Implementing digital individual development planning in teacher education: the challenges of communication in relation to the development of ICT‐supported methods

Abstract

This paper presents a study of the experiences of a group of teacher educators during the 2006–2007 academic year, when they participated in a project to try out and implement digital individual development planning (which in Swedish is digital ‘Individuella Utvecklings‐Planer’ or IUP) in a teacher education faculty at a Swedish university. The project group consisted of seven female teacher educators and three colleague mentors. They shared their experiences of the project and how they viewed their roles in the implementation process through individual narrative interviews. In order to illuminate how the attributes of digital IUP were perceived and how these attributes were communicated within the faculty, the data were analysed in the light of Rogers' (2003) diffusion of innovation theory. Furthermore, concepts of symbolic capital from Bourdieu (1984) were used in analysing the teacher educators' positions as change agents. The article presents a discussion of the circumstances in which digital IUP promotes reflective dialogue. Furthermore, it illuminates the change process and the participants as change agents from a power relations perspective, highlighting communication and shared pedagogical visions.

Keywords:

• teacher education
• ICT
• individual development planning
• diffusion of innovation