Baskin, Colin, Barker, Michelle, and Woods, Peter (2005) Towards a conceptual model for online group work - addressing graduate skills development in online courses. In: Proceedings of the AARE Conference 2004. From: Doing the public good: Positioning educational research , 29 November - 2 December 2004, Melbourne University, VIC, Australia.

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Abstract

In moving towards what Lemke (1996) terms the 'interactive learning paradigm', higher education has adopted group learning technologies as both the means and ends by which graduate attributes and group skills are evidenced and developed. In this light, learning is mediated by (and occurs through) language (Falk 1997; Gee 1997), and is distributed across a managed (but growing) range of people, sites, objects, technologies and time (Gee 1997). This paper details a more recent principle that has emerged in the form of flexible (anywhere, anyplace, anytime) learning that seems to fly in the face of accepted views of group learning technologies. Many universities now choose to offer ‘learning resources’ flexibly online. This paper describes the distribution architecture that enables this to happen, the discourses that drive it, and the limitations that plague it. In short, the paper examines whether Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are ‘robust’ enough to support, sustain and address industry, employer and government calls for greater attention to group skills development in university graduates.

Data features an examination of respondent feedback (n=171) in an ‘online’ group work setting, and their subsequent ratings of group skills development over a 13 week period. This discussion offers an account of learner outcomes by adopting Kirkpatrick’s (1996) four levels of evaluation of learning as a classification scheme for determining learner satisfaction (Level One), the effectiveness of group skills learning transfer (Level Two), its impact on team practices (Level Three) and the appropriation of learning behaviours by group participants (Level Four). Data points to the need for an interactive model of group skills development that focuses on “the demands of the new world environment” (Blasi & Heinecke, 2000, p5), and that is capable of recognising new social presence and the production of social categories online.

Item ID:	14799
Item Type:	Conference Item (Research - E1)
ISBN:	1324-9320
Keywords:	computers in education; ICTs; professional development
Related URLs:	http://www.aare.edu.au
Date Deposited:	26 Nov 2010 03:25
FoR Codes:	13 EDUCATION > 1303 Specialist Studies in Education > 130303 Education Assessment and Evaluation @ 50% 13 EDUCATION > 1303 Specialist Studies in Education > 130306 Educational Technology and Computing @ 50%
SEO Codes:	93 EDUCATION AND TRAINING > 9399 Other Education and Training > 939999 Education and Training not elsewhere classified @ 100%
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