Research is complex. It can be a messy business, but it matters. Higher education revolves around research and student degrees yet when it comes to the REF, pedagogical research in HE has a poor showing. A recent HEA funded investigation found critiques of submission quality* while back in 2002, Jenkins described it as having Cinderella status. A paper by the HEA researchers (Cotton, Miller and Kneale, 2017) suggests pedagogical research in HE remains the Cinderella of academia.
If pedagogical research in HE is struggling for recognition where does this leave the field of education technology or Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL)? The critiques are plentiful** so where is the evidence of impact?
I have great respect for TEL colleagues and wearing my curiosity hat, I headed off to a closed learning technology mail list. Citing Surowiecki’s ‘wisdom of crowds’, I invited members to point me to evidence of TEL enhancement of learning and/or teaching.
Tags: Adoption • Digital Capabilities • Digital scholarship • Research • TEL • vle