Digital Interaction: Unraveling Student Voices through Collaborative Technologiesby

Casey McArdleBall State University

#socialconstructivism

•Vygotsky’s social constructivism needs an involved teacher.

•The culture gives the child the cognitive tools needed for development. The type and quality of these tools determines the pattern and rate of development.

•Teachers are conduits for the tools of the culture – thus, the tools include cultural history, social context, and language.

•Today they also include electronic forms of information access (digital technologies - internet)

#purpose

?#MSUWIDEReport on the different genres students were composing in Facebook and other social spaces.

#research #questions•What’s going on in these spaces?

•Is Web 2.0 being explicitly used as a tool for collaboration inside and outside the writing classroom? If so, how?

•Is Blackboard being explicitly used as a tool for collaboration inside and outside the writing classroom? If so, how?

•Do students interact with one another outside of class in the Web 2.0 social network environments? If so, when did such interaction begin? What part of the discussion is academically centered? What is the nature and frequency of these interactions in Blackboard and Web 2.0?

#interaction #collaboration

Negotiable Space: students openly join these spaces for their own purposes, many yet undecided; not required. (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.)

Non-Negotiable Space: students are forced to sign up for this space and are required to interact with it. (Blackboard)

#participants

Basic Writers“At Risk” Students

Ball State ENG 101/102 – two semesters

Ball State ENG 103 – one semester part ofBall State ENG 104 – one semester the core

2009-2010 Academic Year:17 sections of ENG 101/102(hoping for 12 total participants)

2010-2011 Academic Year:4 sections of ENG 101/102(hoping for 12 total participants)

#participants

Teachers: 3 total

2 PhD Graduate Students in Rhet/Comp

1 Contract Faculty with an MA in English

All 3 use Blackboard in the class

None have used Web 2.0 sites for class assignments or purposes

#methodologyBegin with “At Risk” Students

My own experience teaching Web 2.0 in ENG 103

Examine what is going on in these spaces = difficulty navigating Blackboard while Web 2.0 sites are viewed as less cumbersome

key: interactive spaces

#methods•Observed first day of classes•Issued survey via email•From the survey results, 12 were offered a chance to participate•Only 1 replied•Sent out an email asking for participants•Observed the classes again•Only able to get 7 to agree to interviews•Only 6 signed up for the study

mixed methods: surveys, interviews, classroom observations, online observations (Web 2.0 and Blackboard)

#survey #results

34 responses

#interview #results

•Students see Blackboard as academic•Students see Web 2.0 (Facebook & Twitter) as social•Not interested in combining the two

•Teachers see very little use for Blackboard other than as a file exchange•Teachers (only 2) used the discussions - sparingly •Open to anything other than Blackboard

#observations #results

front desk

312

facebook space=

classroom space

#results

•In the final week of classes, there was a mix of social and academic – and that’s it!

•The student then took this down because he did not want anyone to know what he was writing about.

#results

One teacher’s Blackboard page

#nextstep

#research #questions•What’s going on in these spaces?

•Is Web 2.0 being explicitly used as a tool for collaboration inside and outside the writing classroom? If so, how?

•Is Blackboard being explicitly used as a tool for collaboration inside and outside the writing classroom? If so, how?

•Do students interact with one another outside of class in the Web 2.0 social network environments? If so, when did such interaction begin? What part of the discussion is academically centered? What is the nature and frequency of these interactions in Blackboard and Web 2.0?

#conclusion (so far)

Difference in navigation skills – ENG 101 to ENG 104

Negotiable vs. Non-negotiable Spaces

Have students interact with one another as opposed to just interacting with the software.

Create a Facebook/Web 2.0 based CMS?

The Chronicle of Higher Education

Google and Pearson stole my idea!

#workscitedGrabill, Jeffrey T., et al. “Revisualizing Composition: Mapping the Writing Lives of First-Year College Students.”

2010. 28 September 2010. Web.

Vygotsky, Lev. Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes. Boston: Harvard UP, 1978. Print.

#figurescited8.http://kayl23.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/trichur-pooram-crowd-508657-sw.jpg9.http://www.ratracetrap.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/rocks.jpg10.http://www.easysiteguide.com/images/stories/break-free.jpg11.http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_D7FE1zhZQhY/SY94SxFMWdI/AAAAAAAAADs/kOVkZrvS2Uw/s400/smartsync.JPG12.http://dealbreaker.com/_old/2009/10/30/raising%20hands.jpg13.http://www.visualphotos.com/photo/2x4591194/studio_shot_of_people_raising_their_hands_bld023819.jpg14.http://christdominion.com/images/methodology.jpg15.http://www.hirepros.com/images/Pages/Methodology.gif