Abstract:

The increasing development of a wide range of emerging technologies –as pointed out in the NMC Horizon Reports in Higher Education (2002 until 2015)–, together with the emergence and redesigning of new teaching scenarios and modalities (MOOC, mobile learning, informal campus environments, experiential learning spaces, among others), as well as the increasing use of technology by youngsters in today’s society are becoming important factors that affect deeply in the way that education is conceived, and therefore, it also becomes necessary to find out new ways to design educational programs in all educational levels but specially in higher education due to its relevance in current and future society because of the economic, political and social crisis in the world.

The arrival of technology at universities is not a recent matter and currently, its integration is still in progress (Sandholtz and Reilly, 2004; Sangrà, 2004), however, its pedagogical application in these new training scenarios and teaching modalities is a complex process that still needs to be in continuous and profound study (Aduviri, 2012) in order to evaluate properly its effectiveness in the students’ learning as well as in teacher’s professional development. Technology integration may allow the educator to improve their teaching methodologies as well as their pedagogical and digital competences, but not with the purpose of making a technological innovation, but a pedagogical innovation with the support of technologies, creating then, new pedagogical knowledge and learning to properly develop in the current knowledge society (Cabero, 2005; Hargreaves, 2003, 2011; Salinas, 2008).These pedagogical integration processes of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in the university teaching might also imply having a wider vision of them, understanding ICT not only as a Technology for Learning and Knowledge (TLK) (Sancho, 2008), but also as a Technology for Empowerment and Participation (TEP) of teachers and students (Adell, 2013; Reig, 2012).

In this paper we aim to provide a preliminary review of the factors that affect this pedagogical integration of TEP in higher education teaching, on the basis of a cross-case analysis of two parallel studies that are currently being held since 2010 in two Iberoamerican contexts: Barcelona and Mexico City. The data collection was based on in-depth interviews to teachers and managers of the participant universities. Both studies agree on the need of analyzing personal barriers of the university teachers, as well as the resistance to change (Robbins and Judge, 2013; Tejada, 1998), which arise from various sources such as their institutional context, the educational system, the teachers themselves and the educational policies in higher education that fall on teacher’s developing and training regarding the integration of TEP in higher education (Fabry and Higgs, 1997; Jakstiene, 2011; Prestridge, 2012). Additionally, in both studies it can be identified those factors and conditions that contribute to a good integration of TEP in higher education and, therefore, they should become key aspects for teacher’s training in the 21st century. The results of this cross-case analysis also aim to contribute in improving the models of the pedagogical integration of technology in university teaching.

Keywords:

Pedagogical innovation, teacher digital competences, barriers and resistances, technology integration, technology implementation, higher education, new teaching.