1. SOCIAL/COLLABORATIVE
LEARNING
By Timothy Niven & Shaun Nguyen

2. Personal Learning Preference
 My scores for the Learning Preference Survey
were 3 across the board for
Active, Sensing, Visual, and Sequential. I really
feel that my Learning preferences will go well with
the social and collaborative learning quests. I am
generally really flexible when it comes to working
with other people, so I think I can collaborate with
other people efficiently. As the semester went on, I
preferred to learn Visually and Actively when
dealing with social and collaborative technologies.
Tim

3. Personal Learning Preference
 For the Learning Preference Survey, I
acquired a score of 5 for Visual, a 3 for
Sensing, a 1 for Visual, and a 3 for
Sequential. I again was pretty skeptical in
delving in the Learning Preferences, but to my
surprise they are pretty handy and useful to
know when you are learning.
Shaun

4. Group’s thought on Learning
Preference
 At the end of class, I learned that I really preferred
to learn Visually and Actively when working with
others. I used to be more open and easy going
when it came to learning, but I think that after
learning about my learning preference, I prefer to
study utilizing them. I think that knowing your
learning preference if an important part in learning
and it does make a difference in your personal
learning success. Knowing your personal learning
preference allows you to explore different ways of
learning. It could also make your learn quicker
and more efficient
Tim

5. Group’s thought on Learning
Preference
 My thinking hasn’t changed that much since the
beginning of the semester, I am just more aware
of my learning style and preference now. I think
that knowing your personal learning preference in
conjunction with social and collaborative work is
important and it does make a difference in
whether you succeed or not. Knowing how you
work will give you a good gauge in whether you
will be efficient working with other people or not.
Shaun

6. Pathways at the beginning
 For this learning quest, I chose the path of the
Learning Sage. I was successful in getting a broader
knowledge of multiple technologies. Having different
pathways is extremely helpful when working
collaboratively with other people. If you have people
who learn differently, they can bring new ideas to the
table. I didn’t really change pathway, but I did decide
to explore the other pathways as well. I realized that
since I was already working collaboratively
already, then exploring the other pathways would go
together.
Tim

7. Pathways at the beginning
 For the learning pathway, I decided to follow
the Learning Guide pathway. I thought it was
really important that you learn with
others, especially for this social/collaborative
assignment. Also since my partner is a
Learning Sage, we can work together and use
our different pathways to be better as a team. I
did not change my pathway at all. I stuck it out
as a Learning Guide all the way through.
Shaun

8. Summarize
 I really feel that being on various social networking sites and
interacting with other people was a huge help in helping me
understand the various social technologies more. By allowing
me to interact with other people, and ask questions I was
able to learn more and at a faster rate. Using Social
Bookmarking and Social Networking gave me a deeper
understanding on how to learn using social technology. I
realized that by using Social Bookmarking, I was able to find
information that was relevant to the topics I was trying to
study. Social Bookmarking saves a lot of time because it
allows me to sift through and finder the more important
websites. The combination of Social Bookmarking and Social
Networking were very excellent in learning with social
technologies.
Tim

9. Summarize
 All the social activities were relatively all useful and
easy to understand. I enjoyed utilizing all of them. All
of the learning technologies allowed me to better
understand how to learn and collaborate in a group.
The Social Networking activity(s) helped me to get a
better understanding of using social networking for
learning. I was able to connect with many different
people. Getting people’s opinion and thoughts on
something is an invaluable piece of information when
learning. The Social Bookmarking activities were the
best social technology to learn with other. Having
people tag and link things for you to see made finding
and researching information much simpler.
Shaun

10. Top Mobile Technology
 Social Bookmarking was a technology I utilized quite
frequently throughout the semester via del.ic.ious.com. The
technology/activity accommodated my visual, active, and
sequential learning preferences. I like the fact that I was
able to see people tag websites and information that was
related to the information I was looking at. And since I am
constantly interacting with other people, it makes learning
much simpler. Visually, I like the fact that I was on the
computer, and the computer presented me the information in
an organized web page. Also, it fulfilled my sequential
learning preference because a lot of the websites and
bookmarks on del.ic.ious connected to what we were
learning in the quests.
Tim

11. Top Mobile Technology
 The top social technology I used for this assignment was
MMOG’s. This quest accommodated my learning preferences
pretty well since I am generally a more active and visual
learner. Since I was on the computer a lot and clicking and
generally enjoying myself, I found that I was able to pick
things up quicker, mainly because I was really interested in
the game itself. To be able to enjoy yourself while you’re
working is rare, so being able to play while I learn was really
cool. The technology accommodates each preference pretty
well. Due to the fact that I am mainly a visual and active
learner I need to have what I’m doing in front of me and I
have to be participating (it’s a little harder for me to grasp
things if I’m not participating). Playing the MMOG’s satisfied
the requirements for my learning preferences.
Shaun

12. Synthesize group experience
 As far as learning is concerned, I was really interested in the mmorpg learning
technology. It was really fun to play games and actually learn something. I did not
expect to be playing various role playing games and actually learn something. I was
really impressed and surprised at how you could fit learning and fun together.
Besides being entertaining, the mmorpg social technology surprised me because you
could actually use it as a learning tool. Of all the social learning technologies, I
would have to say that the mmorpg technology was the least effective. The reason I
think that is because it is too easy to get distracted when you are playing a game.
The problem with the mmorpg technology is that you have to keep remembering that
this is a game for learning and not just a game for recreational purposes. If I had to
pick a social technology that I would like to further explore, then it probably would be
social networking. I like connecting with other students and people. It makes
learning more interesting because you have the input of hundreds or even thousands
more people.
 In my opinion, I think that social networking was the best technology that
worked with my learning preference. It did a good job of utilizing my
active, visual, and sensing learning preferences. Websites such as goodread.com
allow you to connect with many people and discuss books with each other. To be
able to read and follow the information is extremely useful, just like being able to
interact with other people in similar sumhect matter.
Tim

13. Synthesize group experience
 Though I really enjoyed the MMORPG social learning technology, I found that it was
the least effective of the three social technologies. I feel that because we are playing
games, sometimes we miss the point. I really enjoyed using it and I was surprised at
the potential of learning through games, but in the end games are still games. You
can learn with them, but I think that we as students tend to slack off and just play
them for fun instead of using them for their education merits. If I can choose a social
technology to further explore, I would again choose the MMORPGs. Technology in
our day and age is indeed advanced, but it’s always ever-changing, so with
improvements on modern technology, who knows how much more education our
games can be. For example, it would be awesome if we could play a game like WoW
and still learn something from it.
 The social technology that worked best for my learning preferences would be
a tie between the MMOGs and the Social Networking technologies. I really like it
when an assignment allows me to roam around, but still retain a solid structure in its
curriculum. It’s nice to be guided and free at the same time. Both of these
technologies were fun to do and they matched my learning preferences.
Again, learning is much more of a breeze when you can interact with other people
Shaun

14. What did you learn in this class?
 After this semester, I actually look forward to using many of the other social
learning technologies. I will definitely be using the Social Networking and
MMORPG social technologies after this class. Social Networking will be
really easy to utilize at a job via networking and getting to know other co-
workers, but the MMORPG technology will not really be utilized at all in a
workspace environment.
 I will be definitely utilize the Social Networking and MMORPGs after
completing this class. I really enjoyed the social technologies because
connecting and interacting with others is always really fun and it makes
learning a lot easier. Being able to socialize with other human beings
makes using this technology more exciting. I don’t think I will be avoiding
any of these technologies after this class due to the fact that all of these
technologies are already heavily utilized in today’s society, so there would
be no way to ignore or avoid them. Everyone is playing games, “everyone”
is on Facebook, and almost everything worth knowing nowadays is always
tagged and or bookmarked
Tim

15. What did you learn in this class?
 After this class is finished, I will still be using all of the
technologies presented in this class. MMOG’s can’t really be
utilized when you are learning at a job, unless they have
games you can play which correlate to the same work you
are doing. As for Social Networking and Social
Bookmarking, I can easily pick up information I don’t know by
asking co-workers via Facebook or Linkedin or by checking
bookmarks to the topics I need help with aka del.ic.ious.com
 I will be utilizing all the technologies I have learned about for
non-learning purposes. I already utilize them in my daily
life, so it won’t be much of stretch to incorporate them a little
more into my daily routine. There wasn’t really a social
technology I disliked enough to avoid, but I would say that I
would limit my MMORPG intake.
Shaun