Collaboration Tools

Web 2.0 is a fundamental shift in the nature of the Web based on a set of principles and practices intended to connect the collective intelligence of its users (O’Reilly, 2005; 2009). It is not a piece of software or hardware.

The internet in the era of Web 2.0 provides collaboration tools that allow the formation of communities on a global scale. These new communities are then able to interact and learn together. Furthermore, some of the most important tools for education are technologies that support online collaboration, called online collaborative environments. These technologies have been designed to connect people around the world for sharing information and creating new content together (Johnson, Smith, Levine, & Haywood, 2010).

This is due to the belief that collaboration is an essential skill in today’s workplace. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills (2009) lists Global Awareness as an essential 21st-century interdisciplinary theme, with collaboration skills as necessary outcomes for success in a global economy.

It should be mentioned that not everyone shares the same positive beliefs about the social networking technologies that make these online communities possible. “Hargadon (2010) suggests the term educational networking to describe educational uses of social networking technologies, recognizing that some educators may have negative views of social networking” (Jonassen, Howland, & Marra, 2011).

A significant trend in technology is shifting to the process of constructing and sharing knowledge. Along with this shift is a change in the idea of knowledge itself as (NMC, 2005). It is believed that learners are more willing to participate in knowledge construction. The results of this shift are technologies enabling social networks and knowledge webs that offer a means of constructing knowledge by facilitating collaboration and teamwork. This is possible because technology plays a key role in knowledge-building communities by providing a medium for storing, organizing, and reformulating the ideas that are contributed (Jonassen, Howland, & Marra, 2011).

In light of this shift toward knowledge building, I find Scardamalia’s and Bereiter’s (1996) statement provocative and insightful:

…schools inhibit, rather than support, knowledge building by: (1) focusing on individual student’s abilities and learning; (2) requiring only demonstrable knowledge, activities, and skills as evidence of learning; and (3) teacher-hoarding wisdom and expertise. Students’ knowledge tends to be devalued or ignored, except as evidence of their understanding of the curriculum.

According to Scardamalia, Bereiter, & Lamon (1994), the goal of knowledge-building communities is to support students to “actively and strategically pursue learning as a goal”—that is, intentional learning. These knowledge-building communities, also called online collaborative environments, are environments where students produce their own knowledge databases in their own knowledge-building community. Knowledge building communities create an environment where student knowledge can be “objectified, represented in an overt form so that it [can] be evaluated, examined for gaps and inadequacies, added to, revised, and reformulated” (p. 201).

Two examples of knowledge building communities I plan to explore are Computer-Supported Intentional Learning Environments (CSILEs) and Knowledge Forum. In these knowledge-building environments, users contribute ideas in the form of text, graphics, movies, or attachments. Pedagogically this is significant because students are providing the multiple representations of ideas, therefore, the key to learning lies with the students.

These ideas, which are central to the knowledge-building process, become connected, expanded, and refined as the individuals in the community question, add to, reference, and annotate each other’s thoughts (Jonassen, Howland, & Marra, 2011).

References

Jonassen, David H.; Howland, Jane L.; Marra, Rose M. (2011-05-18). Meaningful Learning with Technology (4th Edition) (Kindle Locations 3350-3351). Pearson HE, Inc.. Kindle Edition.