Distance learning in teacher education

From the perspective of student teachers working as teachers in local schools in the Westfjords of Iceland

First interest

What possibilities does it bring for the potential development of the local schools where teacher students live and work that teacher students are moving between the university program and the local school?

Between theory and praxis?

Focusing on the student teachers What do the student teachers learn by

participating in and moving between the distance education programme on the one hand and the local schools on the other hand?

What kinds of learning actions experienced in the programme, change the practice of the student teachers in local schools?

What kinds of experience from the teacher job help the teacher students in the learning tasks they are exposed to?

What is the role of ICT as a mediating artifact in student teachers’ learning?

Developmental transfer

What possibilities does it bring for the potential development of the distance education programme that student teachers are participating in and moving between the distance programme and the local schools?

Linking praxis to theory

Data - empiry Teacher students have been visited where they live and

interviewed and observed in the schools where they work. three main informants teaching in three different local

schools which I have followed for two years. at least one more teacher student and the principals - the compulsory school

adviser. visted the fourth school that for the first time had two teacher students

enrolled in two different distance learning programmes, one in the Iceland University of Education and one in University of Akureyri. I interviewed the teacher students and the principal in the end of the first year about the experience.

The scools involved were first visited 2003 and then most of them two times 2004 and in June 2005 most of them also have been visited two times.

Theese visits have partly been in connection to another research project where the use of ICT in schools are being researched. Through that project I have learned to know the teachers and the school culture by observations and interviews with teachers.

Observations have been carried out during on-campus sessions in Reykjavík and students’ participation in five course-webs (LMS) are being analysed.

Activity Theory - Central concepts Learning that leads to development of

individuals and the activity systems in which they participate are under consideration

In trying to conceptualize learning that leads to development for individuals and communities alike, concepts from activity theory are helpful.

The concepts of participation in different activity systems and transfer as a result of boundary crossing as well as the concept of developmental transfer are under special consideration.

Central concepts Developmental transfer:

understanding learning as being horizontal, where interacting activity systems benefit, is helpful if we want learning to lead to development – for individuals and communities alike

The criteria for developmental transfer: the benefits of cooperation between two different activity

systems for both communities of practice; both systems learn something from each other.

Expansive learning, a concept put forward by Engeström (1987) is initiated: when some individuals involved in collective activity take the

action of questioning existing practice, which can then lead to a debate and analysis of the contradictions in the current state of affair, which might again lead to new forms of the activity solving the contradictions

Figure from the group Workplace Learning and Developmental

Transfer in Helsinki http://www.edu.helsinki.fi

/activity/pages/research/transfer

Writing process

I plan to write my thesis as 3-5 papers I have written and presented two papers at conferences –

(drafts to be further elaborated) I have collected most of the data My task now is to analyze and interpret my data, form and

decide the papers that will answer my research questions (and refine them).

I would like to be able to do some experiments with the form of the writing and see if I could use my background in literature

I think it is important to give my participants’ voices a space in the text in a different way... How?

Since they are situated in remote rural communities I also would like to be able to give the local schools and communities a voice in an effort to enhance understanding of their situation – how can I reflect the atmosphere of the different schools and towns