What is Guided Participation

This chapter presents a framework for utilizing a sociocultural theory (SCT) approach to design and implement social media-based learning activities intended to foster learner engagement in higher education coursework. The author discusses the current status of social media, especially as used for educational purposes, as well as the documented learning benefits and challenges. This is followed by an overview of SCT, including its key concepts such as mediation, the zone of proximal development, and scaffolding. Building on these key concepts four pedagogical suggestions are described for fostering learner engagement via social media: provide the foundation for a community of practice, design meaningful and authentic learning activities, guide learners' engagement, and assess learning as a dynamic social process. The chapter concludes with a discussion of suggestions for future research.