Innovation for Education, Spatial Thinking and GeoICT: A Rwandan Case Study Brian Tomaszewski Center for Geographic Information Science and Technology Rochester Institute of Technology Rochester, NY, USA bmtski@rit.edu Anthony Vodacek Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science Rochester Institute of Technology Rochester, NY, USA vodacek@cis.rit.edu Abstract—We present our research on understanding innovation for education in two Rwandan secondary schools. Our innovation for education project focused on developing spatial thinking skills via Geographic Information and Communication Technologies (GeoICT)-based training. Specific GeoICT used focused on 2D, vector-based maps used on Android tablets and commercial desktop Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software. Trainings were conducted in the context of a research program that sought to develop new approaches for Rwandan education innovation. We discuss qualitative results from teacher and student reflections gathered from a Web-based survey about what it was like to be part of the innovation for education process, broader opportunities spatial thinking provides, and innovation for education process feedback. We also conducted extensive group interviews with teachers at the two schools based on data collected from Web surveys. The interviews and surveys allowed us to assess four ways our innovation for education approach impacted teachers and students. First, teachers and students identified broader societal benefits and individual opportunities the innovation for education process is creating. Second, Rwandan teachers identified education and societal benefits for problem solving and reasoning stemming from increased thinking ability, GeoICT training, and space-time thinking ability. Third, teachers found new roles and identities for themselves through incorporation of spatial thinking-oriented curriculum and GeoICT training. Fourth, the importance of certificates and recognition artifacts as tools for students and teachers to establish their new competencies. Our focus on innovation for education, spatial thinking and GeoICT inform the literature onbroader technology-enhanced quality education delivery research on the value of spatial thinking and GeoICTs. Keywords—education, capacity building, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), secondary education, spatial thinking, Rwanda I. INTRODUCTION Education is a key pathway for enabling development and Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) can be critical development mechanisms. Incorporating ICT into education, particularly in the developing world, faces many challenges such as lack of teacher training and professional development, institutional, cultural and policy barriers, and The project “Promoting spatial thinking in natural resource management through community mapping: the case of urban and rural secondary schools” was supported by Innovation for Education, a partnership between the Governments of Rwanda and the UK. XXX-X-XXXX-XXXX-X/XX/$XX.00 ©20XX IEEE 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE Gaspard Rwanyiziri Centre for Geographic Information Systems and Remote Sensing University of Rwanda Kigali, Rwanda g.rwanyiziri@ur.ac.rw resource constraints. In this paper, we present results of our research addressing these challenges as part of an innovation for education process. In particular, we present some of the first research focused on the process by which Geographic Information Communication Technologies, or GeoICTs, can be introduced into Rwandan educational practice using qualitative evidence derived from Rwandan secondary students and teachers. In the following section, we define what we mean by innovation for education as a prelude to discussing our project focus on spatial thinking and GeoICT. We then present qualitative results of our investigation into how teachers and students feel about the process of innovation which allow us to understand the broader process of innovation itself and to draw generalizable conclusions applicable to future GeoICT education research. We then discuss future an ongoing work and provide a research summary and conclusions. II. INNOVATION FOR EDUCATION A dictionary definition of innovation is that it is “a new idea, method, or device” [1]. Thus, innovation for education is the idea of introducing new ideas, methods or devices into educational practice. Innovation for education is not a new idea. Literature on the specific concept first began appearing in the early 1960s as the dawn of the space age prompted calls for change in education to produce a more scientifically literate society [2]. Increased and broadening societal use of ICT in general is creating numerous innovation in education opportunities. For example, in the article “Youth and ICT”, the UN states that almost half the world’s population is under the age of 25 and of those, nearly a quarter are aged 12 to 24 and are becoming a major force in pioneering mobile ICT use and driving industry growth and trends [3]. The desire of more and more young people around the world to own “smart” mobile devices is creating interesting development challenges to inspire them to use mobile ICT to change their world in a positive way. Researchers have also identified the value of mobile devices as learning and tutoring devices [4]. In this regard, our research is broadly directed at how we can take advantage of growing mobile technology interest among the world’s youth to develop education-based technology for addressing pressing spatially-oriented issues such as climate change and poverty reduction. In particular, our research is focused on developing mobile GeoICTs for building spatial thinking skills in secondary students and how these technologies can be incorporated into educational practice. In the following section, we further discuss Spatial Thinking and GeoICTs. III. SPATIAL THINKING A. Spatial Thinking in Education and Development Spatial thinking is the idea of using the properties of space to structure, solve and reason about problems in a wide range of disciplines. Example problems include understanding molecular structure, designing a fluid network with gravity flow, and mapping invasive species. The spatial thinking approach to problem solving has three common elements no matter what the application: concepts of space, tools of representation, and processes of reasoning [5]. Spatial thinking is particularly important to development action. For example, Yudhoyono et al. [6] identified many post-Millennium Development Goal (MDG) sustainable development issues that are inherently spatial in nature. The original, practical MDG such as poverty, hunger, water, sanitation, and healthcare are fundamentally spatial in nature [7-9]. These MDG have complex spatial relationships with new global challenges that are themselves fundamentally spatially complex in nature, such as climate change adaptation [10-12]. Thus spatial thinking will play a key role in attaining the MDG and subsequent sustainable development goals. Spatial thinking is a skill that can be taught using GeoICTs to understand multiscale geographical relationships between people, the places they live and their interactions with natural, physical, and social systems. B. Spatial Thinking and GeoICT Spatial thinking can be supported with GeoICTs (Fig. 1). Fig. 1: The Rwandan Iwacu open source GeoICT-based tool [13]. In this figure, a buffer tool is shown. Buffers are a core spatial thinking skill. Understanding buffers teach students how to think about spatial relationships between human and environmental features such as distance from the stream that can potentially flood. We use the terms GeoICTs and GIS (Geographic Information Systems) interchangeably here. GeoICTs provide key geographical visual representations that can take advantage of human abilities associated with vision and cognition to support learning [14]. The interactive and visual nature of GeoICTs provide a natural approach to building spatial 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE thinking skills by practice with the properties of space such as distance and scale and various spatial representation forms such as maps, to structure, solve and reason about problems that are spatial in nature. GeoICT-based visualizations are an effective way to understand global, multi-scale phenomena such as climate patterns that are too large scale for humans to observe and reason about directly. GeoICTs can also be used to build spatial thinking skills applied to environmental problems related to land cover and land use. Here, spatial representations can be combined using overlays to explore relationships between spatial patterns of human activity affecting land cover and environmental degradation. Additionally, maps in general have been identified by ICT researchers as central to data sharing, politics and development [15]. IV. INNOVATION FOR EDUCATION IN RWANDA As a critical part of development, the Government of Rwanda (GoR) has taken a very proactive position in stressing innovation and education as a basic development building block. Support for educational development is articulated in the GoR Vision 2020 plan to transform Rwanda into a knowledge-based society [16]. To direct educational progress, the Rwandan Ministry of Education (MINEDUC) created the Education Sector Strategic Plan (ESSP) 2010–2015 with the goal to provide “Access to quality, equitable and effective education for all Rwandans” [17:1]. The ESSP contains six high level education objectives: “1—Access to education for all, 2— Quality education at all levels, 3—Equity in education at all levels, 4—Effective and efficient education system, 5— Science and technology and ICT in education, and 6— Promotion of positive values, critical thinking, Rwandan culture, peace, unity and reconciliation” [17]. The Innovation for Education (IfE) Program, which was funded by the United Kingdom (UK) Department for International Development (DFID) and implemented in partnership with MINEDUC was specifically aligned with the 2010-2015 ESSP objectives where the IfE program is “an opportunity to test new ideas to improve the quality of education in Rwanda” [18]. The goals of IfE were to improve the quality of education across six themes: accountability and empowerment, inclusive learning, climate change and environment, effective teaching and learning, skills development, and use of appropriate technologies in education. These general themes of innovation closely fit the Rwandan educational cultural context where MINEDUC is well aware of problems with lack of access, insufficient teacher training both in pedagogy and discipline areas related to the environment, and uneven access to technology for teaching. Within the policy context of the IfE program we identified a curriculum gap where spatial thinking skills are significantly underrepresented in Rwandan secondary education. This gap exists despite great efforts made at introducing GeoICTs into Rwandan secondary schools and much work remains to relate the use of such tools to spatial thinking skills and spatially oriented-problem solving [19]. With IfE support, our project, Promoting Spatial Thinking in Natural Resource Management Through Community Mapping: the Case of Urban and Rural Secondary Schools, addressed this challenge by creating a spatial thinking-based science and technology curriculum for natural resource mapping experiences with integrated GeoICT training. Teachers were trained on using project-supplied Android tablet computers for student mapping projects and other curricular exercises focused on the various aspects of spatial thinking development (Fig 2). thus no longer required specific, unique focus. The final six innovation process issues are outlined in Table 1. Table 1. Innovation Process Issues ID 1 Innovation Process Issues Central players in innovation: teacher & students e.g. as community links/actors Close to innovation: School and community involvement and relationships Indirectly affected by innovation: Involvement of Sector/District Education Officers and of wireless infrastructure providers Building up networks between education, infrastructure and commercial stakeholders Issues in evaluation process: Development of learning objectives (LO) on problem solving, spatial thinking skills and GeoICT skills Risks, conflicts & tensions: between stakeholders and technical problems of wireless infrastructure and use of GeoICT 2 3 4 5 6 Fig. 2: Female Rwandan Secondary Students learning to use Android tablet computers and GeoICT tools for building spatial thinking skills. For example, one student exercise consists of mapping environmental factors related to water quality in a local region. The students may use OpenDataKit (ODK) operating on tablet computers to delineate a wetland and the associated catchment in a field exercise. Within the catchment they can identify erosional features, and thus identify features that link landscapes and impact water quality. Point information collected with ODK can be displayed using Google Earth and viewed on a base map formed by a high-resolution satellite image, providing context for the local region. More advanced maps can be created using ArcGIS on desktop computers available at their school computer laboratory. We also created a free and open source Android-based software tool called "Iwacu" [13]. Iwacu means "our home" in Kyinarwanda and is intended to be an integrated spatial thinking skill development and GeoICT teaching tool. Modular lesson plans can be downloaded via online software updates, enabling efficient use of the limited storage capacity of the tablets. The mapping capabilities being developed for Iwacu are slightly more sophisticated than for ODK, allowing the creation of points, lines, and polygons, whereas ODK is currently limited to points (see Section VI for further Iwacu discussion). The project focus on understanding the process of educational innovation required development of clear monitoring and evaluation (M&E) activities and metrics. Innovation M&E was designed to investigate and understand (1) how the innovation occurred at and between multiple organizational scales with various stakeholders and actors, (2) direct and indirect effects of the innovation process on stakeholders, (3) issues to be identified in the innovation evaluation process itself and (4) innovation risks, conflicts, and tensions. Initially, we identified eight Innovation Process issues that were eventually refined in into six issues as two of the original issues were found to be subsumed by other issues and 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE Evidence Sources Teacher & Students Head Teachers and community representatives Sector/District Education Officers Project team, commercial stakeholders Measurement &Evaluation staff Stakeholders This paper addresses results investigating processes of innovation issue 1 - Central players in innovation: teacher & students e.g. as community links/actors. Because issue 1 is focused on central innovation players, it provides the most concrete examples and lessons learned for other researchers interested in ICT educational innovation at the student/teacher level. The project was performed with two secondary schools in Rwanda. One school is in a rural area and the other is urban. For more details on these schools and their characteristics, see [20]. The following sections describe issue 1 data collection methods with the two schools followed by the results. V. METHODS: TEACHER AND STUDENT WEB-BASED INNOVATION SURVEYS AND TEACHER INNOVATION INTERVIEWS We developed anonymous web-based surveys for qualitative innovation issue data collection. Teachers and students were asked the same questions and the two different categories were separated out for analysis. Even with internet access issues in Rwanda, this approach proved to be quite effective, especially with Android tablet resources our project provided to the schools. The teacher and innovation survey consisted of three short answer question prompts provided in both English and Kinyrwanda: 1. What is it like to be part of the innovation process? Kubwawe wumva bimeze bite kugira uruhare muri gahunda zizana ibintu bishya? 2. What broader opportunities/innovations do you think spatial thinking provides or enables? Ni ayahe mahirwe ubona imitekerereze nzirikan ahantu kuzanira mu kongera ubumenyi bwawe/imyigishirize yawe? 3. Tell us any else you would like to say about the project. Ni iki kindi wavuga kuri uyu mushinga/gahunda. Five teachers out of ten teachers total participating in the project and 69 students responded out of 150 total participating in the project responded to the survey. Teacher process of innovation interview questions were then derived from web-based innovation survey data. The idea here was to examine reasons behind views made in the surveys and, ideally, find explanations for views made. Two, two hour interviews were conducted with five teachers from each of the two project schools. Content analysis was performed on survey and interview results to find thematic patterns discussed in the next section [21]. VI. RESULTS A. Teacher and Student Web-based Innovation Surveys Question 1 Four themes emerged from question 1 responses. The identified question 1 themes and their definitions were: 1. Societal Benefit – the student and/or teacher indicated the broader benefits the innovation provides to their community, country or the world. 2. Environmental Advocacy – a more specific category of societal benefit, the student and/or teacher indicated how the innovation can help them advocate for environmental issues in their community, country or the world. 3. Individual Development – the student and/or teacher indicated how the innovation will benefit their future educational, career or other professional development activities. 4. Technical Advancement – a more specific category of individual development, the student and/or teacher indicated how the innovation provides specific technical advancement. Figure 3 graphically presents raw counts of question 1 survey responses classified into the four aforementioned themes. Note in Figure 3 how responses related to individual development received were the most common. It is interesting to note however, that an almost equal number of respondents saw the innovation’s societal benefits. In some cases, responses contained elements of one or more categories such as using GeoICT (a technical advancement) for environmental issues or societal benefits and individual benefits. However, distinctions between the four categories were clear enough to inform our investigation into how central players feel about being part of the innovation process. B. Teacher and Student Web-based Innovation Surveys Question 2 Six themes emerged in question 2 (What broader opportunities/innovations do you think spatial thinking provides or enables?) responses. Many themes matched closely, although not exclusively, with themes found through question 1 analysis. The identified question 2 themes and their definitions: 1. Problem Solving and Reasoning – the student and/or teacher indicated that spatial thinking can support problem solving and reasoning. 2. Critical Thinking – related to problem solving and reasoning, some student and/or teacher indicated that spatial thinking can support critical thinking (which is related to but not exactly the same as spatial thinking). 3. ICT Skills – related to the technical advancement category described in section VI. A., ICT skill is where a student and/or teacher indicated that spatial thinking provides ICT skill opportunities (but not GeoICT specifically). 4. GeoICT Skills – student and/or teacher specifically indicate that spatial thinking specifically provides GeoICT skill opportunities. 5. Environmental Awareness – the same theme discussed in section VI. A. 6. Individual Development – the same theme as discussed in section VI. A., the individual development theme also emerged in question 2 but with a focus on how spatial thinking can benefit the individual in terms of future educational, career or other professional development activities. Fig. 4 graphically presents raw counts of question 2 survey responses classified into the six aforementioned themes. Fig 4: Teacher and Student Web-based Innovation Survey Question 2 thematic categorization counts. Fig. 3: Teacher and Student Web-based Innovation Survey Question 1 thematic categorization counts. 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE Note how in Figure 4, problem solving and reasoning is clearly the most frequently occurring theme. Additionally, it is interesting to note how ICT skills in general were slightly more frequently mentioned than GeoICT skills specifically (particularly for a question related to spatial thinking). Individual development also appears to be a frequently mentioned thematic area. Like question 1 responses, some responses contained elements of one or more thematic categories. Even with some thematic overlaps however, problem solving and reasoning clearly emerged as the most frequently occurring. C. Teacher and Student Web-based Innovation Surveys Question 3 Seven themes emerged from question 3 (Tell us any else you would like to say about the project?) responses. The identified question 3 themes and their definitions are: 1. Societal Benefit: the same theme discussed in section VI. A. (question 1 responses). 2. Individual Development: the same theme as discussed in sections VI. A. and VI. B. (questions 1 and 2), 3. General Positive Feedback: the student and/or teacher provides positive feedback about the project without any specific details about project aspects or their experiences with the project 4. Positive Feedback – Spatial: the student and/or teacher provides positive feedback specifically about the project’s spatial thinking aspects. 5. Resource Request: the student and/or teacher comments on additional resources they would like as part of the project and innovation process such as training certificates, additional computer hardware such as tablet computers or additional time for training. 6. Request for more GeoICT: student and/or teacher request more GeoICT resources specifically. 7. Constructive Criticisms: student and/or teacher provides a constructive criticism of the project. Many of these responses are similar to resource requests, but do not make specific request statement as opposed to factual statements. Figure 5 graphically presents raw counts of question 3 survey responses classified into the seven themes. As can be seen in Figure 4, resource requests were clearly the most common response. In the case of question 3, responses generally fit closely into the aforementioned thematic categories and category overlaps were not as readily apparent as they were in questions 1 and 2. D. Teacher Innovation Process Interviews As discussed in section V., the teacher and student webbased innovation surveys were used a basis for follow-up, full interviews with teachers at our two schools. The focus of these interviews was to understand how the teachers feel about being part of the innovation process, the importance of spatial thinking and GeoICT in education, new roles the innovation process is creating between teachers, and how the innovation process is changing perspectives on how of the teachers see themselves. Table 2 outlines follow-up interview questions derived from the teacher and student web-based innovation survey themes. Table 2: Full Interview Questions and Survey Sources Full Interview Question Innovation Survey Source/Theme 1. How/Why specifically Question 1 - Individual Development do you think GIS is Question 1 - Technical Advancement important? Question 2 - GeoICT Skills 2. How do you see the project changing your perspectives as teachers? 3. What are you views of having a certificate end of project? How do certificates benefit you specifically? 4. Tell me about the sharing of the tablets. 5. Can any of you describe specific situations where you feel the project has increased student knowledge? Questions 1, 2 and 3 - Individual Development Question 1 – Individual Development Question 2 – GeoICT Skills Question 3 – Resource Request Question 3 – Resource Request Question 1 – Technical Advancement Question 2 – GeoICT Skills Question 1 – Individual Development Question 2 – Problem Solving and Reasoning Question 2 – ICT/GeoICT Skills These questions were used to structure, though not dictate, the interviews to provide flexibility with unforeseen innovation insight topics as they emerged during the interviews. The following is a summary of responses to the Table 2 questions: Question 1 (GIS Importance): Several teachers re-enforced the general ideas that GIS is important. When prompted for more specifics on how and why GIS important, some teachers reported that GIS and was enabling teachers in different disciplines to connect with one another: “You see, GIS information for me as a person who teaches …business and environment, you find I’m cooperating with the geography teacher… it (GIS) has made the negative impacts of business environment. So, you find it facilitates me in teaching.” Fig. 5: Teacher and Student Web-based Innovation Survey Question 3 thematic categorization counts. 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE Other teachers also reported an integrative aspect of GIS in terms of GIS providing visual tools and representations that could facilitate cross disciplinary teaching. Finally, some teachers also reported how GIS is in fact enabling spatial thinking processes by reflecting on how GIS is taught them navigational skills and map reading. Question 2 (changing perspectives as teachers): teachers reflected that being part of the innovation process has made them leaders in their respective local regions in terms of interactions with other schools where the teachers have become very interested in the technology and training innovation. For example, one head teacher communicated that his school has an advanced chemistry lab that other schools often come on weekends to use. He is foreseeing the tablet computing and GeoICT resources being provided by our project as additional resources that other schools in the region may utilize. Teachers at the other school however reported that interaction with the broader local community has been less, but that the broader societal and capacity building benefits could be an innovation outcome of the projects, as reflected in this quote: “That should be an aspect of now looking at what you are studying in spatial thinking can be given to the other community, the surrounding people.” One teacher made a very direct comment about how the project intervention is directly related to problem solving and reasoning skills that have broader societal impacts: “For example, the problem here we are nearby the city, you find everyday people running , they need to know time we have to take a bus towards somewhere and show that we have now a problem. Spatial thinking, to connect spatial thinking with time, one has a ticket knows he has to leave from somewhere – there is a lack, something missing between spatial thinking and time management. So, people need to be trained, to learn how to pay attention to time....So, that people can benefit because I think the purpose of the project is also to change attitudes and the attitudes of people, teachers here” The integration between building space and time thinking skills and the implications of these skills for national development was further expanded upon as reflected in this insightful quote: “..everybody needs to think spatial, the problem of space. Developing countries are accused to not pay attention to time. You request people to attend a meeting. They come two hours after the meeting has started…People are losing their tickets that are paid on those transport They’re losing ticket. That’s money which is lost. And that is affecting everything they’re doing. You have appointment with somebody. You go there after he has left. So, even if he has been waiting for you, that means we are still in the underdevelopment because even our thinking is a problem. If there is a way to integrate into our culture, the spatial aspect, it can really help. It would wake up to know that time, time, time is not waiting…So now, if we do not put in our mind that we need the time, we need to respect the time, we need to link time with the space, we cannot develop.” One teacher made a very specific comment on how the project innovation is enabling his professional development and thinking differently about how he conducts his teaching and research, as reflected in this quote: “So, as a biologist also, sometimes if I pass close to a species I do not know, if I have some on me my SIM card I can take a photo there. And then I know with GPS I can locate that species and then go there with because I’m interested also in 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE biology and that record are done there can help me to go back there so that I can know what kind of species is here from others. So, I think my life has changed because what—the other time I was not giving interest, now I try to think about it.” Question 3 (certificates): teachers reflected that the value of certificates is primarily for professional development and credentials. Certificates from the innovation can allow teachers to become trainers and facilitators of activities they learn initially on the IfE project, as reflected in this quote: “it’s a kind of justification… suppose this project goes to the whole country and you want the person to be a trainer…I can apply. The proof is this I show you my certificate” Question 4 (tablet sharing): teachers were generally positive about the fact that tablet computers had to be shared. The project intervention has been happening outside of normal teaching time. Thus, GeoICT and spatial thinking lessons have been happening after regular class periods. However, the tablet computing resources have been quickly adopted into normal teaching time activities. For example, the English teacher communicated that he had been using the tablet computers to show to English language lessons videos in his classroom, and other teachers were observed using the tablets as Wi-Fi hot spot connections as the normal Internet connection to the schools was very poor. Question 5 (new student knowledge): teachers reported that students were building general computing skills by having access to the tablet computers. For example, learning how to do messaging and other web based communication activities as well as understanding accessing resources through the Internet: “The other thing I can add is that students now, being able to upload something is something interesting. Sometimes people visit websites. (to them) That’s like a product which comes from the heaven But others are in the total absolute ignorance about that. If now students find themselves being able to upload something and is able to retrieve it from somewhere, let’s say physically but seeing it is coming back. It’s really interesting. And then, they get happy.” Of more particular relevance to the innovation process, the teachers also reported they are seeing evidence of their students thinking spatially and supported by various hardware and software on the tablets: “One of the students told me that—what is the importance this application? ... I learn how to use this application and I can go and teach the students, but after teaching with them— they discover how to change. Suppose I’m using the geographic information and I wanted to see the location using maps, they know. You give them overview of the application, but while you are trying to access application, they discover many things. Till now they know and they wanted to know more about GIS” “I remember when I started, they don’t know to differentiate altitude, latitude and longitude. And after teaching them, they know. They differentiate it.” In a related question, the teachers were asked what the students thought about being part of the interventions and innovations. The teachers reflected that students participating in the projects do have a sense of prestige within the overall school. The growing interest in having the tablet computers in general at the school is also leading increased tablet training beyond our projects initial stakeholders. Some teachers also reported students see the value of GeoICT as a university-level pursuit once they leave secondary school. VII. DISCUSSION The web questionnaires and follow-up teacher interviews revealed four patterns surrounding innovation for education focused on spatial thinking and Geo ICT. The first pattern was the dual societal and individual benefits that both teachers and students saw as an outcome of their participation in the innovation process. The web surveys demonstrated that many of the students saw the greater benefits for their country in terms of economic and environmental benefit that can be derived from ICT and GeoICT skill. This is important as GeoICT remains a relatively underutilized form of technology in the developed world, let alone in developing contexts [22]. The high frequency of comments related to problem solving and reasoning reflected that perhaps one of the most important aspects of the project – developing spatial thinking skills – is in fact happening. Although beyond the scope of this paper, our team has been quantitatively measuring spatial thinking abilities in our students (see: [20] for baseline results of our use of a spatial thinking ability test). The ability to think spatially has numerous implications for diverse development issues. For example, Rwanda has been facing many challenging environmental issues stemming from intense land use such as vulnerability to landslikes and floods due to soil erosion [23]. Building spatial thinking skills in the next generation of Rwandan citizens has the potential to create a problem solving and reasoning skill-base that can be applied to a wide range of ICT and GeoICT solutions for addressing these problems. The second pattern was the idea of societal benefits stemming from increased thinking ability and space-time thinking ability. The teacher interview quote discussing how improved space/time thinking can lead to improved development was an innovation process reflection. Such comments provide interesting ideas for considering how time can be added to space for facilitating educational innovation, and supporting development. The linkages between space and time have long been recognized in the geographic information science and other literature as being critical to reasoning and problem solving [24]. The geographic information science literature points to many examples of ICT systems designed to support space-time analysis and problem solving (c.f. [25]). Thus, researchers interested in spatially-oriented problems should also consider temporal aspects of those problems and how both space and time in spatio-temporal ICT solutions can potentially support build space-time thinking skills. The third pattern is innovation appears to be creating new teacher roles and identities. The teachers have the potential to be catalysts of change, innovation, and development in their schools and communities. For example and as was reflected in one of the teacher interview quotes, a business teacher is seeing the value of the GeoICT for understanding business environments. In particular, this teacher is foreseeing further interaction with Geography teacher for enhanced collaboration. 978-1-5386-5566-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE In resource constrained educational contexts like Rwanda, this could be particularly significant as limited resources provided by outside donors could be utilized in new, unforeseen ways. Finally, this aspect of the innovation process reflects the wellknown phenomena that GeoICT is often “discovered” as being relevant and useful to domains that upon first appearance, it may not appear to be useful or relevant. The fourth pattern is the importance of certificates and recognition artifacts. Although our project can offer no formal credit bearing certifications or degrees, both teachers and students were somewhat unanimous in the desire to have some type of formal, if not official recognition. This was an important lesson learned in the innovation process in that we had not considered this perspective when developing our educational innovation design. We anticipate that providing some type of recognition for training and education received by teachers and students will create stakeholder motivation and incentive related to the importance of spatial thinking and GeoICT. We see this motivation and incentive as a first step towards long-term project sustainability and scalability. More specifically, we are currently working closely with GoR educational partners to incorporate our spatial thinking and GeoICT educational innovations into official GoR educational curriculum. We believe that providing certificates and other recognition artifacts will help build a broader support base for GeoICT incorporation into official government curriculum. VIII. FUTURE WORK We are planning a scaled-up teacher training activity. This activity will involve training a group of 50 teachers over a two-week period. This training session will draw upon two sets of experiences. The first are practical lessons learned to date in terms of GeoICT hardware and software in the Rwandan educational context. For example, increased numbers of tablet computers as opposed to pcs for reaching a wider number of teachers groups. The second are our results of seeing how the project innovation is creating new role and relationships between teachers. We are planning to incorporate teachers from spatially oriented domains such as geography and environmental science, as well as teachers from domains such as business, chemistry, biology, and mathematics. Our intent is that teachers from a wide range of domains will learn spatial thinking skills that can be applied to these domains and GeoICTs to support spatial thinking. Rwanda is one of the first countries in the world to have GeoICT as part of national ICT curriculum. However, implementation has been severely limited. Many Rwandan teachers are not aware of what spatial thinking or GeoICT even are or can do. Thus, a national institutional pathway for teacher development and curriculum scale-up already exists but has not been realized. We hope training interdisciplinary teacher groups will lead to synergistic collaborations between teachers and their communities. Ideally, this larger training program will serve as a model for broader scale up of spatial thinking and GeoICT activities in Rwanda and other developing contexts. We also plan to reassess how our research activities match with new ESSP (c.f. [26]). IX. CONCLUSIONS We presented our research on understanding innovation for education in Rwandan secondary students and teachers by assessing the development of spatial thinking skills in GeoICTbased training. We discussed how innovation for education can support development. We defined spatial thinking and GeoICT and how these ideas are being instantiated in our innovation for education project in Rwanda. We presented qualitative results from teacher and student web based surveys where we asked these stakeholders what was it was like to be part of the innovation process, the opportunities they perceive spatial thinking provides them, and feedback on the innovation process itself. Our analysis identified several recurring themes about how the stakeholders felt about the innovation process. These themes included Societal and Individual benefits, Environmental Advocacy, Problem Solving and Reasoning and Resource Requests. Based on this analysis of the surveys we conducted group interviews with teachers at the two project schools, reinforcing and expanding upon themes identified in the surveys. We found our approach impacted teachers in four specific ways. First, they identified broader societal benefits and individual opportunities created by the innovation process. Second, they identified problem solving and reasoning benefits stemming from increased thinking ability, GeoICT training, and space-time thinking ability. Third, teachers are finding new roles and identities for themselves through spatial thinkingoriented curriculum and GeoICT training. Fourth we learned the importance of certificates and recognition artifacts for teachers (and students). We then presented ideas related to future work on open source GeoICT tools motivated by our process of innovation findings. Our results also inform understanding of how stakeholders feel about being part of an innovation process. Researchers interested in incorporating GeoICTs into educational practice or broader ICT research on the value of spatial thinking and GeoICT for development can draw upon these results for project design. 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