Learning technologies to support teaching
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This page identifies recommended tools to support effective technology-enhanced learning and teaching. They are categorised using Diana Laurillard’s six learning types, to ensure that pedagogy is driving their use.
Six learning types explained
Diana Laurillard’s six learning types—Acquisition, Investigation, Practice, Discussion, Collaboration, and Production—are pedagogical activities that support the learning process. When selecting a technology-enhanced learning tool, it’s important to align the tool’s capabilities with these learning types to meet the learners’ needs and provide the appropriate level of support, ensuring the tool facilitates the intended pedagogical outcomes.1
Each learning technology available to you has different strengths and suits different types of learning. Take a look below to find out more.
Diana Laurillard’s six learning types are explained in this 3-minute video.
How our learning technologies align with these types
Acquisition
Comprises listening to a lecture or podcast, reading from books or websites, and watching demonstrations or videos.
Collaboration
Comprises mainly discussion, practise, and production. Building on investigations and acquisition, learners take part in the process of knowledge building.
Discussion
Learners articulate their ideas and questions, challenge and respond to the ideas and questions from their teacher and peers.
Inquiry
Learners explore, compare and critique texts, documents and resources that reflect the concepts and ideas being taught.
Practise
Learners adapt their actions to the task, and use feedback to improve. Feedback may come from self-reflection, their peers, the teacher, or the activity itself.
Production
Learners consolidate what they have learned by articulating their current conceptual understanding and how they used it in practice.
Canvas
University of Auckland self-help guides for Canvas course design and delivery.
ETV video library
ETV is a catalogue of audio visual material for education.
The collection comprises programmes recorded from broadcast television and videos from the internet.
FeedbackFruits peer collaboration
A suite of tools designed to enhance group work, feedback and reflection activities, and assessment.
Google Workspace
Google Workspace comprises Gmail, Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, etc. It provides a platform for collaborating on group projects.
H5P interactive content
H5P enables teachers to create visually rich, interactive content to support learning and assessment.
H5P content integrates with Canvas.
Inspera
Inspera Online Assessments is the University’s platform for delivering online examinations.
Microsoft 365
Microsoft’s Office suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook etc.) encompasses tools for collaboration and workspaces for shared projects.
Microsoft Copilot
Microsoft Copilot utilises generative AI technology to interpret and respond to questions in a natural, conversational manner.
Microsoft Teams
Microsoft Teams allows you to collaborate, share files, chat and call. It has become the go-to tool for staff to connect with colleagues, and for students to collaborate on projects.
Panopto video
Panopto enables staff and students to create and share videos. Auto-generated captioning makes videos accessible to all students.
PeerMark peer review
PeerMark is part of Turnitin. It enables students to peer review the work of others, promoting self reflection and critical thinking.
Peerwise collaborative quizzes
PeerWise allows students to practise MCQ quizzes in their subject area. They can also apply their knowledge through creating questions for others.
Perusall collaborative reading
Perusall is a social reading platform where students annotate texts or other media, post comments and ask questions.
Piazza discussions
Piazza is an alternative to Canvas Discussions and provides features to manage discussions at scale.
Polling tools
In-class polling tools provide a means for feedback, enabling students to direct the learning.
Qualtrics surveys
Qualtrics is a web-based survey tool for developing research questionnaires or gathering student feedback.
Talis reading lists
Talis provides a platform for students to easily access course readings from their Canvas course.
Turnitin plagiarism detection
Turnitin compares a student’s written work existing online content, including the work of other students.
UDOIT accessibility assistant for Canvas
UDOIT scans your Canvas courses, identifies issues, and provides guidance to improve accessibility.
Zoom video conferencing
Zoom can be used for online meetings, virtual office hours, pre-recorded presentations and lecture streaming.
Faculty, LLS or self-supported tools
Tools that are not centrally supported by the University may be supported within your faculty or Libraries and Learning Services.
Acquiring these tools
Many of these tools are available online (no installation is required). Others are installed through the Software Centre for PC or Apple Mac Self-Service. The Staff Intranet also has information about University licensed software.
If you require specialist software in your labs, FlexIT enables off-campus access to software that would otherwise only be available on campus. Request access to FlexIT and check the available software list. If something is missing from the list, please inquire through the IT Portal.
* Tools that are not listed here? The University does not prevent you from using unsupported technologies, but please be cognisant of the risks of self-support, while maintaining a safe learning environment for students.
See also
Teaching tools ecosystem
Download a poster of the University’s teaching tools ecosystem. Designed for paper size A0.
Accessing technologies through VPN
Where off campus locations and/or specific country firewalls prevent access to the University network.
Page updated 12/07/2024 (stylistic changes)
- Laurillard, Diana. Teaching as a design science: Building pedagogical patterns for learning and technology. Routledge, 2013. ↩