Last month our cohort moved into year 2 of our structured PhD in e-research and technology enhanced learning where our current module focuses on networked learning, teaching and assessment. There have been some interesting discussions over the last three weeks, most recently focusing on individual, cooperative, collective, collaborative learning and more. One of the questions we were asked to consider and discuss in week 3 was:
“If learning is a collective action, does it mean that we all learn the same thing?”
In week 2 I had given some consideration to cooperation and collaboration. Were these different things or the same? I had never given any thought to distinguishing between the two terms so turned to Merriam-Webster for the following dictionary definitions:
Cooperation – “the actions of someone who is being helpful by doing what is wanted or asked for: common effort” and “association of persons for common benefit”
Collaboration – “to work jointly with others or together especially in an intellectual endeavor”
Both definitions apply to group work in educational settings in my opinion, so I was interested in the idea of external authority (the teacher):
“McConnell has argued that cooperative learning situations can be divided between those in which an external authority, usually the teacher, enforces cooperation by structure and rewards, and those where the learners choose cooperation without external intervention (McConnell 1994)” cited in Jones (2015), p. 61.
Reflecting on my teaching experiences involving group work over the years (both face to face and online), I consider that the face-to-face groups that have had most success in achieving successful outcomes regarding assignment work are those that self-assigned into working groups rather than being assigned by the teacher (me). In the end each group member is awarded the same mark for their submission but it does seem to me that self-assigned groups who quickly adopt Tuckman’s model tend to do better in this environment. Groups performing less well tend to struggle with the subject matter and reaching consensus as to what is required. I have even had groups omitting half an assignment because groupthink may have set in. While collaboration and cooperation may have been evidenced, the fundamental requirement of understanding the output was not achieved across the group. From my experiences I would say that the groups who have a stronger commitment to joint aims are the ones that perform better in terms of learning outcomes. In my online classes, groups are mostly assigned by the module team owing to the short timescale of each module. For the most part they tend to do well which I attribute to legacy working relationships from previous modules and a drive to succeed.
In the end, perhaps the distinction between cooperation and collaboration matters little and I agree with our tutor’s comment that “to me, the distinction between the two is not that important so long as (1) that there is an agreement on the division of labour and people work on areas of their expertise/interests and (2) that the sum is greater than the individual parts” (Öztok, 2020). While I’m tempted to reflect further on Aristotle’s famous quote in the context of systems theory I think it is time to park this topic here for now, and take the next step to read more on computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) as a pedagogical approach to learning before considering Rolfe’s ‘now what?’.
Until next time,
Sandra
References:
Jones, C. (2015). Networked Learning: An Educational Paradigm for the Age of Digital Networks. Springer
McConnell, D. (1994). Implementing computer supported cooperative learning. Kogan Page.
Featured image courtesy of John Hain on Pixabay
Sandra Flynn 