The very basic idea behind cooperative learning is the backbone of social learning theory. The idea that students work in groups to enhance their learning experience and to further their understanding correlates strongly to the general premise that supports social learning theory.
Webquests are a way to incorporate social learning theory that might link together students that are not even in the same class, school, state, or even country. I like the idea of how webquests can be conducted as partners and groups that are working together in cyberspace. The students can be paired together, complete the project and not even meet face to face. There is a lot of learning that can happen when the distractions of the classroom and peers are taken out of the equation.
Cooperative group projects have been in the classroom for eons, but incorporating the use of technology takes them to a new level. Each student brings personal strength to the classroom and their understanding for technology is no different. The programs that are available on the web are endless and I really feel that the students would learn a lot creating videos and presentations using programs like Xtranormal and Prezi.
The last strategy I want to touch base on is Keypals. When I was reading this section, I was anxious to get to this portion because I had never heard of this before. I was pleasantly surprised to find that this is the modern day pen pals. A pen pal was a great experience growing up and I learned a lot from the person that I was assigned to. The key idea of pen pals is social learning… one can learn a lot from another in just letters back and forth.
The strategies that were presented in our text this week exemplified the ideas of social learning theory to a tee. Any of these activities got students working together in a rich experience which in turn supports learning from others.
Resources:
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD
I am also very excited to try some of the resources from this week. I thought Keypals sounded great as well. I am anxious to try these resources next year. You are right, technology takes cooperative learning to a new level!
ReplyDeleteIt will be great to have the summer to organize and figure out which great strategies and techniques to use next year. I can't wait to put it all together in a well thought out, planned school year.
ReplyDeleteJamie,
ReplyDeleteI also thought Keypals sounded very exciting! Did you find it to be a helpful math resource? I browsed through the collections a little bit and plan on investigating it further. It seems like I pick up several new tools each week!
Jamie,
ReplyDeleteThis week was the first that I had heard of Keypals also. It is a very simple yet effective resource for social learning. I had forgotten all about penpals. Technology has done wonders for cooperative learning. It has help to extend learning and the chances our students have to learn from each other. Students no longer have to wait for class to work together.
Chad