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Supporting transition into higher education through social affordances: The Pod experience
Conference paper   Open access   Peer reviewed

Supporting transition into higher education through social affordances: The Pod experience

Sharn Donnison and J Masters
Proceedings of the 13th Pacific Rim First Year in Higher Education Conference, pp.1-10
Pacific Rim First Year in Higher Education (FYHE) Conference: Aspiration – Access – Achievement, 13th (Adelaide, Australia, 27-Jun-2010–30-Jun-2010)
Queensland University of Technology
2010
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http://fyhe.com.au/past_papers/papers10/content/pdf/14A.pdfView
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Abstract

Education Systems
We know that social engagement is critical for first year transition but often initiatives to promote social connectivity are cursory and peripheral to academic engagement. This paper is concerned with how to best structure students' social interactions as a bridge to their academic learning. The paper reports on a La Trobe University, Faculty of Education initiative to support first year students' transition into first and subsequent years of their degree using structured social interventions called 'Pods'. We present and discuss two years of data on the effectiveness of classroom-based Pods and argue that they are an effective transition strategy that enables social, academic, and institutional engagement. We also argue that Pods are best implemented for first semester, only, and that it is crucial that systematic and explicit scaffolding is undertaken during that first semester to prepare students to be independent and autonomous learners.

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