Improving Research Methods Pedagogy for International

Postgraduate Taught Students: Facebook as a Learning Facilitator

Steve Page & Paul Webb

Overview of the Presentation

Context of the work Web 2.0 & Generation ‘Y’ The Challenge for us … Our use of Facebook for the

Research Methods / Dissertation module

Research findings & analysis Conclusions Where Next? Q&A

“The thing that we are trying to do at Facebook, is just help people connect and communicate more efficiently.” (Mark Zuckerberg)

Internationalisation Issues

Heterogeneity of the student population on the MBA brings with it a plethora of different learning styles (Adeoy, 2011; Wong, 2004; De Vita, 2001; Hofstede, 1986)

This causes problems for the students & learning and teaching challenges for us (Parsons & Fidler, 2005)

Context & Premise

Many international students on the MBA find the dissertation stage (in particular the research methods element) of their postgraduate degree very challenging

All Full-Time MBA students use Facebook (we know because we asked them!)

Could we use Facebook to engage and encourage their learning?

Web 2.0

Early use of the WWW was “information gathering”

Web 2.0 is about “information sharing” (McCarthy, 2010) – the “participatory web”

Social networking forms a core tenet of the participatory web

Generation Y

All the full-time MBA students are ‘Generation Y’ (born after 1980) digital natives

As Prensky (2001) suggests, they:

“… have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age”

The Challenge …

Devise a method of using the Facebook application to enhance student learning, by designing activities that would engage the students, and encourage them to adopt a more Western style of learning

Create an environment that students would perhaps feel able to “challenge” us on-line through the Facebook social networking tool, even if culturally some of the students found this difficult face-to-face

Facebook

Facebook Discussion Boards

Facebook facilitated activities

Facebook “live chat”

Discussion

Initial Facebook postings by the students on the LSG Discussion Boards seemed to be irrelevant to the questions we had asked them to discuss.

BUT … appeared to follow Tuckman’s (1965) ‘Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing’ model

Student Feedback

“Thank you Steve and Paul … it was really very helpful and we learnt a lot.”

“… everybody contributes unlike the normal class where some people are too shy.”

“… nobody particularly felt as if they were being watched.”

Analysis of ResultsCohort Number of

StudentsOverall Mean

Course Grade

(Excluding Dissertation

Module)

Dissertation Module – Proposal

Mean (15% of Module)

Dissertation Module –

Dissertation Mean (85% of Module)

Dissertation Module Overall Mean

Difference Between

Mean Dissertation

Module Grade & Overall Mean Course Grade

Failed Dissertation Module at

First Attempt

2009/1043

53% 51% 40% 41% -12% 11 = 25.6%

2010/1124

54% 60% 55% 56% +2% 2 = 8.3%

Conclusions

Using Facebook on the MBA has improved understanding of Research Methods & consequently students have achieved better grades on their dissertation.

Apochryphal? … No!

Unprompted, at the December 2011 Examination Board the External Examiner commented on the:

… excellent research methodology chapters in evidence in this year’s dissertations.

Success Stories …

Where Next?

Article currently in refereeing - drawn a line under this research

2012/13 – working with Roy Williams @ One Vision Housing exploring ‘governance and sustainability in the UK social housing market’

Will be exploring opportunities for funding the work both from within the University & outside

References Adeoy, B. F. (2011) ‘Culturally different learning styles in online

learning environments: a case of Nigerian university students’, International Journal of Information & Communication Technology Education, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 1-12.

De Vita, G. (2001) ‘Learning styles, culture and inclusive instruction in the multicultural classroom: A business and management perspective’, Innovations in Education and Teaching International, vol. 38, no. 2, pp. 165-174.

Hofstede, G. (1986) ‘Cultural differences in teaching and learning’, International Journal of Intercultural Relations, vol. 10, no. 3, pp. 301-320.

McCarthy, J. (2010) ‘Blended learning environments: using social networking sites to enhance the first year experience’, Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, vol. 26, no. 6, pp. 729-740.

References Parsons, C. & Fidler, B. (2005) ‘A new theory of educational change –

punctuated equilibrium: the case of the internationalisation of higher education institutions’, British Journal of Educational Studies, vol. 53, no. 4, pp. 447-465.

Prensky, M. (2001) ‘Digital natives, digital immigrants’, On The Horizon, vol. 9, no. 5. [online] Available at: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/prensky%20-%20digital%20natives,%20digital%20immigrants%20-%20part1.pdf

Tuckman, B. W. (1965) ‘Developmental sequence in small groups’, Psychological Bulletin, vol. 63, pp. 384-399.

Wong, J. (2004) ‘Are the learning styles of Asian international students culturally or contextually based?’, International Education Journal, vol. 4, no. 4, pp. 154-166.

Zuckerberg (no date). BrainyQuote. Available at: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/mark_zuckerberg.html#O45ZlMBYjjOchIgR.99

Questions?