As I was preparing for this week’s topic – Learning in communities – networked collaborative learning, I came across with a quote “

“Currently, online collaborative learning tends to focus on the cognitive process by emphasizing task-oriented communication, while assuming that the social dimension will occur automatically via communicative technologies (Kreijns et al., 2003). However, individuals will not willingly share their tentative ideas or critically challenge others’ opinions unless they trust group members and feel a sense of belonging. (Kreijns et al., 2003; Rourke, 2000). Therefore, collaboration often remains shallow due to the lack of affective group support.” *

This actually made me started to think and relate it to my own practice. I’ve been practising this assumption that the social dimension of collaborative learning exist automatically and taking it for granted. Maybe it is time to take a pause and look back, by removing this assumption from our head, what needs to be done to better support our students in this digital community learning in a more natural way.

Journey continues….

Reference:

*An, H., Kim, S., & Kim, B. (2008). Teacher perspectives on online collaborative learning: Factors perceived as facilitating and impeding successful online group work. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education, 8(1), 65-83.

Affective collaborative learning has automatically happened?