Interdependence: Reinterpreting the Nature of Leadership and Community in Online Learning with Reference to the Samba School

Abstract

With the advent of online learning, questions have arisen as to which format for leadership may be most appropriate given the technological and social evolution within online discussion. Emerging perspectives on the nature of interaction between those who lead and those who learn in this new environment pose difficult questions for both providers and learners. Institutions are no longer seen as the sole proprietors of knowledge as learners have the freedom to engage in multiple forms of knowledge construction with the advent of Web 2.0. Online learning creates the conditions for emergence where power lies not only in individual achievement but in collective participation. It is this sense of a learning community where new ideas are produced through collaborative engagement that inspired Seymour Papert, a pioneer in educational computing. Papert saw the samba school as the embodiment of this shared learning. In philosophical terms a parallel can be drawn between this development or making of ideas through online learning and the thing in a Heideggerian reading, brought to a point where, through the process of making, it can ‘thing’ within the forum. To continue the reference to Martin Heidegger, what is the role of the teacher when those involved in the process of making are those who in turn will validate the thingness of the thing or idea? Following this thought, is it that the teacher now has to become the person who like the artist gathers from the substrate of the community to be made valid? Just as in the samba school, are, therefore, learners and teachers mutually dependent on each other? The implication is that the work of leadership allows students to comprehend their knowledge in the making.