Sparking spontaneity
With Yammer now extending the success of microblogging, it will be interesting to see if a similar sort of app carries over into educational CMS platforms. To be sure, one of the recurrent threads in online learning research has been greater interactivity and so would, for example, a Yammer-like tool help promote a greater sense of spontaneity among groups? And more specifically, could it promote the type of spontaneity that could lead to creative problem-solving? One factor to consider would likely be integration, that is, how well that app could be integrated with the CMS so students could, for example, easily receive updates via their phone or participate without having to be tethered to a laptop or desktop machine.