Achieving collaboration in e-learning

Collaboration in e-learning is not just an addition to teaching, but a fundamental mechanism for building knowledge, motivation and professional competences. In digital environments, learning is less linear and individual, and more networked and shared: students exchange ideas, question arguments, assume roles and jointly create digital objects such as documents, presentations, code and multimedia.

This activates the principles of social constructivism and shared learning regulation, which increases the depth of content processing and long-term retention of knowledge. For teachers, collaboration opens space for formative assessment on the fly, as traces of interactions such as forums, comments and change history become a source of insight into the process, not just the final product.

Forms of collaboration range from short ad hoc activities such as think-pair-share in a virtual classroom, to structured group tasks such as e-portfolio projects, to long-term communities of practice that extend beyond a single course. It is useful to distinguish between coordination, i.e., the agreement of deadlines and work allocation, cooperation, i.e., the division of labor with partial results, and collaboration, which is the joint creation of a single outcome with mutual dependence. In the e-environment, this level is supported by specialised tools: kanban boards for coordination, shared documents and collaborative repositories, and synchronous discussions and joint modeling on digital whiteboards and collaborative tools.

Clearly defined roles, such as group leader, note-taker, quality assurance and communication coordinator, encourage accountability and visibility of contributions with transparent assessment criteria, with rubrics that measure both the result and the process of creation. The design of the activities should ensure interest and stimulation through open-ended tasks without a single solution, but also a safe climate that includes rules of online etiquette, moderation and support. At the curriculum level, collaboration is planned vertically, through the gradual increase in the complexity of group tasks throughout the semester, and horizontally, by connecting subjects through interdisciplinary themes. In this way, learning (remains) authentic: students work on practical problems, agree on quality standards and deliver results for real users.

Examples

Peer evaluation in LMS

Students submit seminar drafts through the LMS, for example in the Moodle LMS Workshop activity. The system can automatically assign, for example, three anonymous papers from their colleagues to each student to assess using the criteria arranged in rubrics. After the activity, there is a discussion in a separate forum activity where authors revise their papers according to the feedback received and submit a final version with reflection on the changes based on the feedback. Students must provide at least one piece of evidence/claim from the text for each grade they gave to a criterion and suggest a specific step for improvement, such as replacing or changing arguments or making stronger connections to relevant sources. In the rubric, the criteria are grouped according to content, structure, style and academic integrity. The teacher moderates and resolves isolated cases of inconsistent grades through meta-review. Finally, the teacher creates a short meta-summary explaining which types of interventions improved the papers/seminars the most and what is recommended for the next generation of students.

Community of practice

For the needs of their e-course, the teacher opens a private space in the Teams or Slack environment with channels by topic and clear rules of conduct. During the semester, students share articles, ask questions from practice, and once a month organise short webinars for their colleagues in which they demonstrate digital tools and useful procedures or skills. A rotating role of channel moderator is introduced, who summarises discussions weekly and archives them in the Wiki activity on the e-course located on the Moodle LMS. The activity of individual students is measured by the following metrics: the number of meaningful contributions, usefulness according to the votes of colleagues and the impact on the creation of final digital objects (presentations, projects, documentation, etc.). At the end of the semester, the community of practice publishes an online guide with links, summaries and examples of application, which the teacher then uses as teaching material for the next generations.