Koltay—and likely most of you who are reading this column—have observed how Web 2.0 and the use of folksonomies have created conditions that result in information overload. When we provide applications that let users manage information, and those users have limited to no awareness of knowledge organization for the Web, the information architectures that evolve for users and the entire system may be less than optimal.
Since most users are not equipped to produce sound classification schemes or efficient top-down taxonomies on their own, their impact on any system creates what I call a literacy gap, depicted in Figure 6. Depending on the other signatures of information overload that play out in users’ interaction with a system, the consequences of their literacy gap can lead to information overload. Koltay’s article makes this claim, and I agree.
The above excerpt reminds me of a collaborative review project that we did in my class at the end of the last school year. We broke down each unit and lesson that we had covered into chunks and each student was supposed to make virtual flashcards (on quizlet.com) with their chunk of the material. Some students did great while others were absolutely lost while using the computers. It had a deleterious effect on the overall project. As I try to imagine implementing more web resources with the goal of productive communication and interaction in L2, I am troubled by the disparity of web/computer literacy among students. I don't mean to sound negative, but it is something I really struggle with. What about the students who lack the necessary skills?
Even when working with teachers, we find this in workshops. We tend to pair/group teachers, so they can help each other out - have you tried that with students?
Yes, I did assign pairs. Some students are smartphone literate and seem to have little to no interest in anything desktop. Hmmm...perhaps I should try focusing on the ipads.
Yes, while Twitter is most engaging when tweets are firing away, it is also a poster child for propagating information overload.
I'm still learning about all of the features of MS Teams, but this one surprised me. I can imagine it being a good tool for synchronous and asynchronous language learning - not just video conferencing.
App Integrations
I love this feature: When you need to take things up a notch, you can use some of the most popular apps in education right inside the Teams environment, including Kahoot!, Nearpod, Quizlet, and Flipgrid. If a particular app will be used frequently by a group, you can add a designated tab to a channel just for that app, so users can get to it quickly.
I agree that app integrations is the best feature. We are using Canvas for our classes at my institution but we are also using Teams for university wide communication. Both are new but the experience so far has been positive. I may follow up on the advise to start a small project on Teams to learn more about its best features in building a collaborative classroom. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for posting this, Jordan, and reminding me that here at UofL we've got MS Teams as an additional resource! I've just check to see if there's the possibility of integration with Blackboard and it appears there is. (I'm glad to have the option for synchronous class meetings, since I've always found Blackboard Collaborate to be a little baroque in its layout....)
Thanks for the tip @greghutcheson ! It hadn't occurred to me to look for Teams/Blackboard compatibility. I'm not sure yet if I prefer Teams over Blackboard Collaborate, but if one runs more smoothly than the other, that would be my pick!