A methodological approach to educational innovation: a case study involving web-based learning.
Malcolm McElhone.
Paper presented at the British Educational Research Association Conference, Cardiff University, 7-10 September 2000
Abstract
The theory that effective web-based learning environments can promote learning is embryonic, perhaps futuristic. Nonetheless, compelling reasons for using the web for teaching and learning exist including ease of information dissemination, interactivity and its gathering popular appeal. The real challenge of designing web-based learning environments lies in harnessing its huge potential as a realistic tool for improving learning. This might be achieved by using the web to remove impediments to learning such as the lack of access to information and the inflexibility of traditional techniques of delivery in higher education. Currently, educationalists evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of web-based learning are exploring the twilight zone between knowledge and ignorance. If educationalists are interested in discovering in whether web-based learning really works, then this might be done scientifically using a problem-solving approach carried out in a piecemeal way. The methodology that I propose for this is critical rationalism. This involves the formulation of testable hypotheses, experimentation and attempts at refutation. A key feature of this methodology is the notion that our knowledge is fallible, yet a rational approach can be achieved by distinguishing realistic educational experiences from ill-founded ones.
1.1 Introduction.
Swann and Pratt (1999) present a popperian account of knowledge in which a methodological similarity is drawn between the growth of science by conjecture and refutation, and the creation and testing of educational theory in practice. This is the fallibilist position in which the quest for certainty is abandoned, yet not the quest for the truth, and where competing ideas are evaluated and criticized in the hope of improving understanding. In science, bold, new imaginative ideas are life-giving and according to Miller (1995,12) are 'easily relinquished if they are mistaken'. Swann (1999) concludes 'that we need not shy away from reasoned small-scale radical changes, provided that its introduction is used rigorously to test the theories that underpin such change'. It is this methodological approach to the type of innovation wrought upon educationalists by the radical transformation of learning and teaching offered to us by computers and information technology that I tentatively examine.
Relentless innovation in computer and information science and the products that emerge from this innovation present educationalists with new and almost revolutionary ideas for creating teaching and learning environments. Such concepts as 'Virtual learning', even 'Virtual Universities', and e-learning radically challenge notion of how teaching can be carried out and where learning is achieved.
I argue that these innovations could be seen as imaginative trial solutions to educational problems. The issue is: are these innovations realist solutions to problems or not? Not all methodological approaches necessarily result in a realistic evaluation. Some approaches are quite subjective, while others attempt to justify or confirm ideas rather than critically test them. The role of criticism is vital for the growth of knowledge as it allows us to tentatively give critical preference to ideas that turn out to be highly resistant to criticism. These ideas seem to be better approximation to the truth for the time being at least (Popper 1963). If Popper's methodology is adopted, it is possible to learn from mistakes and it may be prudent to make mistakes as fast as possible.
The aim of this paper is to present a sketch of Karl Popper's critical method and to explore its usefulness for the evaluation of web-based learning.
1.2 The fallibility of knowledge.
Karl Popper has made a highly significant contribution to the understanding of the way that science progresses. It progresses by scientists creating bold and imaginative guesses at the truth and formulating these into testable hypotheses that can be shown to be wrong. The role of the scientist is to make progress by actively engaging in a trial and error exercise which involves creating new or modified ideas or theories and eliminating bad ones. Bad ideas or theories are those which do not check with reality. Popper makes the assumption that most ideas are error prone, that is, they contain some falsity, as well as, some truth. He sees scientists as fallible constructors of theories that aim at the truth. Science progresses by paring off falsity (Popper 1991).
Popper's approach is hypothesis driven. This is in stark contrast to the more data driven approach, inductivism, that is popularly thought to characterize the method of science. Inductivism is a justificatory approach that pursues and supports its claim for the truth by a method of confirmation. Confirmation consists of an attempt to give sufficient grounds for accepting a theory as true on the basis of the repetition of facts. The difficulty arises when a consideration is made of whether the past repetition of facts gives sufficient grounds for assuming the same trend for the future. Is it logically possible to infer from the observed past into an unobserved future? According to Popper, it is because of 'custom and habit' that we are conditioned to believe that induction works (Popper 1991,1). Another difficulty that arises with the inductivist account is the vital part played by the hypothesis. The history of science is glorified by the unanticipated emergence of a daring hypothesis that successfully competes with orthodox knowledge to give a more realistic explanation of reality. The successful daring hypothesis is a logically stronger and more realistic approximation to the truth than the orthodox one that it improves upon or replaces. In one sense, the daring hypothesis is a criticism of the inadequacy of existing ideas. The hypothesis does not, and could not arise from the more patient collection of data and the making of generalizations. It is a bold, new, original and spontaneous idea.
An in-depth discussion of Popper's philosophy and technology is given in Levinson (1982) who gives much credit to Popper for his theory of the fallibility of knowledge and its insight into problem of human/technology interaction. The analogy is one that views technologies as physical embodiments of theoretical ideas. Technologies themselves and the theories that underpin human/technological interaction, theories of improved efficiencies and synergism, are fallible and profit most when experiences challenge rather than conform to expectations. This I would argue is an important heuristic than may guide a realistic inquiry into the effectiveness of innovation in teaching.
When new ideas arise they compete with or, improve upon orthodox ones. The view here is that it is quite possible to maintain several hypotheses until sufficient criticism or tests carried out which may give some insight into whether some hypothesis is corroborated or refuted. The multiple hypothesis approach is problem-orientated and concentrates on what went wrong and how errors can be avoided. While not a universal approach, it is an approach much commended by leading scientists (Chamberlain 1965, Platt 1964). What is essential when pursuing the truth of claims is the classification of the falsity or otherwise of a statement that follows deductively from the hypothesis.
Now with the invention of a variety of facilities and tools, many educationalists in higher education are a able to give material existence to the idea that computers and information technology improve their own practices and improve the potential for students' learning. Rapidly, new technological platforms are presented to educationalists for application and evaluation by companies that seem committed to remorseless product innovation. Such innovations include fax machines, learning via the inter-net using laptop computers, CD ROMs and LAN's. Many orthodox educationalists may regard some of these gadgets as irrelevant, partially useful to unique situations or just a modern fad. There are others who treat computers and modern technology as a new theoretical challenge to higher education and who see it as means to re-shape universities and its pedagogy especially by giving control to learners (Laurillard 1988).
The crucial point is this: if, after rigorous critical debate and testing, new technological approaches coupled with modified or new pedagogic approaches, such as e-learning (Molyneux 2000), lead to improved learning then little can be gained by ignoring them. Some innovative approaches may work, others may fail. The important methodological point is that in any open problem-solving inquiry, new theoretical insights which compete with orthodox approaches should be welcomed. This is because at a theoretical level, and perhaps when tested in practice, they constitute alternative ideas and approaches that invigorate and may improve upon existing theory and practice. At the very least innovation reduces stagnation. Given the recent advances in communications and information technology, it might not be particularly speculative to anticipate the potential for new theoretical approaches for improving learning. During inquiry into this thesis, critical reasons used to defend any educational theory can have our conjectural preference. Despite the very necessary doggedness of the innovator, innovative approaches to learning ought to be relinquished if they break under the strain of a critical and evidential attack. Many criticism of Popper's approach have focused on his overly negative or sceptical stance, yet in pursuit of the truth, bad ideas, both new and old ones ought to be replaced to promote progress.
Popper's formulation is enlightening for educationalists who as a result of new technological innovations are now, as scientist have always been, finding their way about in a new world. The element that pervades the whole of Popper's philosophy is the recognition that human designs and their schemes of thought are very often mistaken. The safest way to move forward, to make progress, is to learn from our mistakes and learn to do better next time (Medawar, 1991,101 ). It is the perpetuation of errors that interferes with our understanding and that cure rather than prevention is the gist of the philosophy of knowledge known as critical rationalism (Miller 1994,10)
1.3 Popper's approach to problem solving simplified.
There is nothing highbrow about Popper's approach to problem solving. In an over-simplified way the processes is:
P1 --> TH --> EE--> P2
· P1 -- we start from some problem: P1
· TH -- we proceed to a tentative solution or hypothesis, which may be wholly or partly mistaken
· EE -- the tentative solution is subject to error elimination
· P2 -- new problems emerge from study, perhaps quite unexpected ones.
This is an open, problem solving approach. In reality, there is a whole family of problems, P1,P2,P3...... P.n. In each problem situation, as the twilight zone between knowledge and ignorance is explored, a series of guesses, or, as scientists would have it, a series if working hypotheses are created. Each guess or hypothesis, is a tentative formulation of a solution to a problem. The framing of the hypothesis is not the end but the beginning of work in which the next step is to discover error by testing it and subjecting it to criticism. In a nutshell, Popper's approach consists of showing how an explanatory hypothesis might be wrong. If the hypothesis is not refuted, that is, if we fail to show that it is wrong then it is merely corroborated. It is unfalsified as yet (Bartley 1990). This is in stark contract to justificationary approaches that attempt to confirm and make the hypothesis more reliable. No hypothesis can be made reliable, although a critical preference can be expressed for one theory rather than another. Popper has created a democratic, methodological approach entitled; critical rationalism. Critical rationalism also serves as a planning methodology (Faludi 1986). It has the following key points:
I. Critical rationalism is an a open, problem-solving inquiry processes.
II. The emphasis is on the creation of testable statements, experimentation and refutation.
III. The logic of inquiry compels a deduction and evaluation of consequences of theory and action.
IV. Critical rationalism argues for the realisation of the fallibility of knowledge including that of science.
V. It recognizes the uniqueness of events in a complex and uncertain world and our inability to be predictive.
VI. It has a faith in the notion of objectivity.
There are, of course, many philosophical issues arising from this list. Yet the method is straight forward enough. It consists of stating one's problems clearly and examining the various proposed solutions critically (Popper 1959,16).
1.4 A methodological approach to integrating web-based learning into traditional teaching.
Most educational organizations have to address the imperative for change. The circumstances that have unfolded over the last decade, including the use of new computer and communication technologies together with a variety of social, demographic and economic changes, challenge educationalists to reflect upon traditional methods of teaching. Included among these challenges are strong theoretical challenges concerning the process of learning in students (Perkinson 1993) and, now, given greater technological advances a contextual challenge as to how and where real learning takes place and the nature of its facilitation. The technological conditions in which universities operate have changed in very significant ways (Evans and Nation 2000). The real challenge is to discover the ways to improve learning. In order to do this we need to state what set of initial conditions might be imagined to improve learning using new technologies?
New computer and communications technologies present, in Popperian terms, opportunities to create bold new ideas concerning the problem of how to improve student learning. In less than a decade, the facility for the storage and rapid communication of knowledge and ideas plus the potential for mass assessment to these has improved almost beyond expectation. This potentiality is now being applied to problems of inclusiveness, and Life Long Learning. New technologies are applied and pedagogic strategies invented that encompass the term, e-Learning. (Molyneux 2000 ).
One analogy is that of the ecological niche. A new niche has opened up to allow educationalists and learners to achieve their ends. The conjecture is that bold new approaches to learning mediated via computers and communication technologies can improve learning by removing impediments. For this conjecture to be tested it must be capable of being falsified. If the conjecture is falsified, as difficult as it may be, then the logic compels the enquirer to look for alternative hypotheses to improve learning.