E&PDE 2016 - How Can Social Network Sites Support Collaboration Within Product Design Education?
7th September 2016 at 4pm
Social network sites are an everyday tool to communicate with friends and family. Students have adopted the technology not only in their social lives but also to facilitate their academic work. Studies have indicated that social network sites make it easier for students to share formal and informal information within group project work, and achieve more timely communication. From a pedagogical perspective, this raises interesting questions regarding how a team’s social dynamics could change when it comes to participating in group projects, how we can support and encourage students to use social network sites, as well as how appropriate our involvement is. Since these sites reflect a record of the communication, interaction and collaboration within the group, is it possible to use a student’s involvement in a social network environment as an evaluation of their performance?
Workshop format:
The workshop lasted for two hours and was formatted as follows:
- An introduction will be delivered on how students are using social network sites to conduct design projects and recommendations on ways to integrate social network sites into design education.
- Groups will discuss the role academics play in facilitating social network communication and discover how social network sites will be used in future design education.
- Participants will be asked to share the findings of their group and contribute to the discussion on the challenges academics will face integrating social network sites into design education.
