Always Coming Home: Applying Force Field Analysis

"OOOOHHHH, OOOOHHHH, OOOOHHHH, OOOOHHHH, Can you feel the force?" - The Real Thing

"Always Coming Home: Applying Force Field Analysis as a Structured Approach to Eliciting Ongoing Organizational Contexts and Requirements for Flexible Learning" is a paper I wrote for ICICTE 2007 with Mrs Aurélie Owens of Cranfield University. It is due to see publication in the UCFV Research Review. This paper is about helping academic and professional university staff to engage with flexible learning. We will argue that flexible learning is, in Ursula LeGuin’s phrase, “always coming home” because transformations to flexible learning can never be complete. This notion suggests that flexible learning actually requires a constant personal and institutional commitment to change management and staff development. The paper features a tutorial on applying Force Field Analysis to drive staff development workshops to engage academic and professional staff in the personal and institutional changes heralded by flexible learning. It also includes reflections on the use of Force Field Analysis from a facilitator and a participant observer. This is an example of practice-based research, which enables professionals to make informed decisions about if, where, and when to use a particular method. As The UCFV Research Review is not a specialized educational journal, we will introduce flexible learning, its critiques and some of the burning issues which herald widespread change to individual practice and institutional structure in higher education.

Keywords: change management, flexible learning, force field analysis, institutional change in higher education, personal change, practice-based research, staff development, staff development workshops

Paper on 'Educational and Institutional Fexibility of Australian Educational Software' published by Campus Wide Information Systems

"Bend me, shape me, anyway you want me,

long as you love me, its all right" - Amen Corner

Campus Wide Information Systems have just published 'Educational and Institutional Flexibility of Australian Educational Software', a viewpoint paper which I wrote with Barry O'Grady and Peter Mayall of Curtin Business School. The heart of the paper is the identification of these categories:

"Well-designed educational software can be a key enabler for flexible education, although embedding it at an institutional level brings its own demands for change management. Here
we define flexible educational software to mean applications that provide both educational and institutional flexibility. Educationally flexible software should enable educators to design and manage effective learning experiences and materials and provide an interface that is appropriate for educating. Meanwhile it should provide students with opportunities to learn at their convenience and provide an interface dedicated to learning. Institutionally flexible software should provide institutions and their developers with facilities to adapt and integrate the product with local administrative processes, IT platforms and teaching culture. It should also help universities to join effective federations and partnerships with other institutions, which requires adherence to open standards and tolerance of diverse coding languages and platforms, including those that are popular in other nations ... The three [Australian] educational software packages we introduce below each match our informal definitions of educationally and institutionally flexible educational software and provide solid support and training to domestic and international clients." (Shurville, O'Grady and Mayall, 2008, p 76-77).

The paper is part of a special issue on Australasian E-Learning which I co-edited with Professor Ken Fernstrom (University College of the Fraser Valley, British Columbia), Dr Michael Henderson (Monash) and Barry O’Grady (Curtin). The papers were sourced from ICICTE 2007.

Reference

• Shurville, S., O'Grady, B. and Mayall, P. (2008) 'Educational and Institutional Flexibility of Australian Educational Software', Campus-Wide Information Systems, Vol. 25 No. 2, pp 74-84.

ICICTE 2007 special issue of CWIS gone to press

"... its a wide open road" - The Triffids

The ICICTE 2007 special issue of Campus-Wide Information Systems has now gone to press. This is an Australasian issue and it provides a snapshot of e-learning in Australasia for international readers. It was edited by Ken Fernstrom, Barry O’Grady, Michael Henderson and me. This may be the first special issue in the history of academic publishing to go to press four months early.

Here is a snippet from the editorial to whet your appetite:

The issue features papers presented at the International Conference on Information and Communications Technology in Education (ICICTE). ICICTE addresses the many challenges and new directions presented by technological innovations in educational settings. Each year academic and professional participants at ICICTE gain an excellent overview of current thinking and practices in applications of technology to education. This was exemplified in 2007 by our keynote speaker Professor Rob Koper of the Open University of the Netherlands, who gave an overview the €10,000,000 pan European TenCompetence project (see Stefanov and Koper, 2007): “The aim of the project is to build a European Network for Lifelong Competence Development by establishing a technical and organizational infrastructure for lifelong competence development. The infrastructure will use open-source, standards-based, sustainable and innovative technology to support the lifelong development of competences by any citizen, team or organization” (TenCompetence, 2007, online). Although TenCompetence is a European Union funded project, it is important that contributions from the accession countries and beyond Europe have been included in the research and dissemination agenda. For example Richards, Donkers, Hatala and Dufresne (2007) have contributed work undertaken in Canada. Such cosmopolitanism shows that the educational technology community is taking strides towards the internationalist goals set by Papandreou at ICICTE in 2006 and practical steps toward global interoperability.

Informal discussions of Koper’s keynote throughout the conference noted that TenCompetence seems to be as concerned with fostering international networks as it is about pioneering new educational technologies. Such multi-cultural activity is also a hallmark of ICICTE. While the conferences are based in Greece, they are co-organized between local universities and the University College of the Fraser Valley in Canada. Throughout the conference delegates can find themselves networking with colleagues from all five continents. Conspicuously, despite the travel costs, Australasian delegates have loyally attended year after year; making sizable contributions to the both academic and social life of the conference. Indeed, it is fair to say that ICICTE just would not be ICICTE without them. So the organizers thought it appropriate to acknowledge the dedication of the Australasian contingent by selecting papers from the 2007 event that offer overseas readers a snapshot of current developments in Australasian e-learning and flexible education. This is a timely decision as Australasian institutions have made considerable inroads into Asian higher education and are now turning their gaze towards China. As a forthcoming themed issue of this journal will attest, the Chinese market for e-learning is set to grow considerably and China’s choice of platforms and partners could decisively affect international standards and technologies. With its new Mandarin speaking prime minister taking a public interest in educational technology, Australia is particularly well positioned to enter this emerging market. Competitors and potential collaborators are therefore advised to follow developments in Australasian e-learning closely.

Our Man in Canberra: Henk Eijkman

"Move on up ..." - Curtis Mayfield

Dr Henk Eijkman, all round good guy, ICICTE fellow traveler and non-foundationalist epistemologist supreme, has just moved to be Academic Learning and Teaching Fellow (Senior Lecturer level) at the University of NSW at the Australian Defence Force Academy. So Henk is officially now Our Man in Canberra. Henk is also one of the authors for the upcoming special issue of Campus-Wide Information Systems on Australasian E-Learning. Congratulations Henk and good luck in the new job!

Themed issue of Campus-Wide Information Systems on Australasian E-learning

"I'm happy just to sit here round a table with old friends ... and see which one of us can tell the biggest lies" - Flame Trees by Cold Chisel

Ken Fernstrom, Barry O’Grady, Michael Henderson (who now seems able to fly) and I are editing a special issue of Campus-Wide Information Systems on Australasian E-learning including expanded versions of papers from ICICTE 2007. We hope to publish five papers form Australia and one from New Zealand.

A special issue that Ken and I edited based upon last year's conference entitled 'Rhodes to Global Educational Networks for the Common Good' is now available. It is a good idea to stay on the right side of Ken as he seems to be toteing a wolf these days. Flax the husky who is Ken's new room mate can be seen on the right. Bring some fresh Moose.

Hope to see you all at ICICTE 2008!

ICICTE 2007: 12-14 July 2007

"So now I walk in the midday sun, I never thought that my saviour would come, I think it's amazing, I think you're amazing" - George Michael (tenuous I know but George is Greek)

ICICTE 2007 was a great conference as always. I really enjoyed meeting the familiar faces as new making some new friends. The organization was superb as always and Crete was a welcoming destination. I was very proud to receive an award for being a friend of the conference (which made me so proud that I turned up in a socceroos replica strip). Cheers Ken! I also enjoyed introducing the keynote Rob Koper of the Open University of the Netherlands, who gave an inspiring overview of Learning Design. It was great to catch up with Rob who I met in Bulgaria last year as part of a TenCompetence based special issue I was organizing for Interactive Learning Environments (where I used to be Associate Editor).

My old spar Asher Rospigliosi and I contributed to a paper presented by Sue Greener called ‘The Value of Social Cognitive Theory in Online Discussion: Reflection via a Critical Incident repertory Grid’, which was invited for publication in Interactive Learning Environments. Asher needs a haircut and a shave as always. Aureli Owens and I presented ‘Engaging Colleagues in Personal and Organizational Change via Force Field Analysis’, which was invited for publication in the UCFV Research Review. I think this will be Aureli's first publication. But watch out I think she is a rising star.

The man of the match was definitely Barry O’Grady of Curtin University who presenteda great paper on finance and e-learning co-authored with his colleague Peter Mayall. The best bar conversation was with Steve Wheeler of the Faculty of Education at the University of Plymouth. Steve is the book reviews editor of Interactive Learning Environments. He is something of a rival now of course but as he invited our paper I guess we can live and let live! You can check out his views on ICICTE here.

Piers MacLean was in great form, although rarely seen at the bar, and his paper with Bernard Scott 'Researching Requirements, Practice, and Prospects for Learning Design: Some Results and Conclusions' is part of a research program that is really useful to anyone interested in training the next generation of learning designers. Check out their expanded paper from ICICTE 2006. It is good to see these old muckers from Cranfield have started the new JISC funded WALTER project. The future of learning design education is in safe hands!

We stayed in the Creta Sun apartments about 1/2 an hour from the action. The girls did a fine job of controlling the pool and the beach (Michelle did this by remote from her bed until around 4pm each day) while we were hard at work. Our host Dennis was a man in a million and generous with the four roses. I wish we had the time to nip back later in the summer for another dose of fine Greek hospitality. We eat nuff times at a local Greek lunch wagon that served the best dressed chicken in town for a couple of Euro. Nice! No them belly full but we hungry.

Wackies and Studio One was the boys music of choice in the Creta Sun apartments (except when Marian treated us to early morning Robbie Williams or Michelle went for some serious deep Brixton House) where we entertained Emory and Mina Craig from New York. Barry and Peter provided the most exciting taxi service on the island. Next year I hire a Hummer.