Cooperative freedom / Annotated Bibliography

Unit 1: Activity 1 : Cooperative freedom

 

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Annotated Bibliography

All the papers I read in this short time, about Cooperative Freedom are pointing to Morten Paulsen articles.

Paulsen, M.F. 2003. Online Education and Learning Management Systems Global E-learning in a Scandinavian Perspective , 39 – 50. Nki Forlaget. Norway.

The chapter describes the Theory of Cooperative Freedom . This theory suggests that, "distance students need cooperation as well as individual freedom. It professes that students should have high level of freedom to chose rather than be restrain by a rigid distance education program".
Paulsen identifies and describes three approaches to learning: Individual learning , Collaborative Learning and Cooperative Learning. Cooperative Freedom is a mix balance from group cooperation and individual autonomy and "can be achieved if we can balance time, space, pace, medium, access, and content". 

Paulsen concludes that "Future adult students will seek individual flexibility and freedom. At the same time, many need or prefer group collaboration and social unity. These aims are difficult to combine, but online education, when integrated with other media, can be the means of joining individual freedom and collective unity into truly flexible, cooperative distance education programs". 

Anderson , T. 2008. The Theory and Practice of Online Learning - 2nd ed., 221 – 241. AU Press, Athabasca University.

The chapter describes, defines and discusses the Educational Social Software (ESS). Mentions the Social Presence and refers the Social Challenges in Distance Online Education. 

Terry Anderson suggests a seventh dimension for the Paulsen hexagonal model, he says that to have total freedom, models of distance education should take into account the "freedom of relationship, where learners are allowed to engage in the type of learning relationship with other learners that best fits their individual social needs and capacities." 

For Anderson, the "ESS tool development and application is in its very early stages", so he remains convinced that a ESS killer app can make "significant improvements (both in cost- and learning-effectiveness) to our current practice and theory of distance education".

Workshop: Cooperative and Collaborative Learning A set of internet pages. 14 March 2010, 19:35 

The page has four tabs: Explanation; Demonstration; Exploration; Implementation. In this page the author try to answer several questions about Cooperative and Collaborative learning. It seems a good idea for teachers to see a real work model. It's not a elearning model but try to answer this questions: 

• What are cooperative and collaborative learning?
• How do cooperative and collaborative learning differ from the traditional approach?
• How have cooperative and collaborative learning developed since they became popular?
• What are the benefits of cooperative and collaborative learning?
• What are some critical perspectives?
• How can I use cooperative and collaborative learning in conjunction with other educational techniques?
• What do cooperative lesson plans look like?
• How do I get started using cooperative and collaborative groups?
• What are the most effective small groups I can use for different learning objectives?
• What are some challenges I might face?
• How do I assess students' progress?
• How can small-group projects involve parents and the community?
• How can technology be used with cooperative and collaborative learning?

To learn more about cooperative  and collaborative learning I recommend to read:

Ted Panitz (1996) A Definition of Collaborative vs Cooperative Learning from the site Deliberations (*) Accessed the 30 June 2010.

In this article we can read that the author have "been searching for many years for the Holy Grail of interactive learning, a distinction between collaborative and cooperative learning definitions".  

This article point to Spencer Kagan in an article in Educational Leadership (Dec/Jan 1989/1990)  and to John Myers (Cooperative Learning vol 11 #4 July 1991) and to Rocky Rockwood (National Teaching and Learning Forum vol 4 #6, 1995 part 1). 

Panitz conclues "It is clear to me that in undertaking the exercize of defining differences between the two ideas we run the risk of polarizing the educational community into a we versus them mentality. There are so many benefits which acrue from both ideas that it would be a shame to lose any advantage gained from the student-student-teacher interactions created by both methods. We must be careful to avoid a one-size-fits-all mentality when it comes to education paradigms".

As a final thought, "I think it behooves teachers to educate themselves about the myriad of techniques and philosophies which create interactive environments where students take more responsibility for their own learning and that of their peers. Then it will become possible to pick and chose those methods which best fit a particular educational goal or community of learners".

We can also read about:


    Why more teachers do not use collaborative learning techniques
    Issues Raised for Students in Implementing Collaborative Learning
    Issues Raised for Teachers in Implementing Collaborative Learning

(*) Deliberations is an international website on issues of learning and teaching for the higher education community, is based in the Centre for Academic Professional Development (CAPD) at London Metropolitan University and is currently funded and fully supported by the university. The editor is Anne Morris, Senior Lecturer in Educational Development at London Metropolitan University.

Conclusion 

The need for improvement has always been a constant of the human condition, not always the changes are well accepted, they need to be proved. Edgar Morin said that the man to evolve killed the monkey. We wait for a "Social software’s killer ap". Is also from suggestions and sharing that theories can evolve. Perhaps we needed a seventh freedom, such as Terry Anderson suggested. It seems that elearning starts to kill the traditional learning, like Video killed the radio star, and such said Camões “Mudam-se os tempos, mudam-se as vontades" as time change the wills changes. New doubts appear, for ex: difference between collaborative learning and cooperative learning. New theories rise like the Cooperative Freedom. The whole world is made up of change , always taking on new qualities.  

Illustrated Annotated Bibliography

W hen I was looking for information on Cooperative Learning, I found this concept in conjunction with Collaborative Learning. I wondered how many authors describe these two concepts. 

So I start looking for documentation on this subjects, and the more clearly and
succinctly approach that I found in this shorter time, is a "toonlet" from the Professor Paulsen related to Theory of Cooperative Freedom These concepts are also explained by Paulsen on this paper http://www.seminar.net/index.php/volume-4-issue-2-2008-previousissuesmeny-124/100-cooperative-online education and on this book Online Education and Learning Management SystemsGlobal E-learning in a Scandinavian Perspective

The texts that follow and the designs were cut from the documents mentioned above. 

 
Paulsen identifies three approaches to learning: 

 

Individual learning 

Individual learning provides superior individual flexibility, but very limited affinity to a learning community. It has a strong position in online education delivered by institutions with a tradition in distance education. 

Collaborative Learning 

Collaborative learning requires participation in a learning community, but limits individual flexibility. One may say that collaborative learning requires that students sink or swim together. Collaborative learning is common in online education offered by traditional face-to-face institutions. 

Cooperative Learning
 
Cooperative learning focuses on opportunities to encourage both individual flexibility and affinity to a learning community. Cooperative learning seeks to foster some benefits from individual freedom and other benefits from cooperation in online learning communities. It thrives in virtual learning environments that emphasize individual freedom within online learning communities. 

Another illustration




Paulsen start develop the Theory of Cooperative Freedom in 1992. This theory suggests that, distance students need cooperation as well as individual freedom. It professes that students should have high level of freedom to chose rather than be restrain by a rigid distance education program.



One of the students of last year, the colleague Pedro Teixeira, as created a video that summarizes the Theory of Cooperative Freedom
 

 
A Video from Professor Morten Flate Paulsen.






Cooperative Freedom is a mix balance from group cooperation and individual autonomy and can be achieved if we can balance time, space, pace, medium, access, and content. The hexagon of cooperative freedom.





Morten Paulsen concludes that Future adult students will seek individual flexibility and freedom. At the same time, many need or prefer group collaboration and social unity. These aims are difficult to combine, but online education, when integrated with other media, can be the means of joining individual freedom and collective unity into truly flexible, cooperative distance education programs. 

To learn more about Cooperative Learning and how if differs from Collaborative Learning  I recommend this two videos by Larry G. Richards Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Virginia: