Learning Experience - Developing an E-Community Design - Literature review Example

E-Learning Experience: Individual Reflection in Developing an E-Community Design Student’s Name Professor Course Date Introduction International students face many challenges while studying abroad. Some of these problems include unfamiliarity with the new environment, lack of proper language, which hinders communication, and problems in locating shopping centres among others. Because of such problem, two international students and I came together as a group and decided to design an e-community that would help international students in overcoming the problems and hence be able to undergo their studies smoothly. In relation with this, this paper outlines my individual reflection of personal and group’s endeavours towards designing an e-community. Description of the Group’s Collaborative Process in Designing an E-community Our group worked collectively in designing an International Students’ home page. First, we identified every member’s strengths and weaknesses. In any group work, this is very essential as it helps members understand each other and be able to combine their strengths in achieving the group’s goals and objectives. One of the common strengths identified in all the group members is that we were conversant with participating in various e-learning communities in terms of social interaction, facebook as an example and in a context of knowledge and skills development, which in our group was known as Ning. However, we had a major drawback because none of us had an experience in designing an e-community. Despite putting much effort in collaborating, we experienced challenges because the other two members of my group were international students with extremely weak English language, both written and spoken. Because of lack of adequate understanding of English, the international students had problems in understanding the spoken and written information. In relation to this, these students were reluctant in asking for clarification, a factor that made our progress slow. Therefore, we opted for face-to-face form of communication in order to enhance understanding. Through this way, I could easily judge from facial expressions of my group members and note when they had not understood and hence further clarified the written or spoken information. Just as Boud and Middleton (2003, p. 197) point out, face-to-face form of communication has its disadvantages. One of the challenges faced in this form of communication is cultural differences where some members may have preconceived prejudices about some cultures hence be reluctant or refuse completely to accept contribution from group members associated with such cultures. Just as Weingarten and Overbey (1996, p. 67) argue, another drawback is lack of understanding of other cultures. This is what highly affected our face to face discussions. Every member came from a different culture and therefore, we only accepted the work presented without asking for clarification or providing much feedback on any topic touching on cultures one was not familiar with. Readings’ Synthesis According to Kraut and Resnick (2012, p. 8), with the fast evolving technology, online communities have come to replace previous forms of learning that occurred in the classroom, as they have proved to be more productive. However, it is important to note that all online communities are successful. Some such as face book, Wikipedia, and MySpace are successful while many others fail. According to Atwell (2007, p.1), many values are considered in designing an online community to ensure that it becomes successful. Some of these values include the opportunities presented, education, culture, information, communication, and sustainability. In creating any online community, the focus is having a technology that takes into account the interests and caters for all the needs of the community members. According to Boud and Middleton (2003, p. 4), an online community serves as a common ground for people who share a common interest. Therefore, our online community was designed in such a way that it would meet our social and educational needs. Apart from benefiting in terms of education, an online community enhances its members’ communication skills. The challenges experienced in face-to-face form of communication are overcome in online communities. It is important that before people sit down to design an online community, they should carry out a survey with the local community to be involved to find what they would like to see posted online. This way, the online community developed will be in line with the interests of the members. Just as Kraut and Resnick (2012) emphasize, frequent discussions with the community members are essential to ensure that the online community created keeps in pace with the changing needs of the members. An online community assists in narrowing the divide between consumers and producers. According to Kraut and Resnick (2012), the main aim of designing any online community is to encourage as many people as possible, to come together to teach and learn from one another. As such, through increased contribution and sharing among the members, people become producers of valuable information instead of consumers. According to Sfard (1997, p. 9), learning in online communities is different from learning from an instructor. Researches done on this area indicate that online communities offer learners with better learning opportunities compared to other forms of learning such as classroom learning. Online communities offer opportunities for collaborative learning and new members can learn from each other and from older members. In online communities, learners have opportunities of learning from real-world problems and at the same time focus on teamwork and life experiences. In addition to having freedom of expressing own thoughts and opinions, members of an online community can learn from the opinions of the other members. According to Atwell (2007, p.7), online communities have enabled the connection among hundreds of thousands of people at the same time. It is predicted that online communities will continue growing and spreading because technology is not a problem. Technology is available at low cost and it is evolving each day, a fact that is making online communities become more efficient and productive. To ensure that an online community is successful, three main areas should be given enough consideration. These are starting the online community, encouraging online interaction from the beginning, and ensuring that the interaction is sustained for the survival of the online community. Research shows that many members posting comments in a new online community page for the first time may lose interest and stop from contributing their ideas and information on the webpage again. To avoid such scenarios, it is important that when designing an online community, the creation of web page that suit members’ specific interest to make the online community more effective. The web pages in addition should have clear topics, which are easy to access with no restriction and sign in instructions to increase their effectiveness. To encourage participation, privacy for the discussions should be guaranteed. The community should be designed in such a way that it can function on its own without depending on other online communities. To enhance the success and survival of the online community, additional private discussion groups for sharing delicate and personal information are of high necessity. Analysis of the Learning Community and how it has worked as Learning Experience Our first active group was made up of 10 members and I would say it was motivating and resourceful. One factor that made our progress in designing an online community fast is that two of our group members were e-learning program designers. The two members were highly resourceful to us as they suggested useful links, resources, and other materials required for our experiments. A couple of us were familiar with UTS e-learning tools such as the blackboard and the way to navigate while online. This was highly helpful, as it saved time because we knew where to navigate to, without having to try on guesswork. I will not deny that the whole process was a learning experience for me. I got a chance to learn from other group members who had prior information on e-learning programs. Learning how to use online tools such as the blackboard was also fascinating. On the other hand, I was also resourceful to my group members. I worked hard to keep the group focused so that we could meet the deadline. However, some members did not take this very positively. They seemed to look at it as a kind of bossiness attitude and did not appreciate or understand my goals. Some members felt dissatisfied because some were inactive, but no one was bold enough to bring the issue to the open. The other factor that held back our progress is lack of commitment from members. This was contributed by the fact that many of us were busy with work or other subjects, and this made it difficult for many of us to keep up with the specified dates for our meetings. Blogs were frequent in the beginning, but as time progressed, they became fewer and many of the members started using e-mails in communicating. Just as Atwell (2007) notes, this is common with many online communities, especially where the web pages do not cater for the interests of the members. Despite being mature post-graduate students, some of the members acted immaturely and thus emphasized the need of a lecturer for supervision. According to Siemens (2009, par. 2), there is need for transparency in e-learning. In learning to share our thoughts and ideas in a transparent manner, we become teachers to our observers. Therefore, transparency is of high necessity in e-learning because it assists members to learn from others. Redmond and Lock, (2006, p.3) point out that collaboration and connectivity are other factors that enhance learning in any online community. Members in any online community must stay focused and motivated to execute all the tasks allocated to them. According to these two authors, collaboration can be termed as the idea of sharing and generating new information. This is of importance as it keeps all the members updated on the progress made in the online community. According to Redmond and Lock (2006), connectivity among the community members ensures that they build trust amongst themselves and hence become transparent in sharing information. Reflection on the Approach in Participating and Designing Learning Communities in Future In designing our online community, we have encountered many opportunities and challenges. The greatest opportunity is that we could share information and therefore, able to learn a lot. Just as Atwell (2007, p.17) points out, online communities have narrowed the divide between producers and consumers. Through sharing, a new ecology of open books, multimedia, and other learning materials have been created. Therefore, people do not have to rely on instructors only to learn. Some of the challenges were difficult online navigation in the university library, which made our progress slow. Personally, I avoided using the library, as it was difficult locating the articles. In such situations, our tutor came to our aid by helping us with useful attachments and links. Therefore, in designing an online community in future, I will ensure that the members are adequately prepared in using the available online tools. I will try to incorporate members with prior knowledge on e-learning programs to enhance learning in the online community. In addition, I will integrate a teaching presence to achieve knowledge in action. A learning presence is essential to facilitate the realization of worthwhile learning outcomes. A social presence will ensure that the participants in the developed community can protect themselves socially and emotionally in their real personalities. The online community developed will be safe for all the contributors to convey their thoughts as well as experiences. Finally and not the least, a cognitive presence is required to enhance productive conversation where scholars share their skills, suggest ideas, query themselves and hence learn from each other. Conclusion Clearly, in developing an online community, opportunities, and obstacles exist that might either enhance or hinder progress respectively. To ensure that an online community developed survives factors such as incorporating the interests of the members to keep them interested in posting their blogs. Involving people with knowledge in e-learning program in designing and online community is of high necessity because they are resourceful in teaching others. To develop successful online communities in future, it is essential that teaching, social, and cognitive presences be integrated to make it more effective and efficient. Reference List Atwell, G 2007, The personal learning environments-the future of eLearning, e-Learning Papers, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 1-8 Boud, D & Middleton, H 2003, Trends in online learning communities, SIGGROUP Bulletin, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 2-6 Boud, D & Middleton, H 2003, Learning from others at work: communities of practice and informal learning, Journal of Workplace Learning, vol. 15, no. 5, pp. 194-202. Kilpatrick, S., Barrett, M & Jones, T 2003, Defining learning communities, Available at: http://www.crlra.utas.edu.au/files/discussion/2003/D1-2003.pdf [Accessed 29 May 2012] Kraut E. R & Resnick P 2012, Building Successful Online Communities: Evidence-Based Social Design, MIT Press, United States Redmond, P & Lock, J 2006, International Online Collaboration: Modeling Online Learning and Teaching, MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 233- 247 Sfard, A 1997, On two metaphors for learning and the dangers of choosing just one, Educational Researcher, vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 4-13. Siemens, G 2009, Teaching as transparent learning. Available at: http://www.connectivism.ca/?p=122 [Accessed 29 May 2012] Weingarten, F. W & Overbey, P 1996, Culture, Society and Advanced Information Technology: Proceedings of a Workshop of the AAA and the CRA. Available at: http://www.cra.org/Policy/reports/aspects/aspects.pdf [Accessed 29 May 2012] Read More