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Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Hello

Welcome to my blog about my Master's Dissertation at the University of Oxford Learning and Technology programme!  A bit about the research, and a bit about why I've started this blog.

The Research: Originally, my research was to focus on the educational trends such as international movements for standardization, assessment, and accountability, that constrain the possibilities of innovation in the educational technology field.  I then was originally going to look at how exactly programs that defied these trends came about. 

However, while conducting a scoping questionnaire (Which you can fill out here!) to get a better grasp of what are considered "innovative" programs within the U.K., it became clear that there was a much more imperative story to tell.  No one agreed on what is innovation, or what are examples of innovation. I began pondering, what does innovation look like for those within the Educational Technology field? Is everything innovative? Is nothing? Are some things "more" innovative than others? In a field full of constantly new and emerging ideas, how do we decide what practices we see as true innovations in education? What values do we ascribe when we call something "innovative"?

And therefore, my dissertation research aims to track various themes in how we define "innovation" within the educational technology field. I do believe that a Master's Dissertation may be well-designed to conduct this research, as it involves a shorter time-frame (the full results will be in by August! No matter what) and I'm not accountable to any funders and can therefore conduct my research as I choose.

Why It's Important: The field of educational technology is constantly associated with innovation; by the media, by policy makers, by business, by nonprofits, by educationalists, and by practitioners. What does it mean if we as a field cannot focus what innovation means, or what direction we want to go? Still pondering the implications....

I have no idea if anyone will read this, but it's good for my thought process either way. Hoping to ask some questions and get feedback to the hard questions I'm examining for the field. Subsequent posts will look at preliminary survey results; hoping to post daily. Stay tuned!  

Lisa Phillips

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