Learning in vivo

Disorganised and confusing connection of business needs with HE provision

Simon Roodhouse (2010: 26) concludes that “mechanisms to connect business needs with higher education provision are generally disorganised and confusing”. He starts the section of saying that “in higher education, workforce development is often referred to as work-based learning and is increasingly recognised as a field of study” (p. 24). He cites Costley’s (2001) observation that such work-based learning by higher education institutions incorporates “the learning people do, for, in and through work” (emphasis added) and quotes examples of longevity:

• Sandwich courses (academic study interspaced with work experience) and placements (elsewhere called (cooperative and work-integrated education) for longer than a century.
• Structured continuing professional development courses which recognise knowledge gained through work experience.
• Formalised accreditation of prior and experiential learning (APEL) processes.
• Familiarity of learning contracts as instruments in education.

Costley (2001, in Roodhouse 2010: 25) identify synonyms including “work based, work related, placement activities, elective modules, independent study, APEL, reach out, CPD, work based learning”. She further indicates that in most cases work based learning forms part of existing programmes at universities; and that learning outcomes and assessment criteria are embedded in the subject knowledge areas derived from scholarly activities and research.

The lack of sustained engagement of higher education in workforce development is difficult to conceptualise, observes Roodhouse (2010: 25) and highlights his observation with the following University Vocational Awards Council (2002):

We somehow seem to be incapable of learning from experience. Succeeding generations of employers are still marooned in tedious development project steering committees whose proceedings take place in academic jargon. Frustrated academics are still struggling to secure placements and projects with the very companies who are lambasting the quality of their graduates’ work readiness.

Roodhouse (2010: 25) speculates that it could also be “intellectual scepticism amongst the academic community, that employability which is associated with work-based learning is nothing more than a continuous conflict between individuals, market demands and fluctuations”.

Roodhouse, S. 2010. Defining and theorizing university work-based learning (21-27). In S Roodhouse & J Mumford. 2010. Understanding work-based learning. Surrey: Gower.

Learning in Social Media

Learning moves in the bytes and through threads of social media. Patti Anklam's taxonomy contains five types of social media (SM), which Harold Jarche equates to various forms of learning. Patti Anklam has been pondering about the way the term social media is used, not necessary meaning the same in different contexts. She observes that the use of social tools has forever shifted relationships to conversation as the centre of attention, which Harold Jarche argues is the essence of learning. He accentuates that it is necessary to stop thinking of learning as a separate issue or entity and gives the example that "when you learn with and from your customers" learning-marketing becomes one. He goes as far as to say eliminating the "L word is a start".

Media SM — Blogging software, for example, makes social computing fairly simple, coined mass amateurisation. With this post, for example, I share my learning with readers of learning in vivo.

Customer SM — is about building online communities — customer communities — sets of Internet tools and applications that are driven by the needs of organisations to control their brand; to be responsive to the needs of customers; pay attention to the marketplace; and the development of new products based on the ideas and feedback from customers.

Enterprise SM — is about the shift focus in the use of Web-based technologies from content to conversation; from publishing to interacting—technologies and practices are embedded in a web of relationships. The top five drivers of Enterprise 2.0 are the connectivity across teams and geographies; access to subject experts; increasing productivity; knowledge repository; and fostering innovation.

Personal SM — is the collection of technologies and practices in order to support the development of personal intellectual and social capital. I have, for example started this blog to capture my personal body of knowledge and share it with other, for what it is worth.

Crowd SM — encompasses "the ways that social media are used to promote causes, but also to respond to crises and natural disasters, to call up collective wisdom, or to stream events."

I recommend readers of this post to visit the hyperlinks and personally read the posts of Patti Anklam and Harold Jarche who much more eloquently elaborate on the taxonomy, learning and knowledge management.

Emergent practice for complex and novel practice for chaotic

Learning in real-life situation is shifting towards emergent and novel practice because best practices are restricted to simple situations. Harold Jarche advocates the nurturing of a linchpin culture—locking pin that goes through the end of an axle outside the wheel to keep the wheel from coming off; anything serving to hold together the parts of a whole; or something that holds the various elements of a complicated structure together.

An assortment of linchpins.

Harold Jarche points out that the industrial model is no longer of much use, because work is difficult, calling for innovation and is becoming increasingly one of a kind and creative. He sketches the Cynefin-model framework as follow:

Cynefin is a Welsh word, chosen by the Welsh scholar Dave Snowden, which conveys the sense that we all have multiple pasts: cultural, religious, geographic, etc. The term illustrates the evolutionary nature of complex systems, including their inherent uncertainty and serves as reminder that all human interactions are strongly influenced and frequently determined by our personal and collective experiences.

Domain		Cause and effect relationship		Response	Practice
Simple		Is obvious.		Sense - Categorise - Respond	Apply best practice
Complicated		Requires analysis or some other form of investigation and/or the application of expert knowledge.		Sense - Analyze - Respond	Apply good practice
Complex		Can only be perceived in retrospect, but not in advance.		Probe - Sense - Respond	Sense emergent practice
Chaotic		No relationship between cause and effect at systems level.		Act - Sense - Respond	Discover novel practice
Disorder		State of not knowing what type of causality exists		People tend to revert to their own comfort zone in decision making in order to respond.	Complacency leads to failure

In the Cynefin framework the boundary between simple and chaotic is seen as catastrophic. It's not enough that selected individuals are prepared (becoming linchpins); collectively society will have to be able to deal with change— communities need to be helped out of their comfort zones, overcome their fears and get innate creativity flowing (a linchpin culture).

Sense making for personal knowledge management

Personal knowledge management (PKM) is an individually—according to own abilities, interests & motivation—created process to make sense of information and experience in our electronic surround, states Harold Jarche in his blog post of 17 March 2010. He uses the diagram below (seek-sense-share) to illustrate the value adding through five different ways, namely filtering (sorting out signal from noise); validation (ensuring reliable information); synthesis (indicate patterns, trends or flows); presentation (making understandable); and customisation (describing in context).

Visit http://www.jarche.com/2010/03/sense-making/ for a more detailed description.

In Harold Jarche's follow-up post on 18 March 2010 he states: "People use their knowledge to make sense of data and information. People create information that represents their knowledge, which can then be more widely shared."

I dare say that the two post by Harold Jarche captures my intentions with this blog learning_in_vivo. Ultimately my aim is to share and engage in debate to personally grow in wisdom.

Collective work-based learning

Raelin (2000: 66-100) discusses three kinds of collective work-based learning, namely:

• Action Learning
• Community of Practice
• Action Science

Action Learning

It is an educational strategy that entails groups seeking to derive learning from real-time (in vivo) problem solving. In about 1975, after conversion to adult membership of my congregation I engaged in entry-level instruction of catechumens. At the time the notion of learning by doing got impressed upon my mind. In trying to bring about learning, I have subsequently always tried to build in activity in learning facilitation. Raelin (2000: 66-7) remarks that such activities are useful; but neither sufficient to enable conversion of theory into tacit knowledge; nor for participants/delegates to challenge and reflect on their own theoretical assumptions. Only if people take real positions; are obliged to make moral judgements and required to defend those under pressure do real learning occur. Action learning teams present itself as a means to introduce work-based learning into a work environment.

Community of Practice

Raelin (2000: 75) asserts that "communities of practice evolve as people united in a common enterprise develop a shared history as well as particular values, beliefs, ways of talking, and ways of doing things". Membership is spontaneous and through involvement with one another—mutual engagement—in the process of pursuing the same practice. Problem solving together becomes (as a community) becomes a natural social activity and meanings are informally negotiated. Often knowledge creation is tacit and practices become interpersonally instinctive. A "shared repertoire, including routines, words, tools, ways of doing things, stories, gestures, concepts, and the like that symbolize their shared practice" (Raelin 2000: 76)emerges. Members of a community of practice often serve as gate keepers with regard to the practice.

Raelin (2000: 78) observes that facilitation might accelerate the process toward the emergence of a community of practice, but he expresses reservation if an organisation as a whole could become a community of practice—there are just too many barriers and politics. He discusses the use of Future Search (pp 24-25 of PsychDigest Vol 1 No 3; Download FutureSearch_AfronautHigherEducationlaunchpad-posternarrative) technology (p. 83), Open Space Technology (p. 84) and Virtual Team Learning (p. 85), but cautions about the latter that nobody has yet "invented a technology that replaces a pitcher of beer".

Action Science

When I saw this heading I have been most intrigued. Raelin (2000: 89) defines action science as "a work-based intervention strategy for helping learners increase their effectiveness is social situations through heightened awareness of their action and interaction assumptions". It is a form of 'double-loop' learning derived from becoming aware of a mismatch between your values and your actions and an internal commitment to embracing new or other. The term reflection-in-action—described as rethinking to discover how and what that has been done contributed to the expected or unexpected outcome—is preferred by some, e.g. Donald Schön (p. 90). A member of a community of practice would typically offer a frame of the situation a hand. The members collectively would then reflect upon the frame/s and start testing the underlying assumptions and reasoning processes that surface. The aim is to narrow the inconsistencies between espoused (what is advocated) theories versus theories-in-use (actual practice).

Raelin (2000: 90) agrees with Habermas's views and points out three types of knowledge:

1. Technical knowledge entails "predictions about observable events, physical or social"; may result in empirical or theoretical discourse; and "relies upon hypothetico-deductive logic".
2. Practical knowledge involves "social norms, ideals, values, and moral decisions"; that in the absence of empirical tests rely on tradition and authority. However, consensus derived through dialogue is preferred and metaphors often used to resolve contradictions. Ideally, practical discourse searches for meaning rather than trying to outlining causality.
3. Emancipatory knowledge is gained through critical self-reflection about the taken-for-granted assumptions. The validity of premises for interpretation or understanding is tested through reflective discourse.

People are often socially conditioned—Model I behaviour—which is "characterised by a need to control, maximize winning, suppress emotions, and be rational" Raelin (2000: 91) with minimal learning, but reinforcement of existing socialisation. In contrast, Model II behaviour, "is based on directly observable data" at hand and entails exchange of viewpoints—resulting in increased learning and producing of intended end-results. The table below (based Raelin 2000: 94) on serves as illustration:

	Model I behaviour	Model II behaviour
Contextual cue or triggering condition	An elderly woman is curious about the use of SMSes	Another elderly person, similar age, notices how efficient SMS communication is
Underlying assumptions	Cellphones are complex, I would not master it.	Believe it is possible to master the use of the SMS function of a cellphone
Action strategies	Is shown by a user (grandchild) what an SMS is and how to go about creating a message, sending it, receiving it, retrieving it and responding	Ask a user to demonstrate how to go about creating a message, sending it, receiving it, retrieving it and responding. Make notes how to go about and try SMSing.
Consequences in the behavioural world for learning	Promptly forgets and ask again in future when observing fellow residents of the retirement facility receiving SMSes	Master the use of the SMSes and enjoy the benefit of keeping in touch with relatives and friends

Raelin, J.A. 2000. Work-based learning—the new frontier of management development. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Work-based learning model

Raelin (2000: 49-65) theorises about work-based learning firstly by comparing theory and practice modes of learning, there after explicit versus tacit forms of knowledge. He then builds a conceptual model by first looking at individual work-based learning, in terms of the two mentioned modes of learning and the two forms of knowledge:

	Explicit	Tacit
Theory:	Conceptualisation	Experimentation
Practice:	Reflection	Experience

He next turns to the organisation, as collective, and builds further on his model of work-based learning:

	Explicit	Tacit
Theory:	Applied science	Action learning
Practice:	Action science	Community of practice

Then he completes his pyramid-shape model (Raelin 2000: 64)

Raelin, J.A. 2000. Work-based learning—the new frontier of management development. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Four schools of action learning

Action learning has a history of more than 60 years of practice. During the late 1920s a group of research scientists "found that meeting to question their successes and failures, in a very deliberate and precise way, and then reflecting on them together, helped them to gain insights and act more appropriately" (Rimanoczy 2007:247). The various types of action learning were organised in 1999 (p. 248) into four schools:

1. The Tacit School entail that people learn incidentally from real problems while working.
2. The Scientific School follow Lewin's action research cycle but focus on learning.
3. The Experiential School base their learning process on Kolb's learning cycle, by starting with action, followed by reflection on the action and changes to future action.
4. The Critical Reflection School does what its name implies; the reflection deepens to explore beliefs and assumptions. [Action Reflection Learning falls within this school).

Two consistent elements were found across the four schools, namely:

• Working on real problems that are ambiguous.
• Participants meet to report progress and discuss problems.

Rimanoczy, I. 2007. Action learning and action reflection learning: are they different? Industrial and Commercial Training, 39(5), 246-256.

Every new challenge a learning opportunity

Cairns and Stephenson (in Young & Stephenson, 2007: 2) remark that "every time people engagte with new challenges they have opportunities for significant learning". However tutorial support is required to assist such learners to (1) articulate their acquired learning and plan ways of making current learning from work explicit, and to (2) obtain formal recognition for the new learning achievement.

Source:

Young, D.A. & Stephenson, J. 2007. The use of interactive learning environment to support learning through work leading to full university qualifications. AERA 2007.

Workplace learning pedagogy

Cunningham, Dawes and Bennett (2004, p. vii) argue that work-based learning (meaning here the development of people in the course of real work) should be taken seriously, despite the “commonplace rhetoric of ‘lifelong learning’ and the ‘knowledge-driven society’”. Burton (2005) supports this view by pointing out that knowledge is all the time becoming out dated, resulting in learning being time-limited.

Fuller and Unwin (2002) identified five models in the pedagogy of learning in the workplace. Although the boundaries are fluid and tend to coalesce, the various models do sometimes occur in their pure form. This table depicts these five models.

Fuller and Unwin (2002, p. 99) emphasise the fact that Engestrom reclaimed the role of teachers and trainers in the learning in the workplace, a role they claim that “has been diluted by the parallel of those who advocate informal learning, the outcome-based approach and experiential learning”. Gibson et al. (2002, p. 1) assert that the experience of work is not inherently valuable in itself, but that in order for learning to be derived from experience it need to be meaningful, “intentional, organised and accredited by the institution”. Similarly, Hunt (2006) asserts that work-based learning is not in itself valuable, but that the full potential thereof is only realised by a pedagogy that that informs the application thereof.

Good work-based learning is individualised to the learning needs of the student concerned. Orrell (2004) indicates that for work-based learning programmes to be effective there need to be access to quality learning environments, good preparation and supervisory staff well supported. She remarks that these may cause a substantial drain on scare resources. Wiredu (2005, p. 53) points out that mainstream constructivists argue that instructors should “only provide conditions for learning” and focus on learning process, whereas skills-based work-integrated learning emphasise both content and process. Siemens (2005, pp 3 & 5) supports this by pointing out that instructional design — concerned with the process on instruction — serves only a small part. He puts forward a learning development cycle comprising four “domains: transmission, emergence, acquisition and accreditation”.

Burton, J. 2005. Is learning for knowing or for being? Work Based Learning in Primary Care, 3: 187-190.

Cunningham, I., Dawes, G. & Bennett, B. 2004. The handbook of work-based learning. Aldershot: Gower.

Fuller, A. & Unwin, L. 2002. Developing pedagogies for the contemporary workplace. In Evans, K., Hodkinson, P. & Unwin, L. (eds.) 2002. Working to learn, transforming learning in the workplace. London: Kogan Page.

Gibson, E., Brodie, S., Sharpe, S., Wong, D.K.Y., Deane, E. & Fraser, S. 2002. Towards the development of a work integrated learning unit. In the proceedings of Celebrate Teaching: And gladly teche at Macquarie, June 28-29. Retrieved 28 January 2007, from http://www.cfl.mq.edu.au/celebrate/pdf/papers/gibson1.pdf

Hunt, L. 2006. Authentic learning at work. In Herrington, A. & Herrington, J. 2006. Authentic learning environments in higher education. Hersey: Information Science.

Orrell, J. 2004. Work-integrated learning programmes: management and education quality (pp. 78-80). In Carmishael, R. (ed.) 2004. Proceedings of the Australian Universities Quality Forum 2004, quality in a time of change. Melbourne: AUQA. Retrieved from Internet on 17 January 2007, from http://www.auqa.edu.au/auqf/2004/proceedings/AUQF2004_Proceedings.pdf

Wiredu, G.O. 2005. Mobile computing in work-integrated learning: problems of remotely-distributed activities and technology use. PhD dissertation, University of London, UK. Retrieved from Internet on 28 January 2006, from http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/informationsystems/pdf/theses/wiredu.pdf