So this is the last entry in the projectlog for my Seminary “Grundlagen Methodischen Arbeitens”.
I will try to wrap it up with some conclusions about the topic of E-Learning & Virtual Communities, partly related to the Seminary, partly non-related stuff that was coming into my head while thinking about these topics.
Seminary related Wrap-Up:
I never thought before that so many people were researching the topic of the combination of “E-Learning & Web 2.0” or “modern E-Learning”.
Slidecasting is one of many projects in this area and I think that with more functions it will be more motivating and of better use for the Students.
But it could also be that the whole motivation by features/rating/membership-levels thinking is idealistic and that the only way to motivate Students is by giving them something back that can affect their grades (e.g. points).
And maybe another point is that some Students can never be motivated to take part in anything that isn’t necessary to receive a positive grade.
Personal Wrap-Up:
Especially the topic of Virtual Communties is a really big topic, which got me interested (maybe because I’m taking part/took part in many Virtual Communites 😉 ). There is then also the fact that some Virtual Communites also change to also be Real Life Communities. Even that alone (questions like “how to sucessfully motivate users to also join Real Life Meetings”,”why are some communties so sucessfull in motivating their users to also join meetings in Real Life”,…) brings up many questions which probably were already researched by many people.
Also I found out that Virtual Communties are nearly a 1:1 reproduction of the Real-Life. Including people who work a huge amount of time for the communites, but also the possibillity of a sort of “burn out” syndrom. People are still doing their voluntary work for a Community but did too much, so that they no longer really appreciate to do it.