This has significant implications for the Web as a communications medium. While it may not be highly interactive in a physical sense, the Web has strong potential for social interactivity. The goal of this type of approach is the achievement of ‘virtual communities’ of learners on the Internet working in small collaborative groups to achieve a common goal (Dillenbourg & Schneider, 1995). While it would appear that care is necessary in the formation of such groups, it has been proposed that heterogenous grouping can assist in the creation of zones of proximal development (Walker & Lambert, 1996).
Traditional Internet communication tools such as E-mail, Newsgroups, Internet Relay Chat, and MOOs offer both the rapid synchronous communication of normal speech as well as asynchronous interaction which may help to promote a more reflective metacongitive approach. With the use of Web browser plug-ins and server software such as Ichat, such facilities are now becoming available in a more cohesive form on the Web. Examples of learning through communication can be seen in commercial environments such as TopClass (WBT Systems, 1997) which have no actual content but provide the functionality required for real-time communication and collaborative learning.
The Need for Pragmatism
It would be convenient to see Social Constructivism as a single solution to the limitations of the Web, but no one theoretical approach is likely to achieve the broad range of educational outcomes required from tertiary study. Both Cognitive Theory and Constructivism are not without their critics, who are often damning in their observations of what are, after all, philosophies much less open to the rigorous scientific testing inherent in a behaviourist paradigm. Epistemologically, the relativism of Constructivism is particularly contentious. Constructivism focuses on the individual interpretation of a perceived external reality, and it has been claimed that “individual understanding and conceptualisation is parasitic upon this extra-individual scientific domain”, leading to the criticism that Constructivism is “old unpalatable, empiricist wine in a new bottle” (Matthews, 1992)
One of the most tangible criticisms of Social Constructivism is the type of learning it supports. While it may be true that social negotiation is a useful approach to achieving consensual understanding of ill-structured subject matter, even in the ’softest’ subjects there is often a body of undisputed knowledge. Constructivist strategies are often not efficient, resulting in “a trial-and-error approach to the performance in the real world” (Merrill, 1997).
Explicit guidelines for the use of real-time chat and threaded discussion lists have yet to be developed and there is little doubt that the unique attributes of on-line social interaction will play a large part in the effectiveness of the Web as a collaborative medium. Recent experiences with the use of Listservs at Edith Cowan University have produced mixed results. When a clear structure through prescribed activities is given to the interaction which takes place, students have anecdotally expressed positive outcomes from the experience. The discomfort which some students initially experience in posting their ideas to the ‘ether’ of cyberspace, as well as low participation rates where social interaction is seen as an adjunct rather than an integral component of study, however, suggest more research in this area is needed.
Finally, it must be noted that the Web, and Internet in general are likely to change significantly in coming years. Increasing bandwidth and processing power will make activities such as video conferencing and real time visual manipulation of data across large distances a reality. This will undoubtedly impact greatly on on-line educational practice. In the mean time, however, where the goals of instruction are broader than can be easily accounted within traditional approaches, it may be that instructional strategies informed by a Social Constructivist paradigm can help to lessen the inadequacies for highly interactive authentic learning which are manifest in the Web in its current form.
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