You can find the additional paper for the doctoral consortium of the PLE conference 2012, Aveiro here: http://revistas.ua.pt/index.php/ple/article/view/1463

1. Diverse Knowledge Practices through
Personal Learning Environments
(PLE)
Sabine Reisas, M.A.
Kiel University, Germany

2. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Why do students need a diverse repertoir of
knowledge practices in higher education and
what does it have to do
with PLEs?
Image Reference: http://jaeselle.com/2012/04/planning-ness/
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

3. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
What course concepts should address
• Consider latent needs of students
• Explore context situations and the use of technology
• Initiate reflective processes
„Media are not only ‚new toys‘ but a possibility to gain
experiences with practices in contexts.“ (Fiedler &
Väljataga 2010)
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, Sabine Reisas (@srmpbi), Kiel
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences University

4. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Underlying assumptions
• Actual teaching and learning situations (in higher
education) are affected significantly by personal
learning environments and incorporated
knowledge practices.
• Personal Learning Environments as activity
systems are helpful for students to articulate
knowledge practices.
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

5. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Aim of this research
• to facilitate refining and co-production of diverse
knowlege practices
• to allow critical reviewing of negotiated practices
• to encourage students to take over responsibility
• to enable students to transform their own Personal
Learning Environment (PLE)
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

6. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Research questions
• Is it possible to conceptualize a PLE as a sociocultural/ socio-
material practice?
• Is a PLE in terms of the activity system a vehicle to make
explicit practices observable for empirical research ?
• Which incorporated knowledge practices can become
explicit?
• Which interventions facilitate reflective processes?
• Which kind of intervention are able to induce dissonance in
specific situation to challenge practices and therefore the
transformative development of PLEs?
• How do students recognize discrepancies between the
systemic relations of an activity system and how do students
deal with them?
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

7. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Personal Learning Environments
as Practices
technologically- pedagogigcally-
oriented view of PLEs oriented view of PLEs
(e.g. Jones, 2008) (e.g. Downes, 2007)
Co-evolutionary:
practice-oriented
view of PLEs
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

8. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Key concepts for the research
Ethnography Activity Theory Legitimate peripheral Sociomateriality
(Garfinkel, 1967, (Engeström, 2007) participation in (Orlikowski, 2007)
2003) Communities of Practice
(Lave & Wenger, 1991)
• Frictions of • How and why • How students move • Material and
Intervention students from „peripheral social
are visible interact in participation to full practices are
in students` specific context membership in a constitutively
behavior sitations community“ entangled
• Observing • Role of • Learning as participation • Co-
disorganized epistemic evolutionary
interactions to artefacts perspective
understand
how activities
are produced
and maintained
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

9. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Personal Learning Environments
as socio-material Practices
dynamic activity system
tool
Given task
Material
environment
Constitutive
entanglement
subject object (Orlikowski, 2007)
Social Cultural
environment environment
rules division
community
of labor
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

10. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Exploring seminar settings
1) Seminar Setting 2) Seminar Setting
Development of Development of
ebook concepts collaborative scenarios
(task: Exploring the act (task: Exploring a
of reading) collaborativ process)
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

11. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
Mixed-method approach
• Artefact analysis (Students as co-researchers)
• Activity system analysis
• Conversation analysis
• Semi structured interviews
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences

12. Diverse Knowledge Practices through Personal Learning Environments (PLE)
References
• Bryant, S. L., Forte, A., Bruckman, A. (2005). Becoming Wikipedian:
Transformation of Participation in a Collaborative Online Encyclopedia.
GROUP`05 (ACM), November 6-9, 2005, Sanibel Island, Florida, USA.
• Buchem, I., Attwell, G., & Torres, R. (2011). Understanding Personal Learning
Environments: Litera-ture review and synthesis through the Activity
Theory lens. In Proceedings of the The PLE Conference 2011 (pp. 1–33).
Retrieved from http://journal.webscience.org/658/1/
PLE_SOU_Paper_Buchem_Attwell_Torress.doc
• Fiedler, S. & Väljataga, T. (2010). Personal learning environments: concept or
technology?
• Engeström, Y. (2007). Activity theory and individual and social transformation.
In Y. Engeström, R. Miettinen, & R.-L. Punamäki (Eds.), Perspectives on
activity theory (pp. 19–38). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Lave, J. & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate peripheral
participation. Cambridge.
• Orlikowski, W. J. (2007). Sociomaterial Practices: Exploring Technology at
Work. Organization Stu-dies, 28(9), 1435–1448.
Kiel University, Faculty of Arts and Humanities,
Sabine Reisas, M.A. (@srmpbi)
Department of Media Pedagogy/Educational Computer Sciences