Category Archives: European Ed Research Summer School

This category will be filled with my learning outcomes and pre and post reflections of the EERSS

Interactive Complexity Time Line Map

An incredible interactive map about how the concept of complexity and related issues have evolved throughout time.

I have seen this map before and I have even made a print to study it in more detail but I did not have access to the interactive version.
Thank you to Giorgio Bertini and his incredible project of Learning Change and the overwhelming amount of excellent resources he always is putting out there! Thank you so much for your generosity!!

Here is the link to an article where Katy Börmer explains this art of map making. And if you want to know more about her project of places & spaces here is the link to the web page.
She made a short film “Humanexus” together with other people. Here is the you tube video with the making of the film which I found fascinating.

I hope you enjoy it!


The role of theory in educational research. II part

Chapter 5: The necessity and violence of theory
Chapter 6: Bringing theory into educational research



Definitions of theory:

  • Theory are a kind of explanatory devices





Theory constructs the scholar and illuminates the data


The role of theory in educational research. I part


Chapter 2: Ignorance in educational research





Matrix of sociology inquiry

Phenomena under investigation
  • Social control
  • Social stratification
  • Status attainment
  • Bases of integration and
    differentiation: class,
    gender, race
  • Social relationships: groups,
    household, community
  • Social change






An interesting paragraph that summarises a research speech:



Questions for the EERSS


I am assisting to the European Educational Research Summer School in NTNU Norwegian University for Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway. For that I am doing some background readings in order to get the most out of it.

Question I would like to answer in that week are:

  1. What does it mean to choose pragmatism as my research approach?
  2. What is knowledge under such a premise? How is knowledge acquired? What would be a consistent or pertinent method I shall use in order to capture evidence of knowledge construction in students (what ever the students are: Prospective teachers or math high school students). How can we look at the pieces of knowledge students will produce while learning a subject (math)? Is it possible to create a knowledge artefact recolector? What framework can I use to interpret knowledge artefacts as the units of analysis to look for deep understanding?
  3. PLE are challenging environments to research due to their uniqueness, reflecting students’ needs and ways of learning. What would be a good approach to research in PLE? Can I see a PLE as a complex system?
  4.  Is the HCD a good consistent approach to gather information about what young students expect from their math classroom, math lesson, math teacher, technology use in the learning experience, how they use technology daily, what they expect from technology in their daily life, do they really want to be social connected in the academic environment, to see the emergent needs of young students regarding the learning of math (a way of creating the future), what are the patterns that are emerging in the field (where should I look for this information).Do students see social media as learning tools?
    User participation by means of self-documentation. How to design the probes that will research this self-documentation. Look at the daily factors of students learning lives.  Look into HCD page in cultural probes. It is in the readings of class 3.
    FrogDesign: Help communities to solve problems, generate solutions, connect resources and pool knowledge to solve a challenge and create change
  5. The nature of learning is changing. It is more dynamic and the social tools do foster this dynamism. It is more social, more collaborative. It is not a readymade thing any more it is a constructed experience between teacher and learners. The emphasis is on the learner experience, on his/her performance of learning.
    To transfer the open-minded innate approach of using social media into a structured learning environment requires a careful examination of the tools, the student, the affordances, amongst others. “Patterns of use are complex” Luckins et al. 2009