Abstract :
While supplementation of face-to-face (F2F) teaching with online engagement
is increasingly common, the educators’ challenge of teaching F2F personalities
and facilitating online personalities has not been widely explored. In this
paper, we report on a project in which 1st-year students attended F2F sessions
and engaged with an anonymous online questioning environment. The differences
between students’ F2F and online behaviour led to intended and unintended
consequences. The purpose of this paper is to explore these intended
and unintended consequences of technology use. The project was undertaken
over a 3-year period, starting in 2004. In 2004, a pilot project was conducted
based on a class of 35 students studying a 1st-year programming course in
information systems. The investigation was again conducted in 2005 for the
same course, this time with 63 students. In 2006, the project was extended to
a class of 610 1st-year commerce students studying an introductory information
systems course. In all cases, students met F2F and when online, engaged
with an anonymous Web/SMS collaborative tool. The intended consequence
was that a blending of F2F with online interaction extended student engagement
beyond the limitation of a classroom and provided a forum for further
collaboration and consultation. The intended outcomewas achieved. An unintended
consequence was that the tool provided the lecturer with diagnostic
information that was used to impact on pedagogical designs. This was often a
result of students taking on an online personality that would very often be
extremely frank and honest about the manner in which the course was conducted,
and how learning was taking place. The findings show that students
used the tool in ways that exceeded the envisaged intention, and student use of
the tool positively impacted on the curriculum, pedagogy and general running
of the course. The paper concludes that integration of online engagement with
F2F teaching adds value to the teaching and learning experience.
