Promoting good practice. Lessons from a collection of European eLearning experiences

In the last 20 years the development of new technological tools, and the increasing need for life-long learning, led to a growing attention to online education, i.e., e-learning activities. In turn, the interest toward e-learning has given rise to a considerable amount of activities, experiences, and research on the application of technology for supporting learning activities - especially applied to higher education. Thus, Open and Distance Learning (ODL) and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in education have become more and more a field of interest both for scholars and practitioners involved in learning activities (“providers” of education at different level and in different contexts). Globally, this phenomenon has attracted a rapidly growing amount of research facing up technology-supported learning from different theoretical perspectives (for a review: Larreamendy-Joerns & Leinhardt, 2006; Resta & Laferrière, 2007). Moreover, its multi-faceted character made e-learning a trans-disciplinary field of inquiry, including psychology (educational, social and cognitive psychology), learning sciences (pedagogical and didactic sciences, educational technology), computer science (artificial intelligence, agent-based systems), and communication sciences. The increasing interest and use of online education is generating a vast repertoire of experiences, having in common the use of technologies within learning activities. Now, a teacher or tutor who aims at organizing an e-learning course, can wonder whether all learning experiences based on technologies may offer the same level of effectiveness. This necessarily leads to a further question: what are the most effective strategies to adopt when planning and realizing e-learning activities, in order to foster knowledge acquisition in learners? The European project “Social networks and knowledge construction promotion in e-learning contexts” (http://minerva.ing2.unibo.it) was born out of these emerging interests and demands from the field. Through the adoption of a sort of “knowledge transfer” approach, it is meant at providing ICT-practitioners with those good practices and guidelines, drawn from empirical research in psychology of education, which are particularly focused on the idea of social nature of knowledge and abilities developed within the Vygotskian tradition. Our main goal, more specifically, is that of detecting, describing, and suggesting educational practices, and technological artefacts, by virtue of research evidence concerning the complex relationships between social interaction and cognitive activities, which may foster the beneficial effects of social interaction on knowledge construction.