Postgraduate Course: Digital Education: Futures (EDUA11472)
Course Outline
| School | Moray House School of Education and Sport |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
| Course type | Online Distance Learning |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | Predictions about the future of digital education are everywhere and it can be hard for educators, learners, parents, developers and policymakers to know how to respond. Futures thinking and futures methods have become increasingly important as a way of critically engaging with imagined, predicted and real technology developments in education.
This course gives you the opportunity to develop and use futures thinking skills to consider the trajectory and implications of digital technologies for the future of learning and education. We will ask: what predictions and promises are being made about the future of education? What emerging technologies are on the horizon in a range of fields and sectors, and what might they mean for education? How can we positively shape digital futures for education and learning?
The answers to these questions are highly context-dependent: the future of technology and education is volatile and it can change fast. For this reason, the course introduces and applies futures thinking and methods to three key themes, which are updated regularly to reflect emerging concepts and technologies. A significant part of the course is also structured around student-created and peer-reviewed Open Educational Resources. Each resource takes one of the themes or issues from the course as a jumping-off point for exploring what digital futures for learning might be like. |
| Course description |
The course is divided into four blocks.
Block One involves becoming familiar with futures thinking and futures methods through reading, discussion and activities; and reading around the three core themes to consider and discuss ideas associated with each. These themes change regularly, but in previous years have included trust, resistance, representation, mess, failure, entanglement, privacy and surveillance, interfaces, participation, visibility and sustainability.
Blocks Two and Three are research, writing and Open Educational Resource (OER) development periods, supported by tutor feedback, tutorials and sharing insights and progress. During these weeks, you will choose your topic in discussion with your tutor, engage in research to develop a strong position on the topic as it relates to education futures, and gain experience of writing a position paper and creating an OER. OER production gives you the opportunity to consider how to translate your research and topic into an engaging, hands-on learning experience for others, create valuable materials that can be re-used after the course, and develop useful skills in open licensing and digital content creation.
The final block, Block Four, involves you in engaging with and evaluating the OERs of your peers, and synthesising the outcomes of your OER development for final submission. During this block the course themes come to life in unique ways, as each course participant shares what they have made and receives peer feedback to help improve and finalise their OER.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2026/27, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: None |
| Course Start |
Semester 1 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
196 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Written Exam 0 %, Coursework 100 %, Practical Exam 0 %
There are two assignments in this course:
Position paper (40% of your final mark): You will write a position paper which extends the themes from Block 1 in a direction which is of personal or professional interest and relevance to you. (2000 words)
Open Educational Resource (60% of your final mark: 50% tutor assessed, 10% self-assessed) You will design, develop and present an Open Educational Resource for your peers, based on your position paper topic. You will receive formative feedback from peers, and have an opportunity to modify your Open Educational Resource and write a reflective commentary and allocate a self-assessment mark before final submission. The Open Educational Resource may be theoretical and exploratory, involve a critical perspective on a new technology or environment, or be a problem- or issue-based resource. It can use interactive elements, as well as textual, visual, audio or multimedia communication across a single or a range of environments. The main requirement of the resource is that it engages the rest of the class in considering, in a scholarly way, issues relevant to the course. (equivalent to 2000 words)
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| Feedback |
Not entered |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Critically analyse and situate new and emerging trends and technologies.
- Identify and conceptualise social, political and other factors influencing technological innovation in education.
- Critically engage with the potential of emerging technologies for learning.
- Demonstrate practical skill in the deployment of futures thinking for learning purposes.
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Reading List
These readings for September 2023 give a flavour of the course's approach to futures work and to the three themes explored that year (please note that all are available through the university's e-library). Course themes and readings change frequently, so this is indicative only.
Facer, K. (2016) ¿Using the Future in Education: Creating Space for Openness, Hope and Novelty¿, in Lees, H. E. and Noddings, N. (eds) The Palgrave International Handbook of Alternative Education. London: Palgrave Macmillan UK, pp. 63¿78.
Pollock, N. and Williams, R. (2010) ¿The business of expectations: How promissory organizations shape technology and innovation¿, Social Studies of Science, 40(4), pp. 525¿548. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/0306312710362275.
Cerratto Pargman, T., Lindberg, Y., & Buch, A. (2022). Automation Is Coming! Exploring Future(s)-Oriented Methods in Education. Postdigital Science and Education. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42438-022-00349-6
Prieto, J. de la F., Lacasa, P., & Martínez-Borda, R. (2022). Approaching metaverses: Mixed reality interfaces in youth media platforms. New Techno Humanities, 2(2), 136¿145. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techum.2022.04.004
Arora, P. (2019). Benign dataveillance? Examining novel data-driven governance systems in India and China. First Monday, 24(4). https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v24i4.9840
Puussaar, A., Montague, K., Peacock, S., Nappey, T., Anderson, R., Jonczyk, J., Wright, P., & James, P. (2022). SenseMyStreet: Sensor Commissioning Toolkit for Communities. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 6(CSCW2), Article CSCW2.
Kumar, A. (2019). Between metis and techne: Politics, possibilities and limits of improvisation. Social & Cultural Geography, 0(0), 1¿24. https://doi.org/10.1080/14649365.2019.1645201
Selwyn, N. (2023). Digital degrowth: Toward radically sustainable education technology. Learning, Media and Technology, 0(0), 1¿14. https://doi.org/10.1080/17439884.2022.2159978 |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Keywords | Futures thinking,Futures methods,Digital innovation,Future of learning,Open educational resources |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Prof Jen Ross
Tel: (0131 6)51 6133
Email: jen.ross@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Ms Annemarijn Huizinga
Tel:
Email: ahuizing@ed.ac.uk |
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