Málfríður - 15.03.2007, Blaðsíða 27

line students). In the following section, I will review
the tools that were used within the new Moodle­
based version of the course. First I will review the
use of standard Moodle tools which provided the
main structure for the course. Then I will present
some of the general problems with these tools and
give an overview of the new Covcell tools which are
under development and how they help to address
these problems.
3.3 Media English – The Covcell Version
3.3.1 Standard Moodle Tools
3.3.1.1 The Wiki
“A wiki … is a website that allows visitors to add, remove,
edit and change content, typically without the need for reg­
istration. It also allows for linking among any number of
pages. This ease of interaction and operation makes a wiki
an effective tool for mass collaborative authoring.” (http://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki, accessed 14th March 2007)
The wiki is a standard tool within Moodle. It allows
students to develop a webpage resource collaborati­
vely and as such it provides teachers with a wide
range of options in developing collaborative teach­
ing activities. Within my Media English course, the
wiki was used to allow students to share their com­
ments and insights concerning the interpretation of
the newspaper reports.
I set up a wiki in which each newspaper report
had its own page. Students were then asked to add
comments into that page concerning the interesting
or significant uses of language. Each student chose a
particular colour for their contributions (e.g. yellow
text on a red background) so that it would be easy
both to distinguish the original text from the com­
ments and to identify the contributions of individual
students. The students were divided into groups (10
groups of 2 to 3). There were two general kinds of
group: those who added in comments before class
as a starting point for discussions; and those who
added in comments after class which were based
on the in­class discussions. Each article would then
have one group adding comments before class and
one group adding comments after class.
In this way, students were developing a commu­
nal resource concerning the uses of language in the
texts. These annotated reports would then form the
basis for the midterm written assignment (also sub­
mitted online through the Moodle system). Students
were therefore responsible to each other for contrib­
uting effectively to the wiki. I was also interested
to note that use of “before” versus “after” groups
for the commenting suited the students. They were
allowed to choose their own group (again using a
wiki for group sign­up): some students preferred
putting in their own ideas and insights before class
rather than having the responsibility of taking notes
and effectively reporting on the ideas of others; but
some students preferred to be able to report on what
had been discussed in class rather than having the
reponsibility of contributing original suggestions.
These represented character and cultural differences
but both groups were accommodated and were able
to make an active contribution to the wiki resource.
3.3.1.2 The Forum
A forum is an internet message board where indi­
viduals can place messages to other members of the
forum who can in turn reply to the original message.
It is thus an asynchronous tool for the exchange
of messages. Moodle comes with an inbuilt forum
tool.
In the Media English course, students are expect­
ed to participate in the discussion of the texts inde­
pendently of contributions to the wiki. On­site stu­
dents can do this simply by turning up in class and
participating in the discussions that go on there. For
distance students this is obviously not an option.
In­class discussions are videoed and posted on the
internet so that distance students can listen to the
in­class discussions but this obviously does not
allow them to actively contribute. One of the main
ways in which distance students can participate is
therefore by posting comments and observations in
the forum.
However, the aim of the Covcell Project is not just
to allow distance contribution to a course of this kind
but also (1) to create effective interaction between
distance and on­site students and (2) to encourage
richer collaborative interaction within the on­site
student group. The forum tool has proved to be very
effective in meeting these aims in this course, in part
because it has proved to interact effectively with the
use of the wiki. Not all of the comments and obser­
vations that students want to make can be appropri­
ately added to the wiki: the comment may be a ques­
tion or request for clarification; the comment may
be a general statement of important background
information which is too long and detailed for a wiki
comment; or it may be a position statement where
there is an ongoing argument or debate about the
relevance or significance of various features of the
text. Students have naturally turned to the forum
as a venue for this kind of exchange of information
and opinions. Although there is no requirement for
on­site students to contribute actively to the forum,
a number of on­site students have been drawn into
the forum discussions.
MÁLFRÍÐUR 7