This article discusses an innovative educational experience carried out as part of teaching of the module ‘Technologies of Education’ to third-year students completing the ‘Expert in Social and Cultural Education’ course in the Department of Education Studies at the Bologna and Rimini campuses. The experience examined the use of an online forum as a virtual environment for interactions between students. This experience is based on the hypothesis that significant knowledge can be gained by taking part in learning communities. In particular, this can occur within a deliberately educational digital environment that allows for individual learning to be given a new meaning, thanks to contributions from other participants, which, precisely because of its asynchronous nature, encourages reflective thought. The results are in line with studies that reveal the positive potential of forums: they are shown to be an effective environment for collaborative negotiation and the consolidation of knowledge, as well as for meta-reflection, as they enable topics previously dealt with in the classroom environment to be resumed and reformulated in the context of group discussion.

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The study here presented focus on Role Taking, a collaborative learning strategy considered as effective to support learning and participation. It's aims at exploring students' perceptions about the efficacy of having a role assigned compared to having chosen a role. As such, it was adopted in a university course about "Knowledge Technologies", held during the third year of the undergraduate course for Social and Cultural Educators. 42 voluntary students (M=4; F=38; average age 22) took part into the activities. Divided in groups, students worked around topics concerning educational potentials or issues relating to ICTs. During the activities, students covered a specific role: some of them choose the role, some others had the role assigned from the teacher. Data analysis shows that, in students' opinion, an assigned role is more effective in terms of quality of learning, social dynamics and satisfaction with the experience.

Nell'attuale società post-mediale i media costituiscono un elemento fortemente strutturale all'interno delle diverse dimensioni dell'esistenza, incidendo sui processi di significazione della realtà e di costruzione identitaria individuale e sociale. Ciò appare ancor più calzante se si considera la fase preadolescenziale, in cui il soggetto sperimenta un online ibrido e proteiforme ove convivono derive distopiche e potenzialità empowerizzanti. In questo quadro diventa essenziale una progettazione educativa che intenda far sviluppare competenza tecno-logica legata al concetto di digital wisdom e di digital citizenship, in vista di approcciarsi in maniera critica, competente ed etica nei confronti delle nuove sfide della vita onlife.

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