Abstract:

VocTEL (Vocational Technology Enhanced Learning) is a Lifelong Learning Programme Leonardo da Vinci Transfer of Innovation project which aims to promote key competences in delivering vocational technology enhanced collaborative learning throughout Europe. Within the project, which involves participants from Wales, Bulgaria, Sweden, Greece and Cyprus, Higher Education Universities are working with the vocational training industry to develop postgraduate education that targets the vocational training industry – a Postgraduate Certificate in Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) for the vocational training industry.

This paper looks at more recent insights into developments in concepts based on innovation and technology uptake in learning since Rogers (2003) and Rich and Holtham’s (2005) work. The authors consider the issue facing the programme design in the project of whether to develop learning activities from the perspective of learning theories, metaphors and current practice or, as is traditional in the training industry, to focus on the technologies. For this dichotomy we consider Weller’s (2006) idea that ‘the challenge now facing educators is how to accommodate the potential of new technologies and the sophisticated communication strategies of a new generation of learners into formal structure.’ Extending this we suggest that innovation in online learning is therefore not just about using technology to replicate or accommodate traditional learning structures, but is about how technology can be used to create new learning structures and opportunities.

Our challenge in the VocTEL project is thus to not just identify ways in which learning can adopt technology, but to also identify ways in which new technology changes how we learn and opens up possibilities for practice. We present our ideas for the development of a model based on Wenger’s (1998) Communities of Practice.

Keywords:

Technology Enhanced Learning, Innovation, International Project, Learning Design.