Problematizing Platform Boundary Objects: Assessment Norm Negotiations on Formal and Informal Learning Platforms

• In Event: Platformization as a Driver of "New" Narratives of Learning Across Formal and Informal Learning Spaces

Abstract

Objectives
While digital platform logics associated with social media are relatively new to formal educational settings, they - and the mechanics that support them - are well-established in informal settings. Focusing on mechanics associated with the gamification of assessment, this paper asks how discourses are similar for platforms used in formal and informal learning settings, and what might be learned from the well-established negotiation of norms relating to these mechanics on informal platforms that might inform their emerging use in formal settings.

Theoretical Framework
This inquiry is guided by the identification of gamification of assessment on platforms as a boundary object (Star & Griesemer, 1989). Viewing gamification as a boundary object allows us to examine how it maintains a common recognizable structure, and yet its meaning is interpreted and reinforced at local levels. This process of norm negotiation is conceptualized here through Bakhtin’s (1981) theory of intertextuality as operationalized by Fairclough (1992).

Methods and Data Sources
The contexts discussed in this paper are Stack Overflow, a question-and-answer platform for computer programmers where users earn and lose ‘reputation points’, and ClassDojo, a classroom platform where points are awarded or withdrawn for behavior. Analysis involves examination of institutional discourses found in marketing materials, and rules and guidelines published by platform providers. These discourses and others are then considered in relation to the negotiation of norms expressed in user discussions on the meta site for Stack Overflow where users discuss their use of the platform.

Results
Our analysis shows that gamified assessment is positioned by both platform providers as an instrument to reward particular behaviors, presenting socialization into a learning community as a problem and the community itself as a value. Stack Overflow platform mechanics initiate norm negotiations among users as they create an imaginary of an ideal user who engages in individual and preferably invisible learning practices, while producing high-quality content. While community is positioned as an explicit value of both platforms, our analysis of norm negotiation on Stack Overflow shows how gamification mechanics enforce individual accountability while promoting alignment with underlying business models.

Significance
Our results highlight the standardized communication among platform rhetorics as well as the translation and appropriation between informal and formal educational learning settings that acts as a conduit for logics that emerge in other aspects of digital culture such as social media and gaming to formal education. They also illustrate how well-established norm negotiations in informal settings may predict issues for formal education as such logics are adopted.

Authors

• Svea Kiesewetter, Gothenburg University

• Alena Seredko, University of Gothenburg

• Thomas Hillman, University of Gothenburg