Michelle O'Keeffe - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Uploads
Papers by Michelle O'Keeffe
Recently there has been a rise in research focused on the use of Communities of Practice (COP) in... more Recently there has been a rise in research focused on the use of Communities of Practice (COP) in Education. The aim of my research is to investigate the role a COP and technology can play in stimulating the learning of STEM subjects in second-level schools. The central objective here is to explore the use of UMI technologies (Ubiquitous computing, Mobile technology and the Internet-of-Things), alongside the current STEM curricula to enhance learning in the classroom and to strengthen the communication between members in a COP. To achieve this, my research approach will incorporate a participatory design process and group evaluations. I will collaborate closely with a number of local schools, where design workshops and user studies will be conducted continuously over the course of this research project. Research Context and Motivation I am a funded PhD student at Cork Institute of Technology, Ireland and I am currently nearing the end of my first year of a 4-year full-time program. ...
Teaching and Learning in a Digital World, Dec 27, 2017
Modern societies need young people who are able to think creatively, to collaborate well across m... more Modern societies need young people who are able to think creatively, to collaborate well across multiple disciplines and to use new scientific, technical and engineering knowledge to achieve effective results. This brings a requirement for better teaching and learning approaches that can operate through a real world perspective where complex systems and problems are all around us. This paper describes the development of a framework designed to empower 2 nd level teachers to achieve this by using Ubiquitous, Mobile, and Internet of Things technologies to enhance their approaches to teaching engineering and science subjects to their students. We provide a methodology and design approach towards forming and developing a Community of Practice (CoP), as a knowledge management schema for this and we provide exemplars from the engineering domain to illustrate the approach.
Communities of Practice have existed for as long as people have been learning and sharing their e... more Communities of Practice have existed for as long as people have been learning and sharing their experiences. However, it was not until the early 1990's before the study of these communities gained attention from the research community. Since then, these communities have been studied in many research domains, yet, the core structural elements, which are critical to these communities remain constant-Domain, Community and Practice. In this paper we reexamine the structural elements of Communities of Practice and argue for the extension of these to include aspects on Participation, Learning and Knowledge. We also take a first step in validating these new structural elements by presenting a study that explores how they appear in a known Communities of Practice (the CoderDojo movement). Our research informs the future study of COP from both a theoretical and organizational perspective.
Recently there has been a rise in research focused on the use of Communities of Practice (COP) in... more Recently there has been a rise in research focused on the use of Communities of Practice (COP) in Education. The aim of my research is to investigate the role a COP and technology can play in stimulating the learning of STEM subjects in second-level schools. The central objective here is to explore the use of UMI technologies (Ubiquitous computing, Mobile technology and the Internet-of-Things), alongside the current STEM curricula to enhance learning in the classroom and to strengthen the communication between members in a COP. To achieve this, my research approach will incorporate a participatory design process and group evaluations. I will collaborate closely with a number of local schools, where design workshops and user studies will be conducted continuously over the course of this research project. Research Context and Motivation I am a funded PhD student at Cork Institute of Technology, Ireland and I am currently nearing the end of my first year of a 4-year full-time program. ...
Teaching and Learning in a Digital World, Dec 27, 2017
Modern societies need young people who are able to think creatively, to collaborate well across m... more Modern societies need young people who are able to think creatively, to collaborate well across multiple disciplines and to use new scientific, technical and engineering knowledge to achieve effective results. This brings a requirement for better teaching and learning approaches that can operate through a real world perspective where complex systems and problems are all around us. This paper describes the development of a framework designed to empower 2 nd level teachers to achieve this by using Ubiquitous, Mobile, and Internet of Things technologies to enhance their approaches to teaching engineering and science subjects to their students. We provide a methodology and design approach towards forming and developing a Community of Practice (CoP), as a knowledge management schema for this and we provide exemplars from the engineering domain to illustrate the approach.
Communities of Practice have existed for as long as people have been learning and sharing their e... more Communities of Practice have existed for as long as people have been learning and sharing their experiences. However, it was not until the early 1990's before the study of these communities gained attention from the research community. Since then, these communities have been studied in many research domains, yet, the core structural elements, which are critical to these communities remain constant-Domain, Community and Practice. In this paper we reexamine the structural elements of Communities of Practice and argue for the extension of these to include aspects on Participation, Learning and Knowledge. We also take a first step in validating these new structural elements by presenting a study that explores how they appear in a known Communities of Practice (the CoderDojo movement). Our research informs the future study of COP from both a theoretical and organizational perspective.