What are the advantages of online collaborative activities? Marcin Lewandowski explores what opportunities they can present for language learners.
Being an autonomous and independent learner is crucial for successful language learning. The ability to manage your own learning without relying on the teacher is a skill that should be in the repertoire of all language (and otherwise) students. To this end, teachers too should encourage and help students develop this skill. One way of doing it is through setting up collaborative activities where learners can draw on each other’s (rather than the teacher’s) knowledge and experience to complete a task.
Collaboration advantage
Learner collaboration has numerous advantages. It develops real life transferable skills like teamwork, allocation of responsibilities, and negotiation. It also promotes learner independence by shifting the focus from the teacher onto other students. Working with others engages learners in collective knowledge building allowing them to generate ideas together and to expose one another to valuable input in the process. This collective scaffolding allows them to work at a higher level of activity than would be the case if the learners worked on their own (Storch & Wigglesworth 2009).
Who’s in charge?
It has also been argued (e.g. Brook, et al. (1994)) that classroom activities can only become effective if learners are allowed to take control over them for themselves and have opportunities to grow into them. Deci and Ryan (in McLean, 2003) argue that allowing learners choice in activities can foster perceptions of control and with it a sense of self-determination which is key to intrinsic motivation. In setting collaborative tasks, the teacher hands over control of the task to the students allowing them to make independent collective decisions about the direction of the task. By giving students more autonomy in their learning the teacher gives up some of her control effectively becoming a facilitator who can provide support as and when needed.
Virtual collaboration
Collaborative tasks can be set both in and out of the classroom. Recently, the more adventurous teachers have begun to utilise the tools available on the Internet – the medium commonly used by their students – in setting up collaborative tasks.
Indeed, the Internet is a great platform for students to collaborate. It allows them to collaborate asynchronously, e.g. when working on projects which they research independently in their own time, and then collate the gathered information on a shared platform such as WordPress. The Internet also affords plentiful opportunities for synchronous collaboration (in real time) using social media such as Twitter or Facebook or online video conferencing tools such as Skype. The Google ecosystem, with its Gmail, Hangouts, Docs, Calendars, etc has everything you need for online collaborative work.
Google Docs, for example, is great for group writing assignments. It allows learners to collaborate from within the comforts of their homes. They can do it in real time by editing each other’s work, suggesting feedback or by returning to the text and editing it as and when convenient. Combine it with Google Hangouts (a video conferencing tool) and you’ve got a funky little package that allows teachers to ‘replicate’ classroom face to face collaboration online (for details of how this has been done in practice please visit this presentation, or view this video).
Classroom evolved?
Online tools such Google Hangouts and Google Docs can have a real potential in ESL learning settings. They can offer language practice opportunities and collaboration across many participants within many different locations and, in the case of writing, across varied periods of time. They can also support emerging pedagogical practices in the ESOL classroom. Not only does the use of Google Docs allow multiple participants to produce online texts in real time but also, importantly, it allows teachers to monitor student progress throughout the writing process and offer constructive feedback as and when required.
In a recent paper, Kessler, et al. state the following: “It seems clear that as technology evolves, teaching of L2 writing and of student use of these tools will evolve as well. […] the language learning potential of these Web-based word processing tools may only be realised as a result of exploring and experimenting with varied collaborative writing tasks and pedagogical practices.” (2012: 104)
References
Brooks, F. B. & Donato, R. (1994). Vygotskyan approaches to understanding foreign language learner discourse during communicative tasks, Hispania, 77(2), 262-274
Kessler, G., Bikowski, D, & Boggs, J. (2012). Collaborative Writing among Second Language Learners in Academic Web-based Projects. Language Learning & Technology 16(1), pp. 91-109
McLean, A. (2003) The motivated school. London: Paul Chapman Publishing
Wigglesworth, G., & Storch, N. (2009). Pair versus individual writing:Effects on fluency, complexity and accuracy. Language Testing, 26(3), 445-466.
If you’re interested in technology and learning, ensure to read Sadef’s article!