Megan Poore's List: society, culture and behaviour online

• Jenkins identifies the following skills as critical for literacy in a new media culture:  

   
  • Play—the capacity to experiment with one's surroundings as a form of problem-solving
   
  • Performance—the ability to adopt alternative identities for the purpose of improvisation and discovery
   
  • Simulation—the ability to interpret and construct dynamic models of real-world processes
   
  • Appropriation—the ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content
   
  • Multitasking—the ability to scan one's environment and shift focus as needed to salient details
   
  • Distributed Cognition—the ability to interact meaningfully with tools that expand mental capacities
   
  • Collective Intelligence—the ability to pool knowledge and compare notes with others toward a common goal
   
  • Judgment—the ability to evaluate the reliability and credibility of different information sources
   
  • Transmedia Navigation—the ability to follow the flow of stories and information across multiple modalities
   
  • Networking—the ability to search for, synthesize, and disseminate information
   
  • Negotiation—the ability to travel across diverse communities, discerning and respecting
  multiple perspectives, and grasping and following alternative norms. 
•  Schools as institutions have been slow to react to the emergence of this new participatory culture; the greatest opportunity for change is currently found in afterschool programs and informal learning communities. Schools and afterschool programs must devote more attention to fostering what we call the new media literacies: a set of cultural competencies and social skills that young people need in the new media landscape. Participatory culture shifts the focus of literacy from one of individual expression to community involvement. The new literacies almost all involve social skills developed through collaboration and networking. These skills build on the foundation of traditional literacy, research skills, technical skills, and critical analysis skills taught in the classroom.

• Most state governments in Australia have banned popular online networking sites from public schools after these sites were accused of supporting a broad host of threats to young people. This paper questions the effectiveness of these bans in light of recent empirical research that highlights the social and educational benefits that can accrue from young people's online network use. In doing so, this paper argues for a more informed policy debate that considers not only the risks involved in using online networks, but also the opportunities online networks afford and the capabilities young people require to use them effectively.

• "Most of the content of these sites has little educational value" (QLD DET)!!! // Restricting access may be restricting access to help - Megan Poore on 2009-06-25

•  Approaching technology from the perspective of children, it tells positive stories about how they use online space to build relationships and create original content. It argues that the skills children are developing through these activities, such as creativity, communication and collaboration, are those that will enable them to succeed in a globally networked, knowledge-driven economy.

• Direct quotes from Executive Summary
  _________________
  This study examined the use of social software in the UK further and higher education sectors to collect evidence of the effective use of social software in enhancing student learning and engagement.
  ___
  This study provides insights about the: educational goals of using social software tools; enablers or drivers within the institution, or from external sources which positively influence the adoption of social software; benefits to the students, educators and institutions; challenges that may influence a social software initiative; and issues that need to be considered in a social software initiative.
  ______
  
  Our investigations have shown that social software tools support a variety of ways of learning: sharing of resources (eg bookmarks, photographs), collaborative learning, problem-based and inquiry-based learning, reflective learning, and peer-to-peer
  learning. Students gain transferable skills of team working, online collaboration, negotiation, and communication, individual and group reflection, and managing digital identities. Although these tools enhance a student’s sense of community, sharing and collaboration brings in additional responsibility and workload, which some students find inflexible and rather ‘forced’. The study found that students have concerns about privacy and the public nature of the tools for their academic activities.
  
  
  - Megan Poore on 2009-06-24
• 6.1 Educational goals of social software (pp 24-26)
  *Initiating new ways of learning
  *Recording group discussions
  *Giving control to students
  *Simulating work environments and providing transferable skills to the students
  *Peer-to-peer learning
  *Critiquing each other’s work
  *Reflective learning
  *Problem- and inquiry-based learning
  *Collation of resources
  *Skills Development
  *Team working and online collaboration skills
  *Organising a virtual class
  *Immediate (instantaneous) support from the educator and fellow students
  *Creating a digital identity
  *Improving the effectiveness of face-to-face tutorials and seminars
  *Fostering community building and participation of students in university-wide initiatives
  *Social engagement - Megan Poore on 2009-06-24
• 6.2 Enablers to social software initiatives
  *Decision making by individual educators or a small team of educators
  *Fitting the initiative with the technology-enabled learning or strategy at the institution
  *University’s VLE and availability of suitable tools
  *Existing usage of tools within the institution
  *Internal champion or mentor
  *An internal successful initiative, which is also well documented or communicated
  *Word-of-mouth and personal recommendation for choosing the tool
  *Constraints of the in-house tools and storage space
  *Ease of integration with the institution’s VLE or existing systems
  *Usability and specific function of the tool(s)
  *Students’ familiarity with the tools
  *Giving control to the students
  *Open source solutions and access to the developer community
  *Promotion of the initiative
  *Facility of technology-rich physical learning spaces and availability of equipment - Megan Poore on 2009-06-24
• 6.3 Benefits of using social software
  Educational benefits
  *Increase in retention of the students
  *Better understanding of students’ needs
  *Socialisation
  *Collaborative learning
  *Team working or working in groups
  *Engaging students
  *Development of a community
  *Becoming aware of different approaches to learning
  *Problem solving
  *Inspirational learning
  *Reflective learning
  *Sense of achievement
  *Sense of control and ownership
  *Early feedback or interventions before formal assignments and quick turn-around time for feedback
  *Peer-to-peer support and feedback
  *Being conscious that the educator and fellow students can see their online work
  *Visibility of artefacts being created
  *Integration of multimedia assets
  
  Social and other benefits
  *Student engagement in university initiatives
  *Adding novelty and excitement to the learning and teaching environment
  *Overcoming communication difficulties in face-to-face environments
  *Overcoming isolation and geographical distances
  *Interacting across multiple physical locations
  *Experience with social software tools helps to foster cross-institutional collaborations
  *Being ‘green’
  *Non-educational benefits or effect on employability
  *Support and community building outside the course environment:
  *Students’ positive perceptions of the institution and the educators involved in the initiative
  *Wider impact of the initiative
  
  Positive implications beyond the initiative
  *Developing skills for independent learning
  *Communication and collaboration skills for online environments
  *Improvement in departmental rankings
  *Informal relationships between educators and students
  *Development of transferable skills for studies and workplace
  *Development of communities of practice
  *Development of alumni communities
  *Portability of resources
  - Megan Poore on 2009-06-24

• Lee Bryant examines the development and convergence of social software tools and services and the wider Web 2.0 ecosystem. This article looks at how these connected networks of people, data and services offer great potential for education and the ability to help socialise and personalise learning.

• young adults are more likely to live in households with digital television and the internet, and to regularly use new media devices such as mobile phones, MP3 players and games consoles. By contrast, regular use of more traditional media, such as television and radio, is below the level for adults as a whole.
• young adults are more likely to live in households with digital television and the internet, and to regularly use new media devices such as mobile phones, MP3 players and games consoles. By contrast, regular use of more traditional media, such as television and radio, is below the level for adults as a whole.
• young adults are more likely to live in households with digital television and the internet, and to regularly use new media devices such as mobile phones, MP3 players and games consoles. By contrast, regular use of more traditional media, such as television and radio, is below the level for adults as a whole.
• Compared to adults as a whole, young adults are relatively unaware of how television programmes and radio stations are funded and whether they are regulated.
• Compared to adults as a whole, young adults are relatively unaware of how television programmes and radio stations are funded and whether they are regulated.
• Although use of the internet, and confidence in using services and functions, is higher for young adults, interest in and confidence using internet security tools is at the same level as for all adult internet users.
• Young adults are less likely to make any kind of judgement about a website before entering personal details, less likely to have concerns about entering personal details online, and just over a fifth do not make checks before using new websites.
• Within the young adult population, it is the attitudes and behaviours of the youngest adults – those aged 16-19 – that are most striking. These youngest adults are the most likely to share information and download content from the internet, at the same time as being less likely to make any checks or judgements, and more likely to believe that the internet is regulated.

6 more annotations...