OnPoint - Guideline 7, Require collaboration when appropriate

Today, we continue OnPoint, our bi-weekly series from Jason Ohler, an international keynote speaker, teacher, writer, researcher and Professor Emeritus of Educational Technology, who has been teaching online since 1982.

The following post is excerpt from Jason's latest book, and highlights one of the many guidelines for teaching an effective online class and engaging people socially via electronic means. The book, Digital Community, Digital Citizen (you can check it out here), explores how the internet and technology affect the very nature of learning, relationships, and schooling in the digital age.

This is part of a series about guidelines for effective online teaching.

• Part 1: An Introduction
• Part 2: Communication Venues
• Part 3: Teach the Unfamiliar In Terms of the Familiar
• Part 4: Use Many Social Setting Metaphors
• Part 5: Use Multimodality When Developing Online Communities
• Part 6: Blend Media and Personalize Space
  

Thanks for reading,

- Brad


Guideline 7- Require collaboration when appropriate
In real terms, collaboration translates into a community of interdependence, which can be an effective way to keep students involved with each other. However, beware: Sometimes students don’t want to be interdependent. After all, when you take a class as an individual student, the only challenge to your success is yourself. But if you work in an interdependent environment, you sacrifice your independence for a more complete experience of community. It’s a trade off. Earlier, I reported that Dr. Schrum’s and my research discovered that distance students’ primary concern with their experience was the lack of interaction with other students. Note that they did not say they wanted to work with them, just interact with them. There are many ways to encourage interdependence, including delegating roles and responsibilities and using collaborative pedagogy, including peer review, cooperative learning, jigsawing, joint projects and research, and study and presentation groups. If you are reluctant to manage group projects virtually, you can certainly encourage nonbinding kinds of interaction, such as peer review or informal communication about class assignments. You want students to keep talking, even if they aren’t collaborating. It all helps develop a sense of community.

- Jason