Innovation in ELT

Although innovation in ELT has grown apace in recent years, much of it has been unsuccessful (see, for example Karavas-Doukas 1998; Carless 1999; Nunan 2003), arguably because of a failure to take into account lessons from innovation theory (Wedell 2009), such as the following: 1 In-depth appraisal of the innovation context is vital. Kennedy (1988: 332) shows how the potential for innovation at the classroom level is circumscribed by several additional overarching ‘subsystems’, especially the superordinate, sociocultural one. The ‘hybrid model’ (Henrichsen 1989) provides a thorough system for identifying contextual factors likely to facilitate or hinder the change process. Holliday (1994) demonstrates the importance of a detailed, ethnomethodological understanding of the innovation situation. The value of the ‘baseline study’ as a means of attempting to ensure that proper appreciation of contextual variables is built into the innovation process is illustrated in Weir and Roberts (1994). Wedell (2003: 453) provides a comprehensive algorithm for linking an analysis of the innovation context to the development of an appropriate innovation implementation strategy. 2 Certain innovation characteristics are likely to make adoption more successful. Kennedy (op. cit.) discusses the main criteria identified in Kelly (1980) as preconditions for teacher adoption of innovations, i.e. ‘feasibility’ (will it work?), ‘relevance’ (is it needed?), and ‘acceptability’ (compatibility with existing educational philosophy). Others (for example Henrichsen op. cit.; Markee 1997: Chap. 2) draw attention to and extend the characteristics in Rogers (1983) associated with successful and less successful innovations (briefly, the greater the degree of ‘relative advantage’, ‘compatibility’, ‘trialability’, and ‘visibility’ and the lower the ‘complexity’, the greater the chance of the innovation being adopted). 3 How an innovation is implemented will affect its potential for success. Significant (second order) change involves alteration in terms of materials, teaching methods, and underlying beliefs (Fullan and Stiegelbauer 1991: 29). The innovation implementation approach therefore needs to be based as much as possible on a ‘normative-re-educative’ strategy, i.e. ‘a collaborative, problem-solving approach, with all those affected by the change involved in some way and making their own decisions about the degree and manner of change they wish to accept’ (Kennedy 1987: 164). Such an approach implies that ‘teacher development must take place in the workshop context and in the workplace’ (Karavas-Doukas 1998: 36, original emphasis), and the provision of adequate ‘secondary innovations’ (Markee op. cit.: 172–4), i.e. resources, such as teacher development programmes, which enable ‘primary’ innovations to be successfully implemented. 4 Innovation should be sufficiently systemic. The ‘spider's web’ diagram in Bowers (1983: 101) indicates the importance of taking into account how changing one part of an educational system may affect other parts. Bray and Luxon (1999) discuss their experiences of involving ‘insiders’ in innovation project baseline studies, so that expertise and ownership is established as widely as possible from the outset; Waters and Vilches (2001) describe a framework for taking innovation implementation needs into account at two main levels (‘foundation building’ and ‘potential realizing’) and in terms of four main areas, viz. curriculum development and teacher, trainer, and ‘ELT manager’ learning; Wedell (2009: 48–53) provides a detailed and comprehensive sequence of steps for attempting to combine both centralized and localized forms of change management in the context of large-scale educational reform. Space precludes mention of several other parts of this literature (but see Waters in press for a longer overview). However, given the investment that innovation usually represents, it seems important to pay greater attention to what innovation theory suggests about ways of making the practice of ELT innovation more successful than hitherto.