Today within the practice of collaborative learning the teacher takes on a guiding role rather than role of authority which was part of the traditional teaching methods previously employed (Howell. 2012, p. 9). When the use of technology, specifically the internet, was first integrated into teaching it was not being used to its full potential, its was only used as a source of information rather than a platform for the sharing of people's own ideas in addition. This change has emerged as the students born into today's digital world have become contributors to information rather than simply the receivers, and because of this the generation has been labelled content creators or generation c (Howell. 2012, p.9).
The content creators have grown up in a world where technology has surrounded them in almost all aspects of their life; both educationally and socially (Howell. 2012, p.6), and it could be argued; the thing which has lead this generation to become what they are is put down to the phenomenon of social networking. Sites and apps such as Facebook, Instagram, blogs and wikis have allowed them to share their ideas and opinions, and as posted previously, this is something we all feel the need to do.
In addition to these more socially orientated instances of technology used by generation c, there are also numerous educational types of technology which encourage this natural urge to create and share. Some examples of these include Interactive Whiteboards, Discovery Missions, and Wikis.
A Discovery Mission is a student orientated activity in which the teacher becomes more of a guide figure to lay the initial framework for the students (O'Shea & Kidd. 2013). It involves giving the students a question or concept to explore in depth, but this is not to specific so as to allow for student decision making skills and creativity when approaching research(O'Shea & Kidd. 2013). A Discovery Mission can be done in small groups, and run for either a short or long period of time, ranging from a couple of sessions through to a month in length (Campbell. 2013). This exercise allows the students to "dictate the direction by which they complete the mission"(O'Shea & Kidd. 2013), they are in control of their own learning, and this in turn leads to a high level of engagement among the students, where at which point they are more likely to recall the learnt information later on(O'Shea & Kidd. 2013).
A Wiki is a collaborative website that can be edited and changed by both the teacher and the students (Maloy, Verock- O’Loughlin, Edwards, & Woolf. 2011, p.209). It is a helpful technology to organise the classes collective thoughts into the one space, and also helps students to extend their understandings of concepts through the editing feature which enables people to add to and edit others' previous contributions (Maloy, Verock- O’Loughlin, Edwards, & Woolf., 2011, p.228).
An example of a Wiki using the site: Padlet
(click image for larger version)
(click image for larger version)
References:
Campbell, C. (2013). Wikis and Webquests. Retrieved May 10 2013 from https://learn.uq.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/execute/displayLearningUnit?course_id=_10335_1&content_id=_237178_1&target=blank
Howell, J. (2012). Teaching with ICT: Digital Pedagogies for Collaboration and Creativity. Australia: Oxford University Press.
Maloy, R.W., Verock- O’Loughlin, R., Edwards, S.A., & Woolf, B.P. (2011). Transferring learning with new technologies (MyEducation Kit). New Jersey: Person. (Chapter 8. Pages 206 -239).
O'Shea, P. & Kidd, J. (2013). Discovery Missions: An Educational Tool for Web 2.0. In R. McBride & M. Searson (Eds), Proceedings of Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Confrence 2013 (p 4008-40012). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.
Wiki [Image], (n.d). Retrieved May 16, 2013 from: http://padlet.com/wall/klw9kvnoaq
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