Student choice: Blends of technology beyond the university to support social interaction and social participation in learning

Abstract

This paper presents an overview of a blended collaborative learning design driven by assessment and feedback. To extend class based activities students were provided with a private group space on the university managed learning environment. They chose to supplement this using technologies beyond those provided by the University to support their social interactions and participate in their learning. Qualitative data analysis of student’s reflections provides insights into the students own blends of technology including Skype, What’s App, Facebook amongst others and accessed via their hand held mobile devices such as Smartphones and laptops. These were used by the students to connect and collaborate with their peer group to complete the set tasks throughout the module and the final group based assessment.