Peer Interactions: Extending Pedagogical Deliberations into the Virtual Hallway

The focus of this article was to evaluate a specifically designed digital learning peer-interactive strategy through an e-collaborative web project for reflective engagement with each other and associated academic materials. Data was taken from one semester of participation in an e-collaboration assessing student peer discussions in politics from two introductory American politics classes across two geographic regions of the country. Significant findings reveal that the interactive discussion forums in this e-collaboration engaged students in an academically reflective peer-student and peer-content interactions over the entire semester. The implications of this study are immense, in that a carefully designed digital learning strategy, an e-collaboration, does extend peer deliberative discussions into the virtual hallway, enhancing student deliberative performance. This is one that can be used to complement a variety of disciplines and is a concern to researchers, educators, and universities.