Characterizing and unpacking learning to learn together skills in a wiki project in primary education

Abstract

Learning to learn together (L2L2) skills are widely acknowledged as some of the most important 21 st century skills that enable learners to participate in a digital and global society. This paper examines how L2L2 skills emerged in a small-group wiki-based collaborative project and in the context of face-to-face real-classroom practice, in order to conceptualise L2L2 and identify the key features of the skills involved. To this end, our paper reports on an empirical study with primary school students who worked in two different modes of interaction, namely face-to-face in-pair discussion and on-line wiki-based between-pair discussion. The study identified and defined key features of four L2L2 skills, namely distributed leadership, mutual engagement, group reflection and group assessment, all of which emerged to a similar extent during the wiki project. It was found that a few distinctive features of L2L2 skills are related to different stages of task resolution, wiki affordances and different modes of collaboration. Therefore, this empirical study argues that technology and pedagogy are equally important and required to promote L2L2 skills in primary school classrooms and also it discusses some educational implications for the design of more effective technology-enhanced pedagogy.