Interactive Lecturing by Integrating Mobile Devices and Micro-blogging in Higher Education

Following the recent advances in both technology and social interaction, implementation of interactivity to large lecture rooms presents itself as a promising new methodology to improve the learning and teaching process in academia. Namely, based on the underlying ideas of Web 2.0, learners should be able to collect and share online resources during a lecture, additional communication channels such as discussion forums, chat and micro-blogging helping to achieve interactivity on traditional face-to-face teaching. Building on such premises, first experiences have been acquired by the use of mobile devices and instant messaging in enhancing the learning and teaching behavior, with the help of a university wide available Learning Management System (LMS), which has accordingly been adapted and extended to the specific needs of supporting interactivity through mobile devices. The LMS is intended to use common and existing software and hardware (devices of the learners). The goal of the above research is to find out the potentials of interactivity in order to enhance students\u27 engagement in traditional face-to-face teaching in Higher Education. The paper describes the outcomes of the first experiments in implementing interactivity in Higher Education in such a framework within the Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) and comments on the methodology applied. The experiments, which have been performed during lecturing within the course "Social Aspects of Information Technology" at the BSc level, attended by about 200 students, have shown that such kind of interactivity has a positive effect on the learners\u27 engagement

Tsaap-Notes -- An Open Micro-Blogging Tool for Collaborative Notetaking during Face-to-Face Lectures

International audienceSocial theories of learning demonstrated that collaborative note taking during face-to-face lecture provides important benefits: better learner engagement, collaborative learning, and knowledge building. In this paper we present Tsaap-Notes, an open micro-blogging platform dedicated to collaborative note taking that can be used as a standalone application, or fully integrated into existing virtual learning environments. Tsaap-Notes provides users with advanced features such as annotations, questions, or filtering that encourage learners to participate in the collaborative activity. Our tool has been experimented with a cohort of forty students during a short period of time, results show that learners are getting more and more familiar with Tsaap-Notes and that this application becomes useful when the time of preparing exams has come

Are digital natives a myth or reality?: Students’ use of technologies for learning

This paper outlines the findings of a study investigating the extent and nature of use of digital technologies by undergraduate students in Social Work and Engineering, in two British universities. The study involved a questionnaire survey of students (n=160) followed by in-depth interviews with students (n=8) and lecturers and support staff (n=8) in both institutions. Firstly, the findings suggest that students use a limited range of technologies for both learning and socialisation. For learning, mainly established ICTs are used- institutional VLE, Google and Wikipedia and mobile phones. Students make limited, recreational use of social technologies such as media sharing tools and social networking sites. Secondly, the findings point to a low level of use of and familiarity with collaborative knowledge creation tools, virtual worlds, personal web publishing, and other emergent social technologies. Thirdly, the study did not find evidence to support the claims regarding students adopting radically different patterns of knowledge creation and sharing suggested by some previous studies. The study shows that students’ attitudes to learning appear to be influenced by the approaches adopted by their lecturers. Far from demanding lecturers change their practice, students appear to conform to fairly traditional pedagogies, albeit with minor uses of technology tools that deliver content. Despite both groups clearly using a rather limited range of technologies for learning, the results point to some age differences, with younger, engineering students making somewhat more active, albeit limited, use of tools than the older ones. The outcomes suggest that although the calls for radical transformations in educational approaches may be legitimate it would be misleading to ground the arguments for such change solely in students’ shifting expectations and patterns of learning and technology use

Using Twitter to Support Reflective Learning in an Asynchronous Online Course

The purpose of this study was to further our understanding of the use of Twitter for promoting reflective learning. Specifically, this study investigated how students participate in Twitter-supported activities, what type of knowledge are manifested when Twitter is used to reflect on the course readings, and how students perceive the Twitter-supported activities. The data showed that Twitter was successful in keeping the learners engaged in the reflective discussion activities for a prolonged period compared to Blackboard. Students overall had a positive perception towards the integration of Twitter to support reflection and discussion along with active participation. Twitter was effective in increasing perceived learner-content and learner-learner interactivity along with engagement. We also provide recommendations for educational practitioners and direction for future research

Tsaap-Notes : Plateforme de prise de notes collaborative étendue

Plusieurs études ont montré les bénéfices apportés par les systèmes de prise de notes collaborative, les systèmes de micro-blogging et les systèmes de votes interactifs dans différents contextes d'apprentissage. Dans cet article, nous nous intéressons plus particulièrement au contexte des cours dispensés en face à face à un grand nombre d’étudiants. Nous présentons Tsaap-Notes, une plate-forme de prise de notes collaborative reposant sur un système de microblogging et intégrant les fonctionnalités de systèmes de votes interactifs. Tsaap-Notes combine les fonctionnalités des trois systèmes afin d’améliorer et de renforcer les bénéfices qu’apportent chacun des systèmes pris séparément. L’article présente également les résultats encourageants provenant d'une première expérimentation réalisée avec un groupe de quarante étudiants

Author Index

Author Index: CIT Vol. 17 (2009), No 1–

A literature review of the use of Web 2.0 tools in Higher Education

This review focuses on the use of Web 2.0 tools in Higher Education. It provides a synthesis of the research literature in the field and a series of illustrative examples of how these tools are being used in learning and teaching. It draws out the perceived benefits that these new technologies appear to offer, and highlights some of the challenges and issues surrounding their use. The review forms the basis for a HE Academy funded project, ‘Peals in the Cloud’, which is exploring how Web 2.0 tools can be used to support evidence-based practices in learning and teaching. The project has also produced two in-depth case studies, which are reported elsewhere (Galley et al., 2010, Alevizou et al., 2010). The case studies focus on evaluation of a recently developed site for learning and teaching, Cloudworks, which harnesses Web 2.0 functionality to facilitate the sharing and discussion of educational practice. The case studies aim to explore to what extent the Web 2.0 affordances of the site are successfully promoting the sharing of ideas, as well as scholarly reflections, on learning and teaching

Language Pedagogy and Non-transience in the Flipped Classroom

High connectivity at tertiary institutions, and students who are often equipped with laptops and/or tablets as well as smartphones, have resulted in language learners being able to freely access technology and the internet. Reference tools such as dictionaries, concordancers, translators, and thesauri, with pronunciation and usage tips, are available at the touch of a screen. The web brings a virtually endless corpus of authentic written and spoken target language usage, and instant communication with target language speakers anywhere. Video recordings of teaching or materials created for language learners can be viewed and reviewed at the learner’s convenience and reused by the teacher, freeing contact time for interaction. This paper distinguishes between asynchrony and non-transience and discusses which material can best be offered to language learners in tertiary education in a non-transient or enduring form rather than as live teaching, why this might be a good idea, and how to create and curate non-transient resources for individualised language learning

Language Pedagogy and Non-transience in the Flipped Classroom

High connectivity at tertiary institutions, and students who are often equipped with laptops and/or tablets as well as smartphones, have resulted in language learners being able to freely access technology and the internet. Reference tools such as dictionaries, concordancers, translators, and thesauri, with pronunciation and usage tips, are available at the touch of a screen. The web brings a virtually endless corpus of authentic written and spoken target language usage, and instant communication with target language speakers anywhere. Video recordings of teaching or materials created for language learners can be viewed and reviewed at the learner’s convenience and reused by the teacher, freeing contact time for interaction. This paper distinguishes between asynchrony and non-transience and discusses which material can best be offered to language learners in tertiary education in a non-transient or enduring form rather than as live teaching, why this might be a good idea, and how to create and curate non-transient resources for individualised language learning