Peer learning and Facebook: In class and beyond — K. Ranga Krishnan

JULY 12 — With modern technology, more students are learning from one another. Peer learning happens informally, but it can also take place in formal terms, developed by students themselves or established and monitored by teachers or faculty.

For example, schools could have students working in a group to solve a problem or taking a test in group format.

Or, we could have student-led workshops, team projects and peer feedback sessions.

At Harvard University, professor of physics Eric Mazur has shown that co-operative learning activities enhances complex thinking skills. His peer instruction method, which has been adopted across many science disciplines, encourages student interaction in large lecture classes.

A five- to 10-minute presentation on a single topic would be followed by questions which students would answer, discuss, reformulate and re-answer. Students found in general that this led to better learning of introductory physics.

We, at Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School, use a modified approach. We provide students with content to be learnt before class begins. When students come to class, they take an individual test and get into small-group discussions and retake the test as a group.

Overall, there is a 20 per cent improvement — the data clearly shows that peer discussion improves performance.

Such peer learning does not come from students associating with the brighter ones. Almost all students benefit, even the “good ones”.

The intentional act of sharing and teaching one another seems to account for the improved performance.

Other studies indicate that student-led discussion groups are at least as effective in conveying knowledge as faculty-led discussion groups.

At Duke-NUS, we have student-led groups and it shows that direct contact with the faculty is not always required for desired learning to take place.

BREAK OUT OF THEIR SHELL

The question is whether we can use the informal social interactions that students engage in to facilitate learning.

Social networking sites have now become the meeting place for people, particularly young students.

There are more than 2.7 million Facebook users in Singapore, almost 60 per cent of the population. The time that Singaporeans spend on Facebook, YouTube and so on, is among the most in the world.

These sites are the new global “cafes” in which to chat and exchange ideas and information. The common worry, however, is that the inordinate amount of time spent on such sites might lower productivity and, in the case of students, hamper learning. Could these in fact become tools for learning, even virtual classrooms outside the school?

Students already use these sites to collaborate, co-operate and learn from one another. But educators are still only in the early stages of tapping these to augment learning or as an added teaching tool.

Facebook is easy to use and it is free. Students can stay linked from anywhere, even on mobile devices, to stay updated all the time. They can get feedback and guidance much more quickly from their teachers, peers and the wider online community.

Facebook, Apple, Google and the World Wide Web offer plenty of learning apps for school or college learning, including slides, videos, laboratory demonstrations, PDF files, notes and more.

Let me cite an experiment that highlights the potential.

In Japan, Facebook was used as a tool for language learning. The class began with the teacher getting the students to discuss a question via Facebook. Then the class was divided into groups.

Each week, one group was asked to choose a question and post it as a topic for their classmates to have a dialogue on.

With incorporation of Facebook, even the more introverted students became motivated; they began to interact more with the rest of the class. The students began to express more views, both in writing and orally. The online engagement appeared to lead to more interactivity within the classroom, thus enhancing language learning.

These early forays into the use of social media hold promise and getting teachers to explore such tools more could enhance and extend learning for all students. — Today

* K. Ranga Krishnan is dean of the Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School Singapore. A clinician-scientist and psychiatrist, he chaired the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Sciences at Duke University Medical Centre from 1998 to 2009.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malay Mail Online.