This research investigated the implementation of an audience response system (ARS) to learning in... more This research investigated the implementation of an audience response system (ARS) to learning in a multicultural Asian context using multiple case methodology. Four academic staff teaching in four diverse units with different student numbers (n=133) used ARS as one of their teaching approaches with each using it in very different ways. Both quantitative and qualitative data was collected through questionnaires and convergent interviewing of staff and students. Six constructs emerging from the literature were investigated and five are reported. Although some results aligned with other research, some specific issues were identified and appear relevant not only to other similar cultural contexts but possibly all contexts. The paper concludes with questions for further research into ARS in a multicultural Asian context in pursuant of choices for learners and learning.
Preparing university graduates for the world of work must address teamness, a quality essential t... more Preparing university graduates for the world of work must address teamness, a quality essential to working in complex and dynamic organizations. Mutual performance monitoring (MPM) highlighted as a fundamental component in the authors' initial team learning theory is examined. It was thought that first year university students may not have the skills of MPM to affect high quality team outputs, and our results suggest this is true. It is proposed that students are supported with strategies which legitimize monitoring the work of their team members and that the ideas of collusion, spying and cheating are replaced with teamness. Further, it appears that many academics are unprepared or ill-equipped to prepare students for a world of work in teams. Exposing the naivety of students, presenting perceived and positive changes in team skills and suggesting strategies may provide some pedagogical guidance for academic educators to better implement team learning. This paper explores MPM as a building block in a more comprehensive theory of team learning.
International Journal of Information Technology Project Management, 2013
This research sets out to identify cultural factors that may need to be addressed in order to inc... more This research sets out to identify cultural factors that may need to be addressed in order to increase the chances of international IT project success. The management of projects across national boundaries and cultures is becoming an increasingly important topic as organizations throughout the world expand their globalization efforts. Using a case study example of a failed IT project conducted in Taiwan by an Australian project team, the issue of how national cultural differences contributed to this failure is used as the foundation for identifying how cultural differences might affect other international IT projects. Feedback from local students in a United Arab Emirates national university MIS project management course is analyzed and interpreted in an attempt to identify what cultural differences are likely to affect the management of projects in the Middle East region in particular and across national boundaries generally.
ABSTRACT If, as some people believe, university teaching is all about allowing or enabling studen... more ABSTRACT If, as some people believe, university teaching is all about allowing or enabling students to attain their full potential, rather than merely creating more ‘bricks in the wall’, gifted students provide a particularly thorny problem for teaching academics in the contemporary university environment. Many gifted students, by the time they reach university, have long since established, in their attempts to ‘fit in’, how to hide their special talents. A university environment may well be the final formal opportunity for gifted students to be accepted as such, and most importantly, for them to take better advantage of these capabilities in their ongoing education.Evolving from the findings of a case study approach, the authors propose a model that might be used to help gifted university students reach their full potential. The “I” model for teaching gifted students consists of four functions – having incentive to recognize gifted students, identifying gifted students, suitably involving gifted students in mandated curriculum and the internalization of giftedness by the students themselves. Gifted students may have had little opportunity in their pre-university education to take advantage of their giftedness. It is suggested that for tertiary sector educators to extend this languishing of gifted students in an apparently ubiquitous quest for educational ‘massification’, is contrary to the customary, time-honored nature of any university education.
International Journal of Digital Literacy and Digital Competence, Apr 1, 2011
For a number of years, there has been a concerted effort by the United Arab Emirates to take a pr... more For a number of years, there has been a concerted effort by the United Arab Emirates to take a prominent role in introducing e-business initiatives throughout the Gulf region, and this effort has translated into widespread access of internet technology for its own citizens. The country, in setting out to become a hub for foreign and domestic companies, realized that to achieve these goals it must provide appropriate e-business frameworks and infrastructures, which it has successfully done. Although, while not the only means of acquiring digital literacy, regular exposure to the internet does contribute to gaining these necessary 21 st century skills. It might be expected that with such widespread access to the internet the population would contribute to becoming digitally competent. Using an ethnographic case study methodology, this paper investigates issues contributing to what might be a new form of digital divide; cultural issues which limit the acquisition of such digital skills.
... Tony Jewels School of Information Systems Queensland University of Technology Rozz Albon Depa... more ... Tony Jewels School of Information Systems Queensland University of Technology Rozz Albon Department of Education Curtin University of Technology ... The reliability of information technology (IT) project delivery is one of the four levels at which Thorp & DMR's Center for ...
For optimum workplace effectiveness in knowledge intensive industries in which principles of know... more For optimum workplace effectiveness in knowledge intensive industries in which principles of knowledge management need to be applied, it is necessary to take into account not only the competencies of individuals themselves but also the competencies of the teams in which they must operate. Although the incorporation of various types of group work into pedagogies is already widespread within institutes of higher education, many examples fail to embrace a rationale for, or the potential benefits of, multiple contributor environments. We present in this article arguments for including the teaching of team competency principles in higher education, supported by an original multi dimensional team competency teaching model, a taxonomy for assessing team competency levels and an example of the implementation of these principles.
Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in infor... more Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in information technology between students at an Australian and a South African university. This work provides a background to ethics from the literature from which a behavioural model for micro-level ethical standards is proposed. Using a theoretical underpinning of Fishbein & Azjen’s Theory of Reasoned Action, a survey document has been developed to identify and compare what constructs most affect an individual’s intention to behave in situations requiring ethical considerations.
In tertiary institutions in Australia, and no doubt elsewhere, there is increasing pressure for a... more In tertiary institutions in Australia, and no doubt elsewhere, there is increasing pressure for accountability. No longer are academics assumed a priori to be responsible and capable of self management in teaching and assessing the subjects they run. Procedures are being dictated more from the ‘top down’. Although academics may not always appreciate ‘top down ’ policies on teaching and learning, they should at least be open to the possibility that the policies may indeed have merit. On the other hand, academics should never be expected to blindly accept policies dictated from elsewhere. Responsible academics generally also need to evaluate for themselves the validity and legitimacy of externally introduced new policies and procedures. At one Australian tertiary institution, the Academic Board recently endorsed a new assessment policy, to implement criterion referenced assessment (CRA) throughout the university. This new policy is being promoted by the university’s teaching and learn...
Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in in-fo... more Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in in-formation technology between students at an Australian and a South African university. This work provides a background to ethics from the literature from which a behavioural model for mi-cro-level ethical standards is proposed. Using a theoretical underpinning of Fishbein & Azjen’s Theory of Reasoned Action, a survey document has been developed to identify and compare what constructs most affect an individual’s intention to behave in situations requiring ethical considera-tions.
Understanding why individual knowledge workers within IT project teams would be motivated towards... more Understanding why individual knowledge workers within IT project teams would be motivated towards or inhibited from sharing their knowledge and experiences in their activities, procedures, and processes is likely to be of critical importance to the success of both project and organisational goals. A survey instrument has been developed to measure the relative importance of various extrinsic and intrinsic motivators and inhibitors of intentions to share knowledge. The present paper presents how the constructs were developed for the survey instrument.
When graduates now enter the professional workplace, their ability to work as effective team memb... more When graduates now enter the professional workplace, their ability to work as effective team members will contribute much to their immediate levels of productivity. Various types of group work are already being incorporated into higher education pedagogies with the stated intention of preparing students for modern workplace environments. Yet preparing for such an important vocational skill is not always so enthusiastically embraced by students. Many students openly state that they do not like working in groups because they believe that they can achieve better outcomes on their own. We investigate in this paper the metacognitive processes that students might engage in to help explain why group activities in an academic environment may be so unpopular.
This research investigated the implementation of an audience response system (ARS) to learning in... more This research investigated the implementation of an audience response system (ARS) to learning in a multicultural Asian context using multiple case methodology. Four academic staff teaching in four diverse units with different student numbers (n=133) used ARS as one of their teaching approaches with each using it in very different ways. Both quantitative and qualitative data was collected through questionnaires and convergent interviewing of staff and students. Six constructs emerging from the literature were investigated and five are reported. Although some results aligned with other research, some specific issues were identified and appear relevant not only to other similar cultural contexts but possibly all contexts. The paper concludes with questions for further research into ARS in a multicultural Asian context in pursuant of choices for learners and learning.
Preparing university graduates for the world of work must address teamness, a quality essential t... more Preparing university graduates for the world of work must address teamness, a quality essential to working in complex and dynamic organizations. Mutual performance monitoring (MPM) highlighted as a fundamental component in the authors' initial team learning theory is examined. It was thought that first year university students may not have the skills of MPM to affect high quality team outputs, and our results suggest this is true. It is proposed that students are supported with strategies which legitimize monitoring the work of their team members and that the ideas of collusion, spying and cheating are replaced with teamness. Further, it appears that many academics are unprepared or ill-equipped to prepare students for a world of work in teams. Exposing the naivety of students, presenting perceived and positive changes in team skills and suggesting strategies may provide some pedagogical guidance for academic educators to better implement team learning. This paper explores MPM as a building block in a more comprehensive theory of team learning.
International Journal of Information Technology Project Management, 2013
This research sets out to identify cultural factors that may need to be addressed in order to inc... more This research sets out to identify cultural factors that may need to be addressed in order to increase the chances of international IT project success. The management of projects across national boundaries and cultures is becoming an increasingly important topic as organizations throughout the world expand their globalization efforts. Using a case study example of a failed IT project conducted in Taiwan by an Australian project team, the issue of how national cultural differences contributed to this failure is used as the foundation for identifying how cultural differences might affect other international IT projects. Feedback from local students in a United Arab Emirates national university MIS project management course is analyzed and interpreted in an attempt to identify what cultural differences are likely to affect the management of projects in the Middle East region in particular and across national boundaries generally.
ABSTRACT If, as some people believe, university teaching is all about allowing or enabling studen... more ABSTRACT If, as some people believe, university teaching is all about allowing or enabling students to attain their full potential, rather than merely creating more ‘bricks in the wall’, gifted students provide a particularly thorny problem for teaching academics in the contemporary university environment. Many gifted students, by the time they reach university, have long since established, in their attempts to ‘fit in’, how to hide their special talents. A university environment may well be the final formal opportunity for gifted students to be accepted as such, and most importantly, for them to take better advantage of these capabilities in their ongoing education.Evolving from the findings of a case study approach, the authors propose a model that might be used to help gifted university students reach their full potential. The “I” model for teaching gifted students consists of four functions – having incentive to recognize gifted students, identifying gifted students, suitably involving gifted students in mandated curriculum and the internalization of giftedness by the students themselves. Gifted students may have had little opportunity in their pre-university education to take advantage of their giftedness. It is suggested that for tertiary sector educators to extend this languishing of gifted students in an apparently ubiquitous quest for educational ‘massification’, is contrary to the customary, time-honored nature of any university education.
International Journal of Digital Literacy and Digital Competence, Apr 1, 2011
For a number of years, there has been a concerted effort by the United Arab Emirates to take a pr... more For a number of years, there has been a concerted effort by the United Arab Emirates to take a prominent role in introducing e-business initiatives throughout the Gulf region, and this effort has translated into widespread access of internet technology for its own citizens. The country, in setting out to become a hub for foreign and domestic companies, realized that to achieve these goals it must provide appropriate e-business frameworks and infrastructures, which it has successfully done. Although, while not the only means of acquiring digital literacy, regular exposure to the internet does contribute to gaining these necessary 21 st century skills. It might be expected that with such widespread access to the internet the population would contribute to becoming digitally competent. Using an ethnographic case study methodology, this paper investigates issues contributing to what might be a new form of digital divide; cultural issues which limit the acquisition of such digital skills.
... Tony Jewels School of Information Systems Queensland University of Technology Rozz Albon Depa... more ... Tony Jewels School of Information Systems Queensland University of Technology Rozz Albon Department of Education Curtin University of Technology ... The reliability of information technology (IT) project delivery is one of the four levels at which Thorp & DMR's Center for ...
For optimum workplace effectiveness in knowledge intensive industries in which principles of know... more For optimum workplace effectiveness in knowledge intensive industries in which principles of knowledge management need to be applied, it is necessary to take into account not only the competencies of individuals themselves but also the competencies of the teams in which they must operate. Although the incorporation of various types of group work into pedagogies is already widespread within institutes of higher education, many examples fail to embrace a rationale for, or the potential benefits of, multiple contributor environments. We present in this article arguments for including the teaching of team competency principles in higher education, supported by an original multi dimensional team competency teaching model, a taxonomy for assessing team competency levels and an example of the implementation of these principles.
Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in infor... more Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in information technology between students at an Australian and a South African university. This work provides a background to ethics from the literature from which a behavioural model for micro-level ethical standards is proposed. Using a theoretical underpinning of Fishbein & Azjen’s Theory of Reasoned Action, a survey document has been developed to identify and compare what constructs most affect an individual’s intention to behave in situations requiring ethical considerations.
In tertiary institutions in Australia, and no doubt elsewhere, there is increasing pressure for a... more In tertiary institutions in Australia, and no doubt elsewhere, there is increasing pressure for accountability. No longer are academics assumed a priori to be responsible and capable of self management in teaching and assessing the subjects they run. Procedures are being dictated more from the ‘top down’. Although academics may not always appreciate ‘top down ’ policies on teaching and learning, they should at least be open to the possibility that the policies may indeed have merit. On the other hand, academics should never be expected to blindly accept policies dictated from elsewhere. Responsible academics generally also need to evaluate for themselves the validity and legitimacy of externally introduced new policies and procedures. At one Australian tertiary institution, the Academic Board recently endorsed a new assessment policy, to implement criterion referenced assessment (CRA) throughout the university. This new policy is being promoted by the university’s teaching and learn...
Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in in-fo... more Research is currently being undertaken to compare attitudes and behaviour towards ethics in in-formation technology between students at an Australian and a South African university. This work provides a background to ethics from the literature from which a behavioural model for mi-cro-level ethical standards is proposed. Using a theoretical underpinning of Fishbein & Azjen’s Theory of Reasoned Action, a survey document has been developed to identify and compare what constructs most affect an individual’s intention to behave in situations requiring ethical considera-tions.
Understanding why individual knowledge workers within IT project teams would be motivated towards... more Understanding why individual knowledge workers within IT project teams would be motivated towards or inhibited from sharing their knowledge and experiences in their activities, procedures, and processes is likely to be of critical importance to the success of both project and organisational goals. A survey instrument has been developed to measure the relative importance of various extrinsic and intrinsic motivators and inhibitors of intentions to share knowledge. The present paper presents how the constructs were developed for the survey instrument.
When graduates now enter the professional workplace, their ability to work as effective team memb... more When graduates now enter the professional workplace, their ability to work as effective team members will contribute much to their immediate levels of productivity. Various types of group work are already being incorporated into higher education pedagogies with the stated intention of preparing students for modern workplace environments. Yet preparing for such an important vocational skill is not always so enthusiastically embraced by students. Many students openly state that they do not like working in groups because they believe that they can achieve better outcomes on their own. We investigate in this paper the metacognitive processes that students might engage in to help explain why group activities in an academic environment may be so unpopular.
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