Tuesday, October 7, 2014

MOOC Week 2 Response: Challenges of Collaboration

When we free our students from our grasp and lead them toward the proverbial cliff that is the internet, we must make sure students are as prepared as possible to tackle the unknown! There are numerous challenges such as online reading comprehension, familiarity with internet navigation, and even internet/email access - to name a few!

According to “What are Cooperative and Collaborative Learning” we read in this week’s MOOC, “...research tools such as internet access are made available,” is a requirement of small group cooperative learning. I think the job of the teacher is to put the student in the best possible place to succeed at what is being assessed. For example, if you are assessing how students take a critical stance and using multiple sources as support, it would be helpful to give them sources to read instead of saying, “Ok, have at it! go find sources to use.” Don’t allow them to search the ocean of the internet when you are not assessing their research-finding skills! This would be where scaffolding is used in proper form. One day, that may be a goal: take a critical stance using multiple sources that the student finds. But when you are just starting to develop these skills, scaffolding the material is a necessity. This challenge is only multiplied when you add collaboration to the mix. I run into this all the time with freshman: one has their internet permission slip and the other doesn’t. So, only one can work online. To combat this, I have paper copies of the material for students to use. I also have a generic log in for some students to access to assist this issue. I also think making the materials available for all students is essential to collaborative work for a couple reasons. One, students won't disagree on material they want to use because I already gave it to them. And, I can control the length of the material and readability. If students have different reading levels I don’t want one to try to read a source that is too easy or too challenging.

If you are assessing whether students can determine the validity of sources, then I would scaffold by finding valid and non valid sources for students to assess. I would not throw them to the wolves unless I had confidence in the students’ ability to correctly assess sources I gave them, first. Once they have proven they can do this, then I would let them find their own sources, evaluate, and use in written response/essay material. Otherwise, I feel as if teachers are setting students up for failure.

I also enjoy using databases such as Ebscohost. This database has many filters to narrow material students can search for. Also, it has the ability to read and aloud to students while highlighting the words being read. This is seriously effective in my ELL and SPED population.
It also serves a purpose of allowing students to read at the same pace. When working collaboratively, if students read at different levels, one will obviously be waiting around for the other reader to finish.

Of the many challenges, the few I discussed here are near and dear to me as I have just worked with these very skills and realized the importance of scaffolding material for students to be successful in the world of the web!

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