This blog is part of a series on ‘New Proposals for Digital Pedagogies’ that launches the Sussex Digital Pedagogies Toolkit. 

This toolkit conceptualises new ways to think through digital teaching and learning, gathering data from members of the University of Sussex community who shared their thoughts, fears and hopes about digital pedagogy. This toolkit has been created collaboratively by a staff-student research team and uses material from a series of online workshops with members of the Sussex community, including faculty, professional services and students. Those who took part will be introduced as ‘participants’ to emphasise their active participation in knowledge production for this project. 

This post will explore the challenges and proposals for teaching and learning with technologies in relation to building community, as well as some questions for reflective practice and resources to explore these ideas further.

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‘Pedagogy is about human relationships.’

Workshop participant

Challenges

Throughout the workshops, participants shared that the humanness of learning is often lost within digital environments. Lower passion and attendance was recognised in Zoom lectures, with an example from Covid that online learning took away all the good aspects of School. ‘I hadn’t heard a teenager laugh in 8 weeks! Covid and online schooling took all the joy away and given them only Shakespeare.’

In this section, we will explore how digital pedagogies can change when we set the personal, the human, and the emotional as fundamental aspects of digital teaching.

Digital Logics

Breakout rooms were criticised as a failure in copying the aspects of seminars onto a digital platform. People tend to engage variably in breakout spaces.

Furthermore, Bates (2015) calls for the renovation of teaching models and a change in mindset regarding how tools are used within learning. The core component of teaching, whether online in synchronous sessions or in person, should be about facilitating discussions, and teaching materials should be used to supplement this. However, currently the value is on the materials, and discussions, especially online, are seen as ‘extra work’.

There is a need to move towards a pedagogy based on digital logics. One step towards achieving this is to have open conversations on the platforms currently used in lectures. An example was raised about online classes, with an indication that students’ turning off their cameras has become a norm. Why use an audio visual setting when many students don’t want to be seen online?

Group Work

Student feedback suggests that students are rarely enthusiastic about group work. There have been issues reported by students about the struggles of finding a time to meet and a member not showing up, resulting in uneven workloads and stress.

Whilst assessed group work might be common across the university, there is a need to think about how we can create a setting for people to want to work with each other. A topic that should be discussed is the obligatory nature or willingness to do group work.

Cohort based learning was raised as a successful example of working in small groups. It is a new trend in online learning, where cohorts are built within communities which enables people to learn together and build a community of trust. Cohorts not only help individuals within their community, but have access to wider areas of interaction with other cohorts. It has proven valuable with consumers of online learning and is expanding its influence.

Existing Tools

The creation of new tools is costly and time consuming. Therefore, there is a need to utilise existing tools, as well as train and share information around digital literacy. A range of digital tools were suggested to build community and interactivity in digital learning environments.

Gather Town

A creative virtual space where you navigate different areas as an avatar. This gives more options for liminal spaces and asynchronous interactivity than Zoom, which has become the norm since the Pandemic.

Talis Elevate

A collaborative reading tool embeddable into Canvas, which allows annotations on articles uploaded onto the interface. This enables students to add and respond to questions posted on the article, and helps them to understand difficult texts together online.

Loom

An asynchronous alternative to Zoom. Loom enables screen/camera capture with a chat room underneath. Presentations can be recorded, and it enables room for specific discussions associated with the topic.

Panopto

A tool which many teachers are familiar with, mainly used for recording lectures. In addition to screen and presentation capture, Panopto also has a space for collaborative discussion.

Padlet

A tool that offers opportunities for sharing ideas in a group and comparing work across groups. It works well in both synchronous and asynchronous environments, and across them e.g., students who are absent from a synchronous session can still contribute later.

There is a need to find a midway point between having too many and too few platforms used for online learning, which relates to setting clear boundaries between digital platforms used for personal use and for educational/work purposes. A solution suggested was creating a “My Sussex” platform used for all University related work.

Questions and Resources

• How could you avoid simply replicating in-person logics in online platforms? 
• How could group work be embedded more consistently?
• How are relationships and communities built during teaching? 
• What do students want from their online teaching? What tools and practices might help to build more community and liminal spaces in online environments?

• The Power of Relationships
• A guide to effective digital course design and delivery from four online learning experts
• 6 Strategies for Building Community in Online Courses
• 16+ Best Tools for Online Teaching for Digital Classroom Experience in 2024

Read the full toolkit:

References

Bates, A.W. (Tony) (2015) Teaching in a Digital Age : Guidelines for designing teaching and learning for a digital age. 2nd Edition. Place of publication not identified: BCcampus. Available at: Teaching in a Digital Age – Second Edition – Open Textbook (bccampus.ca).