Emerging from recently collected data and the emerging analysis is a portrait of some of the benefits of operating a digital and media rich version of Winter’s patchwork text approach.
Benefits for learners
• The use of media to provide opportunities for seeing events and issues from other perspectives.
• Intrinsic enjoyment from using creative media
• The opportunity to develop technical skills and to become a critical user of technology
• The opportunity to use media native to the work setting
• The opportunity to articulate and develop understandings through considered asynchronous peer review
• The opportunity to share assessment products beyond he peer group (through the world wide web) and thus gain authentic feedback.
• The opportunity to create assessment products in ways that are natural to an individual learning style.
Challenges for learners
• The need to develop strategies for managing the quantity and quality of review messages.
• Negotiating the use of media which is both creative, authentic to the workplace and helps to develop the learners technology use but that does not distract from the learning content/message.
• Managing the balance between seeking to perform at a high level for assessment and accepting the apprenticeship mindset inherent to the patchwork process (particularly this means managing the number of times that feedback is sought).
• Finding creative solutions to enable the submission of new file types as they emerge.