Computers & Education 69 (2013) 496–499

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Computers & Education

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The role of design and enactment patterns in orchestration:Helping to integrate technology in blended classroom ecosystems

Yannis Dimitriadis*, Luis P. Prieto, Juan I. Asensio-PérezGSIC/EMIC Group, University of Valladolid, Spain

Keywords:OrchestrationIntegration of digital and conventionalresourcesClassroom ecosystemPatterns

* Corresponding author.E-mail address: yannis@tel.uva.es (Y. Dimitriadis).

0360-1315/$ – see front matter � 2013 Elsevier Ltd. Ahttp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2013.04.004

a b s t r a c t

Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL) researchers have been using the word ‘orchestration’ for a numberof different reasons in the last years. From this variety of meanings in which it is employed, the notion oforchestration emerges as the appropriation and integration of the different available technologies inclassroom practice. This paper introduces the role of patterns (i.e., recurrent solutions to commonproblems) and other researcher artifacts (e.g., representations of orchestration) in developing both neweducational technologies and interventions that are easier to appropriate/integrate. We also discussother open questions around orchestration, which are still being discussed in the TEL community.

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1. Introduction

Orchestration is currently a popular term in Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) (see Prieto, Abdulwahed, Holenko-Dlab, Balid, &Gutiérrez, 2011; Sutherland & Joubert, 2010). In that domain, the orchestration metaphor has appeared as a proposal by Dillenbourg, Fischerand others in various occasions, during the mid-2000’s (see, for example, Dillenbourg, Järvelä, & Fischer, 2009). Since then, the adopters ofthis new concept have seen in it several interesting innovative elements:

� A generalization of the lifecycle or inquiry cycle in the use of ICT in education (as, e.g., design, instantiation, enactment, evaluation, seeGómez Sánchez et al., 2009)

� An analogy to the orchestration (and choreography) metaphors in service-oriented architectures� A movement towards a new blended version of teacher or student-centric procedures that promotes the need of teacher empowermentor more persistent and ambitious professional development programs

� A more pragmatic approach in pushing TEL into practice, taking into account and aiming to provide an answer to the contextualconstraints that restrict a sustainable adoption of innovative TEL

� A newmodel, representation, or view regarding the integration of multiple actors, tools and data artifacts at various levels; social (fromindividual to community), tool-related (local or third party) or scenario-related (classroom, field, augmented reality, web-based,3D, etc.).

In much of the earlier work on orchestration, Dillenbourg himself and other TEL researchers use the term “orchestration”inclusively, mentioning some of the aforementioned interpretations (Prieto, Abdulwahed, et al., 2011). However, recently,Dillenbourg (2013) makes a more narrow interpretation of the orchestration term, as “how a teacher manages in real-time multi-layered activities in a multi-constraints context”, referring mostly to a physical classroom. Besides that, in this position paper Dil-lenbourg proposes a set of functionalities related to orchestration, together with constraints to shape the needs and uses of class-room orchestration.

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Therefore, onemight also consider the classroom orchestration problem to solve, as one of “optimization based on constraints”, inwhichthe teacher aims to orchestrate the classroom (instantiating, monitoring, reacting, assessing, etc.), and the researchers provide tools ordesign principles to support teachers and students. As Sharples (2013) mentions, from a technological standpoint this might give rise to an“orchestration layer”, which reminds us also of the equivalent middleware layers employed in Telematics or in CSCW, regarding the sep-aration of levels that allows for better communication, solutions at a given level, standardization, etc. but, at the same time, introduceadditional complexity and overheads.

From these discussions we can see a new trend raising, which we believe lies in the heart of the use of the “orchestration” term: that ofhow teachers (and/or students) appropriate and integrate in their practice the different technologies at their disposal (either digital or paper-based, generic or “intended for orchestration”). This relationship between orchestration and integration can be connected to the conceptof “classroom as a complex technological ecosystem” (Luckin, 2008), and is exemplified by the title of a workshop on orchestration that washeld at the International Conference on Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL 2011): “How to integrate CSCL in classroom life:Orchestration”. In this response paper we delve into this aspect of “orchestration as integration of technologies in the classroom”, drawingfrom Dillenbourg’s position paper, as well as from our own research work. Furthermore, we highlight the importance of research artifacts inorder to develop orchestration technologies and interventions, and we briefly summarize our take on several issues, which are still underdiscussion in the TEL community.

2. Design and enactment patterns in orchestration

We have studied the integration of new technologies in real classrooms (with all their contextual restrictions) and how lessons wereorchestrated using these technologies. More concretely, our two-year work with a primary school, observing how a new, simple collabo-rative technology was integrated with other tools like pen and paper or digital whiteboards in usual curriculum lessons, has provided someinsights about this problem. As mentioned in Prieto, Villagrá-Sobrino, Jorrín-Abellán, Martínez-Monés, and Dimitriadis (2011), uses andcombinations of tools by teachers in the observed classrooms were highly “routinized”. These small-scale pedagogical patterns wereemployed in professional development efforts and they were proved useful in our attempts to foster reflective design and enactment ofcollaborative learning activities. In fact, similar results have been gathered from an independent project at SRI International (see Prieto,Villagrá-Sobrino, Dimitriadis, et al., 2011), where small, actionable pedagogical patterns have been found to be a good way of fosteringthe use of new technologies (e.g. clickers or Group Scribbles1) to enhance science learning in schools.

This line of work thus suggests that, in order to obtain better-orchestrated classrooms that make use of innovative TEL tools, not onlyappropriate technologies have to be provided, but also best practices, principles and advice (in our case, exemplified by design and enactmentpatterns) on how those tools can be integrated with the existing “classroom ecosystem”, and within the complex set of constraints that teachershave to face (time limits, curriculum, disciplinary concerns, etc.). Going back to one of the examples provided by Dillenbourg, the Tinker Lamp,we could imagine it being introduced in many logistics schools. We suggest that providing the school with the technology could becomplemented with providing teachers with easily digestible and actionable advice onways of using it (along with other existing classroomtechnologies) that have proved successful, and which may not be obvious to teachers approaching the new technology. Dillenbourg himselfmentions a number of practices that could be easily formulated as small-scale patterns: “copying the layout information to the whiteboardto discuss it with the larger group”, “taking the design to a real warehouse and comparing them”, “using POKs to elicit students reasoningbefore running the simulation”, etc. Nevertheless, the elicitation of the above-mentioned small-scale patterns requires the (typicially costly)observation and analysis of teacher practice in authentic settings. Additionally, the generalization and application of these orchestrationpatterns is highly contextual (e.g., in primary vs. higher education). In Prieto, Villagrá-Sobrino, Dimitriadis and Jorrín-Abellán (2013), theauthors propose a method for the elicitation, classification, combination and application of small-scale design and enactment patterns fororchestration. The method has been successfully put in practice in several professional development workshops for teachers in primary andhigher education.

3. The role of research artifacts

Apart from the aforementioned problem of integration of new technologies in real classroom settings and practice, there is anotheraspect in Dillenbourg’s proposal which we believe is worth highlighting: the value of the orchestration and the related artifacts (such as theactivities and constraints classifications) as conceptual tools for us, researchers, to understand, define and communicate with each other aboutcurrent classroom practice and our own interventions. These frameworks and artifacts can also help researchers in proposing new solutions forreal classrooms. In this same light could be seen the “5þ3 Aspects” conceptual framework for orchestration mentioned in Prieto,Abdulwahed, et al. (2011), or the routine-based representation of classroom practices that appears in Prieto, Villagrá-Sobrino, Jorrín-Abellán, et al. (2011), which is also reproduced in Fig. 1.

4. Open issues and parting remarks

Since commenting on all the aspects of Dillenbourg’s proposal would far exceed the scope of this short answer paper, we will finish byproviding a few parting remarks summarizing our own take on orchestration, based on the prior work of the GSIC/EMIC research group(Dimitriadis, 2011) and recent review of the existing literature related to orchestration in Technology-Enhanced Learning (Prieto,Abdulwahed, et al., 2011).

1. Orchestration in the classroom vs. other contexts: Orchestration in physical classrooms is significant and affects indeed a largeamount of students and teachers all over the world. However, as Sharples mentions, learning activities do not only take place within the

1 http://groupscribbles.sri.com (Last visit: 10 Apr 2012).

Fig. 1. Visual representation of classroom orchestration, in terms of small-scale pedagogical patterns (routines), as observed during the enactment of a real primary school activity.

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walls of a classroom or with local tools.Within the concept of “ubiquitous learning” (Bruce, 2008), TELmay involve augmented reality or“ambient technology” elements (such as many of the exciting artifacts proposed and developed by Dillenbourg’s team), virtual web-based tools, virtual 3D worlds, field trips or home-based mobile-learning devices. Thus, there is also a need to orchestrate beyondthe activities of the physical classroom and provide efficient solutions for a wider range of scenarios, taking into account transitions,mirroring phenomena, or overlapping between different spaces. This wider view is intrinsically more complex, but at least it should betaken into account by TEL research.

2. Importance of design principles and other design-oriented research artifacts: Dillenbourg argues that studies in orchestration couldeventually derive in a set of design principles that could be used by researchers, instructional designers or technology providers. In hispaper he offers several examples of design interventions in technology-enhanced classrooms, together with attempts to provide anabstraction of these design “ideas or principles”. This bottom-up type of studies is very useful and may form the basis for a morecoherent framework of classroom orchestration. We have performed similar research in the design field for the last few years and wehave proposed several “mediating artifacts” that may be useful not only for researchers but also for teachers. Examples of thesemediating artifacts include “design patterns” and “enactment routines”, which we have briefly presented above.

3. Design – in or out of orchestration? The term “design for classroom orchestration” implicitly means that design is not part of theorchestration itself. We do believe that design and other forms of lesson planning is intrinsically interleaved with the “real-timemanagement” (i.e., the instantiation and enactment) of learning, even if teachers (as opposed to, e.g., instructional designers in an openand distance learning university) sometimes do not have enough time to perform explicitly a formal learning design. Thus, moreattention should be paid to the role of design, even if the orchestration term is used in amore restrictive sense, while there is a need for adeeper analysis of the complementary roles of design and real-time management within the complete learning activity lifecycle.

4. Sustainability and “modest computing”: Monitoring, assessment, mirroring, scaffolding, etc. are illustrated effectively by Dillenbourgin several examples, showing the importance of contingent teaching (Beatty, Gerace, Leonard, & Dufresne, 2006) and the eventual roleof technology in scenarios of collaborative and/or inquiry learning. The use of different devices built ad-hoc is innovative and useful.However, one may question whether these complex ad-hoc technologies are really sustainable. We would also argue for the use of“modest” technology, which may be sustainable in time and especially for the one based on paper (see, e.g., the “paper orchestrationkeys” in one of Dillenbourg’s examples). We support the use of paper-based elements, as they are already integrated in most teachers’routines. As an additional example, paper cards depicting patterns and routines have also proven to be very useful in our professionaldevelopment workshops that take advantage of the aforementioned routines (Prieto, Villagrá-Sobrino, Jorrín-Abellán, et al., 2011).

Overall, we would like to highlight the importance of finding novel and effective ways of promoting the integration and appropriation ofinnovative research-based tools (patterns and routines being only some of the possible options, as the technologies proposed by Dillenbourg

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also are), as a way of attaining better-orchestrated classrooms. Many of the researchers involved in this discussion have shown that theyunderstand and share this view, which might be a worthy message to spread among the rest of the TEL community, even if we do notmanage to agree completely on what is orchestration, and what isn’t.

Acknowledgements

This research has been partially funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness Projects TIN2008-03023, TIN2011-28308-C03-02 and the Autonomous Government of Castilla and León Project VA293A11-2.

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