This is an extract from my supervision minutes from last December. It contains a lot of points which are important to the development of my research, so I’ve put it here to remind me of these.
Examine the resources used by students – local resources and broader social resources – and at how they use these to build a sense of togetherness and  to create a context.
Read Van Oers and Hannikainen’s 2001 article in the International Journal of Early Years Education 9 (2), which privileges a relational approach and deals with how groups are sustained by togetherness.
Investigate how groups build contextual foundations for joint working, mobilise social and community resources and build a sense of mutuality and confidence in the group. This is not just off-task talk, they cannot do cognitive work without this relational work. Together they build contextual links, which is important for distance students who are limited by the bandwidth available.
The ‘approaches to study’ is a limited lens, which looks at how individuals learn. It is a cognitive schema. However, cognitive elements do not stand on their own. It is important to look at the salience and significance of other important aspects.
The group must negotiate their roles and actions in order to achieve things collectively. Their actions and learning are highly relational, not just resourced by course material. Learning is an interactional accomplishment.