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See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at:https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330324761 TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS, SOCIAL MEDIA AND ONLINE COURSE DELIVERY Article· January 2019 CITATIONS 0 READS 45 3 authors: Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects: Hybrid LearningView project Statistical AnxietyView project Jennifer D. E. Thomas Pace University 34PUBLICATIONS121CITATIONS SEE PROFILE Danielle Morin Concordia University Montreal 23PUBLICATIONS94CITATIONS SEE PROFILE Dennis Kira Concordia University Montreal 62PUBLICATIONS593CITATIONS SEE PROFILE All content following this page was uploaded byDennis Kiraon 11 January 2019. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.
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TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS, SOCIAL MEDIA AND ONLINE COURSE DELIVERY Jennifer D.E. Thomas, Pace University Danielle Morin, Concordia University Dennis Kira, Concordia University ABSTRACT With the increasing use of social media in society, as well as in the classroom, this study sought to examine the contribution that various resources and activities, as well as social media toolsusedbystudents, inanonlineundergraduateBusinessTechnologyManagementcourse, may make to the development of various components of team-building skills. Online courses do not generallyfosterteam-building,however,fromourpastresearch,thereisindicationthat students seek to overcome this, as well as the missing human factor, by engaging social media. The results found indicate that certain social media tools are used extensively by a large numberofstudents,namely,emailmessaging, GLearningCampus,Texting,andFacebook,in additiontoface-to-facecommunication. Interestingly,textingandface-to-facecommunications were almost tied, and phone calls were less used than most other media. These results suggest t h a te v e ni nac o m p l e t e l yv i r t u a le n v i r o n m e n t ,s t u d e n t ss e e mt os e e kcommunity, though seemingly not by traditional phone communication. Keywords:team-building skills, social media, online delivery INTRODUCTION Mention the words social media and most everyone has an immediate conception of what that means. In academia attempts are made for more precision resulting in multiple definitions of the meaning of social media and social media tools (Tess, 2013). These attempts were distilled by DabbaghandKitsantas2011,p.1,to suggestthetermisusedto, “defineavarietyof networked tools or technologies that emphasize the social aspects of the Internet as a channel for communication,collaboration,andcreativeexpression,andisofteninterchangeablewiththe terms Web 2.0 and social software.”, with examples of tools such as, Delicious, WordPress, and Twitter,PBworks,Flick,YouTube,Facebook,Linkedin,GoogleApps.Tothislistoftools, Kaplan&Kaenlein,2010,p.61,addWikipedia,SecondLife,Blogs,WorldofWarcraft,and d e f i n ei ta s ,“ag r o u po fI n t e r n e tb a s e da p p l i c a t i o n st h a tb u i l do nt h ei d e o l o g i c a la n d t e c h n o l o g i c a lf o u n d a t i o n so fW e b2 . 0 ,a n dt h a ta l l o wt h ec r e a t i o na n de x c h a n g eo fu s e r generatedcontent”. SocialmediauseissuggestedbyCorrea,etal.,2010,p.247,as“the p a r t i c u l a rc o n s u m p t i o no fd i g i t a lm e d i ao rI n t e r n e tt h a th a sl i t t l et od ow i t ht r a d i t i o n a l informational use.” Bass 2012, p.1, proposed applying “disruptive innovation” to the problem of learning in higher education. Based on the definitions in the paragraph above, it is simple to see how social mediacouldbeconsideredonesuchdisruptiveinnovationineducation,ifoneacceptsthe definition Bass provides from Clayton Christensen, “a product or service takes root initially by s i m p l ea p p l i c a t i o n sa tt h eb o t t o mo fam a r k e ta n dt h e nr e l e n t l e s s l ym o v e s‘u pm a r k e t ’ , eventuallydisplacingestablishedcompetitors.”It’snothardtoseethisplayingoutwiththe increaseduseofsocialmediain theeducationalcontext.Researchby EducauseCenterfor Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 89
Applied Research (ECAR), 2012, as reported in Gikas and Grant, 2013, found 67% of students report that mobile devices (which facilitate social media use) is important for their learning and one study found social media use has increased from 2007 to 2010 and that the age gap between u s e r si sshrinking. Int h e i ro w ns t u d y ,G i k a sa n dG r a n t ,2 0 1 3 ,p .2 1 ,f o u n dt h a ts t u d e n t s describedtheuseofsocialmediatoassistlearningas,“(a)accessinginformationquickly,(b) communication and content collaboration, (c) variety of ways to learn, (d) situational learning”. Itseemsanaturalprogressiontolinksocialmediawithteam-building.Thetermteam- building itself also has many definitions or components. As used by the authors of this paper in previous research, team-building skills are defined as, “Coordinating Work – bringing together work from multiple sources and team members; Team Cooperation/Collaboration – interpersonal skills, resolution of differences; Communication skills – conveying ideas effectively, both orally andwritten”(Thomas,2001,ThomasandMorin,2007), constructssupportedbyMcKendall, 2000,Fapohunda,2013,Ben-Zvi,2007andRosethetal.,2008. Thecollaborativeaspectof team-building is defined by Hermsen, et al., 2010, as translated by Voorn and Koomers, 2011, as “active listening, receiving and giving feedback, honouring one’s commitments, contributing to fairdivisionoftasks,beingassertive,theco-creationofagoodcollaborativeatmosphereand takingresponsibility”.Theacquisitionoftheseskillswouldseemtobenaturallysupportedby theuseofsocialmedia.Whileastillnewareaforresearch,somestudiesalreadysuggest that socialmediacanhaveanimpactonlearning even onthedevelopmentofteam-buildingskills. (Tess,2013;Voorn &Kommers,2011;Cochran&Bateman, 2010; Liaw,Hatala&Huang, 2010). In an online course, the impression is one of isolation in which students most likely work independently,withoutreferencetotheirfellowstudents,apartfromsomepossiblediscussion boarde x c h a n g e s .D e v e l o p i n gteam-buildings k i l l ss e e m sad i s t a n tpossibility.( B e n s o n& Samarawickrema,2009;Mandernach,2006;MacKnight,2000). Whilestudentsappreciatethe convenience of online course delivery, the need for the human component is still vital and they tend to seek it out. This expectation has been observed in our own past research. (Thomas, et al., 2016; Morin, et al., 2015). The popularity of social media interaction suggests that students are likely to employ these means of communication to enhance their online learning experience, with or without instructor intervention. The above assertions are the focus of this current research, expanding on previous work which examined solely communicationskills (Thomas,e ta l .2 0 1 6 a ) .I nt h i spaper work coordinationandteamcooperation wereadditionallyexamined.These three componentswere investigated in a previous study and were found to be the main three legs of team-building skills (Thomas,etal.2016b). Inparticular,thecurrent studyexaminedstudents’perceptionsof the developmentofthe threeidentified componentsofteam-building skills fromtheresources and activities used in an online, undergraduate Business Technology Management course. Secondly, italsoexaminedwhether,forthepurposesofthecourse,studentsseekalternate meansof communication amongst themselves, to compensate for the lack of the face-to-face component of the course. THE STUDY Inthispaper, students’perceptionsoftheiracquisitionofthe threecomponentsofTeam- Building fromt h ev a r i o u sa c t i v i t i e sand resourcesu s e di na virtual BusinessT e c h n o l o g y Management course, and the social media tools they employ for the purposes of the course, were explored. The research questions were: Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 90
1.Whatistherelativecontributionoftheactivitiesandresourcesofthecoursetothe perceived acquisition of the three components of Team-Building skills? 2.Did students enlist social media tools to assist in the course? What were they? 3.Did the choice of social media have an impact on the perceived contribution of activities and resources to the development of the three components of Team-Building skills? Based on Thomas, 2001, and building on prior research (Thomas, et al., 2016b); Thomas andMorin,2012,2010,2006),thethreecomponentsofTeam-Buildingskillsareidentifiedas Communication, Work Coordination and Team Cooperation and are defined as follows: Communication:conveying ideas effectively, both orally and written Work Coordination:bringing together work from multiple sources and team members Team Cooperation:interpersonal skills, resolution of differences Several activities and resources were offered in the course to assist in the development of these skills. Students were also given a list of social media tools and asked about their use. These are: Table 1 ACTIVITIES, RESOURCES AND REPORTED SOCIAL MEDIA USED IN THE COURSE ActivitiesResourcesSocial Media Tools Assignments Discussion Board Discussion Cases Practice Quizzes Website Project Textbook PowerPoint Notes Overall Platform Email, Facebook, Phone Calls, Text Messaging, Blogging, Face-to-Face, GLearning Campus, Other. TheDiscussionCasesrefertotheactivitywherestudentsdiscussacaseonlineand the WebsiteProjectconsistsintheactivitywherestudentsdesignawebsite.TheWebsiteProject was an activity inwhichstudents coulddotheworkasateamorindividually.Moststudents choosetoformateamtocompletetheproject.Ifdoneasagroup,studentswereaskedto evaluateandcommentoneachother’sperformance.Commentsweregenerallypositive.The OverallPlatformusedforthecourseistheeConcordiaCourseManagementSystem andthe GLearning Campus is the communication system part of the online platform. Anonlinesurveywassenttoallstudentsregisteredinthecourse.Theinstrumentwas made up of three parts: a)students’ demographics and their level of understanding of the definitions provided of the three components of team-building skills, b)students’ perceptions ofthecontributionofvariousactivitiesandresourcestowards the three components of team-building skills, c)students’ choice of social media tools to communicate amongst themselves. Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 91
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RESULTS Demographics Therewere376studentswhoparticipatedinthesurvey,ofwhich54% weremaleand 46% werefemale. Mosthadmoderatetoextensivecomputerexperiencewith53.5% having moderate and 42.6% having extensive experience. Most students (60%) were between 20 and 22 years of age, and most students had taken at least one online course, the average being 2.3. Understanding of Definition Students were asked to rate their understanding of the definition of the three components of Team-Building on a scale from 0 (No understanding at all) to 10 (Very High understanding). AsseeninTable2,theaverageunderstandingscoreforeachskillwasCommunication:8.31, Coordination:8.36andCooperation:8.53 outof10.Ofthese,84.8%indicated theyhadan extensive understanding of the definition of Communication, 85.9% of Coordination, and 87.5% o fC o o p e r a t i o n .T h ed e f i n i t i o no fC o o p e r a t i o ni st h em o s tunderstood. Thereforew ea r e confident that the respondents clearly understand the definitions used in this research. Students’ Perceptions of Team-Building Skills Acquisition Research Question 1: Whatis the relativecontributionof theactivitiesandresourcesofthecourseto the perceived acquisition of the three components of Team-Building skills? Table 3 presents the contribution of course components (activities and resources) to the development of each of the components of Team-Building skills. It can be seen that on average, students perceived that the Assignments and the Website Project contributed the most to each of the components of Team-Building. In particular, the Website Project gave the highest perceived contributionw i t h9 3 . 0 7 %f o rC o m m u n i c a t i o n ,9 4 . 1 3 %f o rC o o r d i n a t i o na n d9 2 . 7 8 %f o r C o o p e r a t i o nc o m b i n i n g``Moderately``and` ` Al o t ` ` ,r e s p o n s e s .I ns e c o n dp l a c e ,t h e Assignments also have strong perceived positive contributions, with87.67%for Communication, 8 9 . 8 1 %f o rC o o r d i n a t i o na n d8 7 . 1 0 %f o rC o o p e r a t i o n .T h ea c t i v i t yt h a ti sp e r c e i v e dt o Table 2 LEVEL OF UNDERSTANDING OF DEFINITIONS Students were asked to rate their level of understanding of the definitions from 0 (No understanding at all) to 5 (Average) to 10 (Very High understanding) Communication (n=376)Coordination (n=375)Cooperation (n=375) Extensive (7 to 10)84.8%85.9%87.5% Moderate (4 to 6)13.9%12.0%10.6% Minimum (0 to 3)1.3%2.1%1.9% Average (Standard Deviation) 8.31 (1.71) 8.36 (1.78) 8.53 (1.76) Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 92
contributetheleastto allthecomponentsof the Team-BuildingisthePracticeQuizzes, with positive contribution perceivedcontributionbetween39and43%. Itisencouragingthatmost students tackled the practice quizzes individually rather than seeking to make it a team activity. Among the resources offered in the course, the PowerPoint Notes contributed the most to Communicationa ndCoordinations ki l lswhiletheoverallPl a t for mc ont r i but e dthemostto Cooperation. The textbook contributed the least to all the components of Team-Building which makes sense as reading the textbook is essentially an individual endeavour. The surprise is that it was almost 50-50. It would be interesting to know from those who did perceive the contribution how the textbook helped to achieve these skills. In order to assess whether the different activities and resources offered in the course have a significant different level of impact on each component of Team-Building skill, an analysis of variancewasconducted.Itwasfoundthatthemeanperceivedcontributionofactivitiesand r e s o u r c e sw e r es i g n i f i c a n t l yd i f f e r e n tw i t hp - v a l u e su n d e r10-140f o re a c ho ft h ethree components.Alsoseveraladditionalanalysesofvariancewereperformedtoassessifeach activity and each resource contributes to the three components significantly differently. The sign S+means that the corresponding p-value < 0.01, S means 0.01< p-value < 0.05 and N means no significant difference at 5%. The average perceived contributions of the Website Project to the three components of Team-Building skills are not significantly different. The same is true for the Overall Platform. All other activities and resources contribute differently to each skill. Table 3 STUDENTS’ PERCEIVED CONTRIBUTION OF ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES TO THE THREE COMPONENTS OF TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS CommunicationCoordinationCooperationAnova Per Act&R nMean (St. dev) + impact % Mean (St. dev) + impact % Mean (St. dev) + impact % Significance p-value Activities Assignments3732.32(0.68) 87.67% 2.49(0.67) 89.81% 2.50(0.71) 87.10%S+ Discussion Board3751.88(0.73) 66.40% 1.75(0.76) 55.88% 1.69(0.76) 50.93% S+ Discussion Cases3752.05(0.74) 75.34% 1.84(0.72) 64.80% 1.58(0.70) 46.13% S+ Practice Quizzes3731.50(0.63) 42.25% 1.54(0.66) 44.65% 1.42(0.61) 39.29%S Website Project3752.57(0.62) 93.07% 2.63(0.59) 94.13% 2.64(0.61) 92.78%N Resources Textbook3751.54(0.61) 48.13% 1.74(0.73) 56.53% 1.61(0.69) 48.53%S+ PowerPoint Notes3741.81(0.73) 62.03% 1.86(0.74) 64.71% 1.70(0.69) 56.53%S+ Overall Platform3751.77(0.72 60.48% 1.80(0.72) 61.87% 1.74(0.72) 58.24%N Anova per skill (p-value)S+S+S+ Legend: *The mean and standard deviation are calculated by assigning 3 to “A lot”, 2 to “Moderate” and 1 to “Not at all”. **The Positive Impact corresponds to the combined percentage of “A lot” and “Moderate” S+: Significance < 0.01; S: 0.01< Significance < 0.05, N: Not significant Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 93
Wecanalsoobserve, highlighted inbold, towardswhatcomponent,eachactivityand resourcecontributesthemost.WecanseethattheAssignmentsand theWebsiteProjectare perceived to contribute the most to the development of Cooperation skill, while the Discussion B o a r da n dD i s c u s s i o nC a s e sc o n t r i b u t et h em o s tt oC o m m u n i c a t i o nskill.T h eperceived contributions of the Practice Quizzes to each of the components of Team-Building skills are the lowest of all activities and resources. It is even significantly lower for Team Cooperation. It is comprehensible since this activity is meant as a tool for students to deepen their understanding of concepts and practice their applications. As for the resources, they all contribute the most to the development of Coordination skill. Social Media Used Research Question 2: Did students enlist social media tools to assist in the course? What were they? Table 4 indicates thatstudentsusedonaverage3.18differentsocialmediatoolsto communicate with their fellow students, with 1% of them using no social media tools at all, and morethan60%using atleast3socialmedia tools (18%+22%+16%+5%+0.5%).Table4 also shows that Email is the most popular media of communication, being used by 80% of students, followed by G Learning Campus at 65%, and Facebook at 57%. It can be observed also that a high percentage of students, 47%, still used Face-to-Face communication even if this course is offered online. Only 19% used phone calls, 5% used Skype, and 1% used Blogging. Only three percent indicated they used other means of communication, such as Whatsapp and Googledocs. One percent used no communication at all. Also, we observe that 99% of students reported using at least one social media (including Face-to-Face) to communicate with their fellow students. Table 4 SOCIAL MEDIA (Usage and Types) (N=376) Number of Social Media Tools Used FrequencyType of Social media Frequency 01%Email80% 113%G Learning Campus65% 225%Facebook57% 318%Face-to-Face47% 422%Text messaging46% 516%Phone calls19% 65%Skype5% 70.5%Others3% Average3.18Blogging1% No communication1% Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 94
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Impact of Social Media Tools on Students’ Perceptions Research Question 3: Didthechoiceofsocialmediahaveanimpactontheperceivedcontributionof activities and resources to the development of the components of Team-Building skills? Furtheranalysiswasperformedtodetermine whethertheusage ofsocialmediatools affects the perception of the contribution of activities and resources towards the enhancement of Team-Building components. InTable5,itis observed thattheuse ofsocialmedia seemsto impactsomeoftheperceptionsofthecontributionthat activities andresourcesmaketothe d e v e l o p m e n to fTeam-Buildingcomponents.S i g n i f i c a n td i f f e r e n c e si np e r c e p t i o n swere observed according to use of certain social media.The following five social media tools were studied in detail: Email, Facebook, Text Messaging, Face to Face and GLearning Campus. These wereselectedas they wereusedbyatleast45%ofthesample. Eachsocialmediawillbe analysed separately. Significant differences at 10% were recorded in Table 5. We note that the usage of the social m e d i at o o l ss h o w sn os i g n i f i c a n ti m p a c to nt h ep e r c e p t i o no ft h ec o n t r i b u t i o nm a d eb y D i s c u s s i o nB o a r d ,t h eT e x t b o o ka n dt h eO v e r a l lP l a t f o r mt oa n yo ft h eTeam-Building components. However the following observations can be made: •Impact of Email Students,activelyusingEmailMessaging,foundthattheAssignmentsandthePower Point notes contribute significantly differently to the development of Cooperation skill; in fact studentswhodonotuseemailidentifymoresupportthanthosewhodo.Noother significant difference has been identified. •Impact of Facebook NoneoftheresourcesareimpactedbytheuseofFacebook(FB).Howeversignificant differencesoft h ep e r c e i v e dc o n t r i b u t i o no fs e v e r a la c t i v i t i e st oTeam-Building components havebeenidentified. WefirstnotethattheAssignments,theDiscussion c a s e sa n dt h eW e b s i t eP r o j e c tw e r ea l lp e r c e i v e dt os u p p o r tt h ed e v e l o p m e n to f Communicationskillsinasignificantlydifferentlevel.Forexample,studentswhouse Facebook, perceive that the Assignments and the Website project contribute more, while the Discussion Cases contribute less to the skill. In addition, the Assignments contribute differently to Coordination in fact, those who use Facebook, perceived a higher level of contribution than those who do not. •Impact Text Messaging S t u d e n t s ,a c t i v e l yu s i n gT e x tM e s s a g i n g ,f o u n dt h a tt h eA s s i g n m e n t sc o n t r i b u t e significantly differently to the development of the Communication skill, and the Website project to the Coordination skill, in fact, those who use Text Messaging perceive a higher contribution to those skills. •Impact of Face-to-Face Students,relyingonFace-to-Face(FtoF),foundthatthePracticeQuizzescontribute significantlydifferentlytothedevelopmentoftheCoordinationskill,andthePower Point Notes to the Cooperation skill, in fact, those who do not use Face-to-Face perceive a higher contribution to those skills. Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 95
•Impact of GLC Students,activelyusingtheGLearningCenter(GLC),foundthattheAssignments,the DiscussioncasesandthePowerPointNotescontributesignificantlydifferentlytothe development of the Communication skill, and the Discussion cases, the Website Project andthePowerPointNotestotheCoordinationskill,whiletheWebsiteprojectalso contributes differently to the Cooperation skill. Those who do use the GLearning Center perceive a higher contribution to those skills. Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 96
Table 5 STUDENTS’ PERCEIVED CONTRIBUTION OF ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES TO TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS AND SOCIAL MEDIA CommunicationCoordinationCooperation Activities NoYesNoYesNoYes AssignmentsEmail2.6232.468 FB2.2472.3842.4072.555 TEXT2.2672.392 FtoF GLC2.2442.368 Discussion BoardEmail FB TEXT FtoF GLC Discussion CasesEmail FB2.1321.986 TEXT FtoF GLC1.9302.1101.7251.900 Practice QuizzesEmail FB TEXT FtoF1.5961.483 GLC Website ProjectEmail FB2.5092.6232.5772.697 TEXT2.5852.694 FtoF GLC2.5192.7002.5422.700 Resources TextbookEmail FB TEXT FtoF GLC PowerPoint NotesEmail1.8311.664 FB TEXT FtoF1.7671.624 GLC1.7101.8601.7331.922 Overall PlatformEmail FB TEXT FtoF GLC Legend: *The mean and standard deviation are calculated by assigning 3 to “A lot”, 2 to “Moderate” and 1 to “Not at all”. * indicates significance below 0.05 * Yes indicates the use of that specific social media tool, and No that it was not used. Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 97
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CONCLUSION T h er e s u l t so ft h estudyp r e s e n t e dherei n d i c a t ethat,byu s i n gv a r i o u sa c t i v i t i e s , resources, and tools in the course, it is possible to foster the development of team-building skills inacompletelyonlinecourse,inparticularskillsrelatedtocommunication,teamcooperation and work coordination. It was found that different activities and resources contribute significantly differently to the acquisition of the components of Team-Building skills examined. In particular, the Website Project and the Assignments are the best activities to develop each of the three components of Team-Buildingskills. DiscussionBoardsandDiscussionCasesalsocontributebut atalesser level. Practice Quizzes, although very important for deepening the students’ understanding of a concept and its applications, cannot be expected to develop the skills under study. In fact, their perceivedcontributionstothethreecomponentsarelowerthanthose of theTextbook,the P o w e r P o i n tN o t e sa n dt h eO v e r a l lP l a t f o r m.T h e s er e s u l t sa r ei mp o r t a n tf o ro n l i n ec o u r s e developers seeking strategies to help students develop these skills. Supporting the results found from the comprehensive literature review conducted in the area byTess2013,ourresultsalsoindicatethatwecannolongerignoretheusageofsocial media in the learning process of students. This paper demonstrates that not only do students seek community even in an online course, but that when students use a certain social media tool, their perceivedcontributionofactivitiesandresourcestothedevelopmentofthecomponentsof Team-Building skills is impacted. What seemed to work better in the past does not always work as well in the world of access to multiple media. Forexample,studentsveryactiveonsocialmediamaynotappreciatethevalueofthe D i s c u s s i o nBoard asm u c ha st h o s ew h oa r el e s sa c t i v e .I ti su n d e r s t a n d a b l e ,s i n c et h e i r communicationneedsarecoveredoutsidethepedagogyofthecourse.Inthepastdiscussion boardswere probablytheonlywayforonlinestudentsto communicateamongthemselves. Frequently students now create a Facebook account to post questions and answers not monitored bytheprofessorortheteachingassistant,potentiallyobtainingthewronganswers,whichisa concern. The expectations of students are also getting very high; many will expect to find course support on YouTube and other social media outlets. Answers to students’ email, which according to the results found in this study are their favoured means of communication, when addressed to theinstructor,areexpectedwithinaveryshortturnaroundtime.Insteadofsearchingforan answerthemselves,studentssimplysendanemailtotheprofessororteachingassistantand expect an immediate response. This new phenomenon could eventually have a possible impact on students’ problem solving skills which could be the subject of another research study. Many professors start to feel that this new teaching environment makes their work much more difficult and demanding. In addition to the many demands, professors might have to think aboutpostingquestionsviasocialmediaoutsideoftheconfinesofthecoursemanagement supportsysteminordertoengagestudents. Fortheinstructors,itoftenmeansretoolingand retraining,specificallyinhowtoeffectively integrate thevarioustechnologies toenhancethe learning experience. As was found in this research, in spite of the complete virtual environment of the course, s t u d e n t sa r ed e v e l o p i n gthet h r e ec o m p o n e n t so ft h e i rteam-buildings k i l l s ,b u ti ti sn o t completely certain if the social media tools are complementing the activities and resources of the course or actually replacing some of them. In line with the recommendations coming out of the Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 98
literature review conducted by Tess, 2013, this would need to be studied more deeply so as to be a b l et oma k es p e c i fi cr e c o mme n d a t i o n sfo ren h a n c i n gpedagogy. Ina no n l i n eco n t e x t ,the h u m a n - t o - h u m a ni n t e r a c t i o nm i g h ts t i l lb ea sr e l e v a n ta st h eh u m a n - c o m p u t e ri n t e r a c t i o n experience, as evidenced by the high percentage who reported that they continue to make use of face-to-face communication though not phone calls, in spite of the preponderance of smart phone ownership among the student population. All the above areas will be ripe for research for many years to come. REFERENCES Bass(2012) DisruptingOurselves:TheProblemofLearninginHigherEducation,EDUCAUSEReview,23-33. Retrieved on January 5, 2017 from http://er.educause.edu/~/media/files/article-downloads/erm1221.pdf Benson,R.,&Samarawickrema,G.(2009).Addressingthecontextofe-learning:Usingtransactionaldistance theory to inform design.Distance Education,30, 5-21. Ben-Zvi, D. (2007). Using Wiki to promote collaborative learning in statistics education.Technology Innovations in Statistics Education, 1(1), Article 4. Cochrane,T.,&Bateman,R.(2010).Smartphonesgiveyouwings:PedagogicalaffordancesofmobileWeb2.0. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 26(1), 1–14. Correa, T.,Hinsley,A.W.&deZuniga,H.G.(2010)WhointeractsontheWeb?:TheIntersectionofUsers’ Personality and Social Media Use.Computers in Human Behavior26, 247–253 Dabbagh, N., & Kitsantas, A. (2012). Personal learning environments, social media, and self-regulated learning: A natural formula for connecting formal and informal learning, Internet and Higher Education,15 (1), 3-8. Fapohunda,T.M.(2013).Towardseffectiveteambuildingintheworkplace.InternationalJournalofEducation and Research, 1(4), 1-12.. Gikas, J. & Grant, M. M. (2013) Mobile computing devices in higher education: Student perspectives on learning with cellphones, smartphones & social media.The Internet and Higher Education, 19, 18–26. Hermsen, R., Van der Marel, M.edrednonedehgidraavsgnikrewnemaS‘)0102(.C,teilVnaV&loep: Verschillen tu ssenleer lin genoptraditiodehsilbupnU,’nelohcssgniwueinrevneelenMaster ’ sthesis,Un iv ersityo f Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherland Liaw, S., Hatala, M. & Huang H. (2010). Investigating acceptance toward mobile learning to assist individual knowledge management: Based on activity theory approach.Computers & Education54, 446–454. M a c K n i g h t ,C . B .( 2 0 0 0 )T e a c h i n gc r i t i c a l l ya b o u tc r i t i c a lt h i n k i n gt h r o u g ho n l i n ed i s c u s s i o n s .EDUCAUSE Quarterly, 4, 38-41. McKendall, M. (2000). Teaching groups to become teams.Journal of Education for Business, 75(5), 277-282. Mandernach, B.J. (2006). Thinking Critically about Critical Thinking: Integrating Online Tools to Promote Critical Thinking.Critical Thinking - Insight: A Collection of Faculty Scholarship,1, 41-50. M o r i n ,D . ,T h o ma s ,J . D . E . ,&K i r a,D .( 2 0 1 5 ) .P e d a g o g i c a lS t r a t e g i e si nO n l i n eD e l i v e r ya n dHigher-Order Learning Skills. NNGT Int. J. on E-learning and Education, Vol. 2, October 2015. Retrieved from http://www.ijnngt.org/upload/jr4vl2/Danielle%20Morin%201.pdf Roseth,C.J.,Garfield,J.B.andBen-Zvi,D.(2008).Collaborationinlearningandteachingstatistics.Journalof Statistics Education,16(1), 1-15. Tess, P.A. (2013). The Role of Social Media in Higher Education Classes (Real and Virtual) – A Literature Review,Computers in Human Behavior29, 60–68 Thomas,J.D.E.andMorin,D.(2012).“TheArt(Activities,Resources,TechnologicalSupports)inOn-SiteAnd O n l i n eL e a r n i n g ,a n dS t u d e n t s ’P e r c e p t i o n so fA c q u i s i t i o no fT h i n k i n ga n dT e a m - B u i l d i n gS k i l l s ” ( S e l e c t e dPaper), inIntelligentL e a r n i n gS y s t e m sa n dA d v a n c e m e n t si nC o m p u t e r - A i d e dI n s t r u c t i o n : Emerging Studies, Dr. Q. Jin, ed., IGI Global Publishing, PA., 2012, p. 287-304. Thomas, J.D.E. and Morin, D. (2006). "Technological Supports and Students' Perceptions of Acquisition of Team- BuildingandThinkingSkills",inProceedingsofE-Learn2006--WorldConferenceonE-Learningin Corporate,Government,Healthcare,andHigherEducation,Honolulu,Hawaii,USA,October13-17, 2006, p. 2436-2441. Thomas, J.D.E., Morin, D., and Kira, D. (2016a). “Social Media and Communication Skills”, In Proceedings of the Allied Academies International Conference, Jan. 6-8, Montego Bay, Jamaica, p. 3-8. Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 99
Thomas,J.D.E.,Morin,D.,andKira,D.(2016b).The3C’sofTeam-Building - Communication,Cooperation, Coordination.The Online Journal of New Horizons in Education, 6 (3), 189-194. (Previously published in the Proceedings of the International Teacher Education Conference (ITEC), St. Petersburg, Russia). Thomas,J . D .E.(2007).“AS u rv eyofKn ow ledg eManagementSkillsA cqu is itio ninAnOn lineTeam-Based DistributedComputingCourse”,JournalofCollegeTeaching&Learning–(TLC),Littleton,Colorado: Clute Institute, September, 4(9), 39-46, 2007. Thomas,J.D.E.(2001).“TechnologyIntegrationandHigher-OrderLearning”,inProceedingsofConferencein Advanced Technology in Education Conference (CATE), Banff, Calgary, Canada, May 2001 Voorn J.J. & Kommers, P.A.M.(2011). Social media and higher education: introversion and collaborative learning f r o mt h es t u d e n t ’ sp e r s p e c t i v e .I n t e r n a t i o n a lJ o u r n a lo fS o c i a lM e d i aa n dI n t e r a c t i v eL e a r n i n g Environments, 1(1)DOI: 10.1504/IJSMILE.2013.051650 Global Journal of Business PedagogyVolume 1, Number 1, 2017 100 View publication statsView publication stats