Final Learning Glossary

 Innovation

Definition

Innovation is the purposeful adaptation of existing concepts, habits, or systems into context-specific behaviors that drive significant, sustained change. New ideas alone are not enough; a simple change in priorities, resources, and relations is necessary. It is an intentional re-organization of these factors that is responsive to the changing demands of educational and professional systems, which is true innovation.

Reflection

My first perspective on innovation was that of planned disruption: to be innovative, something new has to be introduced, not merely to cause a material change in general operations. Martin (1996) made me value this concept by showing that institutions are never excluded from determining what to retain and what to discard. Innovation is thus about the decision maker and the reason. I still feel that this is still true.

The difference in my mindset throughout this course is that I began asking a question to which I had never had an answer: ‘innovative to whom?’ The urgency of that question, as raised by the historical readings, was something I did not anticipate. The process of curriculum reforms in Canada as described by reading about how the agendas of the learners played a smaller role in the process than colonial agendas and foreign educational models in a way that Curtis (1997) and Tomkins (1981) each demonstrate that something might seem like innovation on the surface, but in reality, it is just perpetuating the same exclusions that existed previously. That was unpleasant to sit with, but I believe it is essential.

From the readings, I had already begun to perceive innovation as a strategy rather than an ethical commitment. Bourn (2021) discusses education in the context of hope and possibility, and Chanicka et al. (2018) relate real educational change to the involvement and inclusion of democracy. Reading both of them drove me to a definition of innovation that goes beyond what works, and towards what is right  and whether the people who are most affected by an educational system actually have any say in its creation.

Creativity

Definition

Creativity can be defined as the socially based capability to generate and develop new ideas in context. It is determined by individual thinking, environmental factors, and cultural tolerance of uncertainty and is subject to institutional and interpersonal judgment, which may either encourage or discourage its expression.

Reflection

The most interesting fact to me when I first wrote about creativity was the contradiction that Mueller et al. (2012) discovered in their study: that individuals always report wanting to think creatively, and when an actual creative idea presents itself, the automatic reaction is to withdraw from it because it seems dangerous or unknown. That tension shaped my original definition because it was close to the one I had witnessed in school. This is not accidental, and creative work is uncomfortable.

The course has made me consider more deeply the source of that discomfort. The  readings made me realize that it is not the individual learner’s willingness to take risks that is the problem, but rather the learning environment. Falkenberg (2012) discusses education as a space that should foster genuine curiosity and intellectual openness, and reading them made me wonder how little of that is actually built into the environment where learning happens. When learners are tested all the time, when failure is seen as something to avoid rather than learn from, it is nearly contradictory to ask learners to be creative.

The Indigenous perspective readings changed my mindset in a completely new way. Ball (2004) helped me understand that whenever we discuss creativity in education, we are often discussing only a very limited aspect of what human creativity really entails. Historically, some ways of knowing and making have been accepted as legitimate in formal schooling, while others have been treated as though they hardly existed. That is not an objective fact; it is an indication that many learners have been informed implicitly or explicitly that their natural way of thinking and creating does not count. My new definition seeks to label that reality rather than discuss creativity as though it were beyond such power dynamics.

Teaching

Definition

Teaching is a moral act of choice, arrangement, and the passing on of knowledge, values, and cultural practices from one generation to another. It is socially constructed through philosophical commitments concerning what is important, who is included, and what education is all about, and is held accountable for the content taught and the environments it provides for learners.

Reflection

My initial idea about teaching was that it is never only about content delivery. Martin (1996) provided me with a theoretical framework for that belief: the argument that teaching is always a process of selection and that selection always involves a set of values, known or unknown to the teacher. I based my early definition on that fact, and I still hold to it.

The historical readings demonstrated to me exactly how high the stakes of that choice are. Reading Curtis (1997) on colonial schooling in Lower Canada and Tomkins (1981) on the influence of foreign priorities on the Canadian curriculum helped me realize that the decisions made by teachers and curriculum developers are never purely pedagogical; they are always political. They decide which children feel like members of a classroom and which feel like foreigners in a system not designed to accommodate them. It must be a huge responsibility to be a teacher.

The philosophical readings highlighted a new aspect of teaching for me: the relational aspect. Seixas (1993) discusses communities of inquiry in which the teacher is no longer the authority on knowledge but rather the one who sets the environment for actual thinking. Osborne (2012) reflects on decades of teaching history and frames it as an invitation rather than a transfer of knowledge. The two concepts changed my mindset about what I actually do in front of a group of learners. Well, you do not know how to teach. I believe it is about the thought you empower the people in the room around you.

Learning

Definition

A learning process is dynamic, as it involves how individuals gain, understand, and internalize knowledge, skills, and values within specific cultural and relational environments. It is defined in accordance with what is seen and advocated by institutions and what the social, historical, and philosophical circumstances are that define what knowledge is authoritative and who is to be considered an authoritative knower.

Reflection

My initial definition of learning was based on Martin’s (1996) argument that whatever people learn is inseparable from what institutions consider worth knowing. I defined learning as an ongoing process and influenced by what organizations opt to focus on or avoid. In hindsight, I believe that was a fair starting point, but something was missing: it explained the system without actually explaining the person within it.

What changed for me most fundamentally is the Indigenous perspectives in Module 3. Ball (2004) and Louie et al. (2017) each forced me to confront the reality that formal education has not only chosen some knowledge over other knowledge, but has actively acted as though a whole way of knowing does not exist or does not count. It is not a disinterested institutional preference. It is a kind of exclusion that has real implications for real individuals, and it entails that when we speak about learning, we cannot dissociate the process from the question of whose humanity the system is actually built to acknowledge.

The historical readings further enriched this. Both Herbst (1999) and Cuban (2001) demonstrate that the definition and purpose of learning have changed several times throughout history, reflecting what society needed economically, politically, and culturally. It was a handy reminder that the current way I conceptualize learning is not an objective fact but a historically specific view that will continue to change. And the philosophical accounts brought me back to a point I believe is easily lost in much educational talk: that real learning transforms you. It is not accumulating information. It is concerning building another relationship with the world and with what you believed you knew. That is what I would like to continue working toward as a teacher, as well as one who still has so much to learn.

References

Ball, J. (2004). As if Indigenous knowledge and communities mattered: Transformative education in First Nations communities in Canada. American Indian Quarterly, 28(3–4), 454–479.

Bourn, D. (2021). Pedagogy of hope: Global learning and the future of education. International Journal of Development Education and Global Learning, 13(2), 65–78. https://doi.org/10.14324/IJDEGL.13.2.01

Chanicka, J., Mahari de Silva, R., & Merkley, K. (2018). An inclusive design vision for Canada: Schooling as a process for participatory democracy and responsible citizenship. Intercultural Education, 29(5–6), 632–646. https://doi.org/10.1080/14675986.2018.1508620

Cuban, L. (2001). Can historians help school reformers? Curriculum Inquiry, 31(4), 453–467. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-873X.t01-1-00207

Curtis, B. (1997). The state of tutelage in Lower Canada, 1835–1851. History of Education Quarterly, 37(1), 25–43. https://doi.org/10.2307/369903

Falkenberg, T. (2012). Teaching as contemplative professional practice. Paideusis, 20(2), 25–35.

Herbst, J. (1999). The history of education: State of the art at the turn of the century in Europe and North America. Paedagogica Historica, 35(3), 737–747. https://doi.org/10.1080/0030923990350308

Louie, D., Pratt, Y., Hanson, A., & Ottmann, J. (2017). Applying indigenizing principles of decolonizing methodologies in university classrooms. Canadian Journal of Higher Education, 47(3), 16–33.

Martin, J. R. (1996). There’s too much to teach: Cultural wealth in an age of scarcity. Educational Researcher, 25(2), 4–10. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X025002004

Mueller, J. S., Melwani, S., & Goncalo, J. A. (2012). The bias against creativity: Why people desire but reject creative ideas. Psychological Science, 23(1), 13–17. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797611421018

Osborne, K. (2012). A history teacher looks back. Canadian Historical Review, 91(1), 108–137.

Seixas, P. (1993). The community of inquiry as a basis for knowledge and learning: The case of history. American Educational Research Journal, 30(2), 305–324.

Tomkins, G. (1981). Foreign influences on curriculum and curriculum policy making in Canada: Some impressions in historical and contemporary perspective. Curriculum Inquiry, 11(2), 157–166.