Assessing Social Skills in Online Cooperative Learning

The aim of this paper is to discuss the hypothesis that the use and the integration of Communication Technologies can act as amplifiers of the development of social skills. To reach this aim we have created an observation tool to identify the social skills that play an essential role during online cooperative learning activities. The tool consists of 40 describers divided into 3 indicators denominated: "Task Management", "Relationship Management" and "Aggression and stress Management". The describers have been compiled so as to represent behaviour and attitudes observable during the use of synchronous communication systems and resource sharing. To verify the internal and external validity of the tool we’re planning a experimentation session in which it will be involved a representative sample of students aged between 8 and 13 years old. The data collected will be used to adjust the tool and to give rise to suitable statistical analysis