Programming Resources for BYU Students

http://sas.byu.edu/training/PTE_resources.html

For my future reference...

Organizing my Literature

At first, this post was supposed to be an outline of my literature, but I'm now realizing this is huge.  I have a ton of literature, but I don't really know how/where to use it, because:

1. I have my documents stored in Zotero, but not my NOTES for those documents.
2. I have another Excel document that I made to appease a committee member with different categories, with some notes, but it's messy because I've changed my topic a lot of times.  
3. Some articles have elements of different categories, but that doesn't show in my Excel document.  
4. If I had done this in a uniform way from the beginning, this would be a lot easier.   Of course, I did try to do that, but it didn't work because of needs changing through the project, and different bodies of literature explored through the course of finding the right topic.

Time for a lit. review haircut--evening everything all out.  How do do it???  And what to do with my other files??

Option 1.

1. Determinism vs. Agency debate
1. Main premises of each
1. @!People have control over their life choices
2. @agency
2. Critiques on each 
1.  
2. LAEF and its Agentic components
1. Learner antecedent familiarity
2. Learner encounter with Unfamiliarity
3. Learner exploration
3. Technology Adoption
4. Technology Adoption as a(n informal?) Learning Experience
1. What they learn
2. Adult Learning/Faculty Professional Development
5. Technology Adoption as an Agentic Learning Experience
6. Learning Suite 
1. Ways to learn
1. online - learner control
2. formal training/face-to-face

Stuck

I went to a meeting yesterday, full of hope, fully motivated, with direction, and one of my committee members (another one of them was also there, but the main one was not there like I thought he would be), read over my latest draft with "meh" kinds of feedback and suggested a new idea for the context of my research that everybody else seemed to think was the best idea ever.  I was so upset that he didn't have that enthusiasm for the direction I was going, and I felt physically ill at the idea of having to start over.  Again.  It's the end of the next working day, and I figured if I felt that bad, I would just go back to my previous topic.  But I still feel physically ill from yesterday's experience.  And I lost all my motivation and direction.  I'm not sure I know how to write anymore.  I don't know my topic, I don't know what's cool about it, and I don't know where to go from here.  And because it's MY project, no one can tell me the answers to those questions except myself.  This is the problem with a Ph.D.

Sometimes this kind of experience doesn't bother me at all, and that's nice.  Other days it bulldozes me over and I can't get up for a few days.

I feel like I get like this--with this same, deep disappointment and physically ill feeling--at least once every two weeks.  It starts to wear on a person.

I call it "stuck."

Agentic vs. Deterministic Theories

Deterministic Theories

• Belief in science to discern causal forces in psychology like those entertained in physical science (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012)
• traditionally scientific viewpoint (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012)
• Automaticity, non-consciuos processing as "illusion of conscious will." Cognitive activity mostly automated, unconscious, adn determined by psychological variables outside of personal control (Clark, 2011).
• As adults, we are aware of 30% of cognitive operations and automated procedural knowledge; 70% of our learning and problem-solving may be automated and unconscious. (Bargh & Chartrand, 1999)
• People do not think carefully about many acts they perform (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012)
• People do not actually have control of the things that happen; they are actually the result of a web of automated, non-conscious, internal processes no more controllable than biological functions (Wegner & Wheatley, 1999). Also, there can't be any first-person evidence to the contrary b/c that proves the point.
• Neurological, cognitive, and social functioning of humans
• Theory is determined by data
• A spike in certain types of brain activity is the true causal factor behind the free decision (Haggard, 2008; Ruby & Decety, 2011; Soon, Brass, Heinze & Haynes, 2008) - (Contradicted by Sperry, 1988; Gazzaniga, 2011)
• Environment and embodiment as mechanistic forces controlling and undermining human action.

Agentic Theories

• Belief that there are phenomena that do not fit within the platform of dependable, scientific knowledge (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012) 
•  A good deal of human activity is tacit and contextual, and tacitness is crucial for practical involvement in the world. (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012)
• Say deterministic theories lack supporting logic, have inconsistencies and unsupported assertions (Ryan & Deci, 2004; Wegner, 2004; Yanchar, 2000).
• Human learning is not passive or mechanical; it is an "active, meaningful endeavor that requires purposeful engagement by people as holistic, embodied agents." (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012, p. 7)
• Environment and biological processes as critical aspects of the world in which humans life (Yanchar & Spackman, 2012, p. 8)
• 
  

Examples of theories that try to avoid a strong commitment to determinsm:

• Bandura, 1997
• Bruner, 1990
• Kolb, Boyatzis & Mainemelis, 2001
• Wenger, 1998

Revisions 2

Title: Becoming Familiar with a New Technology: An Agentic Perspective

WHY: To see if we can interpret experiences in terms of an agency-based learning theory.  To provide starting evidence that this theory is worth investigating.  To see how people make meaning in their lives in choosing ways to explore or ignore new technology.  To give meaning to learning experiences; to make learning more human. To give learner more responsibility.  So we can know how to be better learners (how to recognize and meaningfully engage in learning experiences).  So we can know how to be better teachers (how to assist learners in learning meaningfully).
Just use exploration part, or whole theory?


1. Intro: Agency and Learning

• Y&S - many learning theories are influenced by hard physical determinism
• Looking at humans in this light may be a narrow outlook
• Y,S & F Learning theory - based on human agency
• Explanation of Theory
• Explanation of Deterministic Learning Theories
• Explanation of differences
• LMS helps increase communication and interaction.
• When teachers encounter Learning Suite, some of them choose not to explore it at all.  Others explore it in many different ways.  
• This study a qualitative study providing examples of specific adult learning experience from learner's perspective and in the learner's own words.  A study of learning ot see whether or not Yanchar, Spackman and Faulconer's theory of learning could explain this experience agentically. 
• Understanding learning experiences in terms of YS&F's learning theory will provide insight into how learning could be understood as an agentic process, and the impact that perspective could have on future research in teaching and learning. 

2.  Research Questions:

1. How do typical university faculty members describe their experiences of learning to use a new LMS?
2. How do their responses agree or disagree with Y, S & F learning theory?
3. How does what we know from YS&F's learning theory based on agency change the way we look at learning?

3. Related Literature    

• Fundamental ideals/principles behind LAEF
• How those fundamental ideals/principles could help teachers and learners
• BYU Learning Suite  - statistics, WHAT WE KNOW
• Why this is a good scenario to study
• Why this study -

Method:

• Is this grounded theory research?
• Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis - Qual. research, gets at human experiences and meanings behind them, to the learners. Good b/c we can talk with professors about choices that were and were not meaningful to them. Also, I can interpret their responses as the researcher, which I will have to do in order to talk about choice and effects on learning. (LOOK MORE INTO THIS)
• Will talk with about 5 professors who originally chose to learn the technology, as identified by user data.  (1-Early adopters, 2-Early Majority, 2-Late Majority, 1-Laggard [how were they selected, why this group? why adults?]) (FIX)
• Will ask them how they first chose to learn Learning Suite  
• Tell me about your choices in learning to use Learning Suite. (What were some of the things you did to get more familiar with it?)
• Which helps did you use at first?  Why those?  How do you think those choices affected your learning experience?

 Results: Stories of learning a new technology. To analyze for themes/patterns similar to those in YS&F's "exploration" phenomenon. That will help with WHY.

Digging a Little Bit Deeper

As I was presenting my proposal to one of my committee members, I realized that I need to dig a little deeper in my experience.  My research certainly does not start with choices.  It starts with Agency.  That word almost makes me sick now.  But it's true, it has a lot to do with why I'm studying choices.  I wanted to study choices because then I wouldn't have to define agency, but I could still talk about how a person affects their own learning.  But in not including Agency, my study is simply a methodology, not a study for a specific purpose or grounded in a specific field of literature.

Now I am worried because I'm afraid I'm going backwards.  I am going back to where I started. If I go back to the original topic, I may lost my methodology.  I'm not sure I can rationalize my study from the point of view I'm taking.  But maybe that's okay.

When my committee chair took me into his office, he wanted me to study Agency and Learning.  But it was that broad, that optimistic. Enter second committee member, who had recently written a theory of learning based on another theory of agency.  It sounded great, but when I used those terms to try to rationalize my study, other committee members got upset by how high-level and open my wording was.  And since the wording was straight from the author's definition of agency, I figured the Agency was the rotten part. Now time to go back.

My Dissertation Topic has Already Been Done!

Nine months into the research, and I finally feel like I'm starting to really articulate what I want to say.  Then, in another search of the literature (ERIC, "Informal learning" and choices), I found a remarkable article, "Employees' Choices in Learning How to Use Information and Communication Technology Systems at Work: Strategies and Approaches (Korpelainen & Kira, 2010)."

It was so neat to read it and say, "That would have been the perfect way to do (frame, cite, etc.) this!"  And it was also a little nice to see that it was only just done recently.  That's the good news.

The bad news is I have to find a different approach to my study.

1. Find the gap in this article that my research might fill

• This article deals with University non-teaching faculty, although "trainers" are included in the sample.
• Use a different analysis of the data.

1. Change the study - study something other than Faculty Members learning to use Learning Suite.
2. Change the context of the study -- study something other than Choices in the Learning Process.
3. Start over.

Dissertation Funnel

I have a few things I need to bring together into the first paragraph of my dissertation:

• Qualitative Research for Learning
• Learner Choices
• Higher Education
• Faculty Members
• learning a new Technology

My committee member says the first paragraph of a dissertation should make me sound like a lawyer, stating all the facts up front, making a convincing case for the rationale for the research.  I need to beef up: rationale for the study, literature pertaining to choice in learning.  Why this is a good example of learning to study?

Current Funnel. 

• Education has been around a long time and we know a lot about how teaching and learning work.
• There have been many helpful studies in education that have made a difference in the classroom. (examples)
• "With all of the remarkable research that has been done, we still know very little about learning from the learner's perspective, in the learner's own words." 

Option 1. 

• Many universities are starting to use learning management systems.
• Good/bad ways to use LMS for instruction.
• Introducing these new technologies are learning experiences not only for students, but also for professors.
• Learners make many significant choices that affect their learning.
• We should ask professors about their learning experiences so we can know their stories and understand this learning experience.

Option 2. 

• One of the goals of universities is a desire for lifelong learning. 
• After university students graduate, it is hoped that they will choose to continue to learn in many different aspects of life.
• One opportunity to learn for BYU faculty members is the choice of whether or not to become familiar with the new Learning Suite.

Option 3. 

• "With all of the remarkable research that has been done, we still know very little about learning from the learner's perspective, in the learner's own words."
  We need to look at how a learner learns in an unstructured environment, on their own.
  We also need to look at adults.
  We should look at how university professors learn to use a new technology to teach their classes.

Option 4.

• A Technology adoption continues to be a major area of concern for education, including higher education. 
• While some universities provide formal technology professional development courses, many universities rely on faculty members' informal learning experiences to guide them to technology use. 
• Informal learning gives

Questions

From Committee Members

• How do you define learning?
• How do you define choices?
• What are you really getting at?
• What kinds of faculty members are you looking at?
• What kind of new technology are you looking at?
• Why use the word "affect" (as in, how learner choices affect learning)?
• Whose learning?
• What are they learning?
• What is the learning that choices will affect?
• Why Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis?  Why not Van Manen?

From Me

• Which method is best to use? 
• How do IPA studies generally frame their research?
• What do other DISSERTATIONS do in their methods sections?
• What can learners choose to do to be better learners?  What am I anticipating/hoping? 

Revisions

Title: Learner Choices in Learning a New Technology
WHY: Understand individual experiences of how learner choices affects learning. Because we need to be better learners.

Existing Literature Organization:  (organizing this differently may help be more supportive. Also include #1s)
    
     Education has been around for a long time.  Like, a REALLY long time.  From so many years of research and learning and teaching, you'd think we would know a lot about how it all works.  And we kinda do.  We have a lot of theories that explain things that happen, especially in the classroom, that have been extremely helpful in helping teachers understand the learners and how to make them learn what they need to know.  There are thousands of studies on what goes on in the classroom from the researcher's perspective.  But we still know very little about learning from the learner's perspective, in the learner's own words.
      In order to look at learning from this perspective, we have to think about what a learner does to learn.  A lot of people are currently debating about whether or not a learner causes his or her own actions themselves, or whether it is due to genetics, peer pressure, or media, but that literature is inconclusive.  Besides, no one has ever asked them.  We have very little literature on what the learner says they choose to do to learn and why they say they choose to do it. There are a few studies that talk about choice and learning, but those studies are, for the majority, quantitative, and deal with children, who often require more structure than adults to learn something, which could mean that they do less to learn.  These studies do not give us an accurate or descriptive depiction of how the learner describes his or her own choices and actions which contribute to or inhibit learning.
       In order to look at learning from the learner's perspective, how 'bout we look at an adult learning experience where the learner has the most control.  And how 'bout we look at a learning experience in an area that is breaking ground in education today.  Let's look at higher education faculty members learning to use a new technology.

Research Questions:

1. How do faculty members describe the role of choices in their learning of new technology?
2. What do their responses tell us about how learner choices affect learning?

Related Literature
      A study looking at learning to use a new technology could resonate with the field of technology adoption.  With the increasing demand for technology in schools, technology adoption, specifically in higher education, has become a hot topic.  But most technology adoption studies only look at a specific choice the faculty members make: Do they choose to use it or not?  Some studies go so far as to ask the faculty members why, but it is usually only to contribute generalizable attributes to those to choose to use the new technology and those who do not, which does not really tell us what the learner can DO to learn. Other studies go into assessing the effects of that choice, but only by looking at performance scores and other measurable results, instead of looking into the experiences of the learners.  Most technology adoption studies are not concerned with the many choices the new user is making as they choose to learn and implement new technology. 
     Technology adoption studies also generally fail to address the many kinds of choices a learner can make.  Learning and implementing a new technology, consummates many choices, and many different kinds of choices.  For instance, a large choice would be whether or not to use the new technology in the classroom. This kind of choice might affect the learning of the new technology in that it might take away the need to learn it, and the learner might discontinue learning the new technology.  Other large choices might include which features of the new tool to use with a class, or, if there is a technology problem, will the learner choose to solve it, or will they choose to be defeated by the technology? How much time and effort will they put into learning this tool before deciding whether or not to use it in their classes?  Smaller choices would probably include which help features to use to learn the technology, and which help features to avoid? Why will they make those choices? 
     In most technology adoption studies, the definition of learning would be technology adoption. For this study, learning will be defined as the process of becoming familiar with something new (see Yanchar 2012, in press). This definition is concrete enough to withstand the current philosophical debates and will be broad enough to allow learners to freely talk about their experiences.
     In May of 2012, Brigham Young University launched a new learning management system to replace an older, less-flexible, and more expensive learning management system. While this change was not too drastic, as it switched from one learning management system to another, the new learning management system raised much more curiosity than the old one.  50% of professors were interested in learning to use the new learning management system as opposed to the 12% who were interested in learning to use the former learning management system when it was first introduced to the university (Russell Osguthorpe, Director, BYU Center for Teaching and Learning, private conversation).  In both cases, the faculty members were invited to attend training sessions and had access to several online videos. With the new learning management system, with a simple phone call, faculty members could request one-on-one, face-to-face help from "Implementation Assistants," student employees trained in the new technology.  Many options were available to any faculty member to become more familiar with Learning Suite.
     Learners' descriptions of their choices in their learning experiences will provide stories that will help us understand individual experiences of how learner choices affect learning.  This understanding will not only help in designing better "learner helps" for assisting faculty members to learn new technology, but it will also help us see the things we as adults can choose to do to be better learners.

Method:

• Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis - Qual. research, gets at human experiences and meanings behind them, to the learners. Good b/c we can talk with professors about choices that were and were not meaningful to them. Also, I can interpret their responses as the researcher, which I will have to do in order to talk about choice and effects on learning. (LOOK MORE INTO THIS)
• Will talk with about 5 professors who originally chose to learn the technology, as identified by user data.  (1-Early adopters, 2-Early Majority, 2-Late Majority, 1-Laggard [how were they selected, why this group? why adults?]) (FIX)
• Will ask them how they first chose to learn Learning Suite  
• Tell me about your choices in learning to use Learning Suite. (What were some of the things you did to get more familiar with it?)
• Which helps did you use at first?  Why those?  How do you think those choices affected your learning experience?

 Results: Stories of learning a new technology.  That will help with WHY.

(I was stuck, so Shelly suggested that I write like I'm talking...Let's see what comes of it!)

Current Research Proposal

Title: Learner Choices in Learning a New Technology
WHY: Understand individual experiences of how learner choices affects learning. Because we need to be better learners.

Existing Literature Organization:  (organizing this differently may help be more supportive. Also include #1s)
      Choices in Learning Experiences

• Computer-based Courses
• Museum Studies
• Special Education
• General Classroom Learning
• Children vs. Adults: Choices in Learning (Add)
• Technology Adoption (Add) (how do tech. adoption studies measure adoption?)

     Existing Literature Summary:

• Literature DOES look at ways to change instruction 
• Literature DOES look at particular choices in technology adoption
• Literature DOES look at many terms related to choice in learning
• Literature DOES look at learner choices that have an impact on learning (change this in paper)
• Literature DOES NOT look at professors' experiences of learning and implementing new technology after adoption decision

Research Questions:

1. How do faculty members describe the role of choices in their learning of new technology?
2. What do their responses tell us about how choices affect learning?

Method:

• Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis - Qual. research, gets at human experiences and meanings behind them, to the learners. Good b/c we can talk with professors about choices that were and were not meaningful to them. Also, I can interpret their responses as the researcher, which I will have to do in order to talk about choice and effects on learning. (LOOK MORE INTO THIS)
• Will talk with about 5 professors who originally chose to learn the technology, as identified by user data.  (1-Early adopters, 2-Early Majority, 2-Late Majority, 1-Laggard [how were they selected, why this group? why adults?]) (FIX)
• Will ask them how they first chose to learn Learning Suite  
• Tell me about your choices in learning to use Learning Suite. (What were some of the things you did to get more familiar with it?)
• Which helps did you use at first?  Why those?  How do you think those choices affected your learning experience?

 Results: Stories of learning a new technology.  That will help with WHY.

Inspiration

Inspiration literally means "to breathe life into."  Beautiful word.

So how's this for a breath of fresh air:

• • "The way to humility is also the doorway to educational excellence." (Elder Eyring, Oct. 1997 BYU Speech)
  • "Because of what we know about adversity in learning, in this community of Saints we pay special honor to determined learners because we know the price that they gladly pay. And we know from whence their power to persist through difficulty comes."  (Elder Eyring, Oct. 1997 BYU Speech)
  • Ann Romney - I can't imagine what it would take to be brave enough to stand in front of that many people and try to say something brave and profound.  But she has it.  I want it too.
  • Sir Hans Sloane - The Natural Historian of medicine and biology.  I'm going to be the Natural  Historian of learning!!  By the way, he invented chocolate milk.  I guess every scholar has to have their own special treat...
  • "Sunday Afternoon Quizzes" in the book The Chosen, as portrayed by the character Danny and his father.  p. 136-140.
  • "I shall act always so as to increase the total number of choices."  Heinz von Foerster (1984) "Disorder/Order: Discovery or Invention?. p.6
  • How to be happy while doing your thesis:  http://3monththesis.com/
  • Using your Gifts in Whatever You Do - http://speeches.byu.edu/?act=viewitem&id=1900
  • How to learn anything - https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5MgBikgcWnY
  • Believing what I'm learning now can someday help my family.

Writing a Dissertation

So I've decided to blog about writing my dissertation and some of my thoughts, not for the world, but for me.  Nine months into this and I still don't really know what my question is or what I'm doing.  I've written at least a hundred drafts of my proposal, and I feel like I'm still asking the same exact questions and getting the same feedback I got on Day 1. It starts to make a person wonder if they have any passion left at all or if they could ever possibly make a contribution to the world, not to mention wondering if you'll ever be marketable (see Butterfly Circus video).

But guess what?  I have a lot of passion about lots of things related to IP&T. And one of them is my dissertation topic.

Most of what I feel like my classes told me about teaching and learning was really focusing on teaching, changing how people teach and designing instruction.  And while teaching helps a TON, and I LOVE designing courses and making visuals, I am genuinely curious to understand how the learner affects their own learning--choices, attitudes, things they like, fears, etc.

My brother sent me a scripture this morning that sums up my graduate experience:

D&C 25:8
" ... thy time shall be given to writing, and to learning much."

See also, The Fellowship of the Unashamed

So let's do this.