Scenario
2: Interactive Tours
"A high school history teacher, located on the west coast of the United
States, wants to showcase to her students new exhibits being held at two
prominent New York City museums. The teacher wants her students to take a
"tour" of the museums and be able to interact with the museum
curators, as well as see the art work on display. Afterward, the teacher would
like to choose two pieces of artwork from each exhibit and have the students participate
in a group critique of the individual work of art. As a novice of distance
learning and distance learning technologies, the teacher turned to the school
district’s instructional designer for assistance. In the role of the
instructional designer, what distance learning technologies would you suggest
the teacher use to provide the best learning experience for her students?"
(from Walden University, EDUC 6135)
For this scenario, the two
distance learning technologies that will assist the high school history teacher
in her endeavor would be media sharing and discussion technologies. To further
streamline the technologies, the teacher should use these features within a CMS
(course management system) if she can. Nonetheless, I would like to focus upon how
she can use media sharing tools and then discussion technologies so that she is
able to have her students tour the museum, see various works of art, interact
with the curators, and finally critique a work of art as a class.
Social media is one mode of media sharing that is very
popular. With the features of smartphones and other mobile devices, sharing
media like pictures and videos is possible with a variety of social media sites
including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and many others. Weilenmann,
Hillman, and Jungselius (2013) confirmed that "mobile technologies such as
smartphones are a relatively common sight in modern museums and science
centers." Therefore, this history teacher should encourage her students to
utilize social media as a means of collaborative learning. Luckily, if she uses
a CMS like Canvas (http://www.instructure.com/),
she will be able to integrate outside social media tools more seamlessly than
with other CMSs, but she should be able to integrate social media tools through
links with any CMS. This will help the history teacher because "media
sharing sites are Web Sites that facilitate the sharing of content and
artifacts such as text, pictures, videos, presentations, and audio files"
(Laureate Education, Inc., n.d.), and that is exactly what she wants to do. She
wants the students to "tour" the museum so that they can see artwork.
Weilenmann, Hillman, and Jungselius (2013) suggested using
Instagram because it "includes dedicated mobile applications that allow
users to take and manipulate photographs... and to share them online where
other users can react through comments and ‘likes’." The latter could help
the students interact with the curators, another goal of the history teacher. Also,
Instagram allows users to include tags which "can be seen as a way
to direct photos into a certain type of image stream or photo-graphic
conversation" (Weilenmann, Hillman, & Jungselius, 2013). With tags, it
would be easier to help the students stay on task and to find artworks again
with greater ease. As an additional bonus, Instagram can be integrated with
Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Flickr, sites that also encourage interactions
through commenting, replies, and/or "likes". This is especially
important because Weilenmann, Hillman, and Jungselius (2013) reported, "It
has become relatively common for museums and science centers to use social
networks with the aim of facilitating new types of participation with visitors."
So if the museums are already using social media networks, the history teacher
should be able to work with the museum to find the right media sharing venue
for her class.
Once the class has sufficiently
toured the museum and interacted with the curators (and possibly other art
aficionados who use social media networks), then the history teacher should gather
her class by using a discussion technology. Again, if she has a CMS, it should
"integrate discussion
technologies such as discussion forums, group collaboration areas, and virtual
chat tools into the online learning environment" (Laureate Education,
Inc., n.d.). However, if she does not have a CMS, there are "Web
discussion technologies [that] provide yet another method to actively engage
students in learning" (Laureate Education, Inc., n.d.). In fact, the
teacher could choose to conduct the discussion on Instagram or whatever social
media network was used for the tour. After all, they do allow for commenting;
however, if the comments are to be graded, that could become a logistical
nightmare and this is why CMSs are so wonderful−they will help you find and
grade your students more easily. However, in order to conduct a group critique
of an artwork, the history teacher should "spend [her] time
preparing materials and the carefully thought out discussion questions and
topics that relate to learning objectives" (Andresen, 2009, p. 251).
Having guiding questions will help direct the learners and allow her to "intervene,
but only in order to keep the discussion on track, or take on a cheerleading
role to motivate the discussion" (Andresen, 2009, p. 251) would be the ideal
situation. Andresen (2009) found that if the instructor participates in the
discussion too much, then the learners "begin to rely on the instructor to
answer questions" (p. 251). Therefore, the history teacher should take
care to intentionally set up the discussion so that learners can participate
and have a lively discussion critiquing the artwork that is steeped in respect,
understanding, and constructive learning.
As you can see, using media sharing
and discussion technologies will help the history teacher accomplish her learning
objectives (and with relative ease if she can use a CMS). These learning tools will
help enrich the classroom experience and connect her learners with outside experts,
something that may even help them realize the possibilities of social media, helping
them become life-long learners.
References
Andresen, M. A. (2009). Asynchronous discussion
forums: success factors, outcomes, assessments, and limitations. Educational
Technology & Society, 12 (1), 249–257. Retrieved from http://www.ifets.info/journals/12_1/19.pdf
Laureate Education,
Inc. (Producer). (n.d.). The technology of distance education. [Multimedia Program]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_3398790_1%26url%3D
Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., &
Zvacek, S. (2012). Teaching
and learning at a distance: Foundations of distance education (5th ed.) Boston, MA: Pearson.
Weilenmann, A., Hillman, T., & Jungselius, B.
(2013). Instagram at the Museum: Communicating the Museum Experience through
Social Photo Sharing. In Academia.edu.
Retrieved September 21, 2013, from http://www.academia.edu/3575522/Instagram_at_the_Museum_Communicating_the_Museum_Experience_through_Social_Photo_Sharing
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