Social aspects of electronic learning environments

A recurrent theme of this blog seems to be the social aspects of electronic learning environments. My first set of questions drew attention to learners’ relationships on the Internet and the impact of ICTs on education. I’ve talked about online communities sharing ideas valuable to the entire community, and information thereby becoming a public good. I mentioned online communities being supportive even when people didn’t know each other in the “real world”. The section on identity highlighted issues, such as the anonymity of the Internet, which affected online relationships. This brings me to yet another question: Trust is an important aspect in learning environments, so how can trust be achieved online when people can choose to be anonymous?

My initial questions can now be made a bit more specific towards the role of social interaction in electronic learning environments. I would like to ask how groups and communities of learners develop and how do they interact and establish a sense of community of learning.

While reading a few articles in this area, I found a paper called: “Identifying the pitfalls for social interaction in computer-supported collaborative learning environments: a review of the research” (Kreijns, Kirschner & Jochems, 2003). I might choose this paper for the article presentation as it covers both the positive and negative factors of online learning environments and it will lead me a bit closer to my final paper.