Step 2

• Introduction to working with and in a blog which serves the purpose of self-reflection. For this, every seminar participant brought their own notebook with them in order to practically try out the various steps needed. The blog was not available to the general public so that the participants could exchange ideas and thoughts in peace and quiet as well as being able to post photos and videos without having to worry about legal problems or the topic of copyright. 
• First internal meetups of the groups and task assignment. The collaboration of the various diverse groups took place in many different facets: in real meetups, via Skype, Facebook, Google tools etc. The work processes and the respective results were recorded within the seminar blog. 
• Two joint museum visits. Hereby the seminar topics were gone into in-depth based on the museum objects. In addition, the comprehensibility, length and usefulness of the text panels used in the museum were discussed and these insights were applied for the participants' own work. The experiences made in the museum were once again reflected in the blog. 

Step 3

• Weekly face-to-face phases (2h/week):
• Students presented in short presentations their respective topic 
• Groups reported on experiences made and about possible difficulties regarding collaboration
• The lecturer presented a new and easy-to-use web 2.0 tool every respective session
• After approx. half of the seminar (in order to first practice working with the blog):
• Introduction to working with a wiki. The seminar participants implemented the work steps once again in their own notebooks.
• The groups were assigned the task of posting their respective thematic texts in the wiki and asked to edit the texts amongst themselves. 
• Seminar participants that did not require a course certificate did join in with the group work, reflecting within the blog etc. However, they did not draft any thematic texts but rather created a wiki glossary instead.  

Step 4

• In the last few sessions the work groups presented the wiki results.

Step 5

• Final evaluation of the project

During the project CeDiS supported the lecturer when it came to technical questions. Parallel to the seminar the lecturer took part in the further training course "Web 2.0 in teaching and research" in which the seminar was reflected on with other educators. The experiences made by other participants who were supervising projects that were running at the same time and the very constructive exchange was very helpful for the lecturer's own project.    

Experiences made by the lecturer

The various different tasks of the project led to an increased active participation of the students. The participants were able to include their strengths such as, for example, special organizational talent, computer affinity, knowledge about AV media etc. In addition, those students that are usually not as active or as participatory in face-to-face seminars were able to engage in a more active manner. The simultaneous learning of how to edit and use blogs as well as wikis within the course of one semester was just too much for most of the students. The blog was the tool of choice as it was visually seen more appealing, the language being used less formal and therefore reminded the students more of how they usually implemented social media platforms. The task of a weekly reflection within the blog was taken up on a very positive note.

The wiki, the much more academic tool, was used less. In addition, the constructive editing and re-editing of fellow students' texts was hard work for most of the participants. 

Finally, the project was positively accepted by the students as they learned a lot of practical things which they are able to use for their (future) studies as well as when they start their working careers.  

Further information

• Self-learning module to the FU wiki
• FAQs on the FU wikis
• LEON_Suggestions for managing online group work.pdf

Support offered by CeDiS

• Consulting services for the implementation of digital solutions in teaching: The Center for Digital Systems (CeDiS) has extensive experience of many years when it comes to the implementation of digital media and systems within the fields of teaching, learning and research. We offer a wide variety of consulting services on the implementation of these tools and systems within the entire academic scope and especially at Freie Universität Berlin. 
• Training courses and workshops: For lecturers at Freie Universität Berlin (professors, employees, tutors) as well as lecturers of other universities CeDiS offers training courses and workshops on the topic of teaching and learning with digital media. These course enable participants to implement online elements within their own sphere of teaching.
• The Executive Board of the Freie Universität supports e-learning initiatives: With the e-learning funding program financial resources are provided to lecturers that enrich and improve their courses quality-wise by implementing technological and media-related support. All of the academic staff teaching, the lecturers or even the institutions of the Freie Universität - without the Charité-Universitätsmedizin - can be supported within this program.
• Training courses on web 2.0 and social media at the Freie Universität:
  

  • Fit for teaching 2.0: Compact course on web 2.0 & social media at Freie Universität

  • Teaching lab: Social media in teaching