Analyzing MOOCs in terms of their potential for teacher collaboration: the Italian experience

The main aim of this paper is to analyze the experience of a MOOC for teacher training implemented in Italy, in parallel with a similar experience in France. The study focuses on teacher collaboration within such an online learning environment, in terms of co-working and co-learning. The Italian and the French teams outline a common starting point of the research and some common research concerns (see the Introduction). Each team then reformulated the research questions and tried to answer them through specific theoretical lenses. As Italian team, we used a fresh theoretical framework called MOOC-MDT. We concentrate on practices implemented by teachers who attend the MOOC, in particular on their interventions in communication boards and the consequent birth and development of their particular community. This analysis will be enriched by the comparison with the results of the French and other MOOCs experiences shared within the TWG15.