Arun-Kumar Tripathi (tripathi@amadeus.statistik.uni-dortmund.de)
Tue, 2 Mar 1999 09:32:27 +0100 (MET)
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 1999 09:32:27 +0100 (MET) From: Arun-Kumar Tripathi <tripathi@amadeus.statistik.uni-dortmund.de> Subject: Re: One more question for the Forum
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On Tue, 2 Mar 1999, Neufeld, John Jeff wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> Roger Hartley closed his (excellent) position paper on EFFECTIVE PEDAGOGIES
> FOR MANAGING COLLABORATIVE LEARNING IN ON-LINE LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS with
> this set of questions.
>
> 8. IN SUMMARY, WHAT ARE THE ISSUES TO ADDRESS?
>
> This is open to the Forum, but several come to mind, eg:
>
> (i) What are the essential characteristics of collaborative learning?
> (ii) What are the advantages of collaborative learning, and the conditions
> for its effective exploitation; have the difficulties been underplayed?
> (iii) Is a shift in teacher attitudes and skills required?
> (iv) Any instances, experiences or difficulties to report?
> (v) What computer tools seem to give good support for collaborative
> learning, and what additional facilities do we need?
> (vi) How can face-to-face meetings be harmonised with on-line collaboration?
>
> (vii) What research needs to be undertaken?
>
> In my own experience, there is (at least) one other area that needs to be
> explored or perhaps I could just change iii) slightly to;
> (iii) Is a shift in teacher *and learner* attitudes and skills required?
>
> And to put my foot right in, I would answer yes to both cases.
>
> Education in Singapore (where I'm writing from) is traditionally teacher
> centred and individualistic (though this is changing to some extent). So, to
> suddenly change the 'rules' to a collaborative approach (and often
> constructivist as well) leave many staff and students with little idea as to
> what exactly they are supposed to be doing. A lot of support is required
> (and a lot of patience).
>
> One (introduction to collaboration) technique I've found useful is to have
> the students (in my case 16-18 years old) write a collaborative story
> (on-line). Perhaps you're familiar with this? One student writes a sentence
> and another student writes a second sentence and so on. If you have a
> couple of stories going at the same time this does seem to replicate many
> features of collaborative learning as seen in discussion groups. The
> 'depth' of thinking/learning that goes on is somewhat questionable but it
> does get the idea across that different people can have different
> ideas/interpretations of a given piece of information (in this case, the
> story to date and what they think should happen next). It's also a good
> opportunity to teach certain discourse/social skills, like 'how to disagree'
> or offer criticism 'gracefully'.
>
Dear IFETS Forum,
I am sorry for interruption..please, please SIGN of your messages, when
you are posting your responses to the Forum. Because, I have seen many
times, responses w/o signatures here.
Kindest Regards
Arun Tripathi
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