Twenty-eighth International Conference on Learning

Abstract

Due to the rapid adoption of communication technologies, social networks in particular, social learning’s significance has increased in the recent decades. Nonetheless, use of social learning in higher education is still in nascent stages, suggesting the need for scalable and sustainable strategies for its adoption. In this context, studies linking social learning to collective intelligence may provide some solutions. In particular, the ability to crowdsource educational content shared by peers on social media platforms may benefit participating students. Yet, little is known about factors involved in fostering high levels of discourse participation among students, particularly those pursuing higher education. This gap in extant knowledge has motivated the present study, as a part of which the use of a purpose-built social learning mobile application (Soqqle) for sharing student-generated content and peer-to-peer communication is analyzed. For this purpose, as a part of semester-long courses, students from universities in Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Indonesia were required to partake in video-based activities through Soqqle and receive feedback from both instructors and peers via its social engagement features. Their perspectives on the app’s utility were examined in post-course focus groups, where the majority of students concurred that the social learning experience facilitated by Soqqle promoted idea generation as well as increased creativity and attention due to enhanced peer- and self-evaluations. These findings indicate that online platforms have the capacity to promote social learning, which is of particular importance at the time when, due to COVID-19 pandemic, most educational institutions have adopted distance learning measures.