Writing Lessons to Strengthen ‘Information Utilization Competency’ －Focused on a Team Project Using the Allo App

Abstract

The extension of life expectancy and the development of science has required change and transformation, not only regarding a person’s quality of life but also the direction of liberal arts classes and their methods. From this point of view, the necessity of cultivating digital-based ‘information utilization competency’ that can respond to changes in social structure has increased, even in the writing classes of college liberal arts subjects, which are ‘communication’ based and which use ‘written language’ as a medium. The K University writing class was designed as a team project and conducted as a process-oriented curriculum. It used the Allo app to improve learners’ information utilization competency. During three weeks of classes team project conducted practical writing practice using personal writing to develop ‘information utilization competency’ related to the authenticity of students. The Allo-based team activity class was constructed to elevate the combined academic knowledge and procedural knowledge, both contextualized through ‘written language’ in the preceding individual writing process and to reproduce useful ‘information.’ It was done using various media, such as ‘voice language’ and ‘written language,’ and through team activities. It was a process focused on ‘re-contextualization,’ achieved by producing discussion, journal writing, product selection, and re-contextualization. Experiences necessary in developing the results were extended to using various media built into Allo, thereby deepening the learner’s functional information utilization competency. At the same time, through the process of the re-contextualization of academic content, such as journal writing, the critical interaction of team members, and the reflection that occurs in the process of the final production, all team members were able to directly or indirectly revise and modify their information utilization. Moreover, students were able to develop their information utilization competencies. In particular, the comprehensive thinking process, including the meta-cognitive domain, which contextualized one’s logic at the elementary level of data collection and the use of verified data, shared the writings of students and team members through a discussion process to produce outputs. The successful class showed that lifelong education and the ability to utilize information as a global civilian competency in a knowledge-based society should be cultivated through writing classes using various media. In particular, we can say that the meaning of competence lies in the ‘productivity’ of problem-solving through information as a response strategy for the future society. Another significant result was the reflection of students who had failed to develop proactively and actively in personal writing revised personal writing after the Allo-based team project. I end this article by leaving the lesson design for such learners as a follow-up task.