Alberta Teachers’ Innovations in Classroom Practice Arising from Use of Technology in Online Learning as a Result of COVID-19

• Author / Creator

  Bakker, Darlene J.

• Abstract
  In this study, a small sample of Alberta teachers were interviewed about their use of technology in the classroom through three specific time-periods during the COVID-19 pandemic: pre-COVID-19, during COVID-19 and post COVID-19. The Cynefin Framework was used to find changes in technology use by teachers in their classrooms during this time. The Cynefin Framework is a sense-making framework. This framework is ideal to use for analysis of technology use during COVID-19. The Cynefin Framework represents three ontologies: order, disorder, and unorder. My findings show that all of these were present for teachers during COVID-19. Pre-COVID-19 is the ordered ontology which houses the best practices of classroom teaching and Professional Development in the Clear and Complicated Domains. The disordered ontology was the time when governments were ordering schools and some businesses to close. When school boards ordered schools to go online, this imposed ordered is called the unordered ontology. The unordered ontology represents the Chaotic and the Complex Domains. The Complex Domain is the domain where innovations occur. Technology that teachers continued to use post-pandemic was always modified slightly by them to suit their teaching topics or style. This has implications for how teachers should be taught to use various technologies, both in the undergraduate classroom and as Professional Development for the experienced teacher.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Technology
  • Cynefin
  • COVID-19
  • Pedagogy
  • Emergency Teaching
  • Pandemic

• Graduation date

  Spring 2024

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Education

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/r3-m0yz-ge88

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.