The document discusses focus groups conducted with Vanderbilt undergraduate students to understand how they use technology and social media outside of class. Key findings include that students frequently use Facebook, Twitter, and video sites for keeping up with friends and news. They find course management systems like OAK useful but prefer other methods for communication. Students suggest faculty could use separate Twitter or blog accounts to supplement learning but avoid merging social and academic accounts. The document advises faculty interested in technology integration to consider students' technology preferences and boundaries.

1. HOW DO YOU WEB?
Undergraduate Focus Groups
for Informing Pedagogy
Derek Bruff (@derekbruff) & Rhett McDaniel
Center for Teaching (@vandycft)
Vanderbilt University

2. What can we learn about how our
students use social media (etc.) that
might inform faculty interested in
integrating technology into teaching
and learning?

3. ECAR Study of
Undergraduate
Students and
Information
Technology
2013
Someone else’s
Data!

5. The CFT’s 25th Anniversary Symposium on the Future of Teaching
Frank Wcislo
Todd Hughes

6. Vanderbilt
Data!

7. 6
FOCUS GROUPS
35
a lot
STUDENTS
OF DATA

8. Thanks to…
Dan Morrison
Stacey Kizer
Katie Taylor
Jessica Riviere
Courtney Campbell
Adam Wilsman
Nayana Bose

9. Some Questions…
Where is the first place
you go when you boot
up your laptop, tablet, or
other computer?
Do you engage in any
kind of discussions
online? If so, where
and how do these
discussions occur?
When you want to learn about
something (in politics, sports,
health, entertainment, etc.),
where online do you go? What do
you do there?
What technologies do you find
useful for your academic work at
Vanderbilt?
Some Answers…

10. What do students do online outside of
their academic work?
“I just check to see what’s going on. I use
the Facebook chat a lot to talk to people;
friends from school and friends from other
schools.”
“In terms of Facebook, it’s just keeping up
to date with family and friends from home
and that’s what I say for Twitter, too.”

11. What do students do online outside of
their academic work?
“Also, I feel like I get a lot of news from
Twitter just because I check, like, what’s
trending, like, I found out about when
Whitney Houston died on Twitter…”
“I have an order of things I always check in
every day. [Facebook,] email, news, ESPN,
and then whatever I decide. I go to a bunch
of video sites and check out some funny
videos and then that’s all, really.”

12. What do students do online outside of
their academic work?
“On my phone I have Google Reader, and I
have an aggregate of RSS feeds for certain
tech blogs and other sites I love. That’s kind
of one of the main things.

13. What do students do online outside of
their academic work?
“Most frequently I’m on Deviant Art, like,
hands-down. I just love that website…
Literature, poetry, stuff like that. Things
based on books and stuff. And, like, I talk to
a lot of people in there… I know people
from Australia, Germany, the Netherlands,
different parts of America.”

14. SIDEBAR: MEMES

16. Student 1: I may have to explain it, but I make
Memes, occasionally.
Student 2: Oh, God, Memes?
Facilitator: Yeah, explain.
Student 1: It’s -Student 2: So complicated.
Student 1: It’s, like, yeah. It’s like a -- it’s
kind of like an inside joke. An inside joke
from, like -Student 3: Of the internet.
Student 1: Basically. And everyone on the
internet can vibe to it.
Student 4: This is so different than Memes that,
like, the definition of Memes in social science;
right?

17. What do students say about our
course management system?
“It’s just a lot easier when you have access to the
syllabi and your grades and everything in one
place.
“It’s like the electronic solution for like papers and
stuff, so…you don’t have to print out or worry
about losing it. It’s always on the computer.”
“I think every teacher should have to put their
syllabus online because I like have a few teachers
this semester who don’t do it and it’s really
annoying.”

18. What do students say about our
course management system?
“People are so much more likely to talk
about something in person, on Facebook,
or in email because they’re more
accessible. Like, like those things are
designed to use for communication,
whereas OAK isn’t necessarily designed for
that. And so people are less likely to
communicate through it.”

19. What do students say about our
course management system?
“I’ve also been in a couple classes that
make small groups within the class,
especially if it’s a big, lecture class. And
they’ll kind of assign you a small group and
they’ll make a group on OAK within the
course and you’ll do assignments together
and you can also share your notes on OAK,
so that’s kind of cool.”

21. What do students say about other
academic uses of technology?
“I really like using the citations on
Wikipedia because, ya know, if you’re
struggling to find stuff through other
databases, you can go to Wikipedia. You get
a kinda overview of the topic, so you, like,
have a general understanding, and then if
there’s something more specific that you
know you’re gonna write about the topic,
it’ll list a set of sources.”

22. What do students say about other
academic uses of technology?
“I really like when the professors use
PowerPoint in class. I don’t think it’s
necessary for them to put all the notes in
the PowerPoint because then it kind of
defeats the purpose of paying attention.
You’re just going to write it all down. But if
there’s really no visual aid and it’s just
them talking I know a lot of people tend to
zone out.”

23. How do students talk about social
media ∩ academic work?
Social
Academic
???

24. How do students talk about social
media ∩ academic work?
“Yeah, I feel like Facebook’s more -- especially
since the advent of Timeline -- it’s, like, this is my
entire life and it’s out there and we’re just going
to merge it with the classroom? So it’s just, kind
of like, wait, wait. Back up a little bit..”
“Yeah, I’d worry it would be a little too invasive. I
know a lot of my friends have their Twitters
protected, too. So, creating a separate account
would be pretty easy.”

25. How do students talk about social
media ∩ academic work?
“Like, we’re not friends, they just give me a
grade.”
Social
Academic

26. So how might faculty use social media
(etc.) to support learning?
“If you had a site that was specifically, like, ‘here’s
help with homework’ and it’s formatted so that it’s
really easy to use… like Twitter feeds where it can
just pop up and, ya know, hey, someone just
posted about this question in class. And you could
tag, like, what [question] number you’re working
on... I think that could be really helpful, but I
would think that it would almost have to be
something that isn’t in use now..”

27. So how might faculty use social media
(etc.) to support learning?
“I don’t know if I tweet a lot, but I look at other
Tweets, and I think that could be kind of
interesting for a class that maybe has some kind
of project if they used Twitter for it. And I do know
classes that do that. If they have a final project
and they’re promoting it, and they’re trying to get
advertising for it they’ll use Twitter. But I think that
would be cool in other classes to kind of expand
that.”

28. So how might faculty use social media
(etc.) to support learning?
“Now, if you altered OAK to be more bloglike… If it were just, like, a blog that you
went through, that might be a little bit more
accessible, you know. Because the nice
thing about OAK is that all of your classes
are in one place. So if you could access all
of, like, theoretical class blogs in one place,
that would be really nice, but -- I don’t
know.”

29. THINK-PAIRTHINK-PAIR-SHARE
Given the perspectives shared by these
students, what advice would you give to a
faculty member interested in integrating
technology in their teaching?

30. Derek Bruff: derek.bruff@vanderbilt.edu
Rhett McDaniel: rhett.mcdaniel@vanderbilt.edu
Vanderbilt Center for Teaching: cft.vanderbilt.edu
Meme featuring Mike Caulfield, courtesy Amy Collier