This paper builds upon previous studies that show that non-task related exchanges between students can have a significant impact on students enjoyment of CSCL, on creating a sense of community and learning outcomes (Abedin et al, 2011). And when CSCL is successful, such interactions can form a significant part of the discussion; Dewiyanti et al ( 2007) showed that 33% of interactions in such a CSCL environment were non-task related.
The context for the Abedin et al paper was a part-time postgraduate general management degree course offered by a large Australian university. Average age of the students was 36 years old with an average of 10 years' work experience. Amongst the online forums established for the course was a seminar room where the learning activities took place and a coffee shop to foster informal, social interaction. The latter is similar to the Staff Room that we established in our Learning Event for the same purposes.
They define on-task interactions as including instructional and learning activities, such as group learning, and pedagogical questions and answers. Non-task interactions, on the other hand, are about socialising and are not directly related to course content; eg jokes, compliments and greetings.
They developed a series of items for assessing non-task sociability and consulted researchers in the field to seek their opinion and to revise them. Based upon these, they conducted a quantitative survey of students, firstly in a pilot and then in a main study, asking their opinion and applying factor analysis to the results. They then assessed the relationship of non-task sociability to learning outcomes, which they defined as pedagogical effect, student interest and perceived learning.
The results of their analysis suggest that non-task sociability strongly affects student interest, which in turn leads to a higher willingness to participate in online discussions and to being intellectually challenged. Similarly there was a strong link to pedagogical affect.
It would be interesting for me to analyse the messages in our Staff Room to see to what extent they were task or non-task related. I suspect that, compared with the other forums in the Learning Event, the percentage of non-task was higher and may be one of the reasons why the addition of the Staff Room was perceived as being useful. As Dewiyanti et al indicate a 'CSCL environment with a higher perceived level of nontask sociability increases satisfaction of the course, bonds students together by fostering a sense of community and avoids development of a sense of isolation' (p.10, Dewiyanti et al, 2007).
Brian
Abedin, B., Daneshgar, F. & D'Ambra, J. (2011) 'Do nontask interactions matter? The relationship between nontask sociability of computer supported collaborative learning and learning outcomes', British Journal of Educational Technology, Blackwell Publishing Ltd. (ONLINE - http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2011.01181.x - accessed 15.05.2011)
Dewiyanti, S., Brand-Gruwel, S., Jochems, W. & Broers, N. J. (2007) 'Students' experiences with collaborative learning in asynchronous Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning environments'. Computers in Human Behavior, 23 (1), pp.496-514
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