When do something shift from just learning to collaborative learning? From the teacher perspective we often try very hard to create collaboration as we see higher values when people connect and start to do things together. But from a learner’s perspective it is often not evident why collaboration is worth the extra work. If your goal is to pass a course to get an exam, the incentive for collaboration can be weak. It is an initial investment, and it might take some experiences of trying to collaborate before it feels like a thing that makes sense to do. I think that’s why it is easier to get this process going if a group has a higher goal than just to learn something. If you for example is a group of people who are formed by a mutual interest of societal change or create an innovation connectiveness and collaboration often arrive silently. It just is there. And if the group finds that new knowledge is needed to achieve a goal, collective learning often takes place or is easier to organise than in a pure learning setting.
If the above is true, then the recruitment of participants might be considered. Today we have a number of people applying to take part in a course. We accept them and then try to “bolt on” collaboration without really know the people in the group. Then we find it hard to mitigate or scaffold a setting that foster collaboration. Maybe we should prepare participants for collaboration before they apply. I don’t really know though, how that could be done.
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