Email Seminars and Student Scaffolding

This paper presents a comparison of the results of two case studies, both examining different aspects of the interactions between members of one cohort of undergraduate Computer Science students at the University of Kent at Canterbury. These studies were performed simultaneously but independently within two different course modules. The first study uses data gathered from the experimental introduction of email-based seminars in a first-year Information Systems module. The second study examines the collaboration displayed by the same students studying an introductory Programming module. This provided an excellent opportunity for a comparison of the effects of traditional and modern innovative teaching methods upon the learning of one particular cohort of students. The results are complementary; students who became accustomed to working together on Programming tasks have carried their co-working strategies into the email seminars.