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Computin and Library ServicesBetween the sheets: the affordances and limitations of social reading tools and
their potential role in developing critical and information literacy skills
Alison SharmanUniversity of Huddersfield
Aim of the talk
• Definition of social reading and why/how it was used at the University
• Affordances/limitations of the technology• Development of students’ higher order
cognitive skills• The future of social reading
What is Social reading?
• The collaborative highlighting and annotation of an electronic text using social reading tools
Transhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/alexvanoostwaard/5325349228/sizes/m/in/photolist-97zNN1-f76b4N-c5D8aw-7YK6Mc-dXzTzS-c6xRSo-dXzThU-dXud82-cT8iCb-dXzTj1-dXud8z-dXzTyL-dXud78-dXucPF-dXzTfq-f8ncG2-dyjjeS-bLqM4X-dRCmAP-8MU14c-fjYGpV-fkdSLj-fkdStJ-cXMFeh-cYanwE-b7zRre-bSdqxn-cY4HFY-9Z4Yq6-9Z4YoH-9Z7TeU-aE7xnj-cSZmyu-cSZmsu-cT8iKN-cT8inj-cXSMsw-aKt51K-aKt55M-aKt542-c2jHWN-c2jJWS/http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexvanoostwaard/5325349228/
Transforms reading from a private to a public activity
http://www.flickr.com/photos/edfredned/3592630542
Reading becomes a dynamic exercise rather than a passive
experience
Why use Social Reading?
http://www.librarything.com/work/11227385http://www.librarything.com/work/4892782
http://www.librarything.com/work/13849821
Why social reading?
• Have conversations about the text inside of the text
• Experimented with three tools
• Participation was voluntaryhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/goldberg/8678735016/
Cath’roleICCT Module co-ordinator
Alison’s role The researcher
Zoe’s RoleThe English Librarian
More about social readinghttp://www.flickr.com/photos/58558794
Practice of Marginalia
https://www.flickr.com/photos/careers/2935895182 https://www.flickr.com/photos/careers/2935 https://www.flickr.com/photos/careers/2935895182 895182https://www.flickr.com/photos/careers/2935895182
Web 2.0 technologies
Use in education
• Social annotation tools (Hylighter, Diigo, Digress.it, eMargin and Eduscom) used in educational settings
• Positive effect on higher order thinking skills but further research required (Novak et al.2012)
• Uni of Leicester, 2009
The tools
Who used the tools?
• 49% neither register or accessed any of the tools
• 33% registered but did not add any of their own comments
• 18% access the tools and added their own highlights/comments
Top 3 reasons for non use of tools
3. Prefer to learn/reflect on their own and formulate their own conclusions (17%)
2. Lack of time (21%)
1. Don’t like reading text electronically on the screen (38%)
What would persuade the students to take part?
3. Recommendations from friends – 20%
2. It was a required part of the assessment – 22%
1. You heard that students got higher marks – 30%
Interestingly, only 9% said recommendation from the tutor!
Who were the lurkers?
• Of those who registered but did not contribute:
–45% registered but got no further–55% lurked
“I think there were a lot of people that loitered round the edges of what was going on. Didn’t necessarily contribute but did still benefit”
The lurkers
• Top two reasons for non contribution
–Lack of confidence
–Didn’t know how to operate the technology
Readmill eMargin Goodreads
Registered students
25% 18% 57%
Contributions 43% 50% 61%Device needed Kindle eReader;
Kindle app on any device; Readmill app on iPad
Any device with Internet access
Any device with internet access
Inside or outside the text
Inside Inside Outside
Ease of set up Some issues with software/device compatibility
Set up by tutor – time consuming downloading the texts
Easy – set up by tutor
Ease of use Easy Medium Easy – similar to Facebook
Readmill eMargin GoodreadsSocial media tie-in Facebook/Twitter
TumblrNone Facebook/Twitter
Kindle integration Yes No No
Push notifications (alerts)
Yes No Yes
Public/private Public Private Private
Scored by students
1st 3rd 2nd
Scored by staff 1st 2nd 2nd
Goodreads example
Readmill example
eMargin example
Goodreads Readmill eMarginReading the comments made by fellow students 3Reading the responses made by tutors to others comments 2 2 3Making my own comments 2 3Getting tutor feedback direct to my responses 1 1 1The feature that enables comments to be made next to the text to which they relate 2
Seeing what fellow students had highlighted in the textMaking my own highlights in the text 2 2Opportunity to engage in discussions with others online 3 3 *Observing the tags that have been used * *Reading the text in another form 3
Readmill and eMargin
• Greatest benefits– 100% agreed
• They drew my attention to useful quotes• Helped me decide which sections of the text would be useful to my
assignment– 80% agreed
• It gave me an insight into how I could apply the theories to my chosen text
• It helped me to better understand the text
• Not so good – 25% felt reassured that fellow students were struggling with
similar issues to them (50% in GRs)
Goodreads
• Not so hot on– Giving them an insight into how they could apply theories to their
chosen text– Helping them better understand the text
(25%)
• Not effective with– Drawing their attention to useful quotes– Deciding which sections of the text would be useful to their
assignment(0%)
Development of higher order cognitive/IL skills
Strands 6, 8 and 9 of the Ancil Framework (2011)• Includes managing information; presenting and
communicating knowledge, synthesis and creating new knowledge
Sconul 7 pillars• evaluate, manage and present
Bloom’s Taxonomy• analysis, synthesis and evaluation
Managing info – presenting and communicating knowledge
Readmill and eMargin– They drew my attention to useful quotes – 100%
– Helped me decide which sections of the text would be useful to my assignment – 100%
Know which ideas to focus on/which ones to discard
...then I could bang in a few thoughts and feelings and initial sort of observations about that particular highlight and then get feedback. Which just helped me to, it just snowballed so once someone would help me to discard it or help me to realise it wasn’t really supporting what I wanted to say in the first place. It was interesting but not for what I wanted. Or they just helped me to keep digging until I got to the crux of what it was saying for me and why it was relevant to what I was trying to write...
Benefits of extracting the chosen text from the rest of the passage
“...when you take it your highlight and put it into Readmill the rest of the page falls away so it’s only your highlight sitting there”.
Helped students organise their thoughts
...it was all just sitting there whenever I had time to go and dip in and when I was really you know when I was really attacking it when I was sat there with all my notes out and my book out and everything else that was just there I could have that open in a separate window, look through that try and develop it straight onto the page it was just so much easier! Look I can’t tell you how useful it was – really and I’ve never ever I never would have been able to get to the depth that I did with that assignment had I never not have been able to order my thoughts that way
Highlights in context helped them select/deselect evidence
Quote from the tutor:
...cos they highlighted a lot more than they were using but they knew what they were using and why they were using it and why it allowed them to say what they needed to so XXX was saying it helped her to organise her thinking – it helped her organise her points and helped her select her evidence to put forward.
Synthesis and creating new knowledge• Helped the student engage in a deeper analysis of their
selected text and application of their chosen theory.
– 80% agreed that they gave them an insight into how they could apply the theories to their chosen text as well as helping them better understand the text
– The tools allowed them to do their thinking about the theory and text as they were interacting online inside of the texts
– They could return to view their comments and further develop their ideas
“Thinking out loud”
...I could go and put it somewhere, get instant access to it, see what I was thinking the last time I looked at it, see where I needed to take it next, write myself little questions if I didn’t have time to deal with it there and then, you know, and if I was out and about and I was thinking “oh my God that’s just made me think something to do with that highlight that I just put in yesterday” I could really quickly access it ...and comment
“tight, textual analysis”
The evidence of this analysis could be seen in her final assignment
“I could see in that paragraph all the thinking and the work that she’d done so you know it was nice to be able to reward her with that comment and praise for the effort that she’d put in”.
Scaffolding through the use of questions
– Tutor intervention was the real key - each student received personalised feedback to comments posted online
• Questioning technique: comments by the tutor:
the way I visualise it these layers of comments that you can see on the side of the screen here are almost like an archaeological dig – I was pushing them to go a bit deeper a bit deeper. If you scrape that back, what’s below that – if you scrape that back what’s below that...
Why, why, why???
• she’d ask me another question and I’d think “well actually I’d better go away and have a little think about that” or I’d go and try and find a secondary resource and I’d be trudging off to the library thinking “well I need to find something that says that! I need to find a way to back that up because that’s what I think and I obviously think it for a reason”.
Synthesized argument
• We’re trying to get them into the way of applying the theory and then using that application to build their argument that’s what we’re always aiming for – that sort of synthesized argument. And it’s interesting cos I think those students who used the social reading got it ... I can see some of the students still don’t quite get how you apply the theory ... I think some of those students would have really have benefitted, even if like me they’d lurked on eMargin they would have seen the conversations that others were having and that in itself I think would have been useful.
Improved marks
https://www.flickr.com/photos/48078450@N04/4727929974
Librarian’s view
• There was a perception that the social reading made her more visible to students
• Able to observe firsthand student concerns about linking their reading to the wider literature and offer timely help at the point of need
• Intervened with a comment (backed up by the tutor who gave the subject view point) or invited the student to attend a 1-2-1 tutorial
• Also contacted more off the list – maybe due in part to being more visible online
Social Reading: future plans
• Continue with Social reading next year • Perhaps focus on one tool – Readmill• Acquire funding to employ students as
mentors• Have a hands-on workshop allowing
students to practice using the tools
Social Reading: the wishlist
• Merge group discussion facility of Goodreads with the highlighting/annotating functionality of Readmill
• Use social reading with the secondary reading tools
Further reading
• Johnson, T. E., Archibald, T. N., and Tenenbaum, G. (2010) Individual and team annotation effects on students’ reading comprehension, critical thinking, and meta-cognitive skills. Computers in Human Behaviour, 26 pp.1496 – 1507.
• Nokelainen, P., Miettinen, M., Kurhila, J., Floréen, P., & Tirri, H. (2005). A shared document‐based annotation tool to support learner‐centred collaborative learning. British Journal of Educational Technology, 36(5), 757-770.
• Novak, E., Razzouk, R., & Johnson, T. (2012). The educational use of social annotation tools in higher education: A literature review. Internet and Higher Education, 15(1), 39-49.
Further reading
• Secker, J., & Coonan, E. (2011). A New Curriculum for Information Literacy: curriculum and supporting documents. Available at: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/37679/ [Accessed 5 April 2014]
• University of Leicester (2012) #tagginganna blog. Available at: https://sites.google.com/site/tagginganna/ [Accessed 24 August 2012].
• Wolfe, J (2002) Annotation technologies: a software and research review. Computers and Composition, 19 (4), pp. 471 – 479
Any Questions??
Here are my contact details:
Alison Sharman
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: asharman
