into practice and used visuals such as google earth imagery, photography, and relevant academic journal figures to generate active learning or problem-solving activities. the live class was typically structured as follows: a summary of the pre-recorded theoretical content was provided at the start of each live class using visual schematics created with the smartart powerpoint feature. this was followed by various types of activities including i) quick answer questions to build confidence and participation, ii) narrative and discussion activities regarding a topical news item or newly published journal article and, iii) guided problem-solving activities related to the course content. students responded either by audio or text comments. the sessions were not recorded to encourage student participation thus creating an informal learning environment. students were also given time to ask questions at multiple intervals. irish journal of technology enhanced learning a student feedback survey was created and distributed through an anonymous and confidential survey tool on canvas lms at the end of the term, using a mixture of multiple choice, likert scale and open written questions. students were informed that the survey findings could be used for research purposes prior to submission of responses – ‘the information that you contribute will be anonymous, you will not be identified. findings may be used for academic research purposes.’ the survey aimed to evaluate student access to broadband, perceived technological proficiency, module delivery preference and provide general feedback for the module. the cohort of students in this study experienced both traditional pre-covid-19 teaching methods on-campus (i.e. face-to-face lectures, tutorials and written examinations) and fully online education (i.e. online module delivery and assessment) over the course of their degree in equal amounts, providing a unique insight and opportunity for student evaluation. the data is securely stored on a password-protected laptop and hard drive and only permitted staff associated with the module had access to the data through canvas lms. irish journal of technology enhanced learning figure 2 – illustration of the flipped classroom structure utilised in this study; student evaluation is based on this module design irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3. results sixty-six survey responses were completed (class size of 133 students), and the survey took an average of 18 minutes to complete. in general, the students reported the flipped classroom approach to be an effective and accessible method of delivery in an online setting and findings showed a request for an on-campus flipped classroom format in the future. students showed an appreciation for the active classroom, increased student-staff engagement and the use of multimedia resources (i.e. using more than one medium of communication). the digitised lecture material was particularly beneficial for students with dyslexia, allowing students to review the content at their own pace. 3.1 technology proficient technological skills were required to navigate the canvas lms, access course material, complete and upload assignments and exam scripts, and troubleshoot associated issues (advanced knowledge). despite access to free university information technology (it) courses, general undergraduate experience, and other free resources (youtube, google etc.), most students rated their technological skills as ‘basic’ (42%, n=27 students) and ‘proficient’ (44%, n=28), and only 11% (n=7) of the cohort identified as ‘advanced’ in technological proficiency (figure 3a). an important and often overlooked variable in e-learning is access to sufficient broadband speeds for streaming and uploading/downloading course material. fiftysix per cent (n=36) of students had access to ‘medium’ broadband speeds (figure 3b), and 19% (n=12) and 2% (n=1) of students had ‘poor’ broadband speeds and ‘none’ respectively. irish journal of technology enhanced learning figure 3 – bar graphs showing student response to statements relating to technology skills and broadband access; a) level of technological proficiency and b) broadband access irish journal of technology enhanced learning 3.2 module delivery final-year students in this case study were exposed to a variety of online lecture delivery methods during the pandemic, dependent upon the lecturer’s personal preference i.e. synchronous, asynchronous, or mixed methods of delivery. student evaluation showed a preference for the online flipped classroom approach utilised in this physical geography module, 68.75% of students (n=44) selected the ‘pre-recorded short lectures and a live class activity via microsoft teams (mixed)’ as their preferred online method of delivery. only 18.75% of students (n=12) chose the ‘pre-recorded full lecture through panopto (asynchronous)’ format and the remaining 12.5% (n=8) selected the ‘live microsoft teams full lecture (synchronous)’ option (figure 4a). in support of the online flipped classroom approach, 86% of students strongly agreed (42%) and agreed (44%) that the live activity class each week was beneficial (table 1). furthermore, 59.4% of students (n=38) chose to move away from the traditional lecture-based delivery (pre-covid-19 format) and opted for an on-campus flipped classroom approach ‘mixture of pre-recorded lectures (theory) and on-campus class activity (practical application)’ in the future. only 35.9% of students (n=23) selected a ‘return to oncampus lectures (pre-covid-19 format)’ and a mere 4.7% (n=3) chose to ‘keep the current online format’ (figure 4b). in a subgroup analysis, all categories of the online lecture delivery methods showed a preference for the on-campus flipped classroom in a post-covid-19 scenario (table 2a). fifty-five per cent of the online flipped classroom subgroup (n=44), 75% of the ‘pre-recorded full lecture through panopto (asynchronous)’ subgroup (n=12) and 63% of the ‘live microsoft teams full lecture (synchronous)’ subgroup (n=8) chose the on-campus flipped classroom option. interestingly, of the students who chose the online flipped classroom (n=44), 45% chose to ‘return to on-campus lectures (pre-covid-19 format)’, and none chose to remain online (table 2). in the investigation of a student perspective on the most important aspect of a successful physical geography module, 27% of students (n=17) chose a ‘multimedia approach to teaching (lectures, videos, readings and activities)’ as the most important aspect, followed by a ‘lecturer’s communication and presentation skills’ at 23% (n=15) (figure 4c). the third rated aspect was ‘field work or practical application of theory’ at 19% (n=12), followed by ‘interesting content’ at 13% (n=8). the aspects of least importance for this cohort were ‘faceto-face interaction’ (9%; n=6) and ‘continuous assessment covers a significant portion of the overall grade’ (9%; n=6) (figure 4c). irish journal of technology enhanced learning figure 4 – graphical representation of student preferences of module delivery a) experienced and b) future predilection. c) perceived important components of a successful physical geography module irish journal of technology enhanced learning table 1 – percentage of student responses to statements related to the delivery of the coastal and marine geomorphology module in the 2020/2021 academic year. legend: strongly agree (sa), agree (a), neutral (n), disagree (d), strongly disagree (sd) and no answer (na) coastal and marine geomorphology module student evaluation sa a n d sd na the pre-recorded lectures were clear and concise 42% 44% 8% 3% 0% 3% the pre-recorded lectures were audible and understandable 42% 50% 5% 0% 0% 3% i liked the online format of pre-recorded lectures (powerpoint slides and audio) + a live class activity 44% 30% 14% 6% 2% 5% the live activity class on a wednesday was beneficial 42% 44% 9% 2% 0% 3% the pace of the course was satisfactory 35% 41% 14% 8% 0% 3% i liked the content covered in this course 35% 45% 11% 5% 0% 5% i revised sufficiently to keep up with the classes 15% 42% 26% 14% 0% 3% the lecturer was easy to approach 61% 32% 3% 0% 0% 5% overall, the lecturer's teaching was excellent 50% 33% 14% 0% 0% 3% irish journal of technology enhanced learning table 2 – a subgroup analysis for three groups in terms of modality preference subgroup analysis preferred post-covid-19 lecture delivery method a) on-campus flipped classroom keep the current online format return to oncampus lectures (pre covid-19 format) online lecture delivery method online flipped classroom (n=44) 55% 0% 45% live microsoft teams full lecture (synchronous) (n=8) 63% 13% 25% pre-recorded full lecture through panopto (asynchronous) (n=12) 75% 17% 8% preferred online lecture delivery method b) online flipped classroom live microsoft teams full lecture (synchronous) pre-recorded full lecture through panopto (asynchronous) technological proficiency learner (n=1) 0% 0% 100% basic (n=27) 81% 15% 4% proficient (n=28) 61% 11% 29% advanced (n=7) 71% 14% 14% broadband access fast (n=15) 47% 27% 27% medium (n=36) 75% 8% 17% poor (n=12) 75% 8% 17% none (n=1) 100% 0% 0% preferred post-covid-19 lecture delivery method c) on-campus flipped classroom keep the current online format return to oncampus lectures (pre covid-19 format) technological proficiency learner (n=1) 100% 0% 0% basic (n=27) 59% 4% 37% proficient (n=28) 57% 4% 39% advanced (n=7) 57% 14% 29% broadband access fast (n=15) 60% 13% 27% medium (n=36) 56% 0% 44% poor (n=12) 75% 8% 17% none (n=1) 0% 0% 100% the three groups presented in table two are: a) preferred post-covid-19 lecture delivery method within the online lecture delivery methods subgroups, b) preferred online lecture delivery methods within the technological proficiency and access to broadband subgroups, and c) preferred post-covid-19 lecture delivery method within the technological proficiency and irish journal of technology enhanced learning access to broadband subgroups. as subgroup analysis reduces the statistical power of results, the numbers of responses per subgroup have been included for data transparency. bold values highlight relevant insights. abbreviations: online flipped classroom = ‘pre-recorded short lectures and a live class activity via microsoft teams (mixed)’ and on-campus flipped classroom = ‘a mixture of pre-recorded lectures (theory) and on-campus class activity (practical application)’. 3.3 module delivery and technological influence (subgroup analysis) a subgroup analysis, albeit with reduced statistical power, suggested technological proficiency and access to broadband did not have an influence on student preference for lecture delivery method either online or in a post-covid-19 scenario (table 2b, c). technological proficiency eighty-one per cent of students with ‘basic’ technological proficiency (n=27) chose the online flipped classroom as their preferred method (table 2b). the online flipped classroom required the most knowledge and technology proficiency of the online options, as students were required to both navigate canvas lms to access the preand post-class material and utilise microsoft teams to participate in the live class activity. secondly, all categories of technological proficiency chose the on-campus flipped classroom approach as their preferred lecture delivery method in a post-covid-19 scenario (table 2c). fifty-nine per cent of students who identified as holding a ‘basic’ level of technological proficiency chose the on-campus flipped classroom which involves a hybrid mixture of online and on-campus learning (table 2c). access to broadband all online lecture delivery methods required access to the internet to complete the module. the ‘pre-recorded full lecture through panopto (asynchronous)’ method is the only option that would not require fast broadband download speeds, as panopto compresses asynchronous video files for streaming purposes. in the subgroup analysis, all categories for access to broadband showed a preference for the online flipped classroom, with 47% of the ‘fast’ (n=15) subgroup, 75% of both the ‘medium’ (n=36) and the ‘poor’ (12) subgroups, and 100% of the ‘none’ (n=1) subgroup selecting the online flipped classroom (table 2a). all categories for broadband access also chose the on-campus flipped classroom, with 60% of the ‘fast’ subgroup, 56% of the ‘medium’ subgroup, and 75% of the ‘poor’ subgroup choosing the on-campus flipped classroom (table 2c). 3.4 qualitative responses in summary, student evaluation showed a demand for change in undergraduate pedagogy with a request to continue the multimedia-focused, flipped classroom approach in a post-covid19 scenario. positive student comments for the following open questions, q1 ‘what did you like most/least about this course?’, q2 ‘what aspect of the lecturer's teaching did you appreciate most?’ and q3 ‘any other comments or suggestions?’ highlight the benefits and success of the module redesign. the following student responses revealed a need for a more engaging and accessible undergraduate education and a preference for use of multimedia resources: irish journal of technology enhanced learning flipped classroom approach “i enjoyed learning more about the themes and topics associated with coastal and marine geomorphology and how engaging the topic was between the readings, videos and live classes each week. it was interesting to be able to engage in each topic without learning about it in detail in face-to-face classes.” – q1 “the live activity! i felt this was a very engaging way to help everyone learn” – q2 “the variety, the pre-recorded with detailed slides and audio and the live class was ideal for questions and simplifying material.” – q2 “loved the wednesday live as i was able to further understand topics by seeing examples etc.” – q2 “you included graphs and images which made the slides easier to digest.” – q2 post-covid-19 scenario ‘the resources and input provided by the lecturer were incredible and made it a positive experience. the combination of pre-recorded lectures and live classes are something i would like to see in a post covid scenario.’ – q2 “if it goes back to face-to-face classes next year i also believe there should be more of a focus on the activities as i often learned more in those 40 minutes than i did in the 2 hours of going through the presentations. i also wish there would have been even more of that type of learning. putting into practice what we learned.” – q3 “i would put forward a case to allow students to undertake online over in class if they wish as some students learn better that way” – q3 the flipped classroom approach allowed for multiple repetitions of the course material in a variety of formats and perspectives which facilitated deeper learning. qualitative student responses highlight the benefit of repetition in learning and found comfort in the consistency of posting times on canvas lms, particularly in an online setting. finally, the addition of audio transcripts or captioning provided a helpful study aid for students. repetition – key to learning “i liked having the recorded lectures first and then the live class with the activities because it nearly acted as a form of revision and study when being asked questions. by using the activities i definitely learned more than just by looking at examples in a lecture slide.” – q2 “i liked the hybrid mix of both pre-recorded and live lectures, as this made it possible to clarify and fully understand everything in the powerpoints” – q1 “the live classes were extremely beneficial for revision and for questions” – q2 consistency in upload times “the consistency of this module was very refreshing. upload times were constant irish journal of technology enhanced learning which was reassuring.” – q1 pdf print out (slides and audio transcript) “i loved how she had the lectures laid out and also print off sheets were so helpful to be able to follow the lecture clearly.” – q2 3.5 other physical geography cohorts the following year's cohort of coastal and marine geomorphology and a second-year, quaternary environments and geomorphology cohort were additionally asked for their preferred method of course content delivery in an anonymous module feedback survey. both modules utilised the same online flipped classroom approach as outlined in this case study and were delivered by the same lecturer. survey findings again showed a preference for an oncampus flipped classroom in a post-covid-19 scenario. sixty per cent (n=24) of students from the coastal and marine geomorphology 2021/2022 cohort and 51% (n=20) of the quaternary environments and geomorphology cohort 2021/2022 also selected the on-campus flipped classroom (table 3). table 3 – table presenting student responses for preferred method of course content delivery in the following year’s cohort of coastal and marine geomorphology (2021-2022) and a second-year physical geography module, quaternary environments and geomorphology (2021-2022) preferred lecture delivery method for other physical geography cohorts which is your preferred method of course content delivery? coastal and marine geomorphology (2021-2022) quaternary environments and geomorphology (2021-2022) online flipped classroom 33% (n=13) 23% (n=9) on-campus flipped classroom 60% (n=24) 51% (n=20) traditional transmissive lecture on campus 5% (n=2) 23% (n=9) no answer 3% (n=1) 3% (n=1) 4. discussion this pedagogical research paper aimed to investigate the effectiveness of a flipped classroom approach in the field of physical geography through student evaluation and reflects upon the enforced transition to online learning in higher education, in response to health and safety regulations associated with the covid-19 pandemic. as educators, our goal is to engender understanding in the transference of knowledge (roehl et al. 2013). romanelli et al., note the best practice most likely involves a teaching method that ‘addresses and accommodates multiple dimensions of learning styles that build self-efficacy’ (2009, p. 3). active and blended learning techniques such as the flipped classroom approach are becoming more prevalent in an age of ‘digital natives’ with a shift towards student-centred teaching (bishnoi 2020; roehl et al. 2013). the flipped classroom approach with the inclusion of continuous assessment is also in keeping with universal design for learning (udl) which aims to improve student’s irish journal of technology enhanced learning educational experience through more flexible methods of teaching and assessment by incorporating three core principles into module design and delivery, engagement (student-staff engagement through the live activity class), representation (including digitally inclusive and accessible multimedia resources) and action and expression (through the inclusion of continuous assessment) (ahead 2017). this case study provides strong support for a flipped classroom approach, as an effective, student-centred and accessible teaching method for physical geography and other geosciences in higher education. student evaluation highlights a preference for both an online and oncampus flipped classroom approach and the use of multimedia resources. from an educator's perspective, the active classroom helps to improve engagement with students which is particularly useful in large class scenarios. both quantitative and qualitative findings provide an important insight into student experiences of online learning during the pandemic and subsequently highlight a potential pedagogical pathway to move away from traditional lecturebased methods in undergraduate physical geography. 4.1 case study findings the online flipped classroom approach utilised in this case study proved successful, with students showing a preference for the alternative approach (69%) in comparison to other lecture-based methods of online delivery (synchronously or asynchronously). this method allowed for greater online interaction between students and staff in an informal manner, enhanced learning and supported students' learning differences. by providing students with the theoretical or lecture material in a pre-recorded video format prior to class, students were able to pause, rewind and review the new information at their own pace and in time; this is particularly helpful for students registered for learning support and additionally allows for video captioning. video captioning or inclusion of an audio transcript is highly beneficial for clarification and comprehension purposes, as well as providing a supplemental study aid (morris et al. 2016). captions are also useful for students with hearing impairments, where the course is in a non-native language i.e. for some international students, visual learners or simply for students reviewing the content in a noisy or distracting environment (morris et al. 2016). according to the irish census in 2016, 1 in 7 of the irish population have a long-term illness, impairment, or disability (national disability authority 2018), highlighting the importance of digital inclusivity and accessibility. from the perspective of creating content, the act of writing a transcript for each slide can be helpful in the recording process for lecturers as it helps to condense and consolidate your narrative. finally, the live class activity facilitates deeper learning through active learning techniques such as inquiry or problem-based learning; the active learning tasks act as a form of revision in keeping with constructivist frameworks. the live class activity provides a unique opportunity for students to ask questions and interact with the lecturer in an informal environment. this was highly beneficial for both the students in assimilating the course material and for staff in tracking student progress and understanding, particularly in an online setting. recording of the live class is not recommended as it significantly inhibits student participation and greatly impacts the informal learning environment. furthermore, the average exam grade increased by 2% from the previous year, which utilised a traditional lecture-based delivery method; both cohorts were examined using the same method of assessment. findings from this study have revealed a strong interest in the on-campus flipped classroom over the traditional transmissive lecture on-campus or online flipped classroom in a post-covid-19 scenario. technological proficiency and access to broadband did not appear to have an irish journal of technology enhanced learning influence on the lecture delivery preference for this cohort, however, a larger sample size would improve the statistical power of the subgroup analysis findings. 4.2 reflection of the emergency online teaching and learning experience the pandemic has altered many aspects of life, forcing society to re-evaluate day-to-day living, including the option to work remotely and the inclusion of digital technological communication. at a governmental level, the minister for further and higher education, research, innovation and science in ireland, mr simon harris td recently launched a project aimed at examining how higher education could learn from the covid-19 pandemic entitled “next steps for teaching and learning: moving forward together” (lowry 2021). minister harris stated “there has been a strong spotlight on teaching and learning in higher education since the shift to online and remote education… the involvement of all key stakeholders in this project, which will consider our re-shaped teaching and learning landscape, is very welcome and timely” (lowry 2021). to improve learning and accessibility, a call for greater integration of technology (i.e. hybrid learning) is emerging fuelled by students, staff and at a governmental level. the transition to online learning proved difficult for both staff and students alike during the pandemic. however, the change encouraged an improvement in technological skills and often a reassessment of module design. student evaluation of the most important aspect of a successful physical geography module proved interesting. pre-covid-19, one might expect the lecturer’s communication and presentation skills and continuous assessment weighting to be the most important aspect, however this was not the case. the pandemic has generated new and creative ways to teach; findings from this study show a shift in the teaching and learning landscape, as a ‘multimedia approach to teaching (lectures, videos, readings and activities)’ was chosen as the most important aspect, while ‘face-to-face interaction’ and ‘continuous assessment covers a significant portion of the overall grade’ ranked low in perceived importance. physical geography by its very nature is a subject that is best taught in the field, with undergraduate modules typically incorporating a field or laboratory work component. one of the main challenges physical geography lecturers face is facilitating a fieldwork component with large class sizes (+100 students). where possible, fieldwork and small group tutorials should be prioritised however, this is not always feasible due to social distancing, finance, transportation, staffing and insurance issues. a flipped classroom approach permits virtual expeditions of the landscape and discussion of theory using google earth imagery and photography which would ordinarily be too time-consuming in a traditional lecture-based format thus, creating an alternative option for large class sizes. additionally, research-led data analysis assignments prove beneficial in these situations by providing students with an opportunity to analyse, graph and interpret real data if fieldwork is not possible. 4.3 limitations there are several limitations to this small case study. firstly, the study results were based on students’ self-reported data, thus the data should be interpreted with a degree of caution as no assessment of students’ learning outcomes was made. secondly, although the number of participants (n=66) is typical for a student evaluation research paper (fuller, 2000; long et al., 2016) a full class response (n=133) over multiple cohorts would be ideal, and preferably include other educators from the field of physical geography. this would significantly improve irish journal of technology enhanced learning the findings' generalisability. this case study merely seeks to enlighten the potential use of a flipped classroom approach in the field of physical geography. the study findings do not imply that the flipped classroom approach, either online or on-campus, is a universal solution for teaching and learning-related issues within higher education. for example, the student-directed aspects of this approach i.e. the out-of-class proportion, may pose a challenge to some students who favour more traditional lecturer-directed methods. furthermore, the approach may not be suitable in terms of other module topics or alignment with the educator's teaching style. 5. conclusion is there a hidden benefit in the covid-19 pandemic for education? it is said that “the most important form of learning is that which enables us to see something in the world in a different way.” – john bowden and ference marton (in hermida 2014). educators have acquired new e-learning skills and created valuable digitalised lecture content with the enforced online conversion. with higher education transitioning back to on-campus teaching, this paper proposes a rethinking of physical geography pedagogy rather than reverting to our traditional teaching methods. can we capitalise on our new skills and teaching resources to create a more dynamic, interactive learning environment that is more digitally inclusive and accessible? findings from this student evaluation of a final year physical geography module have shown an appreciation for the flipped classroom approach and revealed a request for the continuation of this alternative pedagogical approach in the future. increased integration of technology using multimedia resources is recommended to provide a more inclusive and interactive learning opportunity for all. i personally found the flipped classroom approach to be a more enjoyable and successful way to teach particularly in an online setting. the informal interaction during the live classroom activities was a refreshing change from traditional lecture-based communication of course content. finally, i would like to encourage educators to share their experiences moving forward – when we share what we learn, we enhance its value. additional recommendations for utilising a flipped classroom approach either online or oncampus: • educators also should be mindful of student access to broadband and the ability to troubleshoot technological issues. an awareness of download speeds when creating content is key, i.e. suitable file size for download and streaming. furthermore, the advertisement of free university training courses in writing, data analysis, communication and lms software is essential, as undergraduate modules become technologically integrated. • captioning and/or audio transcript inclusion of course video content is recommended to enable accessibility and provide a valuable supplemental study aid. • the importance of structure and consistency should not be underestimated when delivering an online course. students appreciate consistency in the timing and location of posts. outlining the weekly schedule at the beginning of the module is essential. arrangement of course material from new to old on lms is recommended i.e. the newest content is presented first in the availability of order. • on reflection, it is advised to provide students with the pre-class work approximately five days prior to the live class, as students with part-time jobs required extra time to review the material. irish journal of technology enhanced learning acknowledgements i would like to sincerely thank dr dara cannon, university of galway, for her support and guidance. i would also like to thank my colleagues in the department of geography, university college cork and my wonderful coastal and marine geomorphology students of 2020/2021, 2021/2022 and quaternary environments and geomorphology students of 2021/2022 for their time and positive module feedback. irish journal of technology enhanced learning references abeysekera, l., & dawson, p. 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(2016). the flipped geography lecture. marmara coğrafya dergisi, (33), 25-57. doi: https://doi.org/10.14781/mcd.79389 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 68 trust, innovation and risk: a contextual inquiry into teaching practices and the implications for the use of technology lawrie phipps1*a, donna lanclos phd b a. jisc b. anodyne anthropology, llc (received november 2018; final version received february 2019) abstract lasting changes around the use of technology in teaching and learning in colleges and universities, require first an understanding of the practices that staff undertake and the challenges they face. effective and sustained change comes from a place of working in service to pedagogies, and practices that support and surround learning and teaching. in order to better understand these issues, jisc, a not for profit organisation providing digital solutions and advice to the uk education and research sector, commissioned research to gain more understanding about practice around learning and teaching and gaining insights beyond the technology-led. this interview-based qualitative research project aims to captures the voices and experiences of people who are and have been teaching in higher and further education, drawing on senior and junior teaching scholars, across a broad range of academic disciplines. this research was conducted over nine months from 2017-18, and the themes that emerge, and questions that arise, come from analysing more than 22 hours of interviews. we report our research results here to provide insights about both practices and priorities for teaching staff, and as an act of amplifying and advocating rather than discovery. the intent is to inform and support, and to boost the voices that are coming through in our research, not pretend that we have discovered any of this for the first time. we also wanted, in conducting this project, to move away from starting with digital, and to ground discussions in the behaviours of people who were teaching, whether their practices had anything to do with digital or not. *corresponding author. email: lawrie.phipps@jisc.ac.uk irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2019.© 2019 phipps, l. & lanclos, d. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. mailto:lawrie.phipps@jisc.ac.uk http://www.ilta.ie/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 l. phipps & d. lanclos 69 1. introduction lasting changes around the use of technology in teaching and learning in colleges and universities, require first an understanding of the practices that staff undertake and the challenges they face. effective and sustained change comes from a place of working in service to pedagogies, and practices that support and surround learning and teaching. in order to better understand these issues, the non-profit organization jisc commissioned research to gain more understanding about practice around learning and teaching and gaining insights beyond the technology-led. during 2016 jisc, a not for profit organisation providing digital solutions and advice to the uk education and research sector launched a “co-design challenge” around the theme of the next generation digital learning environments. jisc asked “what would an environment do for staff and students?”, “what kind of learning experiences would an environment need to support?” and “what learning and teaching practices aren’t currently supported in environments?” over the course of 18 months, lawrie phipps held workshops and webinars, and engaged across social media and other modes of communication to elicit input on emerging technology trends in learning environments. the next-generation digital learning environment (ngdle) report (phipps et al 2018) identified various themes around technology and pedagogy including: the growth in social media, analytics, usability and design and the identification of new vendors in the market. with regards to technology the ngdle report also identified that innovative practices in teaching tended to occur outside the institutionally provided virtual learning environment (vle). the follow up project, which we report on here, flipped the approach taken with the ngdle work. rather than asking direct questions about technology, and then thinking about teaching and learning, we sought to ask direct questions of academics who teach about teaching and learning, and then see what if anything these educators thought about technology. the intent here is to ground discussions within education technology as a field of practice in the human work of teaching, and the organisational contexts which inform, constrain, and facilitate teaching. we are working to connect our knowledge of what can be done with technology to what may need to be done to support teaching practices. this research emerges from the ngdle report not as an extension of the themes therein, but to fill in the gaps that exist when conversations start with technology. our focus here is to represent and interpret the views and experiences of people who are and have been teaching in higher and further education, drawing on senior and junior teaching scholars, across a broad range of academic discipline. while their experiences are not universal, they can lead us to useful insights around what is at stake with the coming together of technology with teaching and learning. 2. methods our interest in gaining insight into behaviors of people who teach in he and fe, beyond a simple catalog of what they do and what tools they use to do it, made a qualitative approach the logical choice for this project. qualitative data analysis is an inductive approach, whereby the meaningful patterns emerge from the data collected (in this case, interviews and observations of interviewees) (berkowitz, 1997, forsythe, 1999). while the patterns and themes identified via analysis are also linked to what researchers want to know (in this case: a deeper understanding of teaching practices and how people conceive of, acquire, and engage with them), the iteration required, the visiting and re-visiting of the qualitative data irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 70 sets, orients the researcher to what they have found over and above (and frequently, in addition to) what they thought they were initially looking for (srivastava and hopwood, 2009). the specific qualitative approach we settled upon, contextual inquiry, is a process whereby individuals are interviewed about their practices in an open-ended format, within a particular frame designed to elicit information not just about the content of what they do, but what their motivations are, what personal history contributes to these practices, and how they are impacted by current macroand micro-contexts. as with other qualitative approaches, the priority is not to arrive at generalizations about populations as a whole, but rather to help recognize and interpret patterns of behavior, so as to generate insight. contextual inquiry approaches are standard practice in user experience research, especially at the beginning of design processes, and valued in particular for being distinct from “lab” investigations of behaviour that are distanced from the context in which people habitually do their work (dekker et al, 2003). because an interview-based project lent itself well to our time restrictions--we could not command more than about 2 hours of time from each participant, and had nine months to complete this project--as well as the method’s orientation to context, and its systematic treatment of interview data in the analysis phase, we found contextual inquiry approach well suited for this research project. in the sections below we further describe our sampling, data collection, and analysis. 2.1 sampling we drew on our professional and personal networks to recruit scholars in fe and he willing to talk to us about their teaching. prospective participants were informed it would take approximately 2 hours of their time, and met them in the location of their choosing to conduct the interviews. written consent was obtained to interview them, and assured them that we would, in record keeping, data coding and analysis, and in the writing of reports, protect their identities as much as possible. the participants were drawn from academics in stem, humanities and arts subjects, across a representative range of institutions, including experienced and new to teaching staff. 2.2 data collection and analysis each interview was open-ended, and guided by the overall intentions of the inquiry, so as to result in an exploration of teaching practices and the context in which they emerge and are engaged in. manual note-taking allowed the capture of content without introducing the potentially off-putting presence of recording equipment. each semi-structured interview took approximately two hours. altogether we interviewed 11 individuals, for a total of about 22 hours of interview data. each interview was guided by the following prompts: 1. tell me about the teaching you do. where do you teach? 2. how did you learn to teach? where else have you taught? 3. how do you learn about teaching now? 4. who do you talk to/communicate with about teaching? 5. what if anything do you teach your students about teaching? 6. do you do any research? how does your teaching relate to the research you do? 7. what is the balance of teaching with the rest of the work you do? 8. what kind of support or development do you get for teaching in your job? 9. what do you wish you could do around teaching? what are you not getting to do that l. phipps & d. lanclos 71 you would like to be able to do? 10. when you have a new course to teach, where do you start? how do you put your courses together? after the interviews, we gave each participant a £25 gift card to thank them for their time and participation (this incentive was communicated to them at the time of recruitment). we felt it important not to ask for people to give us their time for free, as people in the sector are busy, and we wanted to make it clear that we valued their input and what we might learn from them. post-interview, the handwritten notes were revisited, and further notes and annotations were incorporated into the transcribed document. each set of interview notes was then broken down into a spreadsheet, wherein each cell of the spreadsheet contained a standalone piece of information, e.g. a description of a practice, a direct quote, or an editorial comment. for example: some of her students have whatsapp and fb groups, and she’s not a part of those, but knows they work together within them cite57 once all of these interviews were completed and spreadsheets generated, all of the spreadsheet cells were printed out, and each sheet of cells were cut into strips of paper. each piece of information was assigned a code that identified which interview the piece came from (cit[lower case letter]) and which cell number in the spreadsheet contained the information. most interviews were about 120 cells long. altogether we had about 1500 paper strips with interview snippets printed out. on may 11, 2018, 12 people assisted in the initial analytical coding of the interview data, over the course of 6 hours. the people in the coding workshop (in addition to the project leads) included instructional designers, librarians, jisc members of staff, and academic developers. analytic codes were suggested from the outset based on preliminary analysis by phipps and lanclos, and were then further developed and refined throughout the day by the larger group. we emerged from the coding workshop with all of the interview pieces sorted into higherlevel themes, as well as sub-themes within each. themes that emerged from this coding workshop then entered into interview spreadsheets, so as to visualize clusters of interview data, as well as to make it easier to dig into the content and meaning of these clusters. these codes were then refined and verified by re-sharing the spreadsheet with the advisory group from the coding workshop. 3. findings we have organized this discussion of our findings into four major themes: technology, physical places, risk, and trust. in the following sections we draw on the interview data to illustrate and analyze the priorities and practices of teaching staff in uk higher and further education. 3.1 technology during the interview process we did not lead participants with direct questions about digital. this was so that the boundaries of the conversation were not seen as limited to, for example, irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 72 technology that they already used; this provided a place where they might further understand their existing perceptions of technology. it should be noted therefore that mentions of specific technology, and what did or did not work, emerged from the larger conversation about teaching practices and priorities. the digital aspects become apparent once the conversation has begun and where they are referenced in positive, enabling ways it was apparent that its use was implemented based on perceived needs. fundamental to any discussion of technology is the underlying organizational context in which people are using the technology. one thing that emerges from the interviews is that there is no one single model of education technology support across the sector, and that the landscape of education technology and teaching and learning varies. this means that where people identified institutional barriers to what they wanted or needed to do in their teaching was also not consistent. sometimes participants located barriers in core of their institution, but some participants found a great deal of support in their organizations. the he lecturer in art and design used the digital tech department at her institution to learn from, and found them to be “really supportive,” with the learning technologists coming to help her when she needed it. the civil engineering professor said he knows that technological innovation costs money as well as time, and he felt he had gotten support for both at his institution. as is to be expected the vle featured prominently in teaching practices, with interviewees expressing various levels of comfort and capability with it. the applied ecology professor was confident that she already knew what she needed to do with moodle to get things up and running, especially as a course leader, and so she found things on offer at the academic development office not quite the things she needed to take her beyond what she already knew. using technology outside of the vle was problematic if it did not connect with existing university policies around assessment, raising questions of how participants might reasonably try new things with technology in the absence of structures that might reward or encourage either themselves or their students. the professor of education used a blog for class once, instead of moodle, and she said “some students really got it.” but because she was not allowed, according to university policy, to assess the work done on the blog, students didn’t see the point of doing the work there in that environment. in this instance, the lecturer found that when the focus of policy was on the specific technology rather than the practice, it stifled innovation and change in her approach to tech in her teaching. there are lessons here about approaches to education technology, about the hazards of letting the tech-tail wag the pedagogy dog. the participants had many examples of using institutional technology to manage and enhance their teaching practices. we interviewed individuals who were continually iterating their practices, learning from what worked and what did not. it is unclear to what extent their institutions had mechanisms in place that facilitated learning from these iterative practices, so that academic staff as a whole might have opportunities to reflect, learn and change. the anatomy lecturer had experiences of flipping classrooms with 250 students, and he used previous lecture capture footage, edited it, put it online. he then tried to use the 50 minutes of face to face class time to deal with “difficult” issues. the political geography lecturer said that he found having powerpoint slides available online was good for students with learning disabilities. he also wanted to use blackboard to make his lecture slides available in l. phipps & d. lanclos 73 advance, so that his students could write their class notes on the printouts of the slides. the lecturer in forensics also valued being able to share her powerpoint slides with her students, not because she adhered to them strictly in her lectures, but because she saw them as a help to students who wanted them to read after the lecture had been delivered. the phd student and teaching assistant in education used her institution’s moodle discussion boards for her postgraduate students, and had also set up two different areas for discussion in moodle, one where staff were present, and another that no staff had access to, “so students will use it.” the ways that participants talked about themselves engaging with the vle, or other learning technology, was quite varied. for the most part, their teaching approaches were what informed their needs from the technology, rather than the other way around. the phd student in education said that how she uses moodle depends on how she is teaching--if the teaching is “instrumental, then it doesn’t matter what the (vle) system is, you want it to be fast and effective.” she also noted that at her institution there was is a lot of flexibility in the vle practices, negotiated schedule and resources, because of the devolved responsibilities for content. she thought that because instructors of modules didn’t always get together to make decisions as a team, it made things harder for the students, especially “if you’re working part time [as her students are] you want things to be clear” anxiety about the role of technology in replacing themselves underlies some of the refusal around using the vle. this was a not-insignificant concern at the time we were conducting the interviews, as the ucu/uss pension industrial action was active and very much on the minds of practitioners, whether they were on strike or not. for example, at least one institution used previously captured lectures to replace the content (and labour) of striking lecturers (edwards et al. 2018). the professor of education noted that her colleagues assume that if the “stuff” from class is available online, that students will not come to class--the work of the lecturer, if it’s reduced to content delivery, once it is captured online, is perceived to be unnecessary face-to-face. this is an anxiety, an expectation, and not necessarily one that is true, even as the impact of online content and lecture capture inspires anxiety among increasingly precarious academic staff members. some described bad experiences with their institutional vles that were barriers to student engagement far beyond just the classroom experience. the he lecturer in art and design’s experience with blackboard was that all of the assessment had to be done via rubrics within the vle. her students found it difficult to access the rubric, so her work-around was to take a screenshot of it, and email it to the students. she said that once her student go into blackboard, “it’s a disaster, and they don’t ever go back.” the learning environments provided by technology (not just the vle) were spoken of not just as a tool but also as a place (white and lecornu 2011). participants saw technology as providing places for them to discuss continuing professional development issues, for example the english literature professor valued the higher education academy virtual learning environment she had at her institution, where she learned theory and practice around teaching. the he lecturer in art and design noted that she interacts in constructive ways with her students online (despite their reluctance to engage with the vle), much like in the informal face to face learning environments discussed above, only in digital form. “i like it” she said, of being on facebook with her students, “i can keep a better eye on what they’re asking about.” irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 74 it is worth asking, what does “innovative” teaching look like? it’s not just “use of technology” because the following involves technology, and is also terrifically familiar: “[the professor of education] puts her materials online, uses the slides she has posted online in class, and she gets her students to do activities while in face to face class (all of the activities are on paper).” “innovative” was therefore not necessarily the appropriate word to describe many of the uses of education technology, and it is important to distinguish “digital” from “innovation,” as they are not synonymous. for example, the professor of education described moodle simply as a repository for materials for her classes. the art and design lecturer in fe spoke of “documenting learning” within the moodle environment, especially in group-work contexts, where students participated in forums as well as submitted the outcomes of their work. some staff noted that the vle was seen as the single source of consistency about their course, relying on it as the repository for course materials even if students did not always access it as much as perhaps would be useful, in the minds of their instructors. the lecturer in forensics noted that all her students seemed to want from the vle was to “know where the lecture notes are.” she took a lot of time to find and put extra resources into the vle, but also knew they were not used fully as part of her students’ “learning journey” and wasn’t sure about how to change that. the concern about whether students are likely to engage with “extra” content in the vle mirrors more traditional concerns about students reading the “optional” items on a course reading list. the problem here is not about the technology, then, but about perceptions of what is required to do well in the class, and a larger question of what “engagement” might look like, and indeed if it has to look the same for each student. 3.2 physical places the limits that physical space puts on teaching practices came up repeatedly in our interviews. concerns about class size, the rooms in which individuals have to teach (lecture or fixed-seating spaces when they want to use flexible spaces, for instance), the limited availability of non-classroom spaces that meet the needs of staff and students, were all persistent themes in the interviews. some practitioners were arranging their classrooms into flexible spaces that facilitated conversation and group work because their pedagogical approach required that arrangement. if they had to teach in traditional fixed-seating environments, they had to spend time and energy “hacking” their spaces. the english literature professor found it challenging to have to change the spaces every time to make them suit the kind of teaching she wants to do, but “once you make the changes it is worth it,” she said. many were aware that they could not get into the kinds of spaces they wanted to be able to teach in at their institution. the professor of education noted there was a “hard limit” on non-lecture spaces at her institution, and the civil engineering professor didn’t always get to teach in the interactive spaces he preferred. the persistent sense of scarcity, an awareness that there are spaces they could be in, or that others could be in, that they cannot get into, points to a need to better understand the relationship of staffing, timetabling, and available physical environments. we need to ask additional questions about what role the digital estate might play in supporting teaching, both active pedagogies and more traditional approaches. what tools are available now, what advice and guidance might be possible to support the l. phipps & d. lanclos 75 kind of bridge that digital might build from current practices to ones that more fully use the potential of the spaces they have (and want to have)? participants expressed a need for non-classroom spaces for themselves, and for their students, because teaching and learning does not just take place in classrooms. for example, staff offices were spoken of as an important place for teaching, a place to do the work of marking and also an important place for face to face meetings, which can be difficult in shared office or hot-desking situations. some participants talked about doing marking and other admin work in their office in an attempt to keep separate their work and their home lives. while the solution to “not enough space” institutionally can be “share a space,” that solution does not necessarily meet the expressed needs of practitioners. having confidential meetings, doing work that has private/protected results (such as marking), this is work that requires protected, unshared space. if not offices, then what? we could ask questions about what else might be possible, given the potential of digital systems, and a broader definition of what a teaching and learning space might be. if work, including academic work, is something you do rather than somewhere you go, what role could academics play in designing digital and physical spaces that meet their and their student’s needs? as we saw in the case of classroom teaching spaces, flexibility, a sense of control, and adaptable spaces are a requirement for effective work in non-classroom spaces. when talking about the work she does in her own office, the applied ecology professor also mentioned that people in her department who have shared desks have to manage student traffic and confidentiality carefully--they schedule meeting students on days different from when their desk partner does, for example. the sense that confidential meetings could and should only happen face to face is an interesting one. clearly there is a concern for privacy and security, but there is also an underlying assumption that difficult meetings should be face to face. it would be interesting to explore the possibilities for safe and effective pastoral care that happens in digital places and contexts, and the extent to which that would extend the capacity that academic staff have to meet and talk with their students. informal spaces emerged as important settings for teaching and learning. shot throughout this theme is a need for flexibility, once again echoing the concerns that emerged from discussions about formal teaching spaces such as classrooms. the he lecturer in art and design found it easier to meet students in the flexible learning space set up for her program, the students were more comfortable there (and she was, too). she meets one on one with students in the space “in a quiet corner” at the same time that other students are working in groups--if a student wants to go meet in another space, she has other places (such as her office) to go, but the large, comfortable, flexible space filled with soft seating, tables, whiteboards, and computers along one side of the room was generally preferred. students in some cases find their way to non-classroom spaces even if they are not officially allowed to do so, because they need a range of places to do their work, not just lecture halls and tutorial rooms. the civil engineering professor mentioned that students at his institution were “not allowed in the buildings during the weekend”--but they would go in anyway, to use lounge spaces to study where they were comfortable. he said there was a pattern, particularly at the end of the semester, when students need to be in the building to work more, and they largely ignored the rules about when they were and were not “supposed” to be in the buildings. 3.3 risk irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 76 if innovation is defined as trying something unusual or new, change can be simply trying something different. participants were keenly aware of the risks involved if they failed to innovate, to try and succeed with new things (and discard the things that did not work). the english literature professor stated that inclusive teaching and teaching that doesn’t change are mutually exclusive: “you and your practices have to be malleable.” being transparent with students, talking to them about why they are doing what they are doing, emerged as an important way to deal with and manage student anxiety (and a sense of risk) about the impact of unfamiliar approaches. transparency was thus not only a way of building trust such that students could be more engaged and successful, but also a primary strategy for helping to manage the risks that academic staff felt they were undertaking in trying new or different things in their classrooms and other teaching contexts. there is a relationship to be explored among change, innovation and risk; some individuals did not feel that they had institutional support to try different things, and if they did try new things, they tried not to draw attention to the things they did, for fear that they would be told to stop, or that what they were doing was wrong. student expectations can have a dampening effect on whether teaching staff try new approaches. participants recognize that they have to confront the occasionally quite conservative ways that students frame what teaching and learning looks like, before they can safely try unconventional approaches. they are also aware that more innovative and unconventional approaches do not always correlate to simple measures of “satisfaction” in course evaluations. participants pointed to the importance of explaining why they were doing what they were doing across their practices, as a way of managing risk to themselves. these educators wanted to make sure that students could see the rationale behind lecturing in a particular way, or group work, or the particular structure of any educational experience, so that they (students and teachers alike) could be more successful. this kind of transparency is a component part of building and maintaining trust--those who saw themselves as facilitating trusting relationships with their students did this in part via pedagogical transparency, through repeatedly talking about why they were teaching in a particular way, in a particular place, or using a specific piece of tech, system, or social media platform. their measure of success, and management of risk, was much more about process than content. the applied ecology professor said, “undergraduate success is about breadth, flexibility, and being able to create depth where they want, and making sure they can develop that [ability to go deep where they want to]” interviewees were aware of some of the barriers that put themselves, their teaching practices, and their students at risk. the final question of each interview was “what else do we need to know about?” and the (largely unfulfilled) desire to have the time and space to discuss teaching came up repeatedly. the religious studies lecturer, who is also his institution’s head of academic development, said he didn’t think there was enough time spent talking about teaching and learning, and when there were such conversations, they didn’t “have institutional weight,” because not enough people (and in particular not enough senior people) were participating. the lecturer in forensics pointed out that undergraduate teaching is timeintensive in part because there is a lot that undergraduate students are trying to figure out, and there’s a lot more support needed from lecturers. the lecturer in political geography separately echoed this point that teaching takes time, and added that he would like more time with his tutees, but that would require fewer [staff] meetings, and a budget to socialize with them l. phipps & d. lanclos 77 several participants felt that time was scarce to have discussions about teaching within internal or external peer networks. even when there were institutionally provided spaces to discuss curriculum and teaching, they were much more often about compliance and credentialing rather than new teaching practices, or rethinking current work. instructors talked about having dedicated time to develop new modules, but none to reconfigure or revise in any significant way modules currently on offer. this lack of time to revise existing modules is likely related to the concern about the risks that might be undertaken in changing teaching practices. time also affected what kind of choices participants made around getting access to resources. institutional bureaucracy can be a barrier to getting equipment, licenses, etc, and if people need something on a shorter time scale than organizational red tape allows, they might just purchase something themselves so that they can use it. when we asked the he lecturer in art and design what she wished she could do in teaching that she can’t know, she noted that sometimes she ends up buying her own equipment and licenses, because “it’s better than waiting for a year” to get the things she wants to help her teach, or not being able to teach in her preferred way at all. bureaucratic processes could also add to the time that important work takes, such as curriculum development, exacerbating the sense that there’s not enough time to do important work. for example, the professor of education saw “course design by committee” at her institution, and she found it hard to innovate because of the hours required to do the work via committee. time allotted to tasks is evidence that such things are a priority. when time is not allowed for the practice or further development of teaching, it is hard to argue that teaching is valued. fragmented internal networks are silos that make it impossible for some to see the good work that might be happening. the civil engineering lecturer was convinced that there were “secret projects” on his campus, innovations that no one can see, because of the barriers to their visibility. others were themselves part of the institutional support system for teaching and learning, but encountered academics who did not want any part of that support. the head of the humanities faculty, in trying to effect change within his institution around teaching and learning practices, encountered academics telling him “stop telling us how to do our jobs.” he also recognized that he was part of a network that not everyone at his institution had access to--he spends a lot of his time with staff developers, talking about teaching, but has a small team of them, and so it’s of limited benefit to the entire (large) university at which he works. he thought that lack of access had a negative impact on his institution’s support for continuing professional development for teaching. for some interviewees there was very little institutional support for their teaching practices, while other participants had access to internal and external networks of support. for the most part people had access to either internal or external networks, but not both. not everyone, therefore, had a trusted network to help mitigate the risks involved with experimenting with teaching. for instance, the art and design lecturer in fe had a very limited external network, with few outside connections in his field. in fact, he was hoping to get a chance to do an ma degree in part to build an external network in his field, as it was very difficult to do from his particular institution. but this same lecturer has good internal support from his line manager, and felt he could ask for help. another participant, in the course of our interview with her, realized when she was talking about the support she got for thinking through pedagogy and irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 78 teaching practice, she was referring to resources that were available to her because she was doing her phd. once she finished her degree, she would no longer have the kind of access she currently enjoyed, but which she valued for her work. those who did have access to a supportive network of peers, locally or outside of the institution, recognized it as an important to how they approach teaching. the applied ecology professor had opportunities to see her colleagues teaching, because co-teaching often happened within her program’s modules, and she and her colleagues discuss what to do, how workshops will be run, and generally “talk about practice” amongst themselves. the phd student in education knew that she serves as a resource for her colleagues, because they know she is doing her phd, and she saw the relationships with her colleagues and students as helping to provide the materials and approaches for her to use in teaching, too. 3.4 trust trust was one of the most important themes to emerge from people’s discussions of why and how people make the decisions they make around teaching. building rapport with students, building trust and comfort in informal environments is spoken about as a crucial way to set students up for success in the more formal contexts of the university. the need to have access to more than just formal classroom spaces as a part of their teaching and learning practices was also linked in some cases to a much broader desire to engage with students. the civil engineering lecturer simply stated “in my mind, it’s about trust: students do more work for you knowing they have confidence that you’ll take them somewhere.” the lecturer who was head of the humanities faculty discussed the ways that he builds rapport with students, via guest lectures, and field trips as well as module leadership, resulting in students being candid with him, and not just telling him what they think he wants to hear. the english literature professor’s strategy for putting students at ease when they came to see her in her office (a setting she says they are not always comfortable in), is to deliberately notice something about what they are wearing or holding--shoes, phone, clothes, etc--and talk about it enthusiastically, and ask about it. “because it’s very difficult to go into someone’s office when you don’t know them, and many students coming to my office do not know me yet.” she said that students coming to her office for the first time are “very nervous, even though i am not scary at all.” it is worth asking here what else we might be able to learn about the experiences students have, especially the first time they approach an instructor, and the extent to which the student is apprehensive about approaching “a lecturer” (where the identity is what is scary), or apprehensive about being in a new space (such as an office) for the first time. we need to think about how digital tools and environments might facilitate building of trust, and also ways that current digital affordances might be perceived as barriers to students, in trusting their teachers, and the institutional context in which they find themselves in he and fe. educators wanted to be able to trust their institutions to support their work, and also spoke about barriers to that very support. some of the barriers to the ways they wanted to teach were seen to be particular people, for example members of the senior management team. the professor of education specifically identified a dean at her institution as “anti-ed-tech.” but change management difficulties could be found at many levels, not just senior management ones, and again, the barrier to change here is not necessarily technological, but l. phipps & d. lanclos 79 organizational. in the anatomy lecturer’s experience, “sometimes people create barriers.” for example, if he wanted to change modules, he needed to go through 3 different committees to do so. individuals cannot always trust that there will be enough people to do the necessary work: how many people are available to do the work, and what sort of people (and expertise) are in the institution has an impact on what is possible with teaching. when thinking about designing a course, the religious studies lecturer also had to think about who will be available to do the teaching--he said that available staff and their capabilities/characteristics can be a restriction to thinking about what is possible to offer to students the phd student in education was trying to have class discussions within the vle, but it wasn’t working quite so well this year (as it did last year) because this year they have online practices that are split between two locations , and one of the locations is in the last year of the program, so there wasn’t much attempt being made to keep the two locations coordinated. therefore she said the platforms were “a bit of a mess” this year. in this case, the difficulties manifest as student confusion within the vle, but their confusion is not a problem of education technology, but rather one born of not having enough staffing to communicate and coordinate across multiple teaching and learning sites (digital and physical) funding (or lack thereof) also contributes to the sense of what is and isn’t possible around change, and can heighten a sense of risk, as well as a lack of trust. funding concerns are not of course just about internal forces within institutions, but are part of the larger political context in which teaching staff in he and fe operate. this political context informs organizational concern with metrics such as national student survey (nss) scores and teaching excellence framework (tef) awards. this has the potential to become an even larger concern as attention is paid to the metrics associated with the new office of students data-driven approach. the focus on metrics has the potential to distract from the work of teaching and learning. the he lecturer in art and design called the institutional focus on nss scores as “nonsense” that was in fact in conflict with research and funding concerns, and that got in the way of doing “actual work.” interviewees were aware that not just what they do when they teach, but why they do it, is an important part of their teaching success. the need for transparency was talked about in terms of assessment, of student expectations, and of approaches to teaching practices generally. the professor of religion said “whatever you do with students, you need to be able to explain to your students why you are doing it.” the phd student in education and teaching assistant taught her students about teaching by “echoing” within the process of teaching what she wanted them to do--she told them repeatedly, “this will be useful, trust me,” and also modelled in her own behaviour the things she wanted them to value about teaching. the anatomy lecturer discussed transparency in the process of putting together a curriculum--he takes a holistic approach, framing everything to a problem, especially the student questions around “why,” and designing courses as a journey, which he says “gives meaning to what they are learning.” students, once aware of why certain practices were in place, tended to accept it. the civil engineering lecturer didn’t find his students pushing back on projectbased learning because those practices are a part of their discipline, and students knew why they were engaging in them. transparency of practice was also framed as an important part of providing a context of trust, so that students would come to members of staff when they needed help outside of the classroom. for example, the he lecturer in art and design had a tutor with dyslexia, and so irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 80 was taught in very different ways than she was used to. her experiences with this tutor opened her to the possibility of different approaches to teaching, and she talks about different approaches with her first year students. the feedback she gets from students is that they had been worried they were alone in their concerns or specific needs, and they realized after she talked to them that they were not alone. she thinks these conversations make her students a more cohesive cohort, trust building was important in digital as well as physical spaces--during interviews, people talked about discussion boards and social media as teaching spaces. they also talked about digital spaces that they would not go into because they wanted to make sure that students would interact with each other. for example, the he lecturer in art set up a space on a social media platform where her students knew she was present, and then she encouraged them to set up a separate space that she was never going to go into, because they needed have time and space to interact with each other when she was not around. the same issues around structured and unstructured spaces, institutionally supported spaces and non-institutionally supported, were true in digital as well as physical spaces. digital technology can expand the number of places where teachers can communicate in trustworthy ways with students. the religious studies lecturer was very mindful about his social media presence as a way of breaking down barriers between students and academics. he was aware that sometimes it is hard for academics to frame themselves as people, for their students because they are teachers and therefore authority figures. he very deliberately curated a mode in particular social media accounts to make connections with his students that he could not otherwise make in formal structured classroom environments. he was never under the impression that just because he has a social media account that it would result in engagement with his students; it was about what he did with his presence online that made the difference. sometimes such transparency feels risky, and the religious studies lecturer spoke of his privilege in his position as a permanent, long-term lecturer, and also a white man, in being able to safely admit that he doesn’t know everything, and that he’s sometimes being experimental in his teaching. he is aware that such “risk taking” is not always available to white women or people of colour. 4. discussion l. phipps & d. lanclos 81 fig 1 practitioners are struggling with the disconnect between what they need to do in the spaces their institution provides, and what is possible (figure 1). staff have to work harder to achieve the kind of teaching they want to in spaces that are not always configured to facilitate their desired practices. some of this is a result of limits on space as a resource, however there is also an element of staff not always knowing what is possible in the spaces (digital and physical) available. the opportunities in which innovation can happen are largely invisible to staff who are struggling with institutionally provided technology and teaching environments that are barriers to their teaching. if the circles in figure 1 started to overlap more, people might start to have more access to the possibilities that are currently not visible to them. in addition, while “innovation” seems now to be writ large in every institutional strategy, it is important to distinguish that digital and innovation are not the same thing. in some of the interviews people pointed to quite “traditional” practices they were doing: providing content, facilitating student discussions. neither of these practices is novel, or innovative. it might be “digital” but it's not particularly new or exciting. when institutions mandate technology, that is not the same as supporting teaching. we see that mandating particular approaches in the name of control or “consistency” stifles innovation and turns people away from the creative use of digital around teaching. institutionally provided systems are not single-stop places for practitioners, who use open web and commercially provided platforms as teaching (and learning) places. this is not new, as the dilemma of the bounded vle and limitations is called out here, for instance: “the phrase ‘lifelong learning’ in higher education strikes at the heart of the ‘bounded vle’ problem. students are given the skills to see their cpd as important and necessary and then we give them access to a vle that is aimed primarily at the modular nature of their course, and when they graduate they lose access to that resource. compounding this problem is the idea of ‘life-wide’ learning, where students are actively encouraged to draw on their broad experiences and integrate them into their educational experiences but where is the space within the vle?” (phipps et al, 2008) irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 82 the familiar tension between the bounded vle and the potential of the open web continues to have implications for the ways that institutions support and recognize teaching practices that leverage digital places and platforms. how can institutions support individuals without mandating specific digital approaches or tools? perhaps one answer is for institutions to recognize and facilitate “not-yetness” (collier and ross 2017): “not-yetness is not satisfying every condition, not fully understanding something, not check-listing everything, not tidying everything, not trying to solve every problem…but creating space for emergence to take us to new and unpredictable places, to help us better understand the problems we are trying to solve (collier, 2015).” this would respond quite effectively to stated preferences for time and space to explore, to find out what works and what doesn’t via experimentation, to work with emergent technology and within digital places that haven’t been completely vetted and controlled by institutions. this would require trusting academics, and their students, in contexts where institutions might not be able to observe or quantify what is happening. trust, therefore, is not just an issue between instructor and student. trust emerges as an important component part of effective teaching and learning environments. if the people working in an institution do not trust the technology or the people who are in charge of that technology, they are not going to engage. but teaching is not just about the individual who is “the teacher,” delivery of teaching involves staff developers, educational developers, staff involved in curriculum design, and the people who do the timetabling. if at any point in that network the trust is broken, then things start to go wrong. if students go into a system that doesn't work they never go back. if faculty have bad experience with someone who is supposed to be helping them they never go back. if they try to upload a piece of content to a system and it fails they never go back. if faculty think they are going to be punished in some way for not using institutional tools, they will hide their practices in using what is available outside of the boundaries of their institution. it is worth thinking about the extent to which academic staff trust institutionally-provided technology beyond its traditional role as a repository for materials, and as a potential place for innovative practice. if they do not trust the systems to work, if they do not trust that those systems will not be used against them, as was the case in the uss/ucu strike in 2018, then there is little chance that teaching and learning innovations will be happening with the help of these systems. the political situation of precarity in higher education is having a direct impact on the extent to which people want to engage with technology. likewise, if academic staff do not have trusted relationships with the teaching and learning support staff, there is little chance that their collective expertise will be leveraged to the benefit of their students. we also wish to draw attention to the discussion of how important and occasionally fugitive networks are in developing, maintaining, and growing teaching practices. it is striking how difficult networks are to build and maintain without institutional support for the time and other resources such networking requires. even as the uk has a number of national frameworks and organizations dedicated to he and fe teaching, there remains an uneven l. phipps & d. lanclos 83 sense of access to such structures, and the development that they might offer to people teaching in the sector. the distance between the networks people wish they had and the extrainstitutional structures available for development of teaching is something that needs attention. 5. conclusions we wanted, in conducting this project, to move away from starting with digital, and to ground discussions in the behaviours of people who were teaching, whether or not their practices had anything to do with digital. we report our research results here to provide insights about both practices and priorities for teaching staff, and as an act of amplifying and advocating rather than discovery. the intent is to inform and support, and to boost the voices that are coming through in our research, not pretend that we have discovered any of this for the first time. the practices discussed in this article and the emergent themes identify a range of opportunities and barriers. throughout the research we found the assumption that digital was synonymous with innovation to be a barrier to actual change--in some cases it actually helped to maintain existing practices that were perceived as needing to change. where this perception of digital being the same as innovation we also found instances of institutions mandating the use of technology in teaching, and ultimately stifling innovation. technology cannot save an institution which lacks trust, without which effective relationships cannot be built among staff, or between staff and students. trust is the foundation on which effective teaching and learning environments are built. in presenting this work in talks, conference papers, and to reviewers, we have received some unenthusiastic reactions to our findings and recommendations, especially around “fostering innovation” among educators. we share the disappointment expressed, but not in the educators. our disappointment stems from structural policies and processes, that despite knowing that education is a human endeavor, continue to fund technology and systems in the place of people and their time. we cannot hope for innovative practice in teaching (or learning) until the basic needs of educators for time, for networks, for institutional and structural support, are met. that our findings are seen by many as “already known” indicates, not that we do not need to pay attention to this anymore, but rather that we still do not pay enough attention to the human cost of labor and expertise in education. this paper should raise questions: what is the role of the learning technologist? of the it professional? of the professional organisations in he and fe in facilitating the creation of spaces and structures? how can educators be supported in experimenting with and growing their teaching practices, both with and without technology? until their needs are met, with steady funding, and a trust in their expertise, the innovations we see in education will be despite institutions, not because of them. acknowledgements the authors would like to thank jisc for funding this research, our interview participants, and those who worked with us during the workshop developing the themes, kwabena adjeiirish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2019 84 owusu, paul bailey, james clay, damian chapman, sarah davies, marcus elliott, andrew mcgregor, sarah ney, andrew preater and chris thomson. l. phipps & d. lanclos 85 references berkowitz s. 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(2011). visitors and residents: a new typology for online engagement. first monday, 16(9). http://firstmonday.org/article/view/3171/3049 http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/1997/nsf97153/start.htm http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/1997/nsf97153/start.htm http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/1997/nsf97153/start.htm http://redpincushion.us/blog/teaching-and-learning/not-yetness/ http://www.aupress.ca/books/120258/ebook/02_veletsianos_2016-emergence_and_innovation_in_digital_learning.pdf http://www.aupress.ca/books/120258/ebook/02_veletsianos_2016-emergence_and_innovation_in_digital_learning.pdf http://www.aupress.ca/index.php/books/120258 http://www.aupress.ca/index.php/books/120258 http://www.aupress.ca/index.php/books/120258 http://www.aupress.ca/index.php/books/120258 https://ssrn.com/abstract=3234382 http://doi.org/10.1629/uksg.316 https://www.jisc.ac.uk/rd/projects/next-generation-digital-learning https://doi.org/10.1177/160940690900800107 https://doi.org/10.1177/160940690900800107 https://doi.org/10.1177/160940690900800107 http://firstmonday.org/article/view/3171/3049 irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 3, issue 1, 2018 42 exploring students’ use of the social networking site whatsapp to foster connectedness in the online learning experience suzanne stone*1a anna logan a a. dublin city university (received november 2017; final version received april 2018) abstract in recent years, increasing attention has been paid to the use of social networking tools in higher education teaching and learning. drawing on data from a larger study focusing on student engagement in the online virtual classroom, this paper is based on research conducted with three separate cohorts of students from the masters in special educational needs (msen) at st. patrick’s college now the institute of education, dublin city university (dcu). emerging from the first two phases of the research was the use of the whatsapp social media tool by students as an informal learning space and a means of building connectedness. we explored this finding in more detail in phases three and four by inviting respondents to comment specifically on their use of social media throughout the programme. it emerged that the use of whatsapp was widespread, offering students an opportunity to forge a sense of connection and the basis for developing a learning community. this paper will present findings around the use of whatsapp with reference to literature in three areas connected to the online learning experience: online learning as a second class learning experience, fostering connectedness within online learning contexts and social media and learning. 1. introduction despite the proliferation of social media and increased interest in social networking in higher education (purvis, rodger & beckingham, 2016), surprisingly little attention has been paid to exploring the nature of such social practice (o’ keeffe, 2016). at the same time, there is evidence of uncertainty among both academics (purvis et al., 2016) and students (dabbagh & kitsantas, 2012) regarding the use of social media in professional learning contexts. * corresponding author. email: suzanne.stone@dcu.ie irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 s stone & a logan. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 43 furthermore, it has been argued that the nature and impact of student use of social networks for knowledge sharing and learning has been under-researched ( eid & al-jabri, 2016). arguably, social networking can support the creation of communities of practice (lave & wenger, 1991) particularly among online learners, having potential to support learners in integrating formal and informal learning and facilitate self-regulated learning (dabbagh and kitsantas, 2012). the salience of social networking initially emerged as an unanticipated finding of research conducted by the authors to explore ways to support student engagement in the formal online synchronous classroom, leading the authors to a closer examination of this theme. during the academic years 2014-2017, we researched student engagement in the online virtual classroom with three successive cohorts of students from the masters in special educational needs (msen), a blended programme at the former st. patrick's college, drumcondra now part of the new institute of education, dublin city university. initial findings from cohort one suggested that while most participants expressed a preference for the face-to-face classroom, the convenience of the online approach was highly significant in enabling them to complete the programme. data from the second cohort shed further light on student perceptions and expectations of online learning prior to registration. emerging from this phase was the use of the whatsapp social media tool by students as an informal learning space and a means of building connectedness for students who were distance learners for the majority of the programme. we explored this further in phases three and four by inviting respondents to comment specifically on their use of social media throughout the programme. it emerged that the use of whatsapp was widespread and was seen as a very positive experience. we begin with a review of the literature in the areas of: online learning as a second class learning experience, fostering connection for online cohorts and social media and learning, with particular reference to the use of whatsapp. we follow with a short outline of the research context and background and an outline of the research methodology. drawing on the literature reviewed and considering the connectedness of these themes, we offer an analysis of our findings. we conclude by drawing conclusions and identifying implications for practice and research and suggest how these might inform the development of guidelines for the use of whatsapp for building connectedness within online student cohorts and building learning communities. 2. literature review an initial literature review explored the areas of social media in education and online learning as a second class learning experience. over the course of the research we returned to explore the further theme of ‘connectedness in online learning’ with a particular focus on informal learning spaces, which allowed us to frame the research from a broader perspective. 2.1 perceptions of online learning as a second class educational experience the perception of online learning as a second class educational experience is widely explored in the literature (bayne, gallagher & lambe, 2014, raddon, 2006; ross & sheil, 2017). a perceived lack of connection to the campus or ‘campus envy’ and a longing for the face to face experience is at the centre of this discourse (bayne et al., 2014). bayne et al. mention the difficulty with the semantics of online education: students are described as being s. stone & a. logan 44 ‘distant’ or ‘absent’ from the university campus, suggesting that discourse should include discussion about university spaces from a more fluid perspective. the university, we suggest, can no longer be seen as a bounded, stable place – a static ‘container’ within which education takes place (p. 3) raddon’s (2006) study offers an alternative view from a group of distant students over two years of a masters programme who viewed the distance education model as one of opportunity. the participants in this study recognised that attending a full time face to face programme would not have been an option in their own particular context and saw the distant education model as a positive, allowing control over time and location. while some of the participants expressed some ‘campus envy’ as defined by ross and sheil (2017), on balance the distant option was the more advantageous choice. it is interesting to note that within this generally positive perspective of distant learning, participants did view the lack of communication with other learners as one of the challenges, despite the provision of online communication tools. ross and sheil (2017) offer an interesting perspective on the perception of the challenges of online learning by students completing a dissertation on an online masters programme. building on theories of imaginary in social theory (castoriadis, 1997; taylor, 2002, 2004), they describe what they call the ‘campus imaginary’ created. ross, gallagher and macleod (2013) speak about this perceived deficit as something that needs to be addressed by shifting understandings of ‘nearness’, which we argue could also be understood as ‘connectedness’. they describe nearness as a temporary state involving a variety of elements or stakeholders (people, context and technologies) which is difficult to maintain over a long timeframe for those involved in part-time, distance or blended programmes and suggest that universities need to design strategies to accommodate this shifting sense of nearness. interruptions and subsequent returns should therefore be seen as normal in the practice of studying as an online distance learner, and teachers and institutions should work to help students develop resilience in negotiating various states of nearness. four strategies for increasing this resilience are proposed: recognising nearness as effortful; identifying affinities; valuing perspective shifts; and designing openings (p. 1) 2.2 social media tools and back channel communication within the last few years, the concept of a communication ‘back channel’ has emerged in education in both face to face and online learning contexts (kearns & frey, 2010; holland, 2014; jacobs & mcfarlane, 2005). a back channel is described by kearns and frey as ‘a network of out-of-class dialogues among students’(p.41). social media tools are ideally suited to the development of such out-of-class dialogues and in the case of online learners the use of technology may be the only option in terms of building connectedness. it is therefore important to understand how such technologies can support back channel communication. the research in this area also suggests that student engagement with a back channel increases if a sense of connectedness exists (bouhnik, & deshen, 2014). the literature, however limited, in relation to the use of whatsapp and other social media tools within education does suggest that these informal learning spaces can be of great benefit irish journal of technology enhanced learning 45 to students in terms of sharing information, building connectedness and establishing learning communities (o’keeffe, 2016). bouknik and deshen (2014) also note that the simplicity and the option of private message on whatsapp as a platform contributed to usage by students when compared to that of facebook. there are of course some negative aspects emerging including the level of distractedness (purvis et al., 2016) and the sheer volume of communication within such platforms. bouhnik and deshen (2014) found that teachers involved in whatsapp group moderation were at times overwhelmed by the number of interactions, but did find simple ways to deal with this issue namely to mute conversations at certain times. another possible challenge to whatsapp in an education context is that the immediacy of the platform fosters a culture of ‘here and now’ responses which does not allow students to explore solutions themselves initially (bouhnik & deshen, 2014). 2.3 the importance of informal learning spaces in fostering connectedness the literature identifies barriers to a sense of connection for online learners and the difficulties experienced in fostering such connectedness (wang & gearhart, 2006; paloff & pratt, 2007; bayne et al., 2014; mcdonald, & mannheimer zydney, 2014). deng and tavares (2013) compared students views of facebook and the online learning environment offered by the institution (moodle) and found that while students were much more active on facebook, they could not determine whether the level of interaction was due to the user interface or the bonding between the group that emerged outside of the formal learning space. bouhnik and deshen (2014) also identified the possibility of whatsapp in extending beyond the life of the formal classroom with students in their study choosing to maintain the whatsapp group beyond graduation which of course can only happen through informal learning spaces owned by the students themselves. 3. research context and background this study and the substantive research focus on student use of social networking is located within the wider context of our research on student engagement and interaction. in the academic year 2014-15 in our roles as learning designer and lecturer, we embarked on a collaborative approach to transitioning the msen programme from an entirely face-to-face to a blended model of delivery. this research project subsequently emerged from our concern to support student engagement, participation and learning with a particular focus on the synchronous online classroom. the virtual online classroom tool used for the msen programme is adobe connect and while we have worked over the last number of years to explore ways to support student engagement in the formal online classroom, there has been a low level of student interaction within the online classes. while the use of a back channel has been found to foster peer interaction and reduce the instructor’s burden in the virtual online classroom (vu & fadde, 2013), we remain concerned by the level of discomfort that students are reporting in communicating within the adobe connect classroom itself, particularly in relation to speaking on the microphone, and continue to work towards improving this situation. a very interesting thread emerged from the data around the community building which is happening outside of these formal live online classes. it appears that the formal online learning spaces, the live online classroom and the asynchronous learning activities such as the loop (moodle) forum are not perceived by students as conducive to supporting the development of a sense of community within the group. our findings and analysis to follow, s. stone & a. logan 46 explore the efforts of students to counter this perceived deficit in the formal learning spaces by using whatsapp to create their own interactive space. we reflect on why students have elected to move outside of the formal learning spaces and how we can support this type of connectedness for future cohorts, while allowing students to retain ownership of their informal learning space. 4. methodology as shown in table 1, the research was conducted with three separate cohorts of students completing the masters in special educational needs (msen) programme across four phases over the course of three consecutive academic years between 2014 and 2017. the first author was engaged in supporting students to use the adobe connect classroom tool through an induction process, answering technical queries from students by email and supporting the lecturer in managing break out sessions. the second author was the programme chair, module coordinator and lecturer throughout all phases of the research. data were gathered as part of a broader evaluation of the programme in phases 1, 3 and 4 using the loop (moodle) questionnaire tool with anonymous respondent settings, and in phase 2 by means of one face-to-face and one online focus group. table 1: data collection in each phase phase student cohort year total number of students in cohort data sources number of participants phase 1 cohort a 20142015 29 online survey 27 phase 2 cohort a 20142015 29 focus groups • face-toface • online 5 5 phase 3 cohort b 20152016 23 online survey 16 phase 4 cohort c 20162017 21 online survey 11 in phase 1, at the end of the first semester in december 2014, 27 of the 29 students in cohort a completed an online survey seeking their views on many aspects of module design, delivery and assessment but with a particular focus on their experience of engagement, participation and learning online. in all, 22 of the 28 survey questions related to online learning and 19 of these were closed questions relating to for example student use of and ratings of the usefulness of tools for engagement such text chat, breakout rooms and the microphone and building relationships online. these data are reported elsewhere (logan & stone, 2016). in phase 2, following graduation, all 27 graduates from cohort a were invited to participate in a focus group in order to explore some of the emerging findings in greater depth. ten irish journal of technology enhanced learning 47 graduates took part in either a face-to-face or an online focus group interview as was most convenient for them. the focus groups were conducted by a colleague who was not involved in teaching on the msen to allow participants speak freely about their experiences on the programme and guideline questions were circulated to participants in advance. phases three and four comprised anonymous online questionnaires completed by 16 (cohort b, 2015-16) and 11 (cohort c, 2016-17) students respectively. a key theme emerging from phase 2 was the salience of social media in building community and supporting learning among the cohort. consequently, some open ended questions relating to students’ use of social media applications such as what's app to support their engagement and learning were added to the survey completed by students in cohorts b and c. respondents were asked to indicate if they were part of a what's app, facebook group or any other social media group with their peers and were invited to comment on the benefits and challenges of these back channels for their learning. in all phases, information about the study was provided on the online questionnaires and a plain language statement and informed consent forms were included with letters inviting participation in the focus groups. ethical approval for the study was granted by the research ethics committee of the former st. patrick’s college. the approach to data analysis was ongoing and iterative throughout each phase of the study (rosman & rallis, 2012; robson & maccartan, 2016). data from the online surveys were imported into excel and quantitative survey data were summarised in frequency tables. the approach to the analysis of qualitative data in responses to open survey questions and to focus group data was inductive, in the style of grounded theory (glaser & strauss, 1967) informed by the systematic approach outlined by rosman & rallis (2012). first, audiorecordings of both focus groups were transcribed in full. next, having listened to the transcripts, both authors read and reread the transcripts individually, engaging in a process of familiarisation, the identification of categories, data coding and the generation of tentative themes. then, the authors shared their initial analysis, engaging in a collaborative process of seeking alternative interpretations and explanations leading to the identification of themes for presentation and analysis in light of the existing research literature. the initial themes emerging from the focus group data in phase 2 included themes relating to the broader research relating to the online learning experience in a general sense. tweleve major themes emerged as shown in table 2. table 2 overall themes emerging from phase 3 of research focus groups 1. perceptions/prior experience of online learning including perceptions/knowledge of technology required for synchronous online learning 2. understanding of online learning 3. the positive influence of induction support & live online support (technical) 4. induction support suggestions for improvement 5. comfort level with technology 6. distraction element of online learning 7. teaching strategies suggestions for improvement 8. teaching strategies what worked well 9. benefits of online learning 10. preference for face to face 11. sense of community/lack of 12. social media as a student support s. stone & a. logan 48 taking the text that was coded as social media support from the phase 2 focus group (f2f) and the responses from the phase 3 and 4 questionnaires, (in particular whatsapp) we further analysed this text into three broad themes: the perception of online learning as a second class learning experience; the challenges of fostering connectedness within online learning contexts and using social media tools to build connection for online learners. within these three broad themes some further sub themes emerged which we feel can be useful in guiding future supports for students: the distraction aspect of back channels; social media and inclusiveness and the need for informal learning spaces. 5. findings and discussion in the online questionnaire in phase 1 students in cohort a were asked “to what extent do you feel engaging in online classes helped you to build relationships with your fellow students?” less than one third of the 26 respondents agreed ( n=5: 19% ) or strongly agreed (n=3: 12%) while 31% (n=8) adjudged engaging in online classes to be not at all helpful, or somewhat helpful (n= 10: 38%). regarding participation in social media groups, 15 of 16 respondents in cohort b and 10 of 11 respondents in cohort c indicated that they were part of a whatsapp group. 5.1 online learning as a second class learning experience. respondents from our own data echo the literature explored above with data emerging indicating that students focused a lot on what they felt was ‘missing’ from the online learning experience compared to the face to face classroom. i think in the face to face you’re sitting beside someone you’re kind of familiar with, if there’s anything that you’re unclear you might often whisper to them and it’s easy then if you’ve kind of lost track of something or you’re not grasping something it’s kind of just easy to do it, whereas with the online, you’re less likely to ask out if you’re not sure of something, you know, you might miss more information that way (f2f focus group 2015/16). ….there’s kind of an energy in the room as well, like when you’re finished work and tired and come down, like even like here today, like i was tired when i came through the door and i was thinking ‘oh i have to concentrate now’ but then i picked up the energy in the room and i was like, it kind of woke me up a little bit, but if i was at home now, and just sitting there with a cup of tea listening to you on the computer, it wouldn’t be the same. (f2f focus group 2015/16 ). picking up on the the discussion of ‘deficit’ in online learning by ross, gallagher and mcleod (2013) we reflected on how the four strategies suggested for navigating online learning are reflected in our data, recognising nearness as effortful, identifying affinities, valuing perspective shifts and designing openings. students appear to have taken the initiative to foster ‘nearness’ or ‘connectedness’ through the use of whatsapp, and in doing so have adopted two of the strategies identified above, namely ‘designing openings’ and identifying affinities. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 49 by offering students a robust induction for the synchronous online classes, we are acknowledging that a level of effort is required to engage successfully with the content, with the teacher and with the group in the online space, reflecting the above strategy of ‘recognising nearness as effortful’. the fourth suggested strategy; shifting perspectives, is a more difficult one to address. our initial research sought to support the transition from the face-face to the online class and acknowledged the cultural aspect of such a transition by using falloon’s (2011) framework which identifies technical, pedagogical and cultural transitions. while it is clear in our data that students accept they could not pursue studies outside of an online learning opportunity, there is somewhat of a despondent tone in this acceptance, a sense of resignation rather than excitement. yeah i think it’s really set in stone the type of learner i am i really need to be there, but i was very proud of myself i sat at the laptop for 90% and listened for about 80% so i was delighted with that. it did get easier as you went along (online focus group, 2015/2016). one participant even suggested that the experience had an effect on learning outcomes. in terms of the time commitment and the travelling there, on a cold wet night, you first miss your cup of tea on your table in your sitting room. d’you know, i think that’s the real plus of it, but is that at the expense of the learning outcome? (f2f focus group 2015/16) as the perceived negatives largely relate to a sense of disconnectedness within the literature and our own data, one strategy that could support a shifting of perspective is to develop guidelines for students around building a sense of connectedness within formal and informal spaces. 5.2 the importance of informal learning spaces for fostering connection lack of connection emerges from the data throughout each phase of the research. i think that’s important the social interaction. if you have a sense of someone and kind of know them, you are more willing to talk... but it’s harder to just talk to an arbitrary name, that’s just, you know…i used to do that too, and i used to just think ‘ok, who’s the person?’ (f2f focus group 2015/16) certainly the participants of this research study were critical of the affordances of the communication tools within the formal learning spaces: on moodle there is a forum that you can write in to, so other than that task... now i have to say, i didn’t find, especially in the first year, the forum just kind of fell asunder after and it wasn’t used to its full capacity i don’t think (questionnaire 2016/17). more tutors/supervisors should be encouraged to post comments/articles to the forms (forums sic) to encourage students to engage with them and then build up a relationship where students feel able to post queries online (questionnaire 2016/17). s. stone & a. logan 50 an analysis of the usage of the social online forum tools in loop did show some evidence to support this data with a limited number of engagements on the loop forums (table 3). table 3: number of posts to loop online fora student cohort year thesis discussion forum social forum qualitative research forum assignment forum cohort a 20142015 8 28 15 12 cohort b 20152016 7 25* 22 4 *23 of these posts comprised introduction posts during the online induction. in comparison to the tools available and used on loop (moodle) whatsapp was lauded by the participants. yes i was part of the what's app (sic) group. i thought it was brilliant. it was a way to talk and support each other through the whole process and ask any 'silly' questions one may not have liked to ask on the forum or supervisors (questionnaire, 2016/17). it was used by everyone to have queries answered, advice sought, support and encouragement given. it made us feel like part of a familiar group even though we barely see each other. it will be interesting to see if there is a bigger attendance at this years graduation as a result of the sense of involvement and the class bond that it created (questionnaire, 2016/17) the dichotomy between formal and informal learning spaces appears to have allowed students the space to take ownership of their own community which reflects the situation in a face to face learning environment. bayne et al. (2016) identify ethical considerations of the cultures of surveillance as influential in online learning and we can see this influence on the teaching and learning practices in this context. while we know and accept as educators that we cannot control informal learning spaces in the face to face context, the surveillance opportunities of the online learning experience may present a less than complete picture of how informal learning spaces operate. just because we can monitor online activity more easily does not mean that we necessarily should. 5.3 social media tools and connection in education it is interesting to look at the list of technology tools mentioned in kearns and frey’s (2008) study with back channels facilitated by a variety of technology tools ranging from the simple phone call to skype etc. obviously, technology trends move on at a rapid pace and whatsapp was the tool of choice for the students in our study. in effect, the technology is not irish journal of technology enhanced learning 51 at the centre of this discussion and our data indicates that the affordances and design of whatsapp are not particularly influencing the use of the tool. we do however, see evidence that it is the freedom of the ‘back channel’ structure that is important. when comparing the formal and informal communication spaces, one participant comments: i think, you’re not, we’ll say, explicitly being monitored, but you kind of feel ...a bit exposed if you kind of maybe express some of your worries or something you’re unsure of or you don’t understand. our data echoes the study by bouhnik and deshen ( 2014) with data illustrating that a sense of connectedness was an important factor in the success of the whatsapp group. the contact and support was brilliant. there was a safety provided in being openly honest that's not available online through loop. if i wasn't part of the what's app group it would have been a very different experience. what's app is the news/social forum (questionnaire 2015/16). its great to know people are in the same boat as it can be a little isolating when you are completing a distance learning course (questionnaire 2016/17). our own data was extremely positive around the use of whatsapp with some participants naming the interaction within these groups as central to their engagement and indeed completion of the course. i genuinely would not have completed this course without the support from my whatsapp peers. it was a lifeline through out the year. no question was left unanswered and we all rallied together to support each other a different stages during the year (questionnaire 2016/17). we also see evidence of moving from connectedness towards the formation of a learning community. we’d kind of kept our whatsapp group going from the masters and we’d always bounce questions back and forth at one another to the whole group.... i think in terms of social cohesion that’s a big part separate from your own motivation to engage (focus group f2f 2015/16). equally however, the findings confirm the potential for distraction noted by purvis et al. (2016) and for students to become overwhelmed by the volume of messages (bouhnik & dreshen, 2014) at times i had to switch it off e.g. it got very busy during online lectures with people asking questions and commenting. it could be a bit distracting if you let it. it is quite overwhelming to open your whatsapp to 300+ messages and having to scroll through these to ensure you haven't missed anything important (questionnaire 2016/17). it is also of concern that participants seemed to have developed an over reliance on whatsapp for course information as highlighted in this comment. s. stone & a. logan 52 i always checked the messages just to be sure i didn't miss out on anything courserelated (questionnaire 2016/17). while it is important to support the use of any tool (formal or informal) which supports a sense of connectedness, it is also important for students to have some guidance on using such tools and the affordances and boundaries between the formal and informal spaces. 6 conclusions this was a very small-scale study carried out with three cohorts of postgraduate students completing one masters level programme within one institution and as such the findings cannot be considered generalizable. nonetheless, the findings offer a rich source of data to lecturers and learning technologists seeking to harness the potential of social networking sites in fostering connectedness within online student cohorts. consideration of the findings emerging from the focus groups in phase 2 drew our attention to the salience of whatsapp for student engagement and learning, and survey data gathered in phases 3 and 4 shed further light on the benefits and challenges arising. it is clear that students on this programme have benefited greatly from using whatsapp to build a sense of connectedness throughout their programme of study. it is also clear that this sense of connectedness is not currently supported successfully in the available formal learning spaces. analysis of the data suggests that the benefits related not only to the convenience, accessibility and speed of the social media channel versus the online forums on loop (moodle), but also to the private nature of the discussion.while encouraging students to use the loop app might go some way towards addressing convenience and accessibility, aspects such as speed and privacy are less easily addressed. arguably, the “instantaneous” nature of responses on social media, valued greatly by several respondents, may itself increase the potential for misinformation and confusion. nevertheless, the data from this study indicates that students prefer to use an informal private space for posing “silly questions” that they may be uncomfortable asking in an online forum. furthermore, the data indicated the potential for developing a sustainable learning community for the students beyond graduation in an informal learning space which may not be possible within the formal online learning spaces. regarding the implications for practice, it is clear that lecturers working with online learners need to be aware of the existence of social media groups and the positive and potentially negative impact they may exert within their student cohorts. the data emerging from this study suggests that there may be merit in lecturers and learning technologists encouraging the formation of social media groups, pointing out the benefits for building connectedness and in turn, a learning community. in encouraging such practice, it may of benefit to provide guidelines to support effective use of these channels. at the very least, staff could take a lead in ensuring that all students have equal access to participate in pre-existing or newly established social media groups. in the msen programme for example students entered the programme at different stages and/or from different routes and consequently some were less connected than others. furthermore, while most students highly valued being part of the social network, the findings of this study indicate that at times whatsapp could be a distraction, the volume of messages could be overwhelming and at times a source of misinformation, and at worst, lead to feelings of panic or inadequacy. drawing on these data, our next step is to develop some guidelines for students around using whatsapp, highlighting the potential for building connectedness with fellow students and the positive experience of previous cohorts. in the next phase of this research we will collaborate with former students as partners in developing such guidelines. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 53 the data from this small study sheds some light on the affordances and challenges of social networking for supporting connectedness within online learning communities. in an era where as articulated by a survey respondent “what's app is the news/social forum” we suggest that it is helpful for students and staff to be cognisant of potential benefits and pitfalls of such informal learning spaces. future research should continue to explore the dynamics of social networking as a learning space in the context of online programmes and the connections between this and the formal learning spaces within a vle. such research is both important and timely since as noted by some survey respondents, it is within informal spaces that the learning communities forged can be sustained and developed into the future building capacity and extending learning beyond the confines of the programme timeframe itself. references bayne, s., gallagher, m. & lamb, j. may (2014). being ‘at’ university: the social topologies of distance students. higher education. 67, 5, p. 569-583 15. bayne, s, evans, p, ewins, a, knox, j, lamb, j, macleod, h, o'shea, c, ross, j, sheail, p & sinclair, c (2016) manifesto for teaching online 2016. bouhnik, d., & deshen, m. 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(2013). when to talk, when to chat: student interactions in live virtual classrooms. journal of interactive online learning, 12(2), 41–52. irish journal of technology enhanced learning vol 4, issue 1, 2018 16 promoting critical reading using google tools – a community of inquiry approach jaya kannan*a a. director, digital learning, sacred heart university, fairfield, connecticut (received march 2018; final version received october 2018) abstract creating a community of learning can enhance critical reading in a classroom environment. task design plays a critical role in the effectiveness of this process. this paper presents a case study of a face-to-face literature course that used a host of google tools to create such a community. the community of inquiry (coi) principles of teacher presence, cognitive presence, and social presence have been applied to analyze the task design using google tools. data collected from coursework, surveys, and interviews provide evidence that tasks using google tools can promote community building and critical reading. * corresponding author. email: jkannan@amherst.edu irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland, 2018. © 2018 j.,kannan. the irish journal of technology enhanced learning ireland is the journal of the irish learning technology association, an irish-based professional and scholarly society and membership organisation. (cro# 520231) http://www.ilta.ie/ . this is an open access article distributed under the terms of the creative commons attribution 4.0 international license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. mailto:jkannan@amherst.edu irish journal of technology enhanced learning 17 introduction online and blended courses aim to foster learning communities because of limited or no faceto-face interaction. one would assume that a learning community is easier to build in face-toface courses. however, this is not necessarily the case. the fact that learning communities have to be intentionally fostered in face-to-face courses is sometimes overlooked. (warner, 2016). this paper applies the community of inquiry (coi) framework (garrison, anderson, archer, 2010) to present a case study of building communities in a face-to-face undergraduate literature course. the course goal was to promote critical reading. in their book “critical reading and writing for postgraduates,” wallace and wray (2016, p34) describe critical reading as “a dynamic process,” which includes “identifying the author’s underlying aims and agendas” when evaluating a text. as a teaching methodology, they also suggest that promoting critical reading be task-driven and that it conclude with students submitting a product for assessment. the pedagogical intent in this course was to promote peer discussions over formal instruction. two important factors involved here were identifying the right digital tools to foster synchronous and asynchronous discussions, and creating a task design to optimally apply the coi framework. this paper describes how a variety of google tools were used to build an online learning space for productive discussions. applying the coi framework, it investigates the role of task design and how using cloud-based google tools shaped the learning experience. the results from the student survey, interviews, and student coursework will be analyzed from the coi perspective. what is the coi framework and why is it relevant to this study? according to the coi framework developed by garrison et.al (2003, 2007, 2010), a student’s learning experience is greatly enriched when three interconnected factors – cognitive presence, social presence, and teaching presence – are given importance within an instructional design process. this case study has two goals: 1) to examine the task design involved in promoting a learning community using the collaborative features in three google tools – google slides, google docs, and google plus communities; 2) to study the effect of this task design on honing critical reading skills. garrison’s guiding principles for a coi in online collaborative learning take on great relevance here. garrison (2006) defined the online collaboration principles for each of the coi factors as follows: • cognitive presence principle – establish critical reflection and discourse that will support systematic inquiry • social presence principle – establish a climate that will create a coi j. kannan 18 • teacher presence principle – sustain community through expression of group cohesion the challenge when applying this framework in task design is to meaningfully link learning between the (in-class) synchronous experiences and the (outside-the-class) asynchronous discussions using the google tools. to create a continuum for learning, the task design has to establish a balance between facilitation by the teacher, process mechanisms to foster a suitable environment for collaborative discussions, and providing opportunities for sharing ideas at the individual and group level, thus leading to critical reading and reflection. case study course description the undergraduate freshman face-to-face course titled “experiencing literature” met twice a week throughout the 16-week semester in fall 2015. the readings and discussions were anchored to the thematic topic of “british imperialism in india.” there were twenty-nine students in the class, ranging from 18 to 19 years old. all were native speakers of english and came in with prior critical reading and academic writing experience. the overall course design focused primarily on promoting critical reading through close textual reading, interpretation, and analysis. in keeping with the characteristics of critical reading described by wallace, and wray (2016), this course aimed for the following learning outcomes: to have students scrutinize the evidence in the assigned readings, evaluate the author’s reasoning in arriving at conclusions, and demonstrate awareness of the author’s values and assumptions. in addition, making connections within the text and between texts was also seen as an important critical reading skill. this course used a modular approach to discuss each assigned reading. each module was broken down into several tasks, with the following sequence: assigned reading, individualized summary-writing, small group in-class discussions (face-to-face and synchronous online), whole-class asynchronous online discussions, quizzes and/or written response paper. the selected readings by 19th and 20th century british and indian authors came from different genres. they included an essay by george orwell (shooing an elephant), a poem by rabindranath tagore (“when the mind is without fear”), an autobiographical excerpt by m.k. gandhi (from the story of my experiments with truth), and a short story by h.h. munro (dusk). when presenting these texts, several methods were employed to achieve the pedagogical goal of promoting critical reading. for example, a conscious choice was made to juxtapose the autobiographical writings of orwell and gandhi. presenting the british and indian viewpoints of orwell and gandhi was a deliberate attempt to expose students to a complex web of factors for literary and historical analysis, without limiting the discussion to a simplistic “oppressor-versus-oppressed” perspective. thus, the excerpts chosen for reading focused on irish journal of technology enhanced learning 19 a common genre of memoir writing. all the chosen texts dealt with complex issues such as moral conflict. this provided scope for interpretation and analysis. the purpose of the task sequence was to build incremental steps for critical analysis. wallace and wray (2016, p 37) highlight the importance of having the student’s first step be making his/her “own critical choice” about what he/she reads. students were therefore required to write an individual response in order to generate original ideas before engaging in peer discussions for collaborative analysis. toward the end of the course, students worked individually on a digital storytelling video project that presented a synthesis of their ideas. continuity between tasks was provided though instructional scaffolding: for example, discussions and written assignments required students to demonstrate critical reading by making explicit connections between the different texts. the tasks emphasized learning strategies for critical reading as described by (schumm & post, 1997; seyler, 2000). these include questioning, open-mindedness, consideration of alternate viewpoints, truth-seeking, creativity in building connections, drawing upon knowledge from other disciplines, reflection, and taking a stance by showing evidence from the text and related resources. tasks were structured in a way that enabled students to conduct online discussions in a cloud-based asynchronous environment. the pedagogical intent was to have students learn from peer comments and use this learning to strengthen their critical reading. rationale for using cloud-based google tools to build a coi promoting a coi required building an optimal online learning space to complement in-class discussions. all twenty-nine students in class had to have the opportunity to engage in dialogue in one universally accessible and visible common space. this course used three google tools – google slides, google doc, and google plus communities – to build an optimal online learning space. recent studies have shown the benefits of google tools for collaborative learning. ( cheung & vogel, 2014; jarvela et.al, 2015). some online environments present obstacles to collaborative learning: for example, the discussion forums in the blackboard lms hide discussions within threads, which obstructs open communication within a large group. by contrast, the use of google tools supported the task design in this case because it helped to 1. create a digitally networked learning environment where the instructor and students could easily share their work and promote cognitive presence, 2. build visibility for student learning – each and every student could see everyone else’s work and participate in a common online space, 3. communicate both synchronously and asynchronously to help build upon the social presence from the classroom interactions, 4. model and refine close reading practices (such as digital annotation features and commenting), so that teacher presence essentially consisted of minimal facilitation and co-participation, 5. provide opportunities for students to demonstrate learning in multimodal ways through writing, digital images, and audio/video. j. kannan 20 the google tools promoted a learning community in which peer learning could be the driving factor for interpretation, analysis, and the synthesis of ideas. the instructor’s efforts in designing the tasks using the google tools played a critical role in building the community. three google-based tasks for coi building although several tasks were performed in the course, this case study will focus on three tasks that are representative of the coi approach. they highlight three important points in the course, namely the beginning, middle, and end. each task employed a different google tool, but the unifying principle was the attempt to develop a systematic inquiry that allowed for self-expression at the individual level and encouraged creativity at the peer level when coconstructing interpretations. li and crichton (2008) define task design as the “thoughtful development of activities that students will engage in to experience the learning process and to demonstrate their growing understanding of core concepts.” the description of each task below outlines the task objective, the pedagogical intent, and the technological affordances. the next section discusses key results related to student learning. task 1 – beginning of the course: focus on reading motivation. there is a direct correlation between reading motivation and learning performance (hidi & harackiewicz, 2000). literature on critical reading has also suggested that social interaction is an important factor in cultivating reading motivation (gambrell, 1996). to better understand student motivation and give them an opportunity to discuss collaboratively, a task called “my frustrating reading experience” was designed. this task was intentionally positioned at the beginning of the semester, so that students could express their frustrations related to reading motivation and identify possible barriers to critical reading. building self-awareness about barriers to critical reading was a first step to develop reading strategies. in this task, a single google slide was co-created by all the students in the class. excluding the instructor’s slides, which provided an example of a frustrated reading experience, there were 29 slides from a class of 29 students in a single powerpoint project. each student posted his/her example of a frustrating reading experience in one slide. the example had to present the following: the title of the book in question, an excerpt from the book showing the source of the frustration, and key ideas describing the reading frustration. modeling has proven to be an effective teaching strategy. (harbour et al, 2015), so the instructor modeled by sharing her own example based on a middle school experience. this modeling set expectations, and the instructor’s self-effacement created an atmosphere of trust and safety. the main objective was to help students develop their self-assessment skills and engage in evidence-based writing. another implicit objective in having students express their frustration was to build a community of shared understanding, and to encourage students to share concrete reading strategies to overcome the frustration. the advantage of the cloud-based google slide over individual powerpoint presentations was that it allowed the entire class to co-create and share their reading experience on a common powerpoint slide. there was a sense of ownership by the entire class that was contingent upon individual contribution. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 21 task 2 – middle of the course: reading analysis using google docs. after submitting a brief summary and discussing within small groups in a face-to-face session, students were required to analyze orwell’s essay, “shooting an elephant,” using the online google docs. this task was designed to help students hone several aspects of critical reading: close textual analysis, identification of rhetorical devices, inferential comprehension, making connections with other texts, and discussion with peers to demonstrate and strengthen analysis. first, students had to post their interpretation on the google doc for the section of the text assigned to them as a small group. next, students could add comments on the google doc by responding to anyone in the class, not only their group mates. the design intentionally placed the text on the google doc not only so that all 29 students could collaborate openly in a common learning space, but also to create opportunities for students to move gradationally from individual to small-group to large-group discussions. for designers of constructivist learning environments, the appreciation of multiple perspectives is an important pedagogical goal. (honebein, 1996). the task design applied this pedagogical approach of getting students to recognize multiple perspectives. because interactive discussions are essential for developing multiple perspectives, students were required to observe the comments and analyses posted by peers. this course used the blackboard lms for course communications and announcements. using google docs to analyze texts facilitated sharing and open discussion in ways that are not possible in blackboard lms discussion threads. other studies have also discussed the limitation of lms discussion threads. (kent, 2016). it is generally impossible for all students to engage and see the comments of all the other students within a single space. google docs made this reading analysis an effective sharing experience. students could also choose how they wanted to participate: by leading, following, participating actively through multiple comment postings, or being an observer with minimal participation. task 3 – end of the course: summative reflection through digital storytelling and sharing on google plus communities. this task was designed for students to self-assess the development of their reading strategies through a digital storytelling video. each student had to individually create a digital storytelling video entitled, “observations of my critical reading experience.” this short digital story (4-5 minute video) had to fulfill five criteria: 1) show how you applied the reader response theory; 2) provide an example of at least one concrete reading strategy; 3) identify a digital tool that you used and describe your experience; 4) present a connection that you made between the text from this course and an outside source; 5) describe an ‘aha!’ moment that showed self-awareness about your reading habits. to explain the task clearly and set expectations, the instructor modeled the digital storytelling by sharing her experience through a video. modeling also involved helping students arrive at the final draft of the video by taking them through stages and guiding them through the process. students had to first create powerpoint slides of their story using images and keywords. they then had to add a voiceover narrative and record this as a video. most students in the class used a regular powerpoint format and then used the screencast-o-matic digital screencasting tool to create the video. later, all the students had to post their individual videos on google plus communities to share their digital story videos and post feedback. j. kannan 22 the main pedagogical goal was to have students detach and observe themselves as readers. having students self-assess their learning is a crucial step in building learner autonomy. (benson, 2013; sierra & frodden, 2017). also, since this was an end-of-semester task, it was a way to have students proactively provide a summative assessment through the narrative of digital storytelling. one important aspect of the task was to demonstrate learning through evidence-based examples. for example, for the criterion “identify a digital tool that you used and describe your experience,” students had to name the digital tool, show evidence through screenshots, and describe how the use of the tool improved or hindered their critical reading. the student work for the criterion “present a connection that you made between the text from this course and an outside source” demonstrated higher-order thinking and analysis, since it went beyond the scope of the class discussions and required original, creative ways to describe their learning. this ability to make connections is a vital part of developing critical analysis. in their work on a critical thinking framework for the 21st century, dwyer, hogan, and stewart (2014) reference the work of sweller (1999) to state that making required connections between new information and/or schemas is integral to critical thinking. creating a common digital learning space where all students could post their videos and generate discussions was a challenge. regular learning management systems do allow for video posts, which are instead hidden in discussion threads. learning management systems do not allow all the student videos to be visible in one large space. the instructor used google plus communities to solve this problem and create an optimal learning space for discussions. using google plus communities as a discussion forum had several advantages: easy access, capability to share large video and other digital media files, and opportunities to participate in large class discussions. google plus communities is a social network platform that allows special interest groups to have discussions on specific subjects. google plus communities allows posts in synchronous and asynchronous contexts. scholarly literature has shown positive relations between engagement in synchronous and asynchronous communication. (giesbers, rienties, tempelaar, & gijselaers, 2014; rockinson-szapkiw et al, 2016). the google plus communities based task fostered continuous dialogue, an important factor in forming a learning community. methodology the benefits of a case study approach for qualitative studies are well established by feagin et al. (1991). the primary rationale for using a case study is to perform an in-depth investigation of how to promote coi and to explore the complex issues of integrating tools such as the google apps in real-life classroom settings. a secondary reason for the case study approach is to address a gap in the literature (dudovskiy, 2016) on the impact of digital tools for community building in a face-to-face course. asynchronous online tools are usually seen as more valuable for online contexts than face-to-face contexts, and this case study shows the importance of online discussions for the face-to-face course. quantitative and qualitative data were collected for this study using three methods: 1) observations about student learning from the coursework, 2) an end-of-course online anonymous survey about student perceptions of their learning experience, and 3) one-on-one interviews with seven students who volunteered to participate. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 23 it is generally believed that the use of multiple methods or data triangulation enhance the validity of qualitative research. (denscombe, 2014 ; richards, 2014). this case study therefore combined surveys, interviews, and analysis of coursework in order to gain additional insights, obtain comprehensive data, and show validity. this method of combining data sources was expected to lead to a deep understanding of the factors that contribute to promoting a community of inquiry. the data collection process received formal approval from the university’s institutional review board (irb). the course instructor also served as the researcher. this might be seen as a limitation to the study. to avoid researcher bias, the instructor-researcher carried out the following actions: 1) the interviews were conducted after the course ended and grades had been handed out; 2) student participation in these interviews was voluntary; and 3) the online survey, which was optional, was administered after the course ended. other studies (chavez, 2008) have also reported that having the instructor perform the roles of both task designer and observer of student learning can strengthen the study’s investigative approach. a summary of key results from all three data collection methods is presented below. this triangulation of data will be further discussed in the next section through the lens of the three presences (teaching, cognitive, and social) in the coi model. key results related to critical reading results from student course work – examples of critical reading for task 1 – results for critical reading every student was able to identify an example of reading frustration with evidence, such as an excerpt from the text, showing difficulty in comprehending linguistic or stylistic devices. fifty percent of the class went beyond the first post and engaged in peer discussion by responding to a classmate. seven of the twenty-nine students chose a text from shakespeare as a “frustrating reading experience.” the posts in response to these examples showed a sense of empathy, since they shared a common frustrating experience. the community that developed across the whole class was characterized by inquiry-based discussions using the “comment feature” in google slides. for example, one student shared a solution with the rest of the classmates who had identified shakespeare as a difficult reading experience by providing a link to a database that provided translations to modern english. every student posted at least one peer comment. the peer discussion was enabled by the ease of use in adding text, and images to provide a rationale and participate in a discussion using the simple comment feature. the development of critical reading was evident in the examples from students: identification of a reading struggle, description of the barriers to comprehension, highlighting sections of the text using close reading. student comments mentioned comparable experiences with reading challenges. j. kannan 24 fig 1 – task design using google slides for task 2 – results for critical reading the task design organized the text and responses within a table format that allowed for small and large group discussions. (see fig 2). the online discussions on google docs consisted of two tiers of conversation – small group discussions written out within the assigned section of the table, and whole-class discussions on sections other than those assigned, posted using the comment feature. both of these were visible to the entire class on a single google doc. two of the five groups chose to document the multiple perspectives within the group, with no prompting from the instructor. three other groups posted a joint response summarizing their discussions. in certain instances, students chose to go outside their group and respond to a classmate in a different group. there were a total of 44 comments from the 29 students in the class, all of them more extensive than a simple expression of agreement. each comment was either a question seeking clarification or a statement showing connections within the text or between two texts. for example, one student presented a link between orwell’s thinking and the moral conflict experienced by gandhi in an earlier reading.. the critical reading learning outcome was demonstrated in many ways – by raising questions, providing interpretation of the reading, annotating the text using highlighting, engaging a peer in a discussion from a different perspective, and identification of rhetorical devices such as symbolism. irish journal of technology enhanced learning 25 comments in the form of peer responses showed higher order thinking . the instructor posted only four of the 44 comments. this indicated a very high level of student engagement and minimal intervention from the instructor. fig2 – task design using google docs for task 3 – results for critical reading for the end-of-course reflection, each student created a digital story video and posted this work on google plus communities. every student covered all the required elements for critical reading analysis in this digital story video. in particular, every student video was able to provide answers to all the five criteria, including showing connections by linking with reading outside the classroom discussions. for example, one student linked orwell’s “shooting an elephant” with steinbeck’s “of mice and men,” and provided a rationale for the connection. one student linked orwell’s essay with later works by orwell, thereby building meaningful connections across the body of the author’s work. a third student linked her reading experience in this course with the logical concepts of induction and deduction that she was learning in her freshman logic 101 course. all of these examples were original, and no two students presented the same connection. by making new connections that were not discussed in class, students showed creativity and synthesis, two characteristics of higherorder thinking according to bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives. (bloom et al. 1956). j. kannan 26 if connection-making with concrete examples is considered deep learning, all of the students showed deep learning in this task. that said, five of the 29 students suggested a connection but could not provide a clear rationale for it. fig 3 – task-design using google plus communities results from student surveys for critical reading the anonymous survey administered after the completion of the course included 10 questions on topics related to collaborative learning, the learning experience for each of the three tasks, and requested information about the level of comfort in using the google tools, from both a technological and an emotional perspective. the survey had a 75% response rate. when questioned about whether the google-based task promoted collaborative learning, helped in understanding the course materials, helped in learning critical reading, and helped literary analysis, the response for all three tasks was overwhelmingly positive, with 90% of the respondents either agreeing or strongly agreeing. several of the qualitative responses stated that critical reading was achieved by “learning from multiple perspectives” or by bringing “unique ideas together to build an understanding of the topic.” one student stated that “getting constant updates on what others were thinking (via notification from the google tools) helped me to expand my thought process.” student picture student picture irish journal of technology enhanced learning 27 comments on the role of peer learning included the following: “my classmates would say things that never crossed my mind,” “i was able to voice my opinion and then get feedback from my fellow students.” one respondent highlighted the reciprocity factor in collaboration by stating, “i learned new ideas in addition to sharing my own discoveries.” some of the student comments also mentioned the drawbacks of these online discussion tasks. two students stated that “ideas tended to stagnate” when several students presented similar viewpoints and this could not be synthesized by the group to construct a new perspective. one student stated that “some of the class would put in less effort” and wait for others to post their comments first. as for comfort level with technology, 100% of the students stated that their comfort level was very high with the google tools. the responses were 40% “strongly agree” and 60% “agree,” with no negative responses. the comfort level with communicating thoughts on the google tools was also very high: responses ranged from “comfortable” to “very comfortable,” with only one “unsure.” more than 50% of the students had prior experience with google docs and google slides, although only one student in the entire class had previously used google plus communities. when asked to name a google tool feature that contributed to collaborative learning, comments included: “we didn’t have to search through threads,” “it was easier to see what my classmates were commenting,” “combine our ideas and come up with the best answer,” “state your thoughts freely and safely.” one response stated that the “ability to collaborate virtually” was an advantage when coordinating meeting times. another student pointed out ease of access: “i missed some of the ideas the first time i read it, but i could go back to the posts from my classmates.” when asked what they liked least about working on the google-based tasks, there were very few responses. only one response mentioned a technological glitch: “didn’t work in certain browsers and was inconvenient.” other responses were as follows: “caused some classmates to be lazy with their responses,” “when anonymous option was given students waited for others to post.” only one response alluded to emotional discomfort with participation: “would my classmates judge my responses?” google docs has a feature that allows one to view previous iterations of the document posts. for the instructor, the evidence of contributions was easy to track using the google track feature. previous iterations were visible and transparent to all the students in the class. results from the interviews related to critical reading seven out of the 29 students participated in the interviews. these students volunteered to participate in a one-to-one discussion approximately one month after the course ended and grades were received. since participation in the interviews was voluntary, the data might have been considered skewed if only engaged course participants had volunteered for the interviews. the interviewees represented almost the entire range of performance levels in the course, however, with seven students who had received grades ranging from low (c), to high (a or a minus). j. kannan 28 the interviews provided insights into the student learning experience that are not easy to capture through surveys or coursework. these interviews therefore added to the compilation of data on critical reading. following is an analysis of the student viewpoints presented in the interviews. when reviewing the transcripts from the interviews, it became clear that the viewpoints documented aspects of collaborative learning. the ideas shared by students in the interviews were entered into a master list and then categorized into three critical reading themes collaborative learning, multiple perspectives, and technological affordances. collaborative learning: all of the students stated that working on the google-based tasks contributed to collaborative learning. student bd described the collaborative learning in the three tasks as a “tower of understanding,” with all of the students working together to reach the top and achieve the same critical reading goal. the characteristics of collaboration were identified as “expanding my ideas,” “condensing down to one major point from the discussions,” “understanding what other people think,” “gaining from different perspectives,” “forming a new idea from the different pieces,” “working together to solve a problem,” “bounce ideas off others as opposed to relying on one,” and “motivation to re-read the text was triggered by classmate’s comment.” one student identified creating a situation “where everyone is on equal ground and has the same goal” as crucial to community building in the google discussions. students presented concrete examples of how the learning community formed by the google tasks led to critical reading. student bd explained how the 29 students brought different ideas to the table, and this led to a new idea when discussing the essay titled “canker of untruth” by gandhi. “it was a turning point… a connection that i made only after i had heard that student in class bring up the fact that the canker was sort of like a burden. and that just changed my entire viewpoint.” student interviews also revealed aspects of collaboration that did not work. for example: “i couldn’t take all the comments from my classmates as accurate, and had to use my own judgment,” “sometimes the ideas were repetitive and didn’t move forward within the group,” “some students were consistently relying on other students to post first.” multiple perspectives: without exception, all of the interviewees highlighted the ways in which the google-based tasks helped them learn from multiple perspectives. according to student ah, she could see her classmates’ thinking and compare it to her own when analyzing the text or discussing rhetorical devices. this modified her initial understanding and interpretation, and the discussions “opened my horizons [to ideas that i] didn’t think of initially.” student ss, however, noted that she weighed her classmates’ viewpoints but knew when to modify her thinking and when to stick to her own viewpoint. this revealed the application of judicious thinking rather than falling into groupthink, and the importance of an individual voice within the community. student ap brought attention to the “creative freedom” that she experienced when presenting her interpretations: “if we saw something differently but backed it up, it was okay.” student ss said she observed other students struggling with understanding certain literary symbols or rhetorical devices in the readings and moving toward clarity after the in-class and google doc discussions. when asked to connect the readings and arrive at a thematic analysis for a written response, student ss stated that she linked the works of orwell and gandhi by combining “my idea of fear and my classmate’s idea of perseverance” to present a better analysis. comments about the nature of interactions were also insightful: all of the interviewees stated that they felt safe expressing their opinion to the entire class in the google-based tasks. one interviewee attributed this to the fact that the class discussions focused on literary analysis rather than anything controversial, such as politics. in highlighting the impact of peer learning, one interviewee irish journal of technology enhanced learning 29 provided evidence of a student who was shy during the face-to-face in-class sessions posting thought-provoking comments on the google slides task. in terms of technological affordances, the interviewees touched upon two important factors related to critical reading: easy access and sharing using google tools. when asked about the experience of using online google tools for synchronous discussion in a face-to-face course, student ap said, “although it was a face-to-face class, you would sometimes get to work with a classmate next to you or behind you or in front of you. but then, with google docs – when we were all online simultaneously, i got to see ideas from people on the other side of the room that i wasn’t even talking to.” student ap stated that the use of the google tools not only made it possible to connect ideas, but also made them explicitly visible to other students, and it was easy to observe “how your own idea connects to how someone else is thinking, you never would have known. it really opened my eyes to different perspectives.” the emotional comfort level was unanimously high when engaging with the google-based tasks. discussion with coi focus this section discusses the implications of task design for creating a coi to strengthen critical reading. the impact of task design on each presence will be analyzed using the coi instrument designed by arbaugh et al. the validity of which has already been established in other research studies. (arbaugh, 2008). the headings or subscales from the coi framework survey instrument devised by arbaugh et al. provide an appropriate and useful scaffold for the discussion. it is important to note, however, that the survey instrument itself has not been applied in this case, and instead, the key areas of the instrument have been used to structure the discussion. according to this coi survey instrument, each presence has the following subscales: a. teaching presence has three subscales: design and organization, facilitation, and direct instruction. b. social presence has three subscales: affective expression, open communication, and group cohesion. c. cognitive presence has four subscales: triggering event, exploration, integration, and resolution. impact of the task design on teaching presence when promoting critical reading design and organization: by combining individual, small-group, and large-group interactions, the task design effectively created opportunities for critical reading. when analyzing the reading, students had to start with an individual-response writing assignment. in his paper titled, “how to build a culture of originality,” grant (2016) has highlighted the need to give the individual voice an opportunity to generate new ideas and reflection before it is influenced by peer perspectives in group discussions. with this in mind, the task design consistently began with an individual post for all three tasks. after this, the task design called for students to engage in in-depth conversations in small groups (synchronous and in-class). next, the level of interaction moved incrementally to the whole class (asynchronous and online). this conscious sequencing – from individual to small group to large group – brought j. kannan 30 a balance between individual responsibility and group discourse. sequencing emphasized cognitive presence in different ways: • individual reflection in written posts before being influenced by peers for task 1 and task 2, • collaborative constructivism in small and large group online discussions in task 1 and task 2, and • synthesis, creativity, and higher order thinking in the digital story assignment in task 3 facilitation: the instructor’s overall facilitation method was intended to promote learner autonomy. holec (1981: 3, cited in benson & voller, 1997: 1) describes learner autonomy as “the ability to take charge of one’s learning.” the instructor’s facilitation mechanisms included protocol prompts, questioning techniques, and feedback through explanation, all with the goal of putting the onus on the student to take charge of their learning. the google slides and google doc tasks encouraged the students to reflect for themselves, without giving away answers. the survey results and interview results showed that peer discussions facilitated key aspects of critical reading, namely interpretations, identification of literary devices, and building connections within and beyond the text. the task design, which was heavily reliant on collaborative discussions, created an environment for active learning. the use of google tools in the task design was critical to implementing the pedagogical vision. in task 1, the use of google slides although a collaborative effort allowed for the expression of individual thoughts. each student came up with a unique, evidence-based example to show critical analysis. in task 2, using the google doc, students showed 100% participation in small group and 50% participation in the large group, and a learning community emerged. direct instruction: direct instruction was minimal and strategic in all three tasks. it was characterized by providing guidelines for the task, observing student participation and verifying learning, raising questions to move students toward understanding, and providing explanations that helped students arrive at their own interpretations. the pedagogical vision was to use direct instruction as a scaffolding resource to support the primary goal of creating an optimal environment for active learning. in tasks 1 and 2, peer-to-peer interaction in the online context was 90% and interaction between student and instructor was only 10%. direct instruction in the in-class sessions was limited to providing guidelines and explanation. most of the students effectively demonstrated new connections in their interpretations as part of their work in task 3 (digital story posted on google plus communities). based on this result, it may be deduced that the learning community created by the peer interactions, rather than didactic teaching from the instructor, became the mode of instruction. impact of the task design on social presence when promoting critical reading one important aspect of social presence was the creation of a learning environment built on trust. even with synchronous communication during in-class discussions, students were able to interact only in small groups, and not with all the students in the class. sequencing the online google-based task after the in-class discussion helped to create a learning methodology for continued interaction and sustaining the high comfort level for participation within the community. affective expression in the three online tasks: the work of cleveland-innes & campbell (2012) which studies emotional presence within the coi framework, suggests that emotional irish journal of technology enhanced learning 31 presence may exist as a fundamental element in an online community of inquiry. the challenge for instructional design is to use the student’s fundamental emotional presence as an advantageous contributing factor for achieving the desired learning outcome. the results show that all three tasks provided ample opportunity to display and document encouragement, empathy, and frustration in the online discussions. one example is the google slide task to document a frustrating reading experience, where six out of 29 students chose a shakespeare text. not only was there a display of empathy, but solutions for navigating the shakespeare text were also shared by other students. when discussing the moral conflict faced by orwell in the google docs task, comments from two groups showed a clear emotional stance against orwell, calling his action selfish. the final digital story assignment required expressions of learning preference in the use of digital tools for critical reading. open communication: given that every student got to input his or her idea, even if ideas occasionally overlapped with others, the online posts showed openness in expressing viewpoints. one student stated that she used the idea posted by a peer on the google doc in task 2 to bring it up for discussion in a subsequent face-to-face session. in task 2, students showed autonomy by choosing how they wanted to participate. even when students were positioned in small groups, the voices of individual students were clear and showed originality. in some small groups, each student chose to post an individual comment to document the disagreement in the discussion, while one small group stated that they were unanimous in their interpretation of george orwell’s struggle with moral conflict, and posted it as a joint comment. one student stated that the google docs task in the face-to-face class provided opportunities for discussion with students who were not in her group. when combined with the comment features of google tools, the task design created opportunities for communication across groups and facilitated greater interaction. group cohesion was well achieved in all three tasks. students presented their ideas of what they saw as group cohesion: “you could see what everyone was thinking and you were not the only one talking. in a way, you felt that you were talking to everyone in the class.” this is exactly what the task set out to do. peer feedback was instrumental in moving the discussion forward. in task 1, task 2, and task 3, there were no simplistic “i agree” comments from the students. for task 2, there were 42 responses among the 29 participants. each response was a question or comment, a connection-making idea, or expression of disagreement that focused on the analysis of the reading. the data from the survey responses and interviews revealed that four students highlighted the need for discernment and decision-making in using the information posted by their peers. one comment stated, “it was difficult to know the accurate info...it is very helpful if it is all correct and you can use it. but i think it can also be hurtful if it is not, then you are studying the wrong information.” feedback from the students about “stagnant ideas” and “lazy participation” also revealed areas of the task design that did not work. impact of the task design on cognitive presence when promoting critical reading j. kannan 32 triggering: in all three tasks, the trigger consisted of prompts from the instructor. however, these were structured so that students could show autonomy in selecting their responses. for example, in task 1, each student chose any desired example to describe their frustrating reading experience. this resulted in examples that motivated the students to be evidencebased. no student merely gave the title of a text without also providing an excerpt from the text and a rationale for why it was barrier to their reading experience. exploration: every single student was able to explore an original idea and submit evidence for it in their summative digital story video assignment. every student provided a unique and original response to the question, “how did you make connections between readings or find links with ideas derived from another course?” this showed synthesis in critical reading, a higher-order thinking skill. at the beginning of the course, ideas in the online discussions were occasionally perceived by students as being repetitive or stagnant. by the end of the course, in the final digital story video assignment, every student showed creativity in selecting ideas that they linked together to demonstrate critical analysis. research literature suggests that online discussions often do not show levels of cognitive presence beyond the exploration phase. (celentin, 2007; darabi et al. 2011). the overall course design can address this challenge by building purposeful links between the different tasks within the course, and encouraging students to see their learning on a continuum. the results from this case study show that explorations in critical reading which began in task 1 and task 2 led to the synthesis of ideas in task 3. integration and resolution: to take the students through a developmental process, task 1 with google slides helped to establish a learning methodology for a shared inquiry process. the idea of sharing a frustrating rather than a successful learning experience unified the students and promoted a systematic inquiry built on providing evidence. every student provided an effective example of a reading challenge. in the instructional design process, it is important to see the links between the tasks throughout the course. the results from student course work and the examples provided by students in the digital story assignment show that the community building and inquiry strategies were developmental in nature. according to wallace and wray (2016, p13), “the capacity to develop a convincing argument is heavily dependent on the quality of your preparatory critical reading.” results from the student course work show that the critical reading strategies developed in task 1 and task 2 helped the students to arrive at an original argument for making connections in the digital story in task 3. conclusions the results from all three tasks reveal that the peer discussions played a vital role in strengthening critical reading by providing opportunities to contribute to and gain from multiple perspectives. students identified this as a key factor when making connections, taking a critical stance, and evaluating the readings. the community formed by the online google-based discussions, rather than by the instructor, therefore became the primary agent for enhancing critical reading. 1. the combination of synchronous and asynchronous communications strengthened critical reading the combination of synchronous and asynchronous communications was key to the development of higher-order thinking skills. a face-to-face course presents more https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/6458/638f623c4e7c7d792724cf44e932f679a1fa.pdf irish journal of technology enhanced learning 33 opportunities for building interactions during class time. one cannot assume, however, that the face-to-face context alone will foster quality discussions or engagement between all of the students in the class, especially in a larger class. in this case study, alternating between the inclass and online discussions in iterative cycles greatly strengthened the discourse mechanisms for critical reading. students perceived online communication as democratic when the instructor participated in the online discussions and in-class discussions not as an authoritarian, but as a co-participant. 2. google tools provide the potential for fostering collaboration, but cannot ensure it this equal participation dynamic is promoted more effectively by google tools than by discussion threads. a tool’s technical features therefore also play a role in establishing a community. the cloud-based google tools enhanced accessibility and sharing across different devices, both inside and outside the classroom. the technical features of google tools positively enabled task design. easy sharing, access, and ease of both synchronous and asynchronous communication helped to create strong learning opportunities for social presence because of group cohesion. the google tools features created a learning space where dialogue was achievable. nevertheless, the systematic inquiry necessary for cognitive presence depended to a great extent on the instructor’s task design and the level of student participation, and cannot be ensured through the use of google tools alone. 3. task design was key to community building, but was not a causal factor all three factors – teaching, cognitive, and social presence – must intersect purposefully in order for students to construct new meaning as a collaborative effort. if only some of the 29 students had contributed, or if there had been poor participation from a majority of the class beyond the first post, this would have limited the critical reading experience. excessive intervention from the instructor after providing the prompt and setting the direction of discussions would also be detrimental to the coi. ultimately, the pedagogical design of the tasks brought all the students together into a common and shared learning space, and played a key role in building a coi. results from the student coursework, survey, and interviews provide evidence that the online community created by the google-based tasks had a greater influence on critical reading than did the direct instruction. teacher presence by way of task design could be seen as playing a causal role in establishing the learner community. an earlier study by anderson, garrison, and archer (2001) aimed to assess the causal influence of teaching presence. this case study found that although teacher presence by way of task design was a driving factor, critical reading – as demonstrated by cognitive presence – would not have been enhanced in the absence of open communication by students and the organic development of group cohesion. cognitive presence was also evident in student learning when teacher presence was effectively manifested through task design and organization, but minimal in didactic instruction. this complex relationship between task design, the implementation of the coi model, and the fostering of critical reading requires further exploration. j. kannan 34 references anderson, t., liam, r., garrison, d. r., & archer, w. 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