Destabilizing the Activity System of Online Teaching Through Critical Theory

Abstract

Despite the rapid and prolific uptake of online learning across higher education, the promised positive impact of digital technologies on the quality of learning has mostly failed to materialize. The need for change or reshaping of teaching practice in online environments is well documented, and there is much literature encouraging educators to exploit the affordances of digital media to provide rich learning experiences. However, efforts to affect the needed changes in practice are not very successful. In the present chapter, the authors adopt a framework of activity theory and integrate it with principles of critical theory and transformative practice to better understand why change in teaching practices in online environments has been difficult to realize. The authors also provide a theoretical framework that may be applied to driving change in online teaching practices.