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Into the Labyrinth : A PhD Comprehensive Portfolio

MDL

The primary conceptualization for literacy(ies) encompass both media and digital under the term MDL and recognizes that literacies encompass both cognitive abilities and social practices. Definitions and practices of critical MDL are continually in flux, and since contexts dictate the action and reflection of core and critical elements, it is relevant to explore the lived experiences of how teacher educators’ are shaped by their MDL, as they adapt within cultural, social, political, and technological climates.

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Literature Review 24 This is the introduction to the literature review plain 23 2020-04-29T16:23:42+00:00
Introduction
Current global issues in rapid emergency online instruction and 24/7 media consumption are compounded by ongoing changes in digital technologies and expectations for the development of global competencies (CMEC, 2020). The need for an informed and technologically prepared teaching workforce are identified in policy and position papers nationally and globally:
- Leading SGD - Education 2030 established teacher education as one of the priorities in the sustainable development goals;
- UNESCO continues to examine policies and practices for media and information literacies (Singh et al., 2016), digital citizenship (Law et al., 2018), open educational government (Huss & Keudel, 2020), and open educational resources (UNESCO, 2019a);
- the U.S. Department of Educational Technology (2016) released the document Advancing Educational Technology in Teacher Preparation: Policy Brief (Stokes-Beverley & Simoy, 2016);
- a position paper from the European Literacy Policy Network indicated that “many teachers lack competence, confidence and knowledge of effective strategies to harness the potential of diverse technologies to enhance digital literacy teaching and learning, and to foster young people’s resilience to the risks associated with digital technology” (Lemos & Nascimbeni, 2016, p. 3); and
- a Canadian government report, Democracy Under Threat outlined the need to address education of digital literacies (Zimmer, 2018).
These identified needs are evermore pressing in the pivot to online and remote or distanced instruction resulting from the COVID-19 global pandemic. The impact on teaching and learning, not only in general populations, in K-12 and higher education contexts, but specifically in teacher education programs is yet to be researched. The push for open educational resources (UNESCO, 2019a) and open access are heightened by the open consultation process by an international commission from UNESCO on the Futures of Education in order to "mobilize the many rich ways of being and knowing in order to leverage humanity’s collective intelligence" (UNESCO, 2019b, para: The Aim).
While these identified needs have a sense of urgency, in the midst of the global health crises, these are not new issues. Along with a public outcry for media literacies in the face of fake news (Singh et al., 2016) and increasing demands for technologically and digitally literate populations, there is a push to change teacher education generally and the teaching practices of those who teach in teacher educator programs more specifically (Foulger et al. 2017). A thread connects these issues to the revitalization of teacher education programs in order to “prepare teachers who will teach in transformative ways and leverage technology as a problem-solving tool” (Schmidt-Crawford et al., 2018, p. 132). It is time to examine what is happening in the field of preservice teacher education programs, specifically in relation to media and digital literacy (MDL) instruction, open education, and teacher educators' technological competencies.
This literature review presents the purpose and the research questions driving this investigation. A glossary of terms is shared to fully understand the concepts explored in the literature. A taxonomy of literacies, helping to position MDL within the plethora of definitional combinations available in the field of literacy education, is examined. An open education framework for this research is also presented. My positionality as a teacher and scholar in the field of teacher education is considered. Theoretical and conceptual frameworks grounding the teaching and research of MDL in teacher education from an open educational lens are examined in the Research Frameworks section of this literature review. An Alternative Dissertation (AltDiss) framework is the final section of the literature review. The literature review concludes with research implications, next steps and a brief summary.
Theoretical Frameworks A theoretical framework identifies a researcher's worldview, from the heart, not the head, and impacts every decision made in the unfolding of the research (Grant & Osanloo, 2014). The choice of research theory needs to be explicitly and clearly stated (Grant & Osanloo, 2014). My PhD research is grounded in the theoretical foundations of socio-cultural constructivist theories of learning originating from Dewey, Vygotsky, and Papert (Dewey, 1916; Lowenthal & Muth, 2009; Papert & Harel, 1991; Roth & Lee, 2007) and critical literacies (Freire, 2009; Giroux, 2010; Luke, 2012). My “constructivist paradigm assumes a relativist ontology (there are multiple realities), a subjectivist epistemology (knower and respondent co-create understandings)” (Denzin & Lincoln, 2013), and framed by conceptions of shared and collaborative practice within networked and participatory cultures (Gee, 2015; Ito et al., 2010).
This research will apply an interpretive framework from a constructivist-interpretive and critical paradigm (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005). The interpretive researcher is described as a bricoleur (Denzin, 2017; Denzin & Lincoln, 2011), informed by "personal history, biography, gender, social class, race, and ethnicity and those of the people in the setting"; one who "stitches, edits, and puts slices of reality together” (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011, p. 5). I push this notion of researcher as bricoleur by suggesting this interpretivist research as a crystallization accomplished by an alchemist, mixing elements into something precious and worthy of recognition (Stewart et al., 2017). I will explore this notion of crystallization in other sections of this literature review.
The theory of connectivism (Siemens, 2018) will be explicated within this research. Connectivism relates to the role of cognition when generating connections and networks, both internally and externally to the human brain. Siemens (2012) set out the principles of connectivism as a “response to a perceived increasing need to derive and express meaning, and gain and share knowledge. This is promoted through externalisation and the recognition and interpretation of patterns, which are shaped by complex networks” (Tschofen & Mackness, 2012, p. 125). The four key principles of connectivism – autonomy, connectedness, diversity, and openness – (Siemens, 2012; Tschofen & Mackness, 2012) are supported by emerging technologies that are shaping human cognition in the way we “create, store, and distribute knowledge” (Couros, 2010, p. 114). For this research, the cognitive processes within the connectivist structures of teacher educators will be explored in the stories of their lived experiences as they navigate and make sense of complex MDL and OEPr amalgamations.
This research is positioned within the cognition and learning field of study. I am interested in exploring the inner and outer cognitive landscapes of the human mind in relationship with others and technologies, as mediated by MDL within OEPr. Research into the cognitive theory of multimedia learning focuses on the demands on cognitive processing and the retrieval of information from long term memory. Working memory (WM), particularly our cognitive ability to manage multimedia information within complex teaching and learning environments, can impact MDL and OEPr. WM processes are described as essential, extraneous, and generative (Mayer, 2017). There are specific cognitive demands placed on teacher educators when using multimedia and exploring MDL. Multimedia is holistically defined by de Vries (2003) as “the influence of different symbol systems” presented concurrently or consecutively using text, pictures, sound, and animation (p. 157). Conceptions from the theory of connectivism, cognitive load theory (van Merrienboer & Sweller, 2005), and socio-cultural cognition (Kirschner et al., 2018) impact teacher educators as they engage with MDL to enact their OEPr.
This research is influenced by the philosophy of technology and material engagement theory (Ihde, 2011; Ihde & Malafouris, 2019) to better understand the human–technology relationship. Since the "larger overarching social, cultural, and political frameworks in which people partake and that may be said to vary on a scale from ‘left,’ e.g., (neo-)Marxist to ‘right,’ e.g., (neo)liberal" (Van Den Eede et al., 2015, p. 239) impacts how OEPr and MDL are perceived. I recognize that the everyday use of technology in education does not take place in a vacuum (VanDenEede et al., 2015). My interest lies in understanding the individual and socially negotiated actions that lead to a TEd's enacted OEPr and where this is influenced by MDL considerations.
Literacies: Untangling a Concept Surrounding these definitions of media and digital literacies there exists a veritable Pandora’s box of literacy terminology (Belshaw, 2012) including transliteracies (Sukovic 2016), cosmopolitan literacy (Zaidi & Rowsell, 2017), cultural literacies (Halpert & Chigeza, 2015), place based literacies (Harwood & Collier, 2017; Mills & Comber, 2013); artefactual literacies (Pahl & Rowsell, 2011); information communication literacies (Forkosh-Baruch & Avidov-Ungar, 2019; Horton, 2008); internet or web literacies; technological literacy; multiliteracies (New London Group, 1996); multimodal; multicultural; visual literacy (Collier 2018), transmedia literacies (Jenkins 2010), and re/mix literacies (Hoechsmann, 2019). While this literature review does not specifically examine this tangle of terminologies, they are mentioned here to acknowledge the confusion and recognize potential misconceptions resulting from the conflation of terminology (Belshaw, 2012; Spante et al. 2018).
As a reflection of critical theoretical frameworks, my research is influenced by conceptions of critical literacies that are “historical works in progress. There is no correct or universal model. Critical literacy entails a process of naming and renaming the world, seeing its patterns, designs, and complexities, and developing the capacity to redesign and reshape it” (Luke, 2012, p. 9). This conception of critical literacy rings true for my research since how TEds "shape and deploy the tools, attitudes, and philosophies of critical literacy are utterly contingent: It depends upon students’ and teachers’ everyday relations of power, their lived problems and struggles, and … on educators’ professional ingenuity in navigating the enabling and disenabling local contexts of policy” (Luke, 2012, p. 9).
For this literature review, the primary conceptualization for literacy/literacies will encompass a critical framing of media and digital formats under the term MDL while recognizing that literacies are both an internal, cognitive ability and a social practice, with each requiring action and reflection. This literacy conception will be contextually placed within teacher education and the teaching and learning relating to MDL done in FoE. While Stordy’s (2015) taxonomies of literacies is particularly helpful as a starting point for a preliminary understanding of literacy/literacies, there is potential for further development for generating a phylogenetic graphic to establish origin stories of literacy terminology, integrating information about inherited characteristics, but that required more time than is available for this current review.
Research Questions 11 This is the research questions section of the literature review plain 2020-04-29T16:57:21+00:00
I wonder how a teacher educator’s OEPr are impacted by an awareness and application of MDL? For the purpose of this research project, OEPr are defined, following Cronin (2017), as collaborative pedagogies utilizing digital technologies and authentic learning encounters for “interaction, peer-learning, knowledge creation, and empowerment of learners” (p. 18). In other words, teacher educators will individually or collaboratively select OEPr to support their ways of knowing, designing, planning, and assessing teaching and learning events (Cronin, 2017; Nascimbeni, 2018; Paskevicius, 2018; Paskevicius & Irvine, 2019).
In this research, OEPr are explored through teacher educators’ participatory, collaborative, networked, shared, and public-facing educational practices (Cronin & MacLaren, 2018; Lohnes Watulak, 2018; Lohnes Watulak et al., 2018; Tur et al., 2020). Current research in the field of OEPr fails to clearly identify the critical role played by media and digital literacies (Bozkurt et al., 2019; Cronin, 2017) which prompts the question of how critical media and digital literacies impact teacher educators’ OEPr?

RESEARCH QUESTIONS
- How do teacher educators define open educational practices (OEPr)?
- What are the lived OEPr experiences of teacher educators, as evidenced in the ethos and stories of their networked, connected, collaborative, openly accessible, digital and media infused teaching practice?
- How do critical media and digital literacies inform or shape OEPr, from the perspective of teacher educators?
This research will capture the teacher educators’ storied enactment of OEPr as shared through: “experiences (what people feel); practices (what people do); things (the objects that are part of our lives); relationships (our intimate social environments); social worlds (the groups and wider social configurations through which people relate to each other); localities (the actual physically shared contexts that we inhabit); and events (the coming together of diverse things in public contexts)” (Pink et al., 2015).
Purpose and Rationale This literature review will unfold my qualitative, digital ethnographic inquiry centering on the open educational practices of teacher educators in Faculties of Education in Canadian higher education contexts. This research focuses on the confluence of three areas – media and digital literacies (MDL), faculties of education (FoE), and open educational practices (OEPr). First, MDL is an important research focus, with growing political and public demands for literacies in all areas of education (OECD, 2018; Zimmer, 2018). Calls for educational responses to ‘fake news’ (Gallagher & Rowsell, 2017) and the teaching of digital citizenship to combat cyberbullying (Choi, Cristol, & Gimbert, 2018; Jones & Mitchell, 2016) will increasingly influence educational landscapes in Canada (Hoechsmann & DeWaard, 2015). Digital literacy and competency frameworks have been developed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the European Union to further education for citizenship (Carretero Gomez et al., 2017; Law et al., 2018). While research focuses on MDL in the K-12 education sector, on teachers in the classroom, or on the teacher candidates being prepared for teaching, there is little focus on the MDL competencies of teacher educators (Petrarca & Kitchen, 2017).
Second, UNESCO amplifies the notion of education as common good(s), shifting from previous notions of education as individualistic and economically entangled public good(s), with a focus on open educational practices & networks as mechanisms for change (Daviet, 2016; Law et al., 2018). Common good(s), contributing to societal well-being, are undergirded with a humanistic and holistic belief system (Daviet, 2016). The Canadian Council of Ministers of Education and the National Council of Teachers of English have emphasized the need for enhanced literacy development in conjunction with technology competencies in education for all provincial education jurisdictions (Gallagher & Rowsell, 2017). The Canadians for 21st Century Learning & Innovation document Vision for 21st century learning in Canada, 2012, identifies key skills and competencies learners should possess, which suggests that teachers, teacher candidates, and teacher educators should also possess these skills and competencies. The development of a set of technology competencies for teacher educators (Foulger et al., 2017) suggests the need for a reconceptualization of current FoE structures and teacher educators’ practices.
Since “teacher’s knowledge is an essential component in improving educational practice” (Connelly et al., 1997, p. 674), this research will explore the lived experiences of teacher educators who openly share evidence of applying MDL as part of their teaching practice (Cronin, 2017; Hegarty, 2015; Watt, 2007). In order to gain a better understanding of the context of MDL within FoE, teacher educators’ voices and stories need to be re-presented. Teacher educators will be invited to participate in interviews to document their OEPr and their media and digital literacy landscapes. There is limited research addressing the needs of teacher educators or how teacher educators infuse MDL into their teaching practice (Lohnes Watulak, 2016; Phuong et al., 2018; Seward & Nguyen, 2019; Stokes-Beverley & Simoy, 2016).
Third, this research will explore, revise, and clarify current definitions of OEPr (Cronin & MacLaren, 2018; Nascimbeni & Burgos, 2016; Paskevicius, 2017; Tur et al., 2020). I will uncover potential connections from current conceptualizations of OEPr to understandings of critical media and digital literacy (Gee, 2015; Stordy, 2015).
My research will not only add to rapidly evolving discussions about OEPr but may also contribute a much needed focus on teacher educators (Woloshyn et al., 2017). Teacher educators bring experience in educational teaching practice to the nexus between OEPr, teaching practices, and MDL. Teacher educators from diverse, Canadian, FoE sites will be invited to participate in interviews, to “story” (Clandinin, 2015) their OEPr, and reflect on their MDL landscapes. The ubiquity of electronic technologies in the functional milieu of today’s educational environments suggest that digital tools are both field and method for ethnographic study (Burrell, 2009; Markham, 2016).