ICT in Education

Heuristic 4. Social software tools stimulate collaboration and reflection.

May 3, 2007

Social software tools enable people to connect and collaborate via computer-mediated communication (Wikipedia 2007). They include synchronous tools such as instant messaging and web whiteboards and asynchronous ones such as web fora, blogs, wikis and more recent services such as Flickr and YouTube.

The use of these various tools in a learning environment can offer students new and engaging means to share information and to offer each other feedback which allows them to reflect on concepts in a more meaningful manner.

Driscoll (2002) makes the point that students benefit from hearing ideas other than their own in group work and that they can use software to collaborate by “creating notes to express their ideas or integrate outside information about a topic. They then read and respond to the notes of others, all of which builds a communal database producing shared knowledge abut the topic or problem”.

Dede (2005) goes on to support this by identifying among emerging learning styles an shift towards “communal learning involving diverse, tacit, situated experience with knowledge distributed across a community and a context as well as within an individual”.

My personal experience of using blogs with learners dates back to a class I ran in 2003 teaching platforms and formats for media production. I had the learners keep a blog where they journaled their experiences in working on a number of multimedia projects. They were to reflect on creative decisions that they made as well as technical issues that arose and the ways they were able to overcome them.

A page with links to the blogs was made available in the online space for the subject so they could visit each others blogs and leave feedback or offer suggestions.

I found this a very useful tool as it was an effective way to get greater insight into learner’s understanding of the process and it was a great resource for learners to use for trouble-shooting.

Some suggestions for use:

• Use an RSS feed reader to track blog posts

• Provide clear direction as to expected frequency and length of posts

References:

Robyler, M. D., Edwards, J., & Havriluk, M. A. (1997). Integrating Educational Technology into Teaching (pp. 54-79). New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.

Driscoll, M.P. (2002). How People Learn (and What Technology Might Have To Do with It). ERIC Digest. ED470032

Wikipedia – Social Software – Retrieved April 26 2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_software

Dede, C. (2005). Planning for neomillennial learning styles. Educause Quarterly, 28(1).

Entry Filed under: General, Social Web, collaboration, web 2.0. .