This phenomenographic study investigates the information engagement practices of experienced art ... more This phenomenographic study investigates the information engagement practices of experienced art and design practitioner researchers working in university contexts, with the key aim of contributing to developing the information engagement capabilities of novice practitioner researchers. The investigation takes a relational approach that focuses on relationships between particular social practices and the contexts within which they occur. Accordingly, consideration has been given to contemporary political and economic pressures on university research and on the position of art and design practitioner research within that context. In keeping with this relational perspective, phenomenographic interviews garnered data from 28 art and design practitioner researchers working in Australian universities. Findings from the data analysis include six qualitatively different ways that art and design practitioner researchers experience information engagement. For librarians working with novice researchers, these findings provide examples of effective information engagement that extend beyond the perspective of information literacy standards. For curriculum developers, these findings highlight possibilities for using information engagement development to encourage art and design students to self-identify as researchers at earlier stages of their study. For administrators seeking to provide evidence of graduate attribute development, these findings show practical connections between ongoing student inquiry experiences and the development of attributes associated with independent research and self-directed practice.
"Art and design practitioner researchers have been working within the Australian university syste... more "Art and design practitioner researchers have been working within the Australian university system for over two decades, i.e. since the replacement of the previous binary system of higher education with a Unified National System (UNS). Some commentators (e.g. Buckley & Conomos, 2009) would argue that this university research existence has been at best tenuous and has involved many compromises that are not always conducive to excellence in art and design.
As practitioner researchers now struggle to find ways of communicating their research outcomes to enable measurement for the ERA (Excellence in Research for Australia) assessment scheme, these issues assume even greater importance. How can practitioner researchers strike a balance between the needs of “outside the box” creative research and government regulatory practices requiring results to fit into pre-prepared boxes that are often designed for very different contexts?
This paper looks at that dilemma by tracing the progression of Australian art schools into universities and looking at practitioner research in the higher education environment from the perspective of Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory. The paper will argue that Bourdieu’s theories not only offer explanations for the current difficulties faced by practitioner researchers, but also suggest a possible middle path between the otherwise opposite poles of capitulation to, or revolution against, the higher education system.
Buckley, B., & Conomos, J. (2009). Rethinking the contemporary art school: The artist, the PhD, and the academy. Halifax: Press of Nova Scotia College of Art & Design.
"
Introduction: This paper discusses some outcomes of an ongoing action research project that is an... more Introduction: This paper discusses some outcomes of an ongoing action research project that is analysing the processes involved in a collaborative faculty / library venture aimed at assisting students to develop game designs that promote information literacy learning.
Methods
Through the contribution of a creative brief to students enrolled in a university level games design course, the UNSW Library has effectively become the customer, i.e. potential recipient of creative ideas for information literacy learning objects. This realigns the usual library / student relationship, i.e. a dynamic shift from “library as service provider” to “library as service recipient”. No longer the traditional ‘guide by the side’ our intervention must be minimal so as to increase possibilities of avant-garde responses. So whilst our approach is influenced by a ‘threshold concepts’ learning perspective, we have needed to step back and resist any tendencies to try and direct creative processes and just do our best to ensure that our ‘creative brief’ presentations effectively encompass what we might hope for in any final product.
Outcomes
There is an old adage that says “to learn something well, you should teach it” and in the spirit of this sentiment there is an expectation that through the process of learning to design a product, students will achieve a more complex understanding of the product content (i.e. information engagement at university). But does this incidental learning occur? If yes, what is learned and how does it happen? From a library perspective, it is certainly clear that incidental learning occurs amongst the staff involved in writing and communicating creative briefs for the students and in responding to the student product demonstrations. The action research process also demands an ongoing reflexivity that requires Library staff to re-examine assumptions about possible ways of learning, so new possibilities can be imagined.
Conclusions
Through this presentation we will outline our attempts to answer questions about student learning, by discussing insights gained from ‘successes’ and ‘failures’ and by sharing our reflections about ‘learning for the fun of it.’
"In 2010, librarians at the UNSW Library worked together to identify places where students common... more "In 2010, librarians at the UNSW Library worked together to identify places where students commonly encounter problems whilst attempting to engage with information at university. Based on their many years of experience, the librarians identified a number of different “troublesome” areas where students regularly get stuck, then analysed these to uncover the “ways of thinking” that help students to transcend such problems. These “ways of thinking” were then employed to identify particular threshold concepts that need to be understood if students are to most effectively engage with information at university.
The impetus for this work came from our reading of the research literature on threshold concepts, in particular Meyers & Land, (2006), Land, Meyer & Smith (2008) & Meyer, Land & Baillie, (2010).
Since 2010, consideration of the identified threshold concepts has opened opportunities for innovating library support for university learning and teaching. We are now looking beyond traditional competency based approaches to focus more on the inherent understandings enabling skill acquisition. This has led to a re-imagining of the ways these understandings might be experientially enabled, for example, through the use of interactive games.
This paper reports on an ongoing Library and faculty collaboration with a game development course in which students respond to a library creative brief to create game designs to promote understanding of the threshold concepts. Learning outcomes from this collaboration are greater than the sum of any games produced. Librarians have learned about the difficulties involved in presenting abstract ideas through creative briefs, game design students are learning about threshold concepts and sometimes overcoming unhelpful beliefs about information engagement. Both Library and faculty are learning more about students’ incidental learning (learning about content when designing games to teach it). It is perhaps proof for that old adage, “to better understand something, teach it!”
Works cited.
Land, R., Meyer, J., & Smith, J. (2008). Threshold concepts within the disciplines. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
Meyer, J., & Land, R. (2006). Overcoming barriers to student understanding: Threshold concepts and troublesome knowledge. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Meyer, J., Land, R., & Baillie, C. (2010). Threshold concepts and transformational learning. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
"
From the basis of ongoing practitioner research into the ways that art and design researchers eng... more From the basis of ongoing practitioner research into the ways that art and design researchers engage with information, this paper explores the difficulties and possibilities inherent in the learning and teaching of tacit knowledge. To know something tacitly is one of many layers coexisting with other more explicit dimensions of individual awareness. Although powerfully instrumental in directing and informing expert thought and actions, tacit knowing is often unarticulated and unacknowledged, which can be problematic in learning and teaching environments. The exploration of dimensions of awareness is a common thread throughout the paper, linking Michael Polanyi’s theories on tacit knowing with the phenomenographic research approach.
"21st century skill movements have emerged in response to an international aim to fundamentally r... more "21st century skill movements have emerged in response to an international aim to fundamentally reorient public education systems, commonly perceived to be operating in much the same way as was established at the beginning of the 20th century.
Whereas at the beginning of the last century building adequate educational infrastructure was the primary challenge, now 21st century teachers struggle to adapt that infrastructure to meet the changing expectations and preferred modes of learning of so-called “digital natives.” The Internet has changed the educational playing field, and new rules of play have yet to be established. In developed countries, massive educational infrastructures, built progressively over the previous century, are showing signs of strain. Most need to be transformed into more flexible, adaptive systems, better able to support educators’ needs to develop and practice pedagogical and technical skills which enable them to utilize the educational opportunities presented by new ICT (information and communicative technology) developments.
As technology makes lots of things easier, (and other things more difficult), the traditional focus on the three R’s (Reading, wRiting & aRithmetic) urgently needs to be balanced with a stronger emphasis on the four C’s ((critical thinking & problem solving, communication, collaboration, and creativity & innovation). It may be much, much easier for a student to find information on a given topic, for example, but does this ease and speed of access equate to better understanding?
As with all social paradigm shifts, there are losses and gains, and history cautions us about the danger of throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. The 21st century skills movements are attempting to apply the best educational knowledge currently available to the task of taking advantage of continually emerging technological opportunities. By combining the best of both the old and the new, it is hoped to create a robust educational model, flexible enough to prepare our children for a future that, at this point in time, we can only make guesses about.
This paper will look at the various 21st century skills movements emerging around the world and will discuss the arguments for and against such movements. The paper will also discuss the ideas around the need for understanding “threshold concepts” in order to productively progress learning in and for the 21st century."
This paper discusses the ways that a threshold concepts approach has been used to transform a uni... more This paper discusses the ways that a threshold concepts approach has been used to transform a university library response to the learning and teaching of 21st century information engagement skills.
This phenomenographic study investigates the information engagement practices of experienced art ... more This phenomenographic study investigates the information engagement practices of experienced art and design practitioner researchers working in university contexts, with the key aim of contributing to developing the information engagement capabilities of novice practitioner researchers. The investigation takes a relational approach that focuses on relationships between particular social practices and the contexts within which they occur. Accordingly, consideration has been given to contemporary political and economic pressures on university research and on the position of art and design practitioner research within that context. In keeping with this relational perspective, phenomenographic interviews garnered data from 28 art and design practitioner researchers working in Australian universities. Findings from the data analysis include six qualitatively different ways that art and design practitioner researchers experience information engagement. For librarians working with novice researchers, these findings provide examples of effective information engagement that extend beyond the perspective of information literacy standards. For curriculum developers, these findings highlight possibilities for using information engagement development to encourage art and design students to self-identify as researchers at earlier stages of their study. For administrators seeking to provide evidence of graduate attribute development, these findings show practical connections between ongoing student inquiry experiences and the development of attributes associated with independent research and self-directed practice.
"Art and design practitioner researchers have been working within the Australian university syste... more "Art and design practitioner researchers have been working within the Australian university system for over two decades, i.e. since the replacement of the previous binary system of higher education with a Unified National System (UNS). Some commentators (e.g. Buckley & Conomos, 2009) would argue that this university research existence has been at best tenuous and has involved many compromises that are not always conducive to excellence in art and design.
As practitioner researchers now struggle to find ways of communicating their research outcomes to enable measurement for the ERA (Excellence in Research for Australia) assessment scheme, these issues assume even greater importance. How can practitioner researchers strike a balance between the needs of “outside the box” creative research and government regulatory practices requiring results to fit into pre-prepared boxes that are often designed for very different contexts?
This paper looks at that dilemma by tracing the progression of Australian art schools into universities and looking at practitioner research in the higher education environment from the perspective of Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory. The paper will argue that Bourdieu’s theories not only offer explanations for the current difficulties faced by practitioner researchers, but also suggest a possible middle path between the otherwise opposite poles of capitulation to, or revolution against, the higher education system.
Buckley, B., & Conomos, J. (2009). Rethinking the contemporary art school: The artist, the PhD, and the academy. Halifax: Press of Nova Scotia College of Art & Design.
"
Introduction: This paper discusses some outcomes of an ongoing action research project that is an... more Introduction: This paper discusses some outcomes of an ongoing action research project that is analysing the processes involved in a collaborative faculty / library venture aimed at assisting students to develop game designs that promote information literacy learning.
Methods
Through the contribution of a creative brief to students enrolled in a university level games design course, the UNSW Library has effectively become the customer, i.e. potential recipient of creative ideas for information literacy learning objects. This realigns the usual library / student relationship, i.e. a dynamic shift from “library as service provider” to “library as service recipient”. No longer the traditional ‘guide by the side’ our intervention must be minimal so as to increase possibilities of avant-garde responses. So whilst our approach is influenced by a ‘threshold concepts’ learning perspective, we have needed to step back and resist any tendencies to try and direct creative processes and just do our best to ensure that our ‘creative brief’ presentations effectively encompass what we might hope for in any final product.
Outcomes
There is an old adage that says “to learn something well, you should teach it” and in the spirit of this sentiment there is an expectation that through the process of learning to design a product, students will achieve a more complex understanding of the product content (i.e. information engagement at university). But does this incidental learning occur? If yes, what is learned and how does it happen? From a library perspective, it is certainly clear that incidental learning occurs amongst the staff involved in writing and communicating creative briefs for the students and in responding to the student product demonstrations. The action research process also demands an ongoing reflexivity that requires Library staff to re-examine assumptions about possible ways of learning, so new possibilities can be imagined.
Conclusions
Through this presentation we will outline our attempts to answer questions about student learning, by discussing insights gained from ‘successes’ and ‘failures’ and by sharing our reflections about ‘learning for the fun of it.’
"In 2010, librarians at the UNSW Library worked together to identify places where students common... more "In 2010, librarians at the UNSW Library worked together to identify places where students commonly encounter problems whilst attempting to engage with information at university. Based on their many years of experience, the librarians identified a number of different “troublesome” areas where students regularly get stuck, then analysed these to uncover the “ways of thinking” that help students to transcend such problems. These “ways of thinking” were then employed to identify particular threshold concepts that need to be understood if students are to most effectively engage with information at university.
The impetus for this work came from our reading of the research literature on threshold concepts, in particular Meyers & Land, (2006), Land, Meyer & Smith (2008) & Meyer, Land & Baillie, (2010).
Since 2010, consideration of the identified threshold concepts has opened opportunities for innovating library support for university learning and teaching. We are now looking beyond traditional competency based approaches to focus more on the inherent understandings enabling skill acquisition. This has led to a re-imagining of the ways these understandings might be experientially enabled, for example, through the use of interactive games.
This paper reports on an ongoing Library and faculty collaboration with a game development course in which students respond to a library creative brief to create game designs to promote understanding of the threshold concepts. Learning outcomes from this collaboration are greater than the sum of any games produced. Librarians have learned about the difficulties involved in presenting abstract ideas through creative briefs, game design students are learning about threshold concepts and sometimes overcoming unhelpful beliefs about information engagement. Both Library and faculty are learning more about students’ incidental learning (learning about content when designing games to teach it). It is perhaps proof for that old adage, “to better understand something, teach it!”
Works cited.
Land, R., Meyer, J., & Smith, J. (2008). Threshold concepts within the disciplines. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
Meyer, J., & Land, R. (2006). Overcoming barriers to student understanding: Threshold concepts and troublesome knowledge. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Meyer, J., Land, R., & Baillie, C. (2010). Threshold concepts and transformational learning. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
"
From the basis of ongoing practitioner research into the ways that art and design researchers eng... more From the basis of ongoing practitioner research into the ways that art and design researchers engage with information, this paper explores the difficulties and possibilities inherent in the learning and teaching of tacit knowledge. To know something tacitly is one of many layers coexisting with other more explicit dimensions of individual awareness. Although powerfully instrumental in directing and informing expert thought and actions, tacit knowing is often unarticulated and unacknowledged, which can be problematic in learning and teaching environments. The exploration of dimensions of awareness is a common thread throughout the paper, linking Michael Polanyi’s theories on tacit knowing with the phenomenographic research approach.
"21st century skill movements have emerged in response to an international aim to fundamentally r... more "21st century skill movements have emerged in response to an international aim to fundamentally reorient public education systems, commonly perceived to be operating in much the same way as was established at the beginning of the 20th century.
Whereas at the beginning of the last century building adequate educational infrastructure was the primary challenge, now 21st century teachers struggle to adapt that infrastructure to meet the changing expectations and preferred modes of learning of so-called “digital natives.” The Internet has changed the educational playing field, and new rules of play have yet to be established. In developed countries, massive educational infrastructures, built progressively over the previous century, are showing signs of strain. Most need to be transformed into more flexible, adaptive systems, better able to support educators’ needs to develop and practice pedagogical and technical skills which enable them to utilize the educational opportunities presented by new ICT (information and communicative technology) developments.
As technology makes lots of things easier, (and other things more difficult), the traditional focus on the three R’s (Reading, wRiting & aRithmetic) urgently needs to be balanced with a stronger emphasis on the four C’s ((critical thinking & problem solving, communication, collaboration, and creativity & innovation). It may be much, much easier for a student to find information on a given topic, for example, but does this ease and speed of access equate to better understanding?
As with all social paradigm shifts, there are losses and gains, and history cautions us about the danger of throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. The 21st century skills movements are attempting to apply the best educational knowledge currently available to the task of taking advantage of continually emerging technological opportunities. By combining the best of both the old and the new, it is hoped to create a robust educational model, flexible enough to prepare our children for a future that, at this point in time, we can only make guesses about.
This paper will look at the various 21st century skills movements emerging around the world and will discuss the arguments for and against such movements. The paper will also discuss the ideas around the need for understanding “threshold concepts” in order to productively progress learning in and for the 21st century."
This paper discusses the ways that a threshold concepts approach has been used to transform a uni... more This paper discusses the ways that a threshold concepts approach has been used to transform a university library response to the learning and teaching of 21st century information engagement skills.
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relationships between particular social practices and the contexts within which they occur.
Accordingly, consideration has been given to contemporary political and economic pressures on university research and on the position of art and design practitioner research within that context. In keeping with this relational perspective, phenomenographic interviews garnered data from 28 art and design practitioner researchers working in Australian universities.
Findings from the data analysis include six qualitatively different ways that art and design practitioner researchers experience information engagement. For librarians working with novice researchers, these findings provide examples of effective information engagement that extend beyond the perspective of information literacy standards. For curriculum developers, these findings highlight possibilities for using information engagement development to encourage art and design students to self-identify as researchers at earlier stages of their study. For administrators seeking to provide evidence of graduate attribute development, these findings show practical connections between ongoing student inquiry experiences and the development of attributes associated with independent research and self-directed practice.
As practitioner researchers now struggle to find ways of communicating their research outcomes to enable measurement for the ERA (Excellence in Research for Australia) assessment scheme, these issues assume even greater importance. How can practitioner researchers strike a balance between the needs of “outside the box” creative research and government regulatory practices requiring results to fit into pre-prepared boxes that are often designed for very different contexts?
This paper looks at that dilemma by tracing the progression of Australian art schools into universities and looking at practitioner research in the higher education environment from the perspective of Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory. The paper will argue that Bourdieu’s theories not only offer explanations for the current difficulties faced by practitioner researchers, but also suggest a possible middle path between the otherwise opposite poles of capitulation to, or revolution against, the higher education system.
Buckley, B., & Conomos, J. (2009). Rethinking the contemporary art school: The artist, the PhD, and the academy. Halifax: Press of Nova Scotia College of Art & Design.
"
Methods
Through the contribution of a creative brief to students enrolled in a university level games design course, the UNSW Library has effectively become the customer, i.e. potential recipient of creative ideas for information literacy learning objects. This realigns the usual library / student relationship, i.e. a dynamic shift from “library as service provider” to “library as service recipient”. No longer the traditional ‘guide by the side’ our intervention must be minimal so as to increase possibilities of avant-garde responses. So whilst our approach is influenced by a ‘threshold concepts’ learning perspective, we have needed to step back and resist any tendencies to try and direct creative processes and just do our best to ensure that our ‘creative brief’ presentations effectively encompass what we might hope for in any final product.
Outcomes
There is an old adage that says “to learn something well, you should teach it” and in the spirit of this sentiment there is an expectation that through the process of learning to design a product, students will achieve a more complex understanding of the product content (i.e. information engagement at university). But does this incidental learning occur? If yes, what is learned and how does it happen? From a library perspective, it is certainly clear that incidental learning occurs amongst the staff involved in writing and communicating creative briefs for the students and in responding to the student product demonstrations. The action research process also demands an ongoing reflexivity that requires Library staff to re-examine assumptions about possible ways of learning, so new possibilities can be imagined.
Conclusions
Through this presentation we will outline our attempts to answer questions about student learning, by discussing insights gained from ‘successes’ and ‘failures’ and by sharing our reflections about ‘learning for the fun of it.’
The impetus for this work came from our reading of the research literature on threshold concepts, in particular Meyers & Land, (2006), Land, Meyer & Smith (2008) & Meyer, Land & Baillie, (2010).
Since 2010, consideration of the identified threshold concepts has opened opportunities for innovating library support for university learning and teaching. We are now looking beyond traditional competency based approaches to focus more on the inherent understandings enabling skill acquisition. This has led to a re-imagining of the ways these understandings might be experientially enabled, for example, through the use of interactive games.
This paper reports on an ongoing Library and faculty collaboration with a game development course in which students respond to a library creative brief to create game designs to promote understanding of the threshold concepts. Learning outcomes from this collaboration are greater than the sum of any games produced. Librarians have learned about the difficulties involved in presenting abstract ideas through creative briefs, game design students are learning about threshold concepts and sometimes overcoming unhelpful beliefs about information engagement. Both Library and faculty are learning more about students’ incidental learning (learning about content when designing games to teach it). It is perhaps proof for that old adage, “to better understand something, teach it!”
Works cited.
Land, R., Meyer, J., & Smith, J. (2008). Threshold concepts within the disciplines. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
Meyer, J., & Land, R. (2006). Overcoming barriers to student understanding: Threshold concepts and troublesome knowledge. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Meyer, J., Land, R., & Baillie, C. (2010). Threshold concepts and transformational learning. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
"
Whereas at the beginning of the last century building adequate educational infrastructure was the primary challenge, now 21st century teachers struggle to adapt that infrastructure to meet the changing expectations and preferred modes of learning of so-called “digital natives.” The Internet has changed the educational playing field, and new rules of play have yet to be established. In developed countries, massive educational infrastructures, built progressively over the previous century, are showing signs of strain. Most need to be transformed into more flexible, adaptive systems, better able to support educators’ needs to develop and practice pedagogical and technical skills which enable them to utilize the educational opportunities presented by new ICT (information and communicative technology) developments.
As technology makes lots of things easier, (and other things more difficult), the traditional focus on the three R’s (Reading, wRiting & aRithmetic) urgently needs to be balanced with a stronger emphasis on the four C’s ((critical thinking & problem solving, communication, collaboration, and creativity & innovation). It may be much, much easier for a student to find information on a given topic, for example, but does this ease and speed of access equate to better understanding?
As with all social paradigm shifts, there are losses and gains, and history cautions us about the danger of throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. The 21st century skills movements are attempting to apply the best educational knowledge currently available to the task of taking advantage of continually emerging technological opportunities. By combining the best of both the old and the new, it is hoped to create a robust educational model, flexible enough to prepare our children for a future that, at this point in time, we can only make guesses about.
This paper will look at the various 21st century skills movements emerging around the world and will discuss the arguments for and against such movements. The paper will also discuss the ideas around the need for understanding “threshold concepts” in order to productively progress learning in and for the 21st century."
relationships between particular social practices and the contexts within which they occur.
Accordingly, consideration has been given to contemporary political and economic pressures on university research and on the position of art and design practitioner research within that context. In keeping with this relational perspective, phenomenographic interviews garnered data from 28 art and design practitioner researchers working in Australian universities.
Findings from the data analysis include six qualitatively different ways that art and design practitioner researchers experience information engagement. For librarians working with novice researchers, these findings provide examples of effective information engagement that extend beyond the perspective of information literacy standards. For curriculum developers, these findings highlight possibilities for using information engagement development to encourage art and design students to self-identify as researchers at earlier stages of their study. For administrators seeking to provide evidence of graduate attribute development, these findings show practical connections between ongoing student inquiry experiences and the development of attributes associated with independent research and self-directed practice.
As practitioner researchers now struggle to find ways of communicating their research outcomes to enable measurement for the ERA (Excellence in Research for Australia) assessment scheme, these issues assume even greater importance. How can practitioner researchers strike a balance between the needs of “outside the box” creative research and government regulatory practices requiring results to fit into pre-prepared boxes that are often designed for very different contexts?
This paper looks at that dilemma by tracing the progression of Australian art schools into universities and looking at practitioner research in the higher education environment from the perspective of Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory. The paper will argue that Bourdieu’s theories not only offer explanations for the current difficulties faced by practitioner researchers, but also suggest a possible middle path between the otherwise opposite poles of capitulation to, or revolution against, the higher education system.
Buckley, B., & Conomos, J. (2009). Rethinking the contemporary art school: The artist, the PhD, and the academy. Halifax: Press of Nova Scotia College of Art & Design.
"
Methods
Through the contribution of a creative brief to students enrolled in a university level games design course, the UNSW Library has effectively become the customer, i.e. potential recipient of creative ideas for information literacy learning objects. This realigns the usual library / student relationship, i.e. a dynamic shift from “library as service provider” to “library as service recipient”. No longer the traditional ‘guide by the side’ our intervention must be minimal so as to increase possibilities of avant-garde responses. So whilst our approach is influenced by a ‘threshold concepts’ learning perspective, we have needed to step back and resist any tendencies to try and direct creative processes and just do our best to ensure that our ‘creative brief’ presentations effectively encompass what we might hope for in any final product.
Outcomes
There is an old adage that says “to learn something well, you should teach it” and in the spirit of this sentiment there is an expectation that through the process of learning to design a product, students will achieve a more complex understanding of the product content (i.e. information engagement at university). But does this incidental learning occur? If yes, what is learned and how does it happen? From a library perspective, it is certainly clear that incidental learning occurs amongst the staff involved in writing and communicating creative briefs for the students and in responding to the student product demonstrations. The action research process also demands an ongoing reflexivity that requires Library staff to re-examine assumptions about possible ways of learning, so new possibilities can be imagined.
Conclusions
Through this presentation we will outline our attempts to answer questions about student learning, by discussing insights gained from ‘successes’ and ‘failures’ and by sharing our reflections about ‘learning for the fun of it.’
The impetus for this work came from our reading of the research literature on threshold concepts, in particular Meyers & Land, (2006), Land, Meyer & Smith (2008) & Meyer, Land & Baillie, (2010).
Since 2010, consideration of the identified threshold concepts has opened opportunities for innovating library support for university learning and teaching. We are now looking beyond traditional competency based approaches to focus more on the inherent understandings enabling skill acquisition. This has led to a re-imagining of the ways these understandings might be experientially enabled, for example, through the use of interactive games.
This paper reports on an ongoing Library and faculty collaboration with a game development course in which students respond to a library creative brief to create game designs to promote understanding of the threshold concepts. Learning outcomes from this collaboration are greater than the sum of any games produced. Librarians have learned about the difficulties involved in presenting abstract ideas through creative briefs, game design students are learning about threshold concepts and sometimes overcoming unhelpful beliefs about information engagement. Both Library and faculty are learning more about students’ incidental learning (learning about content when designing games to teach it). It is perhaps proof for that old adage, “to better understand something, teach it!”
Works cited.
Land, R., Meyer, J., & Smith, J. (2008). Threshold concepts within the disciplines. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
Meyer, J., & Land, R. (2006). Overcoming barriers to student understanding: Threshold concepts and troublesome knowledge. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
Meyer, J., Land, R., & Baillie, C. (2010). Threshold concepts and transformational learning. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
"
Whereas at the beginning of the last century building adequate educational infrastructure was the primary challenge, now 21st century teachers struggle to adapt that infrastructure to meet the changing expectations and preferred modes of learning of so-called “digital natives.” The Internet has changed the educational playing field, and new rules of play have yet to be established. In developed countries, massive educational infrastructures, built progressively over the previous century, are showing signs of strain. Most need to be transformed into more flexible, adaptive systems, better able to support educators’ needs to develop and practice pedagogical and technical skills which enable them to utilize the educational opportunities presented by new ICT (information and communicative technology) developments.
As technology makes lots of things easier, (and other things more difficult), the traditional focus on the three R’s (Reading, wRiting & aRithmetic) urgently needs to be balanced with a stronger emphasis on the four C’s ((critical thinking & problem solving, communication, collaboration, and creativity & innovation). It may be much, much easier for a student to find information on a given topic, for example, but does this ease and speed of access equate to better understanding?
As with all social paradigm shifts, there are losses and gains, and history cautions us about the danger of throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. The 21st century skills movements are attempting to apply the best educational knowledge currently available to the task of taking advantage of continually emerging technological opportunities. By combining the best of both the old and the new, it is hoped to create a robust educational model, flexible enough to prepare our children for a future that, at this point in time, we can only make guesses about.
This paper will look at the various 21st century skills movements emerging around the world and will discuss the arguments for and against such movements. The paper will also discuss the ideas around the need for understanding “threshold concepts” in order to productively progress learning in and for the 21st century."