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Collaborative learning has become an important issue that concern to all the educational environments because it is a powerful principle to engage learners in a process of production of knowledge. Due to this fact, collaborative habits are being increased around the world (and this can be observed in the most web sites, if not they should be developed) where a wide variety of educational approaches allow learners and teachers to be exposed to a high level of intellectual efforts and thinking processes. Now a days the importance of collaboration have increased because in that way it is possible to facilitate the development of a learning community and the achievement of the goals of a course. Besides, students become able to move from absolute independence to“general” group interdependence (Pallof et al. 2007).
The networked world, where we are living now, has a big intervention of new technologies that have increased the level of communication in terms of quantity, quality and, of course, velocity. Those technological advances facilitates access to any kind or quantity of resources and people can find those resources just with a “click”, besides people can also modify or contribute arguments for an specific topic by signing up in a blog or a wiki. This helps to any educational environment given that students are involved in a collaborative environment where they are responsible of their own learning and also of others’ learning, then they are members of a group where mutually they can search for understanding, solutions, meanings, and create something relevant and productive together, applicable to their own learning process.
Collaborative English language learning should be promoted in all the courses and classrooms. In order to promote it, it should be considered different projects or activities that engage learners and also challenge them to participate, those activities vary widely, but not all of them are centered on students’ exploration or application of the language. Teachers must consider that collaboration in the classroom involves fostering critical thinking, participation and discussion and not only the presentation and explanation of a topic by the teacher (Pallof et al, 2007). In that way, teacher – centered or reading – centered lessons are deleted of the lesson planning; and then, lecturing, listening and note taking process are replaced for students’ discussions and active participation where they explore and produce outcomes according to what themselves discover and share with others, which is a characteristic of collaboration.
Collaboration is a skill that can be developed by giving the learners the opportunities to interact in activities in which they are required to share their thoughts. Some of those activities are too useful for a language learning classroom; the first thing to consider is to let students to formulate ad share their learning goals, then generate discussions about students’ personal experiences, interests and motivating problems (Pallof et al, 2007). Those are ways to connect students’ ideas and feelings, promoting interdependence which is related to the process of learning that is an active and constructive process. Collaboration in the classroom, favor the acquisition of knowledge due to the students are continuously exposed to new information or new ideas, besides it also favor acquisition of language skills because students are sharing ideas using the target language, for doing so learners need to be engaged to work actively with other classmates. Collaborative learning situations in a language classroom, promote challenges for students to go beyond others’ explanations and reading for information. Students develop the ability to enhance their thinking processes and they change their roles being active contributors, more than passive receptors (LaBonte, Randy et al. 2003). Hence that students are not waiting for taking new information or ideas from others, because they are creating new conclusions (if not theories) with that information and ideas which is an intellectual process of constructing meanings that strengthen the language learning process.
The idea of a collaborative English language learning environment is interesting since encourage all the participants of an educational community to discuss and assume roles. Group talk activities benefit all learners while they are providing scaffolding for learning English; they are collaborative activities that favor all the students’ learning process because they develop shared thinking and retention of information, besides they give the students the opportunity to interact with all their classmates. For doing so, students need to assume different roles (even in online or face to face classes) such as facilitator of the discussion, process observer, content commentator, team leader or presenter of a particular topic (Pallof et al, 2007). On the other hand, teachers have the responsibility to find the strategies to promote collaboration. Those strategies should be developed considering the variability that has the amount of time that is taken in a group work. The group work can be focused on classroom discussion about a short reading or a new from the newspaper or simply a short story; it can be also focused on the creation of teams of study for language classes or carry out cross-curricular projects.
Finally, for a collaborative environment in the English language learning process it is necessary to implement technological tools that allow fostering participation beyond the classroom. “When people work together they can learn from one another” (Tapscott, 2008) and the level of interaction is extended beyond the gathering of information which is something that can be gotten by using technological tools such as blogs, wikis, webs, etc. Because of that, technology (properly applied) is the best way to foster collaboration given that eliminates barriers and provides comfortable settings for students’ collaboration and cooperation (Pallof et al, 2007) while they contribute to build meanings and concepts about the language and its forms and use due to they are using English to write their thoughts. As a conclusion, it is possible to say that collaborative English language learning can be developed if teachers and students are ready to apply new and different strategies where they have to assume roles that support the learning process to define the final work or the products under construction.
References
• LaBonte, Randy et al (2003). Moderating Tips for Synchronous Learning Using Virtual Classroom Technologies. Odyssey Learning Systems Inc. Retrieved from http://odysseylearn.com/Resrce/text/e-Moderating%20tips.pdf [Available as an E-resource]
• Palloff, Rena and Pratt, Keith (2007). Building Online Learning Communities,Wiley.
• Tapscott, Don and Williams, Anthony (2008). Wikinomics, Portfolio.
The networked world, where we are living now, has a big intervention of new technologies that have increased the level of communication in terms of quantity, quality and, of course, velocity. Those technological advances facilitates access to any kind or quantity of resources and people can find those resources just with a “click”, besides people can also modify or contribute arguments for an specific topic by signing up in a blog or a wiki. This helps to any educational environment given that students are involved in a collaborative environment where they are responsible of their own learning and also of others’ learning, then they are members of a group where mutually they can search for understanding, solutions, meanings, and create something relevant and productive together, applicable to their own learning process.
Collaborative English language learning should be promoted in all the courses and classrooms. In order to promote it, it should be considered different projects or activities that engage learners and also challenge them to participate, those activities vary widely, but not all of them are centered on students’ exploration or application of the language. Teachers must consider that collaboration in the classroom involves fostering critical thinking, participation and discussion and not only the presentation and explanation of a topic by the teacher (Pallof et al, 2007). In that way, teacher – centered or reading – centered lessons are deleted of the lesson planning; and then, lecturing, listening and note taking process are replaced for students’ discussions and active participation where they explore and produce outcomes according to what themselves discover and share with others, which is a characteristic of collaboration.
Collaboration is a skill that can be developed by giving the learners the opportunities to interact in activities in which they are required to share their thoughts. Some of those activities are too useful for a language learning classroom; the first thing to consider is to let students to formulate ad share their learning goals, then generate discussions about students’ personal experiences, interests and motivating problems (Pallof et al, 2007). Those are ways to connect students’ ideas and feelings, promoting interdependence which is related to the process of learning that is an active and constructive process. Collaboration in the classroom, favor the acquisition of knowledge due to the students are continuously exposed to new information or new ideas, besides it also favor acquisition of language skills because students are sharing ideas using the target language, for doing so learners need to be engaged to work actively with other classmates. Collaborative learning situations in a language classroom, promote challenges for students to go beyond others’ explanations and reading for information. Students develop the ability to enhance their thinking processes and they change their roles being active contributors, more than passive receptors (LaBonte, Randy et al. 2003). Hence that students are not waiting for taking new information or ideas from others, because they are creating new conclusions (if not theories) with that information and ideas which is an intellectual process of constructing meanings that strengthen the language learning process.
The idea of a collaborative English language learning environment is interesting since encourage all the participants of an educational community to discuss and assume roles. Group talk activities benefit all learners while they are providing scaffolding for learning English; they are collaborative activities that favor all the students’ learning process because they develop shared thinking and retention of information, besides they give the students the opportunity to interact with all their classmates. For doing so, students need to assume different roles (even in online or face to face classes) such as facilitator of the discussion, process observer, content commentator, team leader or presenter of a particular topic (Pallof et al, 2007). On the other hand, teachers have the responsibility to find the strategies to promote collaboration. Those strategies should be developed considering the variability that has the amount of time that is taken in a group work. The group work can be focused on classroom discussion about a short reading or a new from the newspaper or simply a short story; it can be also focused on the creation of teams of study for language classes or carry out cross-curricular projects.
Finally, for a collaborative environment in the English language learning process it is necessary to implement technological tools that allow fostering participation beyond the classroom. “When people work together they can learn from one another” (Tapscott, 2008) and the level of interaction is extended beyond the gathering of information which is something that can be gotten by using technological tools such as blogs, wikis, webs, etc. Because of that, technology (properly applied) is the best way to foster collaboration given that eliminates barriers and provides comfortable settings for students’ collaboration and cooperation (Pallof et al, 2007) while they contribute to build meanings and concepts about the language and its forms and use due to they are using English to write their thoughts. As a conclusion, it is possible to say that collaborative English language learning can be developed if teachers and students are ready to apply new and different strategies where they have to assume roles that support the learning process to define the final work or the products under construction.
References
• LaBonte, Randy et al (2003). Moderating Tips for Synchronous Learning Using Virtual Classroom Technologies. Odyssey Learning Systems Inc. Retrieved from http://odysseylearn.com/Resrce/text/e-Moderating%20tips.pdf [Available as an E-resource]
• Palloff, Rena and Pratt, Keith (2007). Building Online Learning Communities,Wiley.
• Tapscott, Don and Williams, Anthony (2008). Wikinomics, Portfolio.
