Supporting participants in web-based collaborative learning activities from a holistic point of view: a tale of seven online and blended courses

Supporting participants in web-based collaborative learning activities is important to avoid inefficient contributions, improve learning process, and realize learning goals. The present paper introduces and evaluates a new holistic supporting approach to guide the interactions between participants and help them take part in group activities consciously. The holistic approach proposes a new supporting mechanism, completed through addressing the learning context which facilitates the approach utilizations and the possible outcomes resulting therefrom in a collaborative learning activity. Utilizing the proposed approach in seven online and blended courses with hundreds of students has revealed its significant impact on making learning forums more informative and organized which would favor greater gains in individual learning outcomes. The study has also provided valuable information about the context in the form of human factors which might be overlooked in similar researches that often observe the environment in short periods. The approach can be utilized in almost all typical learning management systems and would be more applicable if such systems possess embedded tools for social interactions.