Three secondary school teachers implementing student-centred learning in Iraqi Kurdistan

In Iraqi Kurdistan, the educational system is going through significant changes. The educational system influences the students’ attitudes, and one wants the educational system to support the young democracy. In this study, student-centred learning (SCL) is seen as a first step to learning, but also to participation and engagement as a citizen. Three secondary school teachers worked with researchers from Norway and Kurdistan to implement SCL strategies in their daily teaching. Teachers experienced changes in their roles when emphasizing the importance of students’ participation in the learning processes. They could not lecture most of the time; they needed to make more space for the students’ activities and allow them to become more active. They acted more as mentors for their students. The content of the teaching also changed. When the teachers lectured it was about their subject. When the students were expected to be more active, the teachers also had to teach the students how to be more active. The traditional way of furnishing the classrooms in Kurdistan has been rows of benches and desks for the children and a desk by the board for the teacher. This way of furnishing was described as a hindrance when organising for students’ participation. The teachers’ experiences were of main interest in this action research project. Their responses to interview questions were validated by classroom observations. Also, a group of researchers with very different cultural and scientific background collaborated. This was in itself an interesting side effect in this action research study.     

Configuring the teacher as data user: public-private sector mediations of national test data

ABSTRACT

Datafication of student learning has carved out an influential space for public and private actors who design technologies for visualizing data. As data visualizations shape how teachers’ interpret data, they are powerful devices. This paper examines how teachers get configured as data users in the making of Danish national test data visualizations for municipal primary and lower secondary schools. The paper is based on a qualitative study of the Danish Ministry of Education, which develops the official visualizations, and NordicMetrics, a private consultancy offering a supplementing visualization of student progression. We draw on science and technology studies (STS) to theorize techno-organizational dynamics of developing visualizations. We propose to understand data visualizations as contingent, situated and socio-material achievements that configure teacher as data users. Comparing two institutions’ respective negotiations of different concerns when developing data visualizations enables us to consider the otherwise ‘hidden’ data mediators and the entwined relations between public and private data mediators.     

The configurative agency of metrics in education: a research agenda involving a different engagement with data

ABSTRACT

The increased use of quantitative education data is often regarded by scholars as evidence of the emergence of’governing by numbers’. These scholars ascribe major stakeholders such as the OECD and nation states agency as they produce, distribute and consume data, and respond to these with policy and management initiatives. This paper argues that metrics themselves have a configurative agency that affects education in terms of educational ideas and designs. The paper illustrates this point by analysing two cases of graduate employability metrics, each of which configures education differently, and discusses how the configurative agency of metrics can become the focal point of a different research agenda using distinct analytical concepts drawn from the sociology of quantification and new materialism. The paper concludes that such a research agenda can enable actors involved in the design and development of education to enter into a professional dialogue and engagement with education data, rather than merely dismissing it.     

Close encounters of the digital kind: A research agenda for the digitalization of public services

This paper contributes to e-government research by presenting a review and discussion on how digitalization of public services has affected the interaction between citizens and government. We argue for a conceptualization and critical reflection on the nature of the underlying interaction between citizens and public officials - the public encounter - that digital public services are developed to support. We apply a qualitative and hermeneutic approach and illustrate that digital public services change public encounters concerning when, where, and how interactions occur, what each actor does, and the skills required of them. By relating these changes to emerging digital technologies (e.g. data mining, machine learning, sensor technology, and service automation), we illustrate that while these new technologies carry the potential to further digitalize service provision and fulfill the democratic goals of digital government, authorities can apply the same technology to restrict, control, and surveil citizens. Based on a critical discussion on what digitalization might entail for society, we identify problem areas arising from this development and propose a research agenda for understanding this phenomenon further. We raise questions and ethical concerns regarding accountability and reskilling of citizens and public officials as public service provision becomes citizen self-service.