Towards adoption of eLearning technologies at Lappeenranta University of Technology: Understanding Teachers‟ Adoption of Blackboard Learning System

The electronic learning has become crucial in higher education with increased usage of learning management systems as a key source of integration on distance learning. The objective of this study is to understand how university teachers are influenced to use and adopt web-based learning management systems. Blackboard, as one of the systems used internationally by various universities is applied as a case. Semi-structured interviews were made with professors and lecturers who are using Blackboard at Lappeenranta University of Technology. The data collected were categorized under constructs adapted from Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) and interpretation and discussion were based on reviewed literature. The findings suggest that adoption of learning management systems by LUT teachers is highly influenced by perceived usefulness, facilitating conditions and gained experience. The findings also suggest that easiness of using the system and social influence appear as medium influence of adoption for teachers at LUT.

Induction practices : experiences of newly qualified teachers

The thesis consists of four studies (articles I–IV) and a comprehensive summary. The aim is to deepen understanding and knowledge of newly qualified teachers’ experiences of their induction practices. The research interest thus reflects the ambition to strengthen the research-based platform for support measures. The aim can be specified in the following four sub-areas: to scrutinise NQTs’ experiences of the profession in the transition from education to work (study I), to describe and analyse NQTs’ experiences of their first encounters with school and classroom (study II), to explore NQTs’ experiences of their relationships within the school community (study III), to view NQTs’ experiences of support through peer-group mentoring as part of the wider aim of collaboration and assessment (study IV). The overall theoretical perspective constitutes teachers’ professional development. Induction forms an essential part of this continuum and can primarily be seen as a socialisation process into the profession and the social working environment of schools, as a unique phase of teachers’ development contributing to certain experiences, and as a formal programme designed to support new teachers. These lines of research are initiated in the separate studies (I–IV) and deepened in the theoretical part of the comprehensive summary. In order to appropriately understand induction as a specific practice the lines of research are in the end united and discussed with help of practice theory. More precisely the theory of practice architectures, including semantic space, physical space-time and social space, are used. The methodological approach to integrating the four studies is above all represented by abduction and meta-synthesis. Data has been collected through a questionnaire survey, with mainly open-ended questions, and altogether ten focus group meetings with newly qualified primary school teachers in 2007–2008. The teachers (n=88 in questionnaire, n=17 in focus groups), had between one and three years of teaching experience. Qualitative content analysis and narrative analysis were used when analysing the data. What is then the collected picture of induction or the first years in the profession if scrutinising the results presented in the articles? Four dimensions seem especially to permeate the studies and emerge when they are put together. The first dimension, the relational ˗ emotional, captures the social nature of induction and teacher’s work and the emotional character intimately intertwined. The second dimension, the tensional ˗ mutable, illustrates the intense pace of induction, together with the diffuse and unclear character of a teacher’s job. The third dimension, the instructive ˗ developmental, depicts induction as a unique and intensive phase of learning, maturity and professional development. Finally, the fourth dimension, the reciprocal ˗ professional, stresses the importance of reciprocity and collaboration in induction, both formally and informally. The outlined four dimensions, or integration of results, describing induction from the experiences of new teachers, constitute part of a new synthesis, induction practice. This synthesis was generated from viewing the integrated results through the theoretical lens of practice architecture and the three spaces, semantic space, physical space-time and social space. In this way, a more comprehensive, refined and partially new architecture of teachers’ induction practices are presented and discussed.

Understanding and improving quality of secondary school education : conceptions among teachers in Tanzania

Temat för studien handlar om gymnasielärares uppfattningar om kvalitet och om hur kvalitet kan utvecklas i gymnasieutbildningen in Tanzania. Studien är till sin karaktär kvalitativ och består av utprövade semistrukturerade intervjuer med sammanlagt trettio lärare som arbetar i fyra gymnasieskolor både i urbana och rurala miljöer. Lärarna har varierande arbetserfarenhet och undervisar i olika ämnen. Huvudfokus har gällt identifieringen av variationer i lärares uppfattningar om kvalitet. På basen av två forskningsfrågor avslöjar analysen uppfattningar av hur lärare förstår och önskar utveckla kvaliteten på gymnasieutbildningen. Resultaten visar att lärare förstår kvaliteten på utbildningen i sina skolor som försök att möta skolans och samhällets mål, som individuella prestationer och förmågor som att inneha kompetenser och som att möta utmaningar inom utbildning, Identifierade uppfattningar var baserade på lärarnas personliga kunskap, arbetsmiljön och varierande omständigheter som rådde i deras skolor. Uppfattningar om en förbättring av kvaliteten i gymnasieutbildningen innefattade utveckling av lärares motivation, skolmiljön, arbetet i klassrum, kvaliteten på lärares kunskaper och färdigheter och undervisningsmaterial. Ambitionen bakom studien ar att erbjuda en plattform för strategier för att förbättra kvaliteten på gymnasieutbildningen. Resultaten strävar till att ge en fördjupad insikt i uppfattningar hos en utvald grupp av lärare som arbetar under samma villkor inom gymnasieskolor I Tanzania. Av den här anledningen är den genererade kunskapen därför relevant för att belysa lärares uppfattningar även utanför den studerade gruppen av respondenter.

Are we supreme in agriculture?

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Experiences among primary school teachers in Tanzania

The overall aim of the study was to explore primary school teachers’ experiences of constraints to their work, and actions taken for improvement after undergoing in-service courses in the Education Quality Improvement through Pedagogy program. The research interest was thus to deepen the understanding of teachers’ experiences of constraints to their work and experiences of actions taken to improve classroom actions. In order to achieve this ambition, the study was conducted with primary school teachers in Shinyanga district-Tanzania. Two research questions guided the study: What do teachers experience as constraints to their work? The second: How have teachers improved their classroom actions after undergoing professional development courses? The theoretical framework of the study is centred on limiting and enabling frames on teachers’ work and professional development. In order to understand the classroom situations, qualitative research was designed applying a phenomenological approach with semi-structured interview, observation and videotaping to collect data. Forty experienced primary school teachers from ten primary schools participated in the study. The results of the first research question indicate that teachers face many constraints in their work. Three categories identified as interactional, environmental and professional role constraints. The most critical experienced by all teachers is teaching in large classes and inadequate teaching and learning materials. The results of the second research question show that teachers’ actions taken for improving their work were influenced by professional development activities. Three main categories including expanded interaction, expanded use of environment and expanded professional roles were identified. Generally, the knowledge generated is relevant for viewing teachers’ experiences of the challenges they encounter in teaching and the importance of professional development beyond the sampled respondents. The results suggest that constant provision of teachers’ professional development could improve teaching performance.

Changing teachers´ practices in regular schools enrolling children with visual impairment

The number of persons with visual impairment in Tanzania is estimated to over 1.6 million. About half a million of these persons are children aged 7-13. Only about 1% of these children are enrolled in schools. The special schools and units are too few and in most cases they are far away from the children’s homes. More and more regular schools are enrolling children with visual impairment, but the schools lack financial resources, tactile teaching materials and trained special education teachers. Children with visual impairment enrolled in regular schools seldom get enough support and often fail in examinations. The general aim of this study was to contribute to increased knowledge and understanding about how teachers can change their teaching practices and thus facilitate the learning of children with visual impairment included in regular classrooms as they participate in an action research project. The project was conducted in a primary school in a poor rural region with a high frequency of blindness and visual impairment. The school was poorly resourced and the average number of pupils per class was 90. The teachers who participated in the collaborative action research project were the 14 teachers who taught blind or visually impaired pupils in grades 4 and 6, in total 6 pupils. The action research project was conducted during a period of 6 months and was carried out in five cycles. The teachers were actively involved in all the project activities; identifying challenges, planning solutions, producing teaching materials, reflecting on outcomes, collaborating and evaluating. Empirical data was collected with questionnaires, interviews, observations and focus group discussions. The findings of the study show that the teachers managed to change their teaching practices through systematic reflection, analysis and collaboration. The teachers produced a variety of tactile teaching materials, which facilitated the learning of the pupils with visual impairment. The pupils learned better and felt more included in the regular classes. The teachers gained new knowledge and skills. They grew professionally and started to collaborate with each other. The study contributes to new knowledge of how collaborative action research can be conducted in the area of special education in a Tanzanian school context. The study has also relevance to the planning of school-based professional development programs and teacher education programs in Tanzania and in other low-income countries. The results also point at strategies which can promote inclusion of children with disabilities in regular schools.

Targeted measures bring the greatest benefits for environmental protection in agriculture final report of the TEHO Plus project (2011–2014)

Targeted measures bring the greatest benefits for environmental protection in agriculture final report of the TEHO Plus project (2011–2014). Particular priority areas of the project activities included creating a training package for agri-environment advisers and testing it, farm-specific advisory services and exploitation of experiences of advice provision, putting together an information package of agri-environment issues, farm-level experiments, and development of water quality monitoring. The recommendations issued by advisers on targeting environmental measures were based on utilising geographical information material and nutrient balances. The project was implemented in cooperation by Southwest Finland Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment, MTK-Satakunta and MTK-Varsinais-Suomi. The project received funding from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Ministry of the Environment. Participating farmers, with whom environmental advice was developed and experiments were carried out, were important partners for the project. The operating area of the project was Satakunta and Varsinais-Suomi in Southwest Finland, but its outcomes can be exploited nationally. A national perspective was ensured by close cooperation with actors in different provinces. This final report describes project experiences and outcomes including environmental advisory services, training of agri-environmental advisers, farm visits and the feedback received from farmers on agri-environmental advice, development of water quality monitoring, experiments and project work.

Responding to Changing Student Demographics in Finland: A Study of Teachers’ Developing Cultural Competence

The aim of this dissertation was to examine the skills and knowledge that pre-service teachers and teachers have and need about working with multilingual and multicultural students from immigrant backgrounds. The specific goals were to identify pre-service teachers’ and practising teachers’ current knowledge and awareness of culturally and linguistically responsive teaching, identify a profile of their strengths and needs, and devise appropriate professional development support and ways to prepare teachers to become equitable culturally responsive practitioners. To investigate these issues, the dissertation reports on six original empirical studies within two groups of teachers: international pre-service teacher education students from over 25 different countries as well as pre-service and practising Finnish teachers. The international pre-service teacher sample consisted of (n = 38, study I; and n = 45, studies II-IV) and the pre-service and practising Finnish teachers sample encompassed (n = 89, study V; and n = 380, study VI). The data used were multi-source including both qualitative (students’ written work from the course including journals, final reflections, pre- and post-definition of key terms, as well as course evaluation and focus group transcripts) and quantitative (multi-item questionnaires with open-ended options), which enhanced the credibility of the findings resulting in the triangulation of data. Cluster analytic procedures, multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA), and qualitative analyses mostly Constant Comparative Approach were used to understand pre-service teachers’ and practising teachers’ developing cultural understandings. The results revealed that the mainly white / mainstream teacher candidates in teacher education programmes bring limited background experiences, prior socialisation, and skills about diversity. Taking a multicultural education course where identity development was a focus, positively influenced teacher candidates’ knowledge and attitudes toward diversity. The results revealed approaches and strategies that matter most in preparing teachers for culturally responsive teaching, including but not exclusively, small group activities and discussions, critical reflection, and field immersion. This suggests that there are already some tools to address the need for the support needed to teach successfully a diversity of pupils and provide in-service training for those already practising the teaching profession. The results provide insight into aspects of teachers’ knowledge about both the linguistic and cultural needs of their students, as well as what constitutes a repertoire of approaches and strategies to assure students’ academic success. Teachers’ knowledge of diversity can be categorised into sound awareness, average awareness, and low awareness. Knowledge of diversity was important in teachers’ abilities to use students’ language and culture to enhance acquisition of academic content, work effectively with multilingual learners’ parents/guardians, learn about the cultural backgrounds of multilingual learners, link multilingual learners’ prior knowledge and experience to instruction, and modify classroom instruction for multilingual learners. These findings support the development of a competency based model and can be used to frame the studies of pre-service teachers, as well as the professional development of practising teachers in increasingly diverse contexts. The present set of studies take on new significance in the current context of increasing waves of migration to Europe in general and Finland in particular. They suggest that teacher education programmes can equip teachers with the necessary attitudes, skills, and knowledge to enable them work effectively with students from different ethnic and language backgrounds as they enter the teaching profession. The findings also help to refine the tools and approaches to measuring the competencies of teachers teaching in mainstream classrooms and candidates in preparation.

Flipped classroom technology from teachers’ perspective: implementation experience, barriers and perspectives

Blended learning approaches rise their popularity, however not all professors apply them and find them useful and appropriate. This research focuses on study of flipped classroom arrangement and effectiveness of this concept implementation. The Master’s Thesis explores impact of flipped classroom implementation on resource savings for proffesors. The research is based on the literature review of different education arrangements and results of their implementation, on the survey conducted among proffesors from different Universities and on two experiments of flipped classroom implementation. The results reveal advantages and disadvantages of the concept, professors’ attitude to it and possibility to future research and practice in this field

Mobile applications, solution for sustainable agriculture? - Study of mAgriculture services in Kenya

During the recent years, mobile services have spread to many different sectors, including education, health and agriculture, while changing the practices in those fields. Agriculture sector is under pressure to fill the ever-crowing food demand, while suffering from lack of agriculture resources (such as water and soil) and climate change, as well as figuring how to involve young people in the agriculture sector, in order to replace aging farmers. These issues create a need to bring new sustainable solutions to the agriculture sector. This is the demand, which mobile agriculture, mAgriculture, services are trying to answer. This thesis will examine the mAgriculture services in the Kenyan market. The thesis will provide an overview of the currently available mAgriculture services, their outcome and issues with which they are struggling. The thesis will also present recommendations on how to improve currently existing services and processes behind them. Secondly, thesis will provide four ideas for new services, which would answer for the needs of the farmers. Suitable business models, regarding the new services, are also covered. The thesis focuses with the young farmers as a target group, but findings are also applicable with other potential target groups as well.

Exploring Relationship between Pakistani Teachers’ Pedagogical Beliefs and ICT Use for Teaching and Learning

Background: The aim of present study is to investigate relationship between Pakistani teachers’ pedagogical beliefs and ICT use for teaching and learning. Previous studies found close relationship between pedagogical beliefs and teaching practices including use of ICT. However, variation in results is also reported and attributed to cultural and contextual differences. Methodology: Quantitative approach was used to study a sample of 231 Pakistani basic education teachers from middle and upper-middle range private schools, mostly from large urban centres. Results: This study confirmed previously study results that constructivist-compatible pedagogical beliefs are significantly related to both traditional and constructivist use of ICT. However, it is also found that traditional-transmission pedagogical beliefs are significantly related to traditional use of ICT – a finding not reported in previous studies. Some amounts of ICT training for pedagogical purpose exhibit significant impact on ICT use, in particular constructivist use of ICT. Similarly age also play a role as younger teachers are more likely to use ICT, however, no significant difference of pedagogical beliefs and ICT use was found between male and female teachers. Recommendation for practice and further investigation are made in chapter 5.