This document summarizes research on using a social network site to support blended learning in an English GCSE resit program. Data was collected over two years from four student groups using the site to supplement classroom activities. The summary describes: 1) How the teacher mediated tools and discussions to guide students' learning and development. 2) How students' engagement and participation increased over time as informal uses of the site built a supportive community and students gained confidence in sharing work. 3) Suggestions for future uses of networks to organize student work, integrate refugee students, and facilitate collaboration between educational institutions.

1. Howard Scott
PhD candidate in Technology Enhanced Learning
University of Hull
howardscott75@hotmail.com
@howardscott75
https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/57df1fd2-4782-4fec-a35f-3a09712095ab
https://www.polleverywhere.com/free_text_polls/2qYptQjfF90zLrq
“All communities are networks, but not all networks
are communities.” Etienne Wenger

2.  Two year data collection of four separate groups
(Population. 100+ students) of FE English GCSE re-sit
 Data drawn from social network site blended between
mobile and classroom activity
 Data used to create analysis of learner affordances and
continuum of engagement of participation:
 An Anatomy of a Social Network in a fixed period
mapped Learner’s mobile experiences (posts,
communication types)
Situated Mobility: case study

3. Activity Theory
• The teacher mediates tools and signs towards objects, via
pedagogy as artifact
• Artifacts include language, questions, discussions, signs:
push notifications that act on the Zone of Proximal
Development

4. 1. Sustained mobility - orientation 2. Situated and habitual residence
Agency of individual
3. Community endeavour
4. Self-determination and self-
efficacy

5. Offline augments the online
 Early F2f group work in lessons and collaborative tasks
 Directed online role tasks for completion of offline activity
– co-authoring and collaborative editing
 Blended instruction – grand tour of a network
 Informal uses, framed in lifeworld discourse, teacher
modelling humour, posting of multimodal responses
 Make the affective effective as the cohesive binding of a
community
 Make bite-sized targets continually clear to support goals

6. Goal-directed Momentum
 Frequency of ‘posts’ (quantity) increases based on activities
re-purposed through the online network:
 Where the teacher blends activities to classroom
meetings, the community independently:
 Constructed affective support
 Made intrapersonal organisation normal habitus
 Shared resources and gave feedback
 Congregated peers (from HEUs to LEUs) to outcomes
 Object (for teacher): that frequency increases resident
orientation and quality of ‘posts’ improving learning
experience and affordances

7. Interventions
community responses
ENHANCED
ENGAGEMENTAgent Momentum of use
Blended use
‘Post work here’ ‘Open-publishing’
‘Polls/surveys’
More orientation to space in
‘first’ instance; more mobile
access; more proactive
students sharing own
resources
‘increased
confidence’;
community
support
(among
adults)
Direct Messages
for feedback - *
‘Limited
response’ –
muted
communications
Open questions in discussion
threads
Limited
reflection–
sustained by
more engaged,
prominently
adults
Collaborative work
Increases participation; ensures
some engagement thresholds are
met (first post)
Participation Threshold

8. Future design operations
 Designation of roles to support community interchange
 Use of networks for student plenaries – reorganisation and
synthesis of personal schema to community
 Integrating refugee students – distributed knowledge curated
and assimilated to central hub
 Use of networks as learning-bridge between
institutions/sector (schools to colleges, colleges to university)
 However, we must be careful that in an age of economic
austerity, these online experiences do not seek to overcome
offline, f2f teaching. They augment, but do not substitute.

9. Joe: ...even if you did post something that weren’t the best, I started
getting a bit less self-conscious, you know. Like, at first you’re like,
“Oh, I want to make sure this is spot-on. We’re going to post this on
Edmodo.” But after a while, you’re like… you could write something
pretty quick and just put it up, you know, if you just had a quick
minute. I guess we started getting less self-conscious. … Polly: It
helped me implement other people's ideas and gauge the level that
was expected of me…Carlene: I view it as a base, a sort of textbook
to start studying… Jane: some students would post things that
aren’t relevant to the course…still writing using abbreviations. I saw
people using it in the wrong way… Craig: I’m using it for a certain
reason...for a great purpose that will help me in the future, as
opposed to having a laugh on the internet for 5 minutes…Dan:
Facebook is like, proper social. I think there’s about five or six of the
class that I’ve got on Facebook. But I could literally be talking to
them on Edmodo ten minutes before talking about work and be on
Facebook talking about something totally different.

10. Blended Case Study 1 - Glogster
Mobile/external Classroom/internal Edmodo network
Data collection:
Observational research
Surveys
Vox pops
Roles/Skills:
Organising
Delegating
Selecting
Meaning-making
Uploading
Posting
Labelling
Explaining
Post – sharing –
commenting
Teacher:
Provides feedback
Uses polls to construct
knowledge and generate
summaries; questions to
challenge assumptions,
build arguments and
draw conclusions

11. Blended Case Study 2 –
collaborative editing
Teacher role: Collaborative activity Edmodo network
Provides:
- Resources
- Organises groups
- Provides framework of
prior knowledge
(techniques)
- Assessment rubric
Student skills:
- Selecting
- Co-authoring
- Checking
- Editing/decision-
making
- Synthesising
- Posting
Students:
Publishing – sharing –
commenting – reading –
peer assessing - evaluate
Teacher:
Provides feedback
Challenges grading
Assesses

12. Community
sharing
membership
Inclusivity
Social discourse
Informal Lifeworld
disclosures
Affective disclosures
Peer-support
Network
sustained engagement to
objects
orientation
agency
repurposing
decoding language
confidence building
publication
technical skills
submitting /receiving
feedback