Module 3: Assessing Collaborative Effort
I think our vodcast this week on Assessment of Collaborative Learning with George Siemens was very clear on where we should stand with our ideals of assessment and how the paradigm has shifted from being focused on individual learning to a model based on collaborative learning. With this shift students would be assessed by other peers, receive feedback from online communities, and the facilitator or instructor could also assess based on user contribution to the community.
I guess I am going to jump on my soapbox for this one, but if someone is not willing to network or collaborate in a learning community for an online course, then why did they decide to take the online course in the first place? However, I do understand that circumstances may arise that may impede a learner at one point or another during a program of study or course. I know that during my master's program (also online through Walden), I had a death in the family that prevented me from contributing to the week's discussions, assignments, etc. while I was traveling to attend the funeral. I also know that a friend of mine also recently had a health scare that took her out of the ball game of Walden for week. Luckily, in both cases, our Walden professors and colleagues were very gracious and understanding of our circumstances and allowed leniency. I feel that this was due, in part, to our previous contributions to our learning community. However, if someone is taking advantage of their group of community, I think that it is important for someone to make this person aware before the issue is taken to the professor. Once it has been communicated to the person, if they still continue to be lackadaisical, then the professor should address the issue. Worst case scenario, they withdraw from the class or fail the class, but in the end, their actions (or lack there of) was the direct cause of such an effect.
I think part of the reason people do not collaborate and/or network is that there is a trust issue. When we meet people in person, we often can determine how well we are likely to work together. Yes, we are sometimes wrong, but most of us are good judges of character. In an online environment, however, we are flying blind. We know little/nothing about our classmates and it is hard to determine if they can be trusted to do their fair share.
ReplyDeleteOf course, many life events come up and mess with all of us. From tornadoes to deaths, and most of our professors are understanding. However, what about group projects where each person has, say 25% of the work to do. If one classmate drops the course or takes a leave of absence (so easy to do), then the rest of the group is sunk.
In short, I think many people are scared of getting burned by someone, especially when we're talking about thousands of dollars of tuition per class.
Great post! You touch on a lot of important issues especially when out of the blue a flood comes or tornadoes tear the land as they did in AL and GA. For sure, Ray make a vital thought with trust. It is tough to trust people in person more so in an online environment as we might neve know who is behind the screen. That is where instructors have to use their creativity to create a demand for the one individual to want to be part of a group. This as Simens said in his video...changing the assessment model could help this situation.
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