Methodological Challenges When Exploring Digital Learning Spaces in Education

Over the last decade, the practices by which scholarly knowledge is produced--both within and across disciplines--have been substantially influenced by the appearance of digital information resources, communication networks and technology enhanced research tools. Viewed from a methodological perspective, the rich ICT-based environment in educational settings influences research methods, ethics and the general conduct of research. Methodological Challenges When Exploring Digital Learning Spaces in Education represents a collection of work of established academics as well as emerging early career researchers all of whom focus on various methodological challenges. From numerous perspectives, the chapters in this volume deal with three particularly demanding challenges for educational research in digital learning contexts. The first challenge concerns how research manages to explore networked learning within a multi-faceted ICT environment. What kind of research designs and forms of data collection are able to grasp this complexity of multiple learning taking place within these contexts? The second challenge deals with how researchers experience the research context and interact with various actors within these settings. How to capture and understand interaction between contexts and across different dimensions of contexts in time and space? And finally, the third challenge is about exploring how children make meaning across physical places and virtual spaces. All together, these challenges are questioning the traditional research methods that we use and are familiar with. This volume is devoted to stimulating debate about the various methodological challenges facing the researcher in the digital sphere of educational research, and furthermore, exploring what kind of new methodological approaches these challenges impose. It is aimed at students, researchers and academics within education and those working with learning across disciplines and contexts interested in methodological issues.