The elements of collaborative interaction and communication have evolved through technological innovation to extend beyond borders and span distances in order to facilitate global diversity. These three elements of technological communication have facilitated many types of interactions among people as life-long learners, and promote continued discussions among individual as well as groups.
Such an example would be that of a wiki. Wikipedia is a prime example of taking limitless subjects for constructing collaborative definition. This is a prime example of a tool which facilitates interactions among its users, promotes the collaboration of collective meaning and encourages all to communicate, argue, persuade, etc. in order to come to common terms and understanding.
As this global market of Wikipedia users and contributors works, so may the learning community. Educators need to seriously take into consideration the role technology plays in creating meaning through collaboration. This type of collaboration wouldn’t allow for the individual to be left out. Each member of the learning community is encouraged through interaction to participate within the wiki space. With this type of encouragement, individuals can be lead to research and comment, create and respond, through higher levels of thought and investigation. Facilitated by an educator, this is a tool which would create and maintain accountability, and truly assist is assessing individual growth and learning. Through thoughtful design, a facilitator would be able to post inquiry based learning opportunities, follow threads of discussion, and assist in promoting further research, action or collaboration depending on the outcome. Design of the program along with the facilitator taking on the role appropriately would be the key to the success of the wiki used as a collaborative communication tool in education.
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3 comments:
The problem with wikipedia (from a K-12 perspective) is that the name misleads students at this level to believe it is all fact. I know since its invention, many teachers I know have had to provide instructionon how the site works and is constructed and using sources appropriately.
The concept, however, is one that is very useful. It does allow for sharing of information and resources, however, you still have to go behind and check the information for accuracy.
I totally agree with the opinion of wikipedia as a source. However, don't you find it interesting that the collaborative nature of the site is dictating definition?
It reminds me of a book by Andrew Clements that I used as a literature piece for vocabulary development. It's called Frindle. The children (mischievious child in general) named a pen a frindle, and once it became a popular term for the children to use, it eventually became a dictionary entry many years later...that's just like google, and how it's become a verb universally used. At one point, at the beginning of every language, people had to agree in small tribal meetings possibly, now known as the internet, on which sounds of speech put together are going to make up words for common language. I find Wikipedia amazing for that reason.
Hi Jeannine and Rachel -- Your discussion of Wikipedia brings many thoughts to mind. One primarily is the diverse opinions on the use of Wikipedia in general. While it has been customary to refrain from using Wikipedia in an academic sense, I want to say that at least one instructor made reference to using the source in our program. In the same sense, I have known fellow students to use Wikipedia as a source for just about anything. In another online school, students frequently cite Wikipedia as a reference in their short papers and presentations.
The beauty of Wikipedia in my opinion is the encompassing nature of the beast as well as the collaborative approach used to build the database. While I understand that Wikipedia is not created entirely, even if minimally, by scholars, I do think it warrants merit in some, if not many, cases. That is, anyone can offer suggestions to verify or add to definitions and content. Likewise, one often finds requests for additional content and citations. This, in my opinion, is a good, if not great effort similar to the manner in which open source coding operates. The results of open source are often better than the results achieved by dedicated coding shops and I firmly believe that more eyes can more quickly fix a problem. I've experienced coder's tunnel vision when staring at a screen filled with visual basic code yet I just could not find the missing semicolon or the like, but it was immediately found by a cohort passing by. I always found it a relief to get past those road blocks and imagine the same could be said of traversing the entries in Wikipedia. Granted, it is not something to take lightly, but as the both of you mention, we can learn from this innovative phenomenon I am certain.
Jeannine -- You note how tribal meetings have evolved into collaborative discussions via the Internet. That's a very interesting comparison and a good one at that I believe. I imagine that we are creating a new language dedicated to DE and online "living" if you will. While the language is more broad to that which applies to DE, we none the less can capitalize on witnessing the beginnings of this social transition and apply what we learn to DE. I think we are living in very exciting times in this regard. I see this as a true beginning of a new way of life frankly. While we have accomplished much, I believe that we have only scratched the proverbial surface.
Thanks for the ideas!
Shane.
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