Promoting students’ reflections in organisational improvisation arrangement between higher education and workplaces

Tiina Rautkorpi,Laura-Maija Hero

doi:10.3384/njvet.2242-458x.17711

Abstract

This article focuses on how experimentation-based pedagogy has been pursued by one Finnish university of applied sciences (UAS) in working life environments in the context of the Triple Helix. This article focuses on efforts to combine together situated learning, organisational improvisation and cultural-historical activity theory. In this higher education organisation, the students’ multidisciplinary innovation projects are used to improve the students’ skills in performing experiments with variations. The article demonstrates how pilot trainings were organised for teachers and their networks to equip them to project facilitators in a new mode of activity. It also reports on the undergraduates’ group demonstrations and evaluations based on a recent sample of their subsequent innovation projects. The small-scale content analysis was conducted to identify areas for further development. According to the activity theory, the crucial learning outcome of the UAS educational projects should be a collective reflection on practices. In addition, the two essentials of reflection and learning are the tools available for mirroring and continuous concept formation. According to the findings, there were prominent achievements in ethnographic fieldwork but more supportive arrangements and training is needed to promote especially the concept formation.

Highlights

At the largest university of applied sciences (UAS) in Finland, project-based learning is arranged by organising multidisciplinary innovation projects for third-year bachelor students
According to Cunha et al (1999, 318–322), constant readiness for quick reactions belongs to the culture of experimentation, and the new experimental way of acting is based on utilising diversity in encounter situations
To be more systematic and to obtain better results in the organisational improvisation-based UAS arrangement, the principles of double stimulation should be taken into account

Summary

Introduction

At the largest UAS in Finland, project-based learning is arranged by organising multidisciplinary innovation projects for third-year bachelor students. We developed a procedure for community living, providing a theory and some exercises on how to put it in practice This group wanted to step out of their comfort zone and to concentrate in an unprejudiced manner on the shared object, as follows: Collective Report B: We learned that a project plan is for making our thoughts clear and more structured and for giving the framework for carrying out the project. In 2015, when the end products were surpassing higher technical and business rates, there were some written evaluations, where the students had hardly any detailed considerations about their working process or their object, the project results can reveal their demanding fieldwork. The section concludes how the essentials for reflection among different participants of Triple Helix are perceived in the activity theory framework

Conclusions

Notes on contributors