Social Dynamics and Pro-Social Learning

Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash

 As someone interested in education and learning, I have a responsibility to create a positive digital environment. I must encourage fellow students to contribute, question, and support each other in a positive way. That could be through peer feedback or creating spaces where people or other students feel safe adding to or participating in discussions. From exploring the Nicky Case simulation, I learned how important it is to have both diversity, independence, and spaces where people can think for themselves but still stay connected. If everyone, especially students like myself, copies the loudest voice, we end up all thinking the same way or agreeing on something that may not be the best idea, instead of a learning community. However, when learners have room to share different perspectives and challenge each other in a positive way, true growth and learning can happen! This relates to what I learned from Dave Cormier's blog post about Pro Social Web, as he describes that "pro-social" spaces help to create trust and openness. He urges that we all help to add to spaces like this and promote these kinds of discussions! For me, this idea of pro-social means encouraging people to speak up, ask questions, and support one another, no matter the topic of discussion or whether we agree or disagree. Honestly, I think healthy disagreement is important for our society and young learners because we need to learn to expand our ideas, but do it respectfully, like Cormi
er talks about in his post. Especially in learning spaces, this is important because everyone needs to feel safe to share their ideas and not begin to groupthink or be influenced by the wrong ideas, as demonstrated in the Nicky Case simulation! 

I think I find groupthink dynamics or instances similar to the simulation showing up both online and in the classroom. It is not necessarily super negative or cases of misinformation, but it is definitely places where there may not be a lot of discussion or sharing of multiple perspectives. As students, we tend to just agree with the first idea put out and build off of that. It is hard to speak up about disagreements as we don't know each other well, and we don't want to cause arguments in a classroom environment. Additionally, from personal experience, I tend not to speak up because I don't want someone to feel bad about speaking up first and sharing their idea, because it can be very nerve-racking! This is something we should work to improve upon in a respectful way, because sharing multiple perspectives would be more beneficial to our learning! I think the online environment is a bit different. We can use reposts to spread many different ideas, and no one tends to elaborate on their ideas; they just use words others say. I think it is important for us to share our perspectives online, but again, like in the classroom, we shouldn't be afraid to share our own ideas or thoughts too!