Proposal
Your innovation proposal should focus on your specific audience who may include, but may not be limited to, the administrators who will be affirming the completed innovation plan, your colleagues or peers you are hoping will be inspired to join you, and/or other stakeholders who have an interest in how the innovation will impact your learners.
Ideally, your innovation proposal should take the form of a 1-page letter because it will become part of your overall plan that you will be sharing with your audience.
The innovation proposal should address the following 5 key points:
Opportunity or problem that you have observed (that can be addressed as part of CEI)
How you will address the opportunity or solve the problem
What you are proposing to do (Pilot project… over what time frame)
Benefits of this solution
What are you asking for
Be prepared to revise and update as your ideas develop and your situation changes.
Letter Format Examples
https://stemtoolkit.weebly.com/project-proposal.html
https://sharplibrarian.weebly.com/innovation-plan.html
https://tashiamossman.wixsite.com/tmossman/innovation-proposal
Document Format Example (Depending on your audience and their expectations a more detailed document may be required).
http://www.patricknreid.com/2016/09/05/ipad-educational-opportunities/
Innovation Proposal Planning Tips
Begin with the end in mind, 100k view, learning outcomes, be clear about your purpose
Understand that the proposal will change based on situations, personnel, circumstances
Be flexible, adaptable, and patient, rest assured that things will not go as planned
Collaborate with others–get others on board with your ideas, key influencers
Start with a pilot/trial/focus group, don’t extend too far too fast
Plan forward, but do not map every step; fail forward opportunities are automatically built into innovation planning
Consider how you will measure success; what will be happening and what will others be doing
Completed Innovation Plan – Looking Ahead
Your innovation plan will include the following
Media Pitch – 2 minutes or less, capturing your project and Audience
Innovation Proposal Letter to District/Principal/School Board/Administration/Media
Literature support, 5+ resources
Implementation Outline, plan ahead for next steps over the next 12-24 months
Innovation Plan – a final post that narrates and summarizes your plan and includes links to all the above
Examples of how the innovation proposal will fit into the final innovation plan:
http://www.patricknreid.com/ipadopportunities/
Learner’s Mindset Discussions (LMD) Disruptive Innovation Hype Ep 02. We discuss how the notion of disruptive innovation is wrongly attributed to the traditional information transfer model of education. Using technology to make the transfer more efficient isn’t innovative nor is it disruptive.
Now, let’s take a look at some research…..
Diffusion of Innovations
The Law of Diffusion of Innovations provides an explanation about how the spread of ideas actually “spread.” Sinek (2009) states that early adopters are not necessarily innovators, but they do follow innovators after a method has been tried. These folks will try a new idea if, and only if, it has been tested first, hoping they will suffer the least consequences. This reminds me why most early adopter owners of iphones and android devices wait 2 weeks before they download a software update. They will eventually download the updated software after all of the kinks have been worked out and noted to the company. They perceive lesser risk involved. Likewise, these folks are not of the same mindset as innovators that will go to any length to be the first one to get a new device. The other side of the bell curve shows the laggards. The laggards are instinctively and rationally driven. They do not believe in owning the best and newest products; they believe in rebuilding or acquiring better parts for what they already own.
The Tipping Point
The tipping point occurs at which the growth becomes a need and moves ahead at an extraordinary pace. This is why it is essential to get the key influencers on board with your belief systems. Don’t try to incentivize others or manipulate them; allow them to formulate their own thoughts and beliefs and see how they relate to your own. Otherwise, you will attract only temporary folks, so watch your aim.
DOI as a Framework
Rogers’s (2003) DOI framework posits that the rate of adoption of a strategy is determined by perceptions of the adopters as they consider the attributes of the innovation. One of the primary perceptions that lead to adoption is that of relative advantage, or the idea that one product or strategy is superior to another. In the field of educational technology, Rogers’s (2003) DOI theory has frequently been used to determine teachers’ perceptions of new information and communications technology programs. In a study by Vanderlinde and van Braak (2011), a questionnaire to identify attributes of the new curriculum was administered to a sample of teachers using Rogers’s DOI framework. They found that the teachers did not specifically support or reject the new curriculum with relation to the learning environment conditions. However, the resulting information was helpful for administrators and decision makers in that it explicated the complex issues of new technology implementation. Though relative advantage of an innovation is important, the perceived drawbacks of the adoption (e.g., complexity) also play a role (Rogers, 2003). Therefore, perceptions of the complexity of integration can be a potential barrier to technology adoption. In a study conducted by Anthony (2012), the goal was to use activity theory as the framework for determining classroom systems and their influence on the integration of new technologies. Over a 3-year period, two classrooms were evaluated in the same school district in the area of teacher preparedness, institutional conditions, and the combination of the two. Findings from several studies have suggested that teacher perceptions, as well as student attitudes and beliefs, influenced the integration of new technologies and the perception of success by using technologies. Furthermore, Anthony found that effective technology leadership also played a large role in enhancing instructional experiences for the participating teachers and students. Anthony concluded that an integration system specifically designed to combine institutional goals with teacher perceptions and beliefs toward the adoption of technology could be the best way to integrate new technologies. Thus, a DOI framework is very appropriate of BYOD and one-to-one technology-integration strategies.
References
Anthony, A. B. (2012). Activity theory as a framework for investigating district–classroom system interactions and their influences on technology integration. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 44, 335-356.
Sinek, S. (2009). Start with why: How great leaders inspire everyone to take action. New York, NY: Penguin Group.
Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.). New York, NY: Free Press.
Vanderlinde, R., & van Braak, J. (2011). A new ICT curriculum for primary education: Flanders. Defining and predicting teachers’ perceptions of innovation attributes. Educational Technology & Society, 14, 124-135.
