contributing to online collaboration

I'm currently reflecting on the task for week 2 and considering my contribution. If I was to assess my input here I would be saying that it was somewhat limited, although my contribution did form part of the final submission. For reasons identified previously, I wonder whether this was something about my unpreparedness for the time element involved? I am very aware in face-2-face teaching that however long you think it will take, it will take longer and perhaps I did not fully appreciate the similarity in the online setting.

However, the issue that arises from this is one of quantity versus quality. If we are to assess contributions to a collaborative task, this is clearly a dilemma. For me, the quality of an interaction has to be fundamentally more important than the quantity - for example, one student may make several postings during the task that may bear no relation to the task itself.

If we base an assessment only on the amount of contributions (irrespective of what they contribute to the overall task), the individual who 'posts the most' may receive a higher mark than feels appropriate. In contrast the student that only posts once, but has a considered and well-structured piece, may lose out if we concentrate of quantity, even though they may have established the foundation of group's ultimate success.

Conversely, if assessment is based purely on the quality of the posting, this may not account for the attempts of the stuggling student who cannot make sense of the task and asks more questions rather than adding to the end result. I guess this follows on from the discussion on 'lurkers'. Consequently, it would seem that it is difficult to pinpoint exactly what the 'norm' should be if, indeed, there is one and any system of assessment must find a balance to both ends of this spectrum (ie the quantity AND quality of contributions).

In many ways, this does seem to reflect the difficulties when assessing work in the classroom setting. Some students are clearly more voluble than others, but does this mean that 'he who shouts the loudest deserves the higher grade'? Where it perhaps differs between the envrionments is in the nature of the medium itself in facilitating assessment - whilst we can (seemingly) monitor the amout of time spent online, there is a limit to which we can engage with someone who chooses not to reciprocate - an e-mail can be easily ignored, as can an invitation to 'chat'. Although this disengagement also occurs F2F, there seems to be (to me at least) something about the visible, non-verbal cues in face-to-face contact that allow a different interpretation of what's going on to ensure appropriate support. I wonder if, in my unfamiliarity with the VLE, I'm missing a trick in how to manage this most effectively online (without the bonus of visual clues)...