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This article sets out to compare and contrast two different projects, aimed to get primary teachers collaborating online for a specific purpose. The first project tried to encourage teachers in small rural schools to share ideas for the implementation of the National Numeracy Strategy in an attempt to help them overcome the difficulties of having to cater for extremes of ability in whole key stage or cross key stage classes. The second was intended to provide a platform for teachers to develop materials for the teaching of religious education in the classroom. The two projects were examined in terms of the advice followed, from research, on how to engage participants in online collaboration and also with respect to four success criteria, namely: the number of teachers agreeing to participate; the number of postings they sent into the discussion boards; the number of prompts needed from the project leaders to maintain the impetus of the projects; and the end results to find out exactly what the projects achieved. There was a discrepancy between the outcomes of the two projects in spite of them both following similar advice and the comparison has allowed the researchers to list four ‘necessary ingredients’ for the successful establishment of e-learning communities within practising teachers. These include: face to face meetings; high quality IT support; outcomes which are of real benefit to participants and adequate funding.
The outcome of the comparison is felt to add to the knowledge of how to encourage participation in online forums within a context outside those normally researched. As such it should help those trying to design similar projects in the future.
Keywords:
Online collaboration, online forums, face to face meetings, project ownership, Religious Education, National Numeracy Strategy, mixed age classes
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