Hull City Council Adult and Community Learning: Facebook your learners for engagement and retention

An Excellence Gateway case study

Published: 24 July 2009

This case study was produced by JISC RSC (Regional Support Centres) Yorkshire & Humber on behalf of the Excellence Gateway.

Sector relevance: Adult and community learning

Keywords: Improving teaching and learning, improving responsiveness to learners, improving institutional effectiveness, social networks, instant chat, distance learning, personal support, support for remote learners, motivating learners, personalisation of learning, coaching learners, access to education, Entry to Employment, Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET)

Summary

Theresa Rowland directly supports her learners via the ‘Instant Chat’ facility on Facebook. This case study highlights the successes of her method.

About Hull City Council Adult and Community Learning

Hull City Council Adult and Community Learning service (Hull ACL) offers both formal (national accredited examination courses) and informal personal development courses such as numeracy and literacy. Courses are delivered by professional tutors in five major centres and over 150 outreach locations.

The challenge

A challenge for the adult and community learning sector is communicating with their particular type of learners. Learning can take place in non-traditional environments, at various times of the day, and learners often have other priorities in their lives in addition to their learning. Theresa Rowland, Learning Development Officer and e-CPD Advisor, began using Facebook to enhance communication with her learners.

The activity

Facebook is a social networking website that allows users to share updates, photographs, videos and more with ‘friends’ on the site. According to the website, Facebook has more than 200 million active users. It has an ‘Instant Chat’ facility - friends that are online at the same time can chat in a private virtual ‘chat room’ where participants can view and contribute to the typed conversation in real time.

Most of Theresa’s learners have a ‘profile’ on Facebook and they asked Theresa to join the website so that they can use the site as a way of communicating. Theresa does not use Facebook for social purposes but she could by altering the privacy settings on her account to allow different types of ‘friends’ to see restricted areas of her profile.

The outcomes

Theresa has adopted a communication method that suits her learners. Theresa and the teaching assistants on the NVQ2 Supporting Teaching and Learning course log on to Facebook at 7pm on a certain night. They use the Instant Chat facility to discuss the course and raise any problems.

The impact

Caters to the type of learner

Whilst official online facilities for Hull ACL, such as a virtual learning environment (VLE), can provide space for teaching, the instant communication that Facebook provides via Instant Chat is a suitable tool to provide direct learner support at a time and place when it is needed. Theresa outlines how “students are busy… The teaching assistants are in school and doing literacy and numeracy. It's a lot to ask them to leave their kids and husband at home for another night.” By using Facebook, Theresa is able to contact her group at a time and place that suits them.

Appropriate communication channels

Using Facebook was a suggestion from her learners so Theresa is responding to her learners’ needs in a format appropriate to them and communicating on their terms. She says:

“It's looking at it from a different point of view."

Theresa finds that learners are using technology to communicate in their personal lives. Skype is software that allows users to make free-of-charge telephone calls over the Internet to other Skype users, and she notes that there is a large immigrant population within Hull using Skype to contact relatives. Theresa also says that those using the Internet to contact friends and relations include age groups not normally associated with embracing technology. She says:

“The older ones have more time on their hands and it saves on their phone bills. A lot don’t have mobile phones but they have laptops.”

Theresa has not had a problem with learners not having Internet access. The BBC Open Centre in Hull provides free Internet access and she finds that most people have access at home. Hull is unique in that it has its own broadband television, STREAM, which provides an Internet connection. Set-top boxes are given to children in schools in more deprived areas.

Better communication

As Theresa’s learners are regular users of Facebook, she can utilise the medium to contact her learners at short notice. She has informed the group of cancelled classes by Facebook. "How else would I contact them at short notice?". Users who check email more regularly can set-up their Facebook account so that any communication to them on the website also sends an email notification. Theresa notes that there has never been a problem with people not finding out messages sent in this way.

Better-supported learning - retention and engagement

Theresa cites using Facebook to help in retaining and engaging her learners. She ‘chatted’ with one learner for half an hour via the Instant Chat facility to encourage her.

"It does make a difference, being able to speak to somebody. Some of the Level 1 teaching assistants think, because it’s Level 1, it’s easy but they have to do a placement in a school. There's more to it than they think."

Theresa was able to coach the learner, who admitted "she was glad she had done the Level 1 and now she won't drop off the Level 2".

Part of the course involves putting a portfolio together, which some learners find difficult. Theresa has used Facebook Chat to encourage learners to do the work and answer any problems students may be having. She can also talk to the people who do not come to classes and find out why. Theresa provides information, advice and guidance (IAG) to her learners and finds she can use Facebook to "do informal IAG on there".

Supporting the student community

Adult learners are often not in the classroom every day so Facebook can add to the social aspect of the course, as well as act as a way for learners to support each other. Theresa describes how one learner answered another’s call to borrow some pink shoes via the medium!

Theresa is keen to point out that those not on Facebook are not losing out. They still have the same support in the learning centre. Facebook provides additional support for those that would like it – and the medium is perfect for the type of learners of may be learning at different hours and in different places.

The future

Theresa is thinking of setting up an official ‘Hull ACL’ group, in addition to her profile. This makes it easier for her to monitor her communication with learners. A group profile allows for more 'static' information; 'discussion boards' and 'links' centred on different topics remain on the profile, whereas the text of the 'chat' disappears when the session is closed. Theresa can also utilise other aspects of Facebook, uploading images and videos useful to the course.

Useful links

• Hull City Council website
• Facebook website
• Read a related case study on Calderdale College: Using social networking sites in teaching and learning.
• View all Yorkshire and Humberside case studies on the Excellence Gateway.
• For more information about this case study, email the JISC Regional Support Centre for Yorkshire and Humber.

Disclaimer: The Regional Support Centres (RSC) and the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) support the development of educational e-learning. We may refer to specific products, processes or services. Such references are examples and are not endorsements or recommendations and should not be used for product endorsement purposes.