Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
oped clear communication processes that allowed
them to ask for help in a casual way because of
the behavioural etiquette established in the first
few weeks. Evidence of the effectiveness of this
modelled behaviour started to appear early in the
course when some students started to organise to
meet at arranged times so they could help each
other with technical aspects of operating in the
MOO. The MOO was both a familiar and foreign
environment for most students. Although spaces
had familiar labels, students had to gain technical
skills as well as work through their relationships
with each other to complete content related tasks.
The modelling of behaviour initially by teaching
and technical staff, and later between the students,
not only reinforced a constructivist approach, it
created the opportunity for informal “chat” which
became one of the factors for people “getting to
know each other” and the development of SLSN's.
The environment supported them in this because
of the patterns of engagement they had developed
with each other.
how students move and engage with each other in
those areas not defined as classrooms.
For all three cases, students illustrated the
significance of SLSN's and the effect the environ-
ment they encountered had on them developing
connections with each other. Although students
from the first case did not engage socially with
each other online, they clearly illustrated how
the physical campus environment supported the
incidental contact between them that provided
the foundations for the development of their
SLSN's. Students from the second case went to
great effort to ensure they spent social time with
most of their colleagues around the on-campus
workshop days held each semester, specifically
because they understood the value of developing
supportive relationships with others; and yet they
did not use the virtual space provided online to
facilitate these social connections. However, the
most compelling evidence for the importance of
the relationship between the constructed online
environment and the development of SLSN's
comes from the third case.
The MOO environment provided students
who had no other opportunity to engage with
each other, with the capacity to develop SLSN's.
This is because the constructed environment of
the MOO contained the key elements students
required to transform an online space into a lived
place - a place they could inhabit by creating
things, engage in defined learning activities, play
in, and importantly, a place students went to for
support in times of study stress.
The idea that the design of the online environ-
ment can facilitate the development of community
is certainly not new, nor is the idea that people will
strive to create support networks using whatever
means at their disposal. In 1993, Rheingold ar-
gued this in his seminal book
Virtual Community:
Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier
:
My direct observation of online behaviour
around the world over the last ten years have led
me to conclude that whenever computer mediated
communication technology becomes available to
pHySical/virtual
environmentS: purpoSefully
turning Space into place
The most significant theme to emerge from this re-
search is the relationship between the environment
and the development of Social Learning Support
Networks. While the literature reviewed for this
research related the development of community
for students with the learning activities designed
by teaching staff, there was no evidence in the
literature of the need to understand the relationship
between student's engagement with each other
outside of the formal learning activities and the
vital role the environment played in supporting the
development of these relationships. This requires
a more holistic understanding of the
environment
to include not just the activities designed in class-
rooms, nor just the constructed physical or virtual
environment students study in, but to understand
Search WWH ::
Custom Search