Diffusing Innovations: Adoption of Serious Educational Games by K-12 Science Teachers
Innovation is a term that has become widely used in education; especially as it pertains to technology infusion. Applying the corporate theory of diffusing innovation to educational practice is an innovation in itself. This mixed-methods study examined 38 teachers in a science educational gaming professional development program that provided baseline characteristics about personal technology use and post professional development workshop experiences to ascertain characteristics that align with diffusion of innovation theory and educational game development as a new innovation in current pedagogical practices. The posttest-only design tested correlation (ANOVA) between factors, following scale conversion employing Rasch modeling, using the established Ocean Explorers workshop survey to collect data. Results suggested that while none of the demographic factors were significantly correlated with participant perceptions of the workshop, participants’ perceptions of the presentation of the material were strongly correlated to their perceptions of the opportunities afforded by the workshop and the level of technological pedagogical content knowledge learning that took place. Frequencies of response ranges from the survey, for each scale, were paired with qualitative data to propose a fit to Rogers’ innovation adoption curve and provide a richer description of participant perceptions. Additionally, the findings from this study serve as a framework for professional development of innovative educational technologies for subsequent studies.
Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education
