In 2008 a new educational initiative termed “School without segregation” was implemented in Iceland. Its goal was to ensure that all children would be provided with education suited to individual variations in social and educational needs. Coinciding with this policy initiative a new technology strategy was implemented in the municipality of Kópavogur, Iceland´s second largest city, with the aim to equip children to deal with the fundamental technological changes in modern society and integrate technology in their education. As an integral part of this strategy all students in Kópavogur, from the fifth to the tenth grade were given iPads in 2015. The affected population was approximately 4.700 students and over 450 teachers. A significant body of research has examined how students fare when technology is integrated into their education. However, this thesis aims to examine how the implementation of this tablet-centric initiative affected the working environment of the municipality´s teachers, a subject that has been researched to a much lesser extent. With the aid of personal interviews communication between stakeholders of the initiative, strategies to motivate and encourage teachers in dealing with the change in their working environment and support afforded during the process was examined. Special focus was placed on the extent of involvement and participation of teachers during the implementation and the question of whether teachers´ opinions had an impact throughout the process. The thesis analysis is based on 18 semi-formal interviews with teachers from all of the city´s nine schools. Additionally, the team in charge of leading the implementation was interviewed to further broaden the scope. In brief, the thesis highlights that contention surrounded various aspects of the implementation. Many of the teachers felt overwhelmed and hesitant and described feeling that their concerns went unnoticed. Today, however, three years down the road, the iPads seem to have become an integral part of the everyday working environment of teachers and students alike and none of the teachers want to go back to teaching without iPads.

abstract: This dissertation is about videogames. It is also about teaching, and the ways videogame design represents good teaching. However, this dissertation is not about videogames alone. It makes broad claims about teaching in- and out-of-schools in the 21st Century. Over the last few decades many scholars have been impressed by the rich forms of learning going on out-of-school. In particular, the emergence of digital and social media has fueled interest in informal learning while often ignoring or effacing the critical role of teaching. Indeed, the term “informal learning” is common while the term “informal teaching” barely exists. At the same time, the learning sciences have made progress on understanding how learning works based on empirical evidence of how the mind operates. While this research is not well implemented in many of our schools, it is well represented in much out-of-school learning (such as in videogames). This dissertation argues that there is a body of evidence germane to good teaching, that many learning principles celebrated today in out-of-school learning are actually teaching principles, and that good videogames can give us insights into how teaching can work as a form of design with or without games. The dissertation then develops a model of distributed teaching and learning systems which involve designed- and emergent organization of various teaching and learning “sites”. Finally, the dissertation looks at the rhetorical function of teaching in building a “deliberate learner,” one whose goal is not simply to know and do things, but to become a certain type of person committed to new ways with words, forms of interaction, and values. Rhetoric, teaching, learning, and design of all sorts have been set free from institutions and turned loose into a market place of ideas and sites. In the face of this market place we need to engage in discussions about who we want to be, who we want others to be, and what world we want all of us to live in. These discussions will center not just on “truth”, but on values as well—which is exactly where, in a high-risk imperiled world, they should be centered. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation English 2016

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abstract: This study investigated high school band students' processes of learning as well as their responses and reactions to student-led aural-based learning projects. Previous research has focused on various aspects of informal learning and student-centered learning--the frameworks upon which this study is based--but none have focused on inclusion of informal learning methods into a secondary large ensemble classroom setting with an emphasis on playing by ear. Participants in this study were 20 students divided into four small groups in a 45-member high school band. The study took place during the regularly scheduled band class during one full class period for eight weeks, culminating in small group performances. Data were collected throughout the study via observation and audio- or video-recording of weekly group rehearsal, participant interviews, teacher interviews, and collection of student artifacts. Data were analyzed by creating a case study of each of the four groups to determine their working processes. Cross-case analysis revealed themes common to the participant groups in these categories: navigation of the learning process, playing by ear, and student attitudes and perceptions of benefits and drawbacks of the project. Discussion of navigation of the learning process includes group members' methods of problem solving within a constructivist classroom environment. These methods included problem finding, strategizing, and responding, peer assessment and feedback, and teacher scaffolding; I also discuss how group dynamics played a major role in student's learning processes. While learning to play by ear, musical elements students addressed included pitch, division of parts, form, key and modality, intonation, instrumentation, dynamics, tempo, rhythm, improvisation, and range. Students' attitudes included enjoyment of most aspects of the project, and dislike or frustration with a few aspects. Benefits students perceived from participation in the project included increased ability to play by ear and increased confidence. Recommendations for music teachers and music teacher educators as well as suggestions for future research are provided. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Music Education 2014

Software projects are among the failure prone projects in engineering and software requirements problems have been attributed to be one of main reasons to software project failures. There are many techniques and methodology developed for practitioners to use in working with software requirements, which makes it impossible for one to master them during formal education. In addition, many of the practitioners are coming from different disciplines. Thus they are required to learn in practice. Previous studies have shown informal learning (i.e. not planned or run by institutions or organizations) to be more effective and more used in workplace learning situations. The study investigates how the requirements engineering skills are and can be learned in workplace especially informally. By comparing the results obtained by the literature study and empirical study the recommendations are given on how one can recognise, utilise, and encourage the informal learning activities to develop requirements engineering skills. The study does not rule out the need to have the formal education and training in requirements engineering but identify it as an important prerequisite and/or complement. It provides insight on how informal learning practices are utilised by practitioners who are rather experienced in requirements engineering and how they could try to recognise and/or utilise other learning opportunities presented by previous literature. It furthermore offers general recommendations of how to utilise the informal learning for developing requirements engineering skills and other related disciplines.

Denna studie ämnar undersöka huruvida yrkesverksamma upplever att mångfald påverkar förutsättningar för lärande inom arbetsgrupper. Syftet har operationaliserats i forskningsfrågan “Hur upplevs mångfald påverka förutsättningar för lärande i arbetsgrupper?” samt dess två underfrågor “på vilka sätt upplevs mångfald vara en förutsättning för lärande i arbetsgrupper?” och “på vilka sätt upplevs mångfald vara ett hinder för lärande i arbetsgrupper?”. Det empiriska materialet har tillhandahållits med hjälp av kvalitativ ansats i form av semistrukturerade intervjuer samt tematisk analys. Studieresultaten visade att samtliga informanter, trots deras olika branscher, resonerar på liknande sätt och upplever att mångfald och heterogenitet medför stora förutsättningar för lärande i form av nya perspektiv, erfarenhetsutbyte och ifrågasättande. Resultaten visade även att mångfald kan skapa hinder för lärande, när perspektiv och erfarenheter undanhålls på grund av maktskillnader och hierarkier. Informanternas erfarenheter visar att de gemensamt är positivt inställda till förutsättningarna för lärande inom arbetsgrupper som mångfald medför. Slutsatserna som dragits är att uppfattningen av huruvida mångfald påverkar lärandet beror på individers inställning till mångfald samt arbetets och gruppens kontext. Mångfaldsbegreppet är komplext och svårt att mäta, då det kan formas till att passa individers egna värderingar. Det gör att det påverkar hur de kan se på förutsättningar och hinder för lärande på olika sätt, till följd av definitionen av mångfald. / This study aims to examine whether professionals experience that diversity affects the conditions for learning within working groups. The purpose has been operationalized in the research question "How is diversity perceived to affect the conditions for learning in working groups?" and its two sub questions "In what ways is diversity considered to be a prerequisite for learning in working groups?" and "In what ways is diversity considered to be an obstacle for learning in working groups?". The empirical material has been provided by a qualitative approach, in the form of semi structured interviews and thematic analysis. The study results show that all informants, despite their different industries, reason similarly and feel that diversity and heterogeneity imply great learning opportunities in terms of new perspectives, experience sharing and questioning. The results also show that diversity can create barriers to learning, when perspectives and experiences are retained due to differences in power and hierarchies. The informants' experiences show that they are jointly positive to the prerequisites for learning within workgroups that diversity brings. The conclusions drawn are that the perception of diversity is influenced by the individual's approach to diversity and the context of the work and the group. Diversity as a concept is complex and difficult to measure, as it can be tailored to the individual's own values, which affects how one can interpret the conditions and obstacles to learning differently, as a result of the diversity definition.

Mobile learning has the pedagogical potential to provide informal, context-based educational experiences that can teach practical and applicable workplace skills and behaviors. The goal of this study was to examine the learning experiences and outcomes of healthcare professionals as they participated in a mobile learning activity designed to teach them the technical and procedural skills for facilitating clinical consultations via videoconference. The primary research question was: How does the use of a curriculum framework to design mobile learning experiences impact the learning experiences and outcomes of healthcare professionals with regards to developing workplace skills and understanding clinical processes? Informed by a systematic review of the mobile learning literature, this dissertation proposed a conceptual framework to guide the implementation and evaluation of mobile learning based on five dimensions of instructional design: content, structure, delivery, usability and communities of practice. Physicians, nurses and healthcare administrators voluntarily participated in this pragmatic, mixed methods study. Their quantitative and qualitative feedback was utilized both to assess the validity of the proposed mobile learning experience conceptual framework as well as its quantitative and qualitative evaluation tools. The study found that informal, contextual mobile learning content can promote communication and collaboration among healthcare professionals, and provide them with hands-on learning experiences that can be easily situated in a specific workplace environment. Delivery was identified as perhaps the most critical element in increasing motivation and interactivity among participants, and communities of practice after the learning activity were found to increase collaboration and provide opportunities for problem-solving. The structure of embedding the informal mobile learning experience within a formal, didactic online learning course was also found by participants to provide the right mix of background knowledge and practical application to produce meaningful learning outcomes. Overall, the mobile learning experience conceptual framework synthesizes best practices in the literature and proposes innovative methods for the design and evaluation of effective mobile learning.

Despite extensive team studies research over the past 40 years, team learning remains an emerging field of study where there is significant conceptual discord. Three conceptualizations have dominated the literature where team learning is represented as: acquisition; participative activity, or an open system. Team learning models have also emerged integrating these three conceptualizations and included elements such as feedback, mediational factors and emergent states, though they have generally maintained the linearity of traditional input – process – output models. Teams have also recently been conceptualized as complex learning systems, yet there is a paucity of research at the team level of analysis particularly within dynamic work teams. In conjunction, exploration into a complementary area, collective transformative learning within authentic work teams, is also limited. Through an instrumental case study, the researcher investigated in what ways is collective informal learning is enacted within this authentic work team. Additionally, the potential for unfacilitated collective transformative learning was also studied. Using a social constructivist lens, this case study leveraged multiple methods including document analysis, observation, focus groups and interviews to capture a rich picture of team informal learning at the collective level of analysis. The study found that team informal learning was embedded in work activities and enacted in various ways through team interactions and activities. Moreover, the findings supported that the team had experienced collective transformative learning. The study concluded that conceptualizing teams as complex learning systems supports team informal learning and emergence as well as the potential for collective transformative outcomes in and through work. Overall, this study enhances our understanding of collective informal learning in authentic work teams and collective transformative learning.

The purpose of this independent project is to give teachers of young ESL-students a collected knowledge of what kind of digital extramural activities the students often do on their spare time and what consequences this have for the formal primary classroom and students’ vocabulary skills. The studies used are found on EBSCO’s ERIC and SwePub, peer reviewed, published between 2010 and 2020, and all available in full text through Malmö university. Informal learning is shown to have a big impact on formal learning, especially for boys who learn mainly through gaming. Girls still score higher on English tests within formal learning, though boys who are frequent gamers score higher within the studies. Gaming seems to help boys keep up with girls in formal English as a second language. The main skill which gaming gives the students is to communicate, hold a conversation and increase their vocabulary. Since gaming is the extramural activity which seems to give the student the most, and at the same time there are students whose families could not afford to game due to costs of computer, tv, games and, in some cases, internet. This could become a socioeconomic factor which the school and the teacher need to consider, especially since results from some of the studies claim gaming to be how the boys keep up with the girls. Not to forget the students who, thanks to informal learning, speak English on a higher level and their right to be educated at their own level.

The U.S. Department of Education, Office of Ed Tech Future Ready program has encouraged the use of open informal learning communities as professional learning opportunities for educators. This study categorizes 46 state Twitter chats by their moderation techniques and design. A purposive sample of Twitter chat designers participated in this phenomenological exploration that demonstrates how the designs of these informal learning spaces are aligned with the designers' pedagogical philosophies. Recommendations for supporting, growing, and sustaining similar learning communities are included.