Crossing borders: Collaborative learning in virtual exchange projects
The third topic in the Open Networked Learning course that I am taking this term (more info: https://opennetworkedlearning.wordpress.com/ ) is "Learning in communities: networked and collaborative learning. In this post I would like to reflect on how I experienced my students' online collaboration in a virtual exchange project.
Virtual exchange is a collaborative term for intercultural projects that are based on online communication and/or collaboration between groups of learners from different countries (see O'Dowd 2018). The projects are usually short term (lasting for a few weeks or months), are run by teachers or facilitators, usually as part of on-going courses. Some of the tasks are based on the students' collaboration in pairs or in small groups, which can result in joint presentations or other multimedia artefacts.
In my Sociolinguistics course this spring, my English major students had a virtual exchange project with a Czech university (many thanks to my wonderful colleague, Irena Podlásková!). The aim was not only to develop our students' intercultural communication and collaboration skills but also to raise their awareness of the presence of English in their own and in the partner university's country.
Two mixed nationality groups were created, each having 8-9 students in total. One of the tasks required the students to find a pair from the other country and choose a domain of language use (e.g. advertizing, catering, public transportation) in which they compare the use of English. The two students had to agree on the method of collecting field data, discuss and compare their findings, and then create a joint presentation for the whole group. Towards the end of the project each group had a videoconference session, where the findings were shared and discussed. As a follow-up activity, the students had to write down their reflections of the learning experience.
According to Brindley, Walti and Blascke (2009: 3), collaborative learning takes place when "knowledge is shared or transmitted among learners as they work towards common learning goals, for example, a shared understanding of the subject at hand or a solution to a problem. Learners are not passive receptacles but are active in their process of knowledge acquisition as they participate in discussions, search for information, and exchange opinions with their peers".
Considering the above defintion, the students taking part in the virtual exchange project experienced a form of collaborative learning. They had common learning goals, such as a better understanding of the role that the English language plays in the two countries; they were actively collecting information and then they exchanged opinions with their peers.
Even though everything went well in the project, there were some hickups in the collaborative learning process. Some students complained that there was no real collaboration as pairwork was basically just carried out in the form of independent work. Some students just wanted to make sure that they did something (e.g. created a slide for the presentation), but they did not discuss or negotiate the process with their peers. There was more collaborative learning in the synchronous sessions, where all the group members explained their findings. Knowledge was then really co-created as everyone took part in the discussion.
The lesson learnt from the project was that as an instructor I should not assume that a collaborative task naturally generates collaboration. My students need to be prepared; they need more guidance and perhaps good examples for what collaboration means in practice.
References
Brindley, J., Blaschke, L. M. & Walti, C. (2009). Creating effective collaborative learning groups in an online environment. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 10(3).
O’Dowd, R. (2018). From telecollaboration to virtual exchange: state-of-the-art and the role of UNICollaboration in moving forward. Journal of Virtual Exchange, 11-23. Research-publishing.net. https://doi.org/10.14705/rpnet.2018.jve.1
Virtual exchange is a collaborative term for intercultural projects that are based on online communication and/or collaboration between groups of learners from different countries (see O'Dowd 2018). The projects are usually short term (lasting for a few weeks or months), are run by teachers or facilitators, usually as part of on-going courses. Some of the tasks are based on the students' collaboration in pairs or in small groups, which can result in joint presentations or other multimedia artefacts.
In my Sociolinguistics course this spring, my English major students had a virtual exchange project with a Czech university (many thanks to my wonderful colleague, Irena Podlásková!). The aim was not only to develop our students' intercultural communication and collaboration skills but also to raise their awareness of the presence of English in their own and in the partner university's country.
Two mixed nationality groups were created, each having 8-9 students in total. One of the tasks required the students to find a pair from the other country and choose a domain of language use (e.g. advertizing, catering, public transportation) in which they compare the use of English. The two students had to agree on the method of collecting field data, discuss and compare their findings, and then create a joint presentation for the whole group. Towards the end of the project each group had a videoconference session, where the findings were shared and discussed. As a follow-up activity, the students had to write down their reflections of the learning experience.
According to Brindley, Walti and Blascke (2009: 3), collaborative learning takes place when "knowledge is shared or transmitted among learners as they work towards common learning goals, for example, a shared understanding of the subject at hand or a solution to a problem. Learners are not passive receptacles but are active in their process of knowledge acquisition as they participate in discussions, search for information, and exchange opinions with their peers".
Considering the above defintion, the students taking part in the virtual exchange project experienced a form of collaborative learning. They had common learning goals, such as a better understanding of the role that the English language plays in the two countries; they were actively collecting information and then they exchanged opinions with their peers.
Even though everything went well in the project, there were some hickups in the collaborative learning process. Some students complained that there was no real collaboration as pairwork was basically just carried out in the form of independent work. Some students just wanted to make sure that they did something (e.g. created a slide for the presentation), but they did not discuss or negotiate the process with their peers. There was more collaborative learning in the synchronous sessions, where all the group members explained their findings. Knowledge was then really co-created as everyone took part in the discussion.
The lesson learnt from the project was that as an instructor I should not assume that a collaborative task naturally generates collaboration. My students need to be prepared; they need more guidance and perhaps good examples for what collaboration means in practice.
References
Brindley, J., Blaschke, L. M. & Walti, C. (2009). Creating effective collaborative learning groups in an online environment. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 10(3).
O’Dowd, R. (2018). From telecollaboration to virtual exchange: state-of-the-art and the role of UNICollaboration in moving forward. Journal of Virtual Exchange, 11-23. Research-publishing.net. https://doi.org/10.14705/rpnet.2018.jve.1
I was at a conference on this in Krakow in April this year, UNICollaboration and met lots of teachers working with this and got inspired by all the great examples. Your experience here confirms also what we are learning in ONL - collaboration takes time to develop and our students are seldom ready to collaborate immediately. Scaffolding is needed.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment! I have now joined the UNICollaboration network. This term I am attending one of their online trainings, and it is very interesting and inspriring to combine the knowledge that I gather here in ONL with what I explore there!
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