Abstract
Too often, online learning is positioned as an inferior alternative to working in the real classroom. To explore why, we review some of the ways people refer to the real and the virtual both in practice and in the relevant literature. In order to reach fundamental issues pertaining to networked learning, our approach is based on a broad critique of interpersonal relationships that reaches beyond questions of power and meaning characteristic of traditional critical theory. In the process, we draw on our own dialogues within a tutor–student dyad, and other dialogues with students now that we are colleagues on the same M.Sc. programme. We find explanations for the view that the virtual is inferior, but also alternative perspectives supporting our challenges to this notion especially in the context of networked learning where the terms real and virtual are no longer so distinct from each other. We explore the potential offered by a dialogical perspective on the concept of networked learning to both bring out the problems and offer suggestions for better forms of engagement for teachers as well as learners. We argue that the advent of the virtual has usefully exposed complexities in the role of teachers that have always been there. Networked teachers as well as students may well require exemplars, models and heuristics for how to exist online, but these are augmentations of teaching practices rather than indications of totally new roles. Our method and findings highlight the dialogical nature of the teacher–student relationship, with the teacher having a role in how their students’ experience is managed and how understanding is co-created. We conclude that students should come to be regarded as junior colleagues, whether online or off, and should be encouraged to espouse this role.
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Sinclair, C., Macleod, H. (2015). Literally Virtual: The Reality of the Online Teacher. In: Jandrić, P., Boras, D. (eds) Critical Learning in Digital Networks. Research in Networked Learning. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-13752-0_5
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