It entails role clarity, identifying and accepting personal differences, and dealing with conflicts so the group can move ahead (Jagues & Salmon, 2007; Schauppenlehner-Kloyber & Penker, 2015). Retrieved from http://integralleadershipreview.com/4758-feature-article-integral-leadership%E2%80%99s-potential-to-position-poverty-within-transdisciplinarity1. It empowers you to see tangible correlations across subject matters rather than view each in a silo. They explained that the process starts with individual needs, shifts to group needs (establishing rules and norms), and ends with task needs (working together). (2015). Sixth, the results of the transdisciplinary team work have to be disseminated and diffused to relevant audiences, who in turn have to promote and apply them. In P. Gibbs (Ed.). Fourth, the higher the degree of familiarity among group members, the better the chance for meta-knowledge to form; that is, members can learn about each others expertise. At the final stage, adjourning, the group dissolves either because it accomplished its goals or because members lost interest, motivation or could no longer work together. All learning content is divided into four levels of management and six zones of leadership. In order for cognitive and social factors to interact, transdisciplinary teams have to manage conflicting approaches; clarify and negotiate stakeholders differences; compromise; communicate in a systematic fashion; and, engage in mutual, common, and joint learning activities (Baturalp, 2014; Klein, 2008). Journal of Curriculum Studies, 38(3), 251-271. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220270500422632, Science Education Resource Center at Carleton College. New York, NY: SUNY Press. In their 2020 Future Work Skills report, The Institute for the Future think tank emphasizes the need for the skills transdisciplinarity develops: Many of todays global problems are just too complex to be solved by one specialized discipline (think global warming or overpopulation). Third, participants can create models that facilitate shared understandings and mutual learning. Because transdisciplinary knowledge creation has an experimental and social character, team members need to appreciate that co-production of knowledge is a socially-mediated process of [concrete] problem solving based on experimentation, learning and context specificity (Popa et al., 2015, p. 48). Members of the transdisciplinary group retain their own disciplinary or sector-specific identity while embracing a commonly-developed thought style unique to this group. The common group modelling approach to integration best ensures eventual agreement on the outcome. Reflexivity is a two-way relationship between something. New York, NY: Earthscan. Dinc, I. The research project or transdisciplinary enterprise culminates in a synthesis of reprocessed, related and brought together contributions emergent during the team work. Creativity and organizational learning as a means to foster sustainability. Brown, V. A., & Harris, J. Day, along with a panel of federal educators and practitioners at the Smithsonian's National Education Summit on July 27-28, 2022. in collaboration with disciplines that could work together on composite solutions to the challenge. Transdisciplinary problems: The teams addressing them and their support through team coaching. Indeed, Schauppenlehner-Kloyber and Penker (2015) added group dynamics as a key factor of effective collaboration, predicated on the assumption that transdisciplinary groups move through four stages: (a) the latent and informal emergence of a need, and then an explicit call, for transdisciplinary work; (b) collaborative problem framing and team building; (c) co-production of solution-oriented and transferable knowledge; and, (d) the integration and application of the knowledge produced. Like Defila and Di Giulio (2015), Pohl and Hirsch Hadorn (2008) also recommended that transdisciplinary stakeholders turn to Rossini and Porters (1981) typology of integration, an act that can be enriched by using one of four recommended integration facilitation strategies. Transdisciplinary research: Characteristics, quandaries and quality. Evaluation of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research. They wrote: Problems that are relevant to peoples lives, communities, or society, as a whole, often cross disciplinary boundaries, making them inherently engaging and interesting. (2017). The IWG is co-led by Louie Lopez and Jorge Valdes, with support from Executive Secretary Emily Kuehn. And unfortunately, any attempts to solve these problems often create new problems, yet but everyone feels something must be done (Brown, Harris, & Russell, 2010; Pohl & Hirsch Hadron, 2008; McGregor, 2012). (Ed.). These premises and research protocols and strategies were employed in this study. With this approach to integration, knowledge is generated by the group that acts and learns as a whole. Terms of Use These dynamics require people who are experienced in leading group processes, whether they are team members or external facilitators (Schauppenlehner-Kloyber & Penker, 2015). Failure to account for these issues compromises group dynamics, and, by association, the extent and quality of transdisciplinary collaboration. Whats actually new about trandisciplinarity? For clarification, transdisciplinary thought styles facilitate going beyond disciplinary or societal boundaries to develop original problem solving trajectories for the creation of hybrid knowledge. In more detail, common group learning best ensures a consensus with the final outcome (the new transdisciplinary knowledge). In fact, there was no real government interest or control over the education system in most countries until the last 100 years or so. A single disciplinary approach has limitations, particularly as it is concerned with the norms of that one particular discipline, ignoring other disciplines contributions to the issue or potential solutions. A transdisciplinary program should begin by identifying a complex, multifaceted, global problem (e.g., Global Grand Challenges, National Academy of Engineering Grand Challenges, Humanitarian Grand Challenge, etc.) Natures Sciences Socits, 16(2), 111-121. Appreciating that integration at disciplinary boundaries may not be enough anymore, the transdisciplinary team can, second, achieve integration by embedding stakeholders in the problem being examined. This article considers the opportunities and . Nicolescu, B. They co-construct a negotiated and shared knowledge though the act of transdisciplinary intelligence, understood to be the linking of ideas with each other. [When this happens], the perspectives can begin to interact. To analyze the concept of transdisciplinarity and provide an enhanced definition of transdisciplinarity in health care. All participants can hold onto their own worldview (identity), but they must be prepared to link the teams integrative perspective into their own identity (Defila & Di Giulio, 2015). Her professional and scholarly work is available at http://www.consultmcgregor.com. It ensures that people are not stymied by the preliminary state of knowledge when coming into and moving through the transdisciplinary integrative process. Kennedy, M. (2007). Focus on worldviews. In this process, members of the group remain themselves while at the same time understanding the others, and making progress with them toward a common understanding (i.e., a common learning) (Kly et al., 2015). An example is occasions when non-academic knowledge informs the design of a transdisciplinary project but is excluded when creating integrated knowing. Another example is when non-academic knowledge is ignored when the joint enterprise is initiated, but expected to be used when the common result is created (Defila & Di Giulio, 2015; Pohl & Hirsch Hadorn, 2008). Finally, when developing the program, ensure the curriculum is transdisciplinary rather than interdisciplinary. Convergence education and a transdisciplinary approach to teaching and learning helps students develop critical reasoning skills, systemic understanding of complex issues, scientific literacy, perspective taking, and consensus building, all as they plan and carry out local actions for social good. Transdisciplinary collaboration in designing patient handling/transfer assistive devices: Current and future designs. No one perspective, discipline, or world view constitutes a privileged place from which to understand the world or these intractable problems (Nicolescu, 2010, 2014). Whilst the teachers are united in their ambition for establishing a curriculum that gives greater status to the arts, curriculum integration presents significant challenges, notably in how subject knowledge is understood and presented within an integrated curriculum. She published Transformative Practice in 2006. Defila and Di Giulio (2015) suggested that Rossini and Porters (1981) typology of four approaches to integration is the only one that is actually used in transdisciplinary research (see also Pohl & Hirsch Hadorn, 2008): common group learning, system (group modelling), negotiation, and delegation (integration by leader), with a fifth approach, collective intelligence, added by Cunningham (2009). Design: Risk Analysis, 13(2), 8-24. The third feature of transdisciplinary reflexivity is social experimentation and social learning processes. Respecting this assertion, transdisciplinarity is about dialogue and engagement across ideologies, scientific, religious, economic, political and philosophical lines (Shrivastava & Ivanaj, 2011, p. 85). We develop resources to support educators as they move from disciplinary to transdisciplinary teaching and learning along the pathway to convergence. But boundaries between the disciplines now operate in concert with the processes of cross fertilization, alliances, and the cross-pollination of ideas and skills (Songca, 2006). Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 76(19), 1138-1149. Cookie Settings. Sustainable communication as an inter-and transdisciplinarity discipline. (2015). At its core, two things are necessary in convergence research: 1) It must be deeply collaborative, involving a deep integration of disciplines; and 2) It results in a positive societal impact. Handbook of transdisciplinary research. (2006), who distinguish it from personal reflection). Transdisciplinary collaboration involves the interaction of both cognitive and social factors. The goal of the present Research Topic is to provide a forum where research groups, investigating teaching and teachers from multiple perspectives involving multidisciplinary (i.e., different disciplines working on different aspects of a problem independently within their disciplinary boundaries), interdisciplinary (i.e., restructuring and integrating existing disciplinary approaches to . Vasquez, J. Transdisciplinary learning requires that all teachers are involved and collaborate. Transdisciplinary knowledge (the common result of collaboration) cannot emerge from collaborative enterprises unless the integration and synthesis of divergent contributions to addressing the problem is facilitated. You can also use some experiential learning approach-based activities. In order for common learning to occur during transdisciplinary work, team members have to unlearn many things, a collaborative offering that requires humility and modesty. The results help people understand how the literature conceptually frames a phenomenon. Rather than inventorying the documents gleaned from this process, results of the conceptual literature review will be shared in a narrative, organized by the most common conceptual threads emergent from the literature. In the context of education, learning needs to be more about the development of skills to work with people in other disciplines with other points of view (the process) so that viable alternative solutions can be created to support innovation. Group processes running out of control can seriously endanger transdisciplinary research [and work] (Penker & Muhar, 2015, p. 143). Malden, MA: Blackwell. Through interdisciplinarity, students can look at the same theme, issue, or topic from the perspectives of different, individual disciplines. Proitz, T., Mausethagen, S., & Skedsmo, G. (2015, September). It is a highly demanding task without which transdisciplinary collaborative work cannot happen. Transdisciplinarity: Joint problem solving among science, technology, and society. To work best, this collaborative work is characterized by reflexivity, which Polk defined as on-going scrutiny of the choices that are made when identifying and integrating diverse values, priorities, worldviews, expertise and knowledge (2015, p. 114). : Towards an analytical framework. These future users are intricate to the research project. However, one of the key competencies for the 21st century is to . Klein, J. T., Grossenbacher-Mansuy, W., Hberli, R., Bill, A., Scholz, R., & Welti, M. In addition to information and knowledge, transdisciplinary collaboration may also have to include social, cultural, aesthetic, spiritual, and religious considerations (Baturalp, 2015; Nicolescu, 2014). Often used in combination, these five approaches to integration are complementary rather than mutually exclusive (Defila & Di Giulio, 2015). Futures, 65(1), 55-71. Rossini, F. A., & Porter, A. L. (1981). Newig (2007) indicated that group processes can be more effectively managed if several key aspects of collaboration are accounted for: fairness of any procedures, transparency of the process, open communications, early involvement, joint determination of process rules, impartiality of mediation, and openness regarding any decisions to be made within and by the group. Awards Ceremony Highlights the Range and Influence of Smithsonian Education for Teachers and Students, A New Smithsonian Guide for How You Can Make Your Daily Routine More Sustainable, 2023 Smithsonian Magazine Stage two helps form the basis for team cohesiveness in that people deal with disagreements, resistance, defensiveness, unsureness, and vested concerns. Those engaged in such work can benefit from the results of conceptual literature reviews, which help map the terrain of particular phenomenon; in this case, transdisciplinary collaboration. While throughout the 20th century, ever-greater specialization was encouraged, the next century will see transdisciplinary approaches take center stage. They describe the desired future workers as needing to speak language of multiple disciplines, with an in-depth understanding of one or more fields but also able to converse in the language of a broader range of disciplines.. Futures, 42(10), 1146-1155. (2010). Analysis for radical design. Required fields are marked *. Individual and collective diversities deeply affect communications and collaborations during transdisciplinary work. Principles of designing transdisciplinary research. McGregor, S. L. T. (2015). At the third stage, norming, a sense of common identity and purpose begin to emerge, manifested in growing consensus, cohesion, and comfortableness with each other. (2011). Divisional challenges include the requirement of cooperating and coordinating between different disciplines and creating cohesiveness across the program. No matter what you call it, this type of teaching is important to prepare todays students for tomorrows complex world. The ideal size seems to be between 4-12 members, and the more constant the number stays, the higher the chance of group integration and positive dynamics. Success of transdisciplinary learning can be blocked if course quality is poor, if training and aid for educators is negligible, or if specialty biases arise. Springer. It revealed four overarching issues: (a) managing group processes, (b) reflexivity, (c) the common learning process, and (d) facilitating integration and synthesis (see Figure 2). Instead of university scholars determining the research questions and research design, these decisions are made jointly (Pohl & Hirsch Hadorn, 2008). (2010). In order to have effective activities in an inclusive setting, the group has to work through an intensive and ongoing collaboration. Learning in groups. | READ MORE, Dr. Carol ODonnell is Director of the Smithsonian Science Education Center, dedicated to transforming K-12 Education through Science in collaboration with communities across the globe. And, using a 'building' approach to knowledge, learning by relating one thing to another, may offer a key to being able to think in a truly interdisciplinary way. Penker, M., & Muhar, A. Research in physical medicine and rehabilitation II: The conceptual review of the literature and how to read more articles than you ever wanted to see in your entire life. However, the standard. 2009. This approach helps ensure broad-based support for the final integrated product (but does so at the expense of full integration) (Rossini & Porter, 1981). DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-56185-1, Levinson, M. (2016, January 21). Framing a socially relevant problem entails assuming a critical stance toward fellow members understandings, values and assumptions. (2015). Doing your literature review: Traditional and systematic techniques. They proposed that transdisciplinary reflexivity has four features. These may or may not be the same people. Teaching in Higher Education, 21(4), 471-483. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13562517.2016.1155549, Nikitina, S. (2006) Three strategies for interdisciplinary teaching: contextualizing, conceptualizing, and problemcentring. Institutional challenges to implementing transdisciplinary programs include the complexities in coordinating such programs, buy-in from administration, the time and effort involved in putting programs together, funding concerns, and recruiting stakeholders from within divisions and departments. The transdisciplinary integration of STEM teaching and learning across STEM fields and with other fields such as the humanities and the arts enriches all fields and draws learners to authentic challenges from local to global in scale. (OSTP, 2018, p 20). Those involved in the enterprise create one or more models (like decision trees or flowcharts) that mediate the co-production of new knowledge. Jones C. Interdisciplinary approach- advantages, disadvantages, and the future benefits of interdisciplinary studies. (2001). Transdisciplinary group developmental stages. When approaching a conceptual literature review, it is common for the researcher to already have several important articles at hand. Classroom examples help spotlight what this framework can look like in practice. As these diverse perspectives are processed, common learning occurs. Your Privacy Rights Because the team comprises academics and non-academics, channels of information and knowledge dissemination have to be developed to reach all target audiences (Defila & Di Giulio, 2015). Brown, V. A., Harris, J. Common learning happens when the group achieves a thought collective, or a common thought style all their own (Kly et al., 2015, p. 76). Instead of being an outside observer, all members of the team would experience the problem first hand (Wickson et al., 2006). Integrated learning is the most rudimentary level of collaboration across disciplines. Disciplinary boundaries What are they and how they can be transgressed? These life-world problems are especially relevant for those experiencing the issue or those dealing with the fallout and consequences of it being inadequately addressed. In P. Gibbs (Ed.). A transdisciplinary consensus entails the research team arriving at a shared framing of the problem, agreed-to objectives they all equally want to reach, shared questions, and a joint understanding of how to answer the questions (or at least the need to address the issue). Rethinking science for sustainable development: Reflexive interaction for a paradigm of transformation. Integral Leadership Review, 15(3) http://integralleadershipreview.com/13135-616-the-nicolescuian-and-zurich-approaches-to-transdisciplinarity/. Image used with the authors written permission. This results in building meaningful and enduring understandings for students. https://serc.carleton.edu/sp/library/interdisciplinary/what.html, Your email address will not be published. (2010). Examples are poverty and inequalities, hunger, violence, disease, unsustainability, and uneven wealth and income distribution. These conceptual threads reflect Polks (2015) aforementioned five challenges: inclusion in the group, collaboration within a group, group reflexivity, and knowledge integration, and knowledge usability. Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning. This goal can be compromised. Oxford handbook of interdisciplinarity. Marketing Education Review, 15(2), 81-94. She is Docent in Home Economics at the University of Helsinki, a Kappa Omicron Nu Research Fellow (leadership), an The ATLAS Transdisciplinary Fellow, and an Associate Member of Sustainability Frontiers. Other scholars agree, recognizing that transdisciplinary learning is based on equal dignity and right relationships (Hartling, Linder, Britton, & Spalthoff, 2013). This recursive approach helps the work move forward. They provide a platform upon which to integrate the dynamics that will shape the outcome (Rossini & Porter, 1981). Hartling, L. M., Linder, E. G., Britton, M., & Spalthoff, U. Both disciplinary knowledge and non-academic knowledge (also called life-world or local expert knowledge) should be taken into account when new knowledge from the transdisciplinary enterprise is synthesized. Berlin, Germany: Birkhuser Verlag. (2017). Baturalp, T. B. While leveraging a vast amount of information, this approach runs the risk of too much information, leading to compromised knowledge integration. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Your email address will not be published. McMillan, H. S., Morris, M. L., & Atchley, E. K. (2011). Transdisciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches to teaching and learning offer occasions to consider the same issue from different disciplinary perspectives. These challenges mirror the special qualities of transdisciplinary collaboration. Sustainable Development, 22(3), 205-216. International Journal of African Renaissance Studies, 1(2), 221-232. A conceptual literature review revealed four conceptual threads: (a) managing group processes, (b) reflexivity, (c) common learning process, and (d) facilitating integration and synthesis. The Smithsonian and other federal agencies that support STEAM teachers are here to help. Paper prepared for the International Symposium on Research Across Boundaries. Acknowledging these group formation stages, Collins and Fillery-Travis (2015) recommended team coaching as a way to ensure that the substantial psychological investment required to join a transdisciplinary team is respected. In social processes like transdisciplinary group work, reflexivity is a collaborative process of acknowledgement, critical deliberation and mutual learning on values, assumptions and understandings that enable members of the group to create new meanings, new rules for interacting with each other (heuristics), and new identities within the transdisciplinary group (Popa, Guillermin, & Dedeurwaerdere, 2015, p. 47). Yeung, R. (2015). 235-253). New York, NY: Springer. Finally, transdisciplinary reflexivity depends on the critical and transformational aspects of collaboration. Transdisciplinarity requires collaboration between disciplines to create a cohesive curriculum in which students collaborate to solve multifaceted problems. Disciplines are often characterised by different paradigms, methods and research approaches (Lowe & Phillipson, 2009); failure to recognise or acknowledge such differences has been identified as. Transdisciplinary collaborative work has several special qualities (see Figure 1). Nicolescu (2011) goes further, positing that the resultant transdisciplinary knowledge is alive and in flux, because those co-creating it are alive and always changing as the team work unfolds. Those engaged in such work can benefit from the results of conceptual literature reviews, which contain synthesized data from selective literature. Webster, J., & Watson, R. T. (2002). Pohl and Hirsch Hadorn (2008) called this mutual learning (p.114), arguing that the core challenge of transdisciplinary research is concurrently understanding the diverse scientific and societal views of problems while integrating diverse insights. Fifth, group dynamics are further improved if the group exhibits strong group reflexivity (i.e., meta-reflection), defined as their ability to (a) reflect on the transdisciplinary groups objectives, strategies, and processes, coupled with their ability to (b) use this knowledge to adapt to their context and circumstances. Johannesburg, South Africa: Real African Publishers. Futures, 38(9), 1046-1059. Day This conceptual literature review identified four key challenges to transdisciplinary collaboration: (a) managing group processes, (b) reflexivity, (c) common learning process, and (d) facilitating integration and synthesis (see Figure 2). Respectively, this refers to each individual group member, the interactions amongst members, the central concern or focus of their work, and the larger environment and context within which the transdisciplinary work is happening. The integration of disparate worldviews requires that they first be made visible. Required fields are marked *. Individual learning forms the vital base for group learning, whereby the combined intelligence in the team exceeds the sum of the intelligence of its individuals, and the team develops extraordinary capacities for collaborative [learning and] action (Lozano, 2014, p. 209). She was a Professor in the Faculty of Education. Carol ODonnell Collaborative reflexivity better ensures the integration and synthesis (assimilation and combination) of both academic and real-world contributions and perspectives, leading to useful transdisciplinary knowledge. Educators are using transdisciplinary learning to help students address deep scientific questions and tackle broad societal needs. Once exposed, those involved can perceive them, thereby acknowledging and unlocking their potential to inform or impair the common result (i.e., the new transdisciplinary knowledge) (Defila & Di Giulio, 2015). Songca, R. (2006). Publishing such reviews will make the concepts, challenges, and approaches to transdisciplinary collaboration more accessible for critique, application, adaptation, and implementation (Penker & Muhar, 2015). The curriculum should provide regular opportunities for students to tackle questions from multiple disciplinary perspectives and connect those efforts. Thought styles. Transdisciplinary knowledge is validated through an iterative and adaptive process that involves social (common) learning and the confrontation of different, reasoned perspectives. Four strategies to facilitate integration. Prior to her placement at the DOE, Day was a mathematics teacher and in 2015 ,Day received the Fulbright Distinguished Award in Teaching. Yeung (2015) coined the term transdisciplinary learning, which happens at the intersection where stakeholders are engaged in transdisciplinary collaboration. Mathison S, Freeman M. The logic of interdisciplinary . Acknowledgement: This article is based on the work of the Federal Coordination in STEM Education (FC-STEM) Interagency Working Group on Convergence, under the direction of Quincy Brown and Nafeesa Owens of the Office of Science and Technology Policy. 2) (pp. This consensus often involves the development of a common language emerging out of the team work. Privacy Statement Tackling wicked problems: Through the transdisciplinary imagination. At the Smithsonian, for example, we have a front door to discoveries in science, history, art, and culture. (2017, March 6). These students may struggle in a social situation where they have to speak up and be vulnerable. More empirical evidence is needed to inform educators and practitioners which strategies work and which do not in the pandemic context.
