Online Collaboration

Online collaboration is something that allows multiple people on a global platform to communicate, synthesise and of course collaborate. This demonstrates that the benefits of online collaboration, is definitely globalisation. Globalisation in the sense that when working together, it doesn’t matter, where, when, who, how, or even what you are; the common goal is more important. We have viewed several different programs which allow for collaboration to happen, for instance, Wikki, Google docs, Prezi Collaboration, just to name a few. A constant site we have used for online collaboration is Blogger, the very site you are on now. Blogger allows, for public postings, and the ability to comment on blogs. We have used this technology to give feedback to our peers work, and to give other our own person point of view on topics we have been addressing at the end of each week.

“Work teams Cooperate; learning teams Collaborate.” (Paulus, T.M., 2005).

This quote I believe represents an important mindset that should be used in the classroom. Cooperation and collaboration, are two very closely knitted definitions, the only difference is what they are for:

Cooperate: the process of working together to the same end

Collaborate: to work jointly on an activity to produce or create something

Promoting working as a team in the classroom, is extremely important. Of course in the digital word, the task, outcomes, and process are completely different to in the real world. Online collaboration comes from talking (dialoguing), and having to find ways to collaborate together such as; Skype, Google +, Google Docs, etc.

Benefits

Maryellen Weimer (2013), indicates that there is five things students can learn through e-Learning:

·         They can learn content, as in master the material

·         They can learn content at those deeper levels we equate with understanding

·         They can learn how groups function productively

·         They can learn why groups make better decisions than individuals

·         They can learn how to work with others

Downfalls

After reading through fellow student’s blogs, Clare Bielenbergedse (2015), raises good points on the drawbacks and failures of online collaboration. These points are:

·         The possibility of plagiarism

·         The potential of technology failing (eg. a wrongly embedded PowerPoint)

·         The possibility of forgetting to reply to a comment

·         The loss of tone (potential for misinterpretation)

Using e-Learning in the classroom, may very well one day redefine education. This redefinition will only come about once we as educators can ween out the downfalls, and produce a learning space which is ethical and safe for student use. I do believe in e-Learning, and can see the definite potential after working with it throughout this class.  

 

References

Bielenbergedse, C. (2015). Collaborative Learning. Retrieved from

http://clarebielenbergedse.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/collaborative-learning.html

Morrison, D. (2012, April 27). Online Groups - Cooperative or Collaborative? Retrieved from Online

Learning Insights: https://onlinelearninginsights.wordpress.com/2012/04/27/online-groups-

cooperative-or-collaborative/

 

Weimer, M. (2013, March 20). Five Things Students Can Learn through Group Work. Retrieved from

Faculty Focus: http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-professor-blog/five-things-

students-can-learn-through-group-work/