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It happens between learners who share their knowledge and experience for the common good. Although collaborative learning is an essential approach, one can further enhance it with the use of social learning.

In this article, we’ll be looking at how you can use social learning to boost collaborative learning.

What is social learning?

Social learning involves human social efforts, to acquire new behaviors, through observing and imitating others. It can happen in two forms, including;

• Synchronous Form: through social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Video conference, Chats, Instagram, etc.

• Asynchronous Form: via group discussion, forums, interaction, seminars, etc.

One can make use of all the features of the synchronous and asynchronous forms of learning to encourage collaborative learning.

Why is social learning important for boosting collaborative learning?

Incorporating social learning technologies into your online training has positive impacts on learners and instructors. They’re impactful on processes in an enterprise, including recruiting and developing talents.

They also have a direct effect on learners’ performance, which contributes to the ease of measuring results. Below are some of the benefits of using social learning to boost collaborative learning.

Getting answers to questions at the right time

Since real-life problems are inevitable and can happen anytime, there’s always a need to get solutions that can help us. So, with social learning, it’s fast and easy to get answers that matter, to complicated and unclear subject matters.

These answers can come through chats, discussions, forums, or social media platforms from colleagues who have a similar experience of the subject matter.

It saves the time of waiting to get trained

With social learning, one doesn’t have to wait every time to get trained in acquiring a new set of skills before being productive at work. There are many skills that you can learn on your own, at your convenience, on social platforms without having to wait for your company.

So, you can use social learning to boost collaborative learning, by enabling your learners to work in groups, on discussion forums for the common good.

It helps passive learners to express their minds

Using social learning to boost collaborative learning opens the way for passive learners to express their minds and ask bothersome questions. Some learners/employees may be intimidated by asking questions to seek clarification in the classroom.

However, with social channels, they feel less intimidated and can express themselves to seek clarification on unclear subject matters.

Improves employee retention ability

Using social learning to boost collaborative learning can help to improve learners’ retention ability. How? Research has it that learners only acquire 50% of what they learn in the classroom or online.

So, with social discussions and chats, one can recover the missing knowledge and hold on to it. They tend to recall what they do on social platforms better than what they get in the classroom.

Boost organizational productivity

Using social learning to boost collaborative learning is a vital approach to increase an organization’s productivity level. Organizations can grow and develop by creating a discussion platform where your employees can meet to discuss on bothering questions.

On the platform, employees get essential solutions through group discussion and collaborative effort that can take the company to the next level.

Now, we have talked about the benefits of social learning. What is next is how can we use social learning to boost collaborative learning at the workplace.

Effective ways to use social learning to boost collaborative learning in the workplace

To achieve a collaborative effort at your workplace, you need to provide your employees with multiple learning options that offer ease of learning. Here’s how you can use social learning option;

Conduct seminars and training

Seminars are one of the most effective ways of delivering knowledge to your employees. It involves group discussions and interactions among the group/team members, which always improves employee engagement and retention ability.

Use technologies as social platforms

This approach involves using social platforms to boost learners’ collaborative effort. You can achieve this by creating a platform for your organization where learners can meet to share their experiences.

One of such platforms can be a webinar to deliver online seminars to move your company forward. You can also make it in the form of a social platform to boost collaborative learning.

Hopefully, this article should help you understand what social learning is and how you can integrate it, to boost collaborative learning.