Tompsett,+C+2007

=Tipping into the abyss: with more than a virtual parachute?= Chris Tompsett*. Kingston University, UK ALT-J, Research in Learning Technology. Vol. 15, No. 2, June 2007, pp. 175–180

Any application of information and communication technology in education (ICTE) sits, at times uncomfortably, at the intersection of three key disciplines: technology, education and sociology (including reflexivity). To confuse matters, any specific study may need to take account of specific knowledge within subdisciplines, such as organisational management and technology transfer, and of knowledge within the domain of application (e.g. nursing, social work, fashion, etc.). Researchers must build a consistent model of knowledge that can integrate disparate methodologies, research goals and even conflicting interpretations of the same terminology. Without this, the ICTE research field will be dominated by what is simply novel, irrespective of the relevance of particular changes to educational practice. If existing models in this field are as limited as suggested by Moule, when should lecturers and teachers, with no motivation to use technology for its own sake and no additional financial support, review progress in this field for effective examples of innovative practice, let alone wide-scale change? On most of the criteria that could be introduced to compare two papers, the views of Moule and Salmon appear almost diametrically opposed and a detailed comparison would seem of limited value. Instead, this paper asks a more fundamental question: what could be the basis within this research community for establishing coherence within the field and ensuring that research can justify actual changes in educational practice?
 * Abstract**

The present article, instead, is intended to suggest that a number of critical factors must be considered in any subsequent discussion to ensure that the debate fosters developments in this field towards the establishment of reliable outcomes for educational practitioners to adopt (cf. Hargreaves, 1996), rather than experimental or  innovative, practice (Rogers, 1962).

The rate of technical development in information and communication technology produces an ephemeral research agenda in ICTE.
 * Remember education?**

... the constant changes in the research agenda leave much started and little complete. Even where research in ICTE works specifically within an educational environment, and suggests that educational improvement has been achieved, it is far too common for ‘improvements’ to be attributed to the technological change rather than the many other educational changes that may also have taken place.

Researchers in ICTE might also benefit from a number of systematic reviews and meta-studies that have been published more extensively within the education field. The benefits of peer-group discussion and networked learning are clearly difficult to establish (for example, Andrews et al., 2002; Goldberg et al., 2003; Hogarth et al., 2005). A careful analysis of these reviews/studies provides interesting examples of what not to repeat, what is required to establish educational benefits and to provide benchmarks for the standard of research that can be achieved.

As some critical terminology (e.g. community, constructivist) has markedly different connotations depending on the approach chosen, it is incumbent on those reporting the research to ensure that these differences are presented coherently within the published literature. Avoiding this problem requires that there is consistency between the problem, model and methodology within the research—and clarity of reporting for the relevant readership.

At the simplest level this requires that the researcher is aware of, and accounts for, their own influence on the research processes (reflective self-awareness—the researcher as a non-independent observer;

Dirckinck-Holmfeld et al. (2004) provide one of the few cases within the community of practice model in which consistency has been achieved. In contrast, Zuber-Skerrit (1992) provides some cases within the action research model where course designers clearly apply one model to themselves and a different one to their students. Some contradictions may be unavoidable, but that does not remove the need to recognise that they exist and to address them within the research process.

For those in educational practice, even if research progresses beyond the simply technological, innovative work is seldom pursued to the point at which effectiveness is sufficiently proven to justify a change in practice (Alsop & Tompsett, 2007).