Using social media for teaching & learningexploiting an indispensible tool in student hands

1Cheryl Brown

• I. Key Trends Accelerating Ed Tech Adoption in Higher Education

• Fast Moving Trends: Those likely to create substantive change (or burn out) in one to two years– ! Online, Hybrid, and Collaborative Learning– ! Social Media Use in Learning

ISSUES ABOUT ACCESS

Sms 31957 example: R 8753 Example: R [space] 8753 [space] because I don’t know how

• ICT access is varied and unequal

Czerniewicz and Brown 2010

< 2 years ago 2-4 years ago 4-6 years ago 6-10 years ago 10-15 years ago >15 years ago0.00%

10.00%

20.00%

30.00%

Years ICT experience of under 22 yr olds

Survey of 3556 students across 6 HEIs in South Africa

Digital Strangers

we're a lot of students and ICT facilities are limited. I'll request if donators can donate more as students face difficulties in queuing or computers. It's expensive, I pay more money for few minutes. I think ICTs sometimes create digital divide, especially for students who find it hard to access internet [ID 2922]

Digital Natives

people in my community don’t have access to computers, my knowledge of computer & owning a computer at home, it makes work easier & you work more, improves my learning capabilities, this is a computer dominated world, so it is essential for me to understand computers. [ID 190]

.,

.. Like issues of computers is that I never had a chance to be with a computer before I came here ... [Bianca Int 1]

infographic

Youth Adoption72% of 15 –to 24-year olds “having a cell phone.” (Unicef 2012)

The computer skills I learnt while using Facebook and YouTube has helped, as these services are more or less the same, like Twitter. So, it kind of helps you to do other internet things.

c

My phone has helped me because you know like the keyboard n my phone is more like the computer, so like I started with it, they are more like similar so my speed in typing has improved

But .... Cell phones are different◦Ownership is ubiquitous (98.7% in 2007)◦Ownership is not socially differentiated ◦Main means of access to Internet off campus for students

from low SEGs– - in 2009 78% of South African students accessed the internet via

their cell phones (Kornberger, 2009)

Dial up; 68

Broadband; 84

cell phone; 191

wireless; 24 satellite; 25

Type of internet access for low SEG students (2007)

However not mainstreamed in education yet

Sms 31957 example: R 8753 Example: R [space] 8753 [space] because I don’t know how

The only sustainable way forward is to exploit devices students already own and use (Traxler 2013)

Do students use cell phones for learning?

Digital Native Digital Stranger0.00%

20.00%

40.00%

60.00%

34.97%37.19%

49.91%

40.19%

15.12%

22.62%No cell phone use< 40% cell phone use> 40% cell phone use

% of cell phone time spent for academic purposes

2007 survey of South African university students

SOCIAL MEDIA IN

LEARNING

DO STUDENTS USE SOCIAL MEDIA FOR LEARNING?

Informal

• At one stage I was trying to learn Spanish, which did not go very well. I was in contact with three people from different parts of the world and would chat to them to practice it.

– Student O Int 2 UCT Ref 6

• I go on Vula on my small phone, though its small, when I am studying for exams I took pictures of stuff and I recorded myself reading a test and then I would listen to myself ....

– [Fudge Int 2]

• The "Prayer Network" will be on a Facebook Page. People can "like it" on the Facebook page to stay updated about its activites. People will also be able to submit their own prayer requests. "We" will pray for them, and all members will pray for those who have requested a prayer.

Student K Int 1 UCT

Ref 1

Affective

• Jaa I always write on my status like, Maths is giving me stress, and people respond to me and they say like, hang in there and some of them are like jaa, maths, so yes I get a lot support

– [Fudge Int 2]

To empower ‘silenced’ , ‘dominated’ & ‘marginalised’ voices to become co-producers of knowledge

First of all I don’t think I can live without social networks

It's not a lifeline, but after not having it, or being off it for a while, I sort of feel disconnected.

I wanted to stay away from Facebook for ever; - it was draining – I was addicted to it - needed space, so I stopped for three weeks and deleted my profile.

felt a bit ignored, so deleted Facebook. I got angry at it. Then I remembered this project

DEVICES IN THE CLASSROOM

Arguments for• increased student and teacher technology use

– facilitate faculty student interaction• increased student engagement and interest level

– increase rates of in-class participation and student motivation

• increased ease and speed of note taking and engagement with online sources related to the course material

• modest increases in student achievement

Arguments against

• In lecture style classes where computers are not essential to the material, the sustained use of laptops during lecture is potentially so distracting as to hinder a student’s performance and distract their fellow students.– students with open laptops remembered less lecture

content than those with closed laptops (Hembrooke and Gay 2003)

– Laptop multitasking hinders classroom learning for both users and nearby peers (Sana, F., Weston, T and Cepeda, N (2013)

IDEAS' FOR ENGAGEMENT

Virtual noticeboard

38

http://manipalthetalk.net/online-notice-board/

I can lie in my bed and sit with the laptop and then watch the lectures and then I can do the assignment in bed…

So Friday, I’m running all the way back to my room, sitting on my laptop watching all the lectures and then trying to type in whatever and submitting in time for 4,

Self paced learning

Anonymity

40

blog.talkingidentity.com

Peter Steiner has been reproduced from page 61 of July 5, 1993 issue of The New Yorker, (Vol.69 (LXIX) no. 20)

Open consultation

41

http://bronzeagebabies.blogspot.com/2011/01/suggestion-box.html

opendoormgmt.com

Decision making

42

http://www.alticore.eu/area_partner/photo_people_meeting_room_3.JPG

Scaffolding critical reading

43

http://www.clipartguide.com/_pages/0511-1003-1503-2959.html

http://www.mmu.ac.uk/tips/reading/index.php

Transformation of mind

44

Content – using RSS

TAKE HOME THOUGHTS

Technology and teaching and learning interactions

All about matching your teaching and learning tasks with appropriate educational technologies

Invisibility of technology

• “… for technology to be used effectively in any learning process it must be highly visible as a learning tool but at the same time highly invisible as a mediating technology” (John & Sutherland 2005: 408).

Both task & learner experience

• “As designers for learning, we need to make choices about technologies in a way that takes account both of how they support the learning task [design features] and how they will be experienced by individual learners – the different ‘possible relationships’ between task and learner they might mediate” (Beetham 2007:34)

WHERE TO GO FOR MORE?

http://www.emergingicts.blogspot.com/

https://studentictaccess.uct.ac.za/

1

• http://issuu.com/dgachago/docs/2013_11_26_emerging_tech_higher_edu?e=8853622/5768218

• http://www.scoop.it/t/interactive-teaching-and-learning

https://www.coursera.org/course/edc

Prepared by Dr Cheryl BrownCheryl.brown@uct.ac.za

@cherybrownhttp://www.scoop.it/t/developing-learning-

teaching

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