Work coordination and collaborative knowledge construction in a small group collaborative virtual task

Interest on how students organise and coordinate their work in virtual collaborative groups has increased in recent years, both from research on computer-supported collaborative learning and collaborative writing. Our study aimed to explore possible relationships between the types of organisation and coordination of work used by small groups dealing with a complex collaborative writing task and the levels of collaborative knowledge construction they reached. A case-study was conducted, and four small groups of undergraduate students in an “Instructional Psychology” course at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC) were analysed. Results showed differences between the types of organisation and coordination of work used by high and low performance groups, and a relationship between organisation and coordination of work and collaborative knowledge construction. These results suggest that teachers should assist group processes of organisation and coordination of work as a condition to enhance collaborative knowledge construction and collaborative writing.