Lecture Notes
Categories of the strategies used by students:
Desktop options
Input options
Output options
Colour changes
Planning
Organisation
Notes and ideas
Multimedia
Language
Science issues
Using Presentation tools
Word processing
Using the Internet
Communication
The most frequently mentioned affordance of technology that participants mentioned when discussing their reasons for using technologies to support their learning, was the efficiency it offered them in terms of organisation of time; organising essays; finding references and information quickly and being selective in what read.
Five participants talked about how they were looking for or hoping for a certain type of technology that would suit their needs more effectively. These preferences or decisions were typically based on a good working knowledge of what technologies could offer them as well as extensive experience of the faults or weaknesses of other technologies
The most commonly mentioned property of technology that appeared to influence decisions about use and nature of use, was whether or not it was a technology that participants perceived to support learning or support socialising. When talking about their use of technologies, eight participants made distinctions of some kind of other about technologies for learning and technologies for personal life. The most common technology referred to was social networking tools, which were viewed as just for personal life, mainly because they were too distracting. Other technologies referred to included podcasting, mobile phones, Ipods, digital cameras, YouTube and multimedia authoring tools
The second most frequently mentioned property of technology that appeared to influence the decisions and preferences of LEXDIS participants was the validity or reliability of the tool or application. This was frequently mentioned in relation to the information or evidence that you can obtain using forums, Google Scholar or Wikipedia was also mentioned in relation to assistive technologies.
