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 * Collaborative learning: Breaking old traditions **

Collaborative learning is the term used for an educational approach which requires commitment and intellectual effort from students. Wikispaces is a useful online platform that facilitates colaboration amongst peers, because it provides a space for sharing information, constructing knowledge and getting feedback. The collaborative approach is an innovation in education because it requires students to be involved in the learning process, changing also the teacher's role. The purpose of this essay is to introduce the educational approach and also the online platform, describing their positive aspects.

With the collaborative approach, the students work in pairs or in small groups, usually from three to five people. The main objective is to help each other with questions and problems that might come along during the course. Collaborative activities can vary between classroom discussions,short lectures, and also group research, both inside the classroom and out. It is important to keep in mind that every student has his/her own learning style. So, teachers can no longer assume the traditional one-size-fits-all approach that was used in classrooms for such a long time.

Collaborative approach is known for breaking a lot of teaching traditions. That is due to the fact that a s opposed to the tradicional lectures that are focused on the teacher, collaborative learning focuses on students’ involvement with the course material. In order for the collaborative approach to work properly, there are some aspects that have to be observed. For instance, in order to improve one's learning is important to be commited and active during the constructive process. That means that instead of being only viewers when it comes to learning, students are supposed to raise questions, do researches and work together in order to find the answers. That effort will improve students's problem- solving abilities and also their group- working skills. .

According to the article written by Kevin R. Parker and Joseph T. Chao, wikispaces is a web communication and collaboration tool that can be used to share information with the students and also with the teatcher. Wikispaces are not, necessarily, an alternative to face-to-face classes. It can be used as a plataform, that if combined with face-to-face meetings, will help students improve their own learning process, and therefore their construction of knowledge. Another positive aspect of Wikispaces is that it also provides a platoform that allows the teacher to give students feedback of the activities. Students can also give feedback to eachother's work by means of peer-editing, which is the term used to define the process of students correcting each other's' work.

Although wikispaces was introduced more than ten years ago, its use is relatively new in Higher Education, that has only recently begun to explore its potential educational value. It is important to spread the use of wikispaces for educational purposes because it will allow educators to better prepare students. That happens because it uses software tools which students have shown to appreciate better than only using paper and pen.

The Collaborative approach and Wikispaces complement each other, because combined they create a space that allows students to be involved in the learning process as they are able to share information, be active in the construct of knowledge and get feedback. Learning collaboratively takes a lot of effort from the students but if they are willing to commit and work hard "the result can be a community of learners in which everyone is welcome to join, participate and grow" ( SMITH, 1992 p.9) .

REFERENCES

1) SMITH, Barbara L. and MacGREGOR, Jean T. // What is Collaborative Learning // . 1992. 2) PARKER, Kevin R. and CHAO, Joseph T. //Wiki as a Teaching Tool. vol.3 2007//

