COMPUTER SUPPORTED LEARNING AS A TOOL FOR

DEVELOPING ENTREPRENEURIAL

LEARNING COMMUNITIES

Tiit Elenurm

Department of Entrepreneurship, Estonian Business School, Lauteri 3, Tallinn, Estonia

Keywords: Blended learning, e-learning environment, Learning community, Entrepreneurial orientations, Knowledge

sharing, Cross-cultural communication.

Abstract: This paper reflects e-learning and blended learning experiences and challenges from the point of view of the

co-creative entrepreneurial orientation and cross-cultural knowledge sharing. The use of WebCT tools and

weblogs are compared in the blended learning context. Computer supported learning that develops co-

creative entrepreneurship should support information monitoring and business opportunity searches on the

internet, and introduce students to social and business networking sites. The applications and limitations of

some WebCT tools for developing learning communities and sharing knowledge are discussed. The blended

learning concept should take into consideration the cultural context of using explicit and tacit knowledge

and the readiness of entrepreneurs to share knowledge through online and face-to-face interactions in order

to apply students as virtual gatekeepers for small and medium-sized enterprises.

1 INTRODUCTION

E-learning paradigms that support entrepreneurship

education have to face the fragmentation of

professional knowledge domains and missing links

between different sources of entrepreneurial

opportunities as essential problems of contemporary

society. The focus should switch from the static

knowledge of established facts to new information

monitoring skills and to interactions in small groups

and larger virtual communities for knowledge

sharing and developing practical new knowledge.

Computer supported learning can introduce students

to knowledge management practices and challenges,

and especially to the role of tacit and explicit

knowledge (Nonaka and Takeuchi, 1995) if it as

applied in the blended learning framework

(Osguthorpe and Graham, 2003)

Applying computer supported education to

develop entrepreneurs has to find the right balance

between methods that support different

entrepreneurial activities. Identifying business

opportunities (Casson, 1982) has been a classical

focus in entrepreneurship education. Participation in

formal and informal entrepreneurial networks has

been discussed as a factor of successful

entrepreneurship in recent decades (Sweeney, 1987,

Johannisson, 1998).

The present paper presents the experience of

applying blended computer supported learning, and

analyses essential choices and challenges in e-

learning from the point of view of the co-creative

entrepreneurial orientation and cross-cultural

knowledge sharing. Entrepreneurial orientations and

the need to develop competences for business

networking in the “global village” – the

globalization metaphor already popularized by

McLuhan (1962) – are used as the departure point

for defining the priorities of applying different

computer supported education tools. Knowledge

sharing between potential and experienced

entrepreneurs is discussed both as an opportunity

and as a challenge for computer supported learning.

Involving students in cross-border projects to

monitor international business opportunities is

presented as a way of developing entrepreneurial

learning communities through computer supported

learning.

193

Elenurm T. (2009).

COMPUTER SUPPORTED LEARNING AS A TOOL FOR DEVELOPING ENTREPRENEURIAL LEARNING COMMUNITIES.

In Proceedings of the First International Conference on Computer Supported Education, pages 193-198

DOI: 10.5220/0001837501930198

 SciTePress

2 ENTREPRENEURIAL

ORIENTATIONS

In order to develop computer supported

entrepreneurship education, the entrepreneurial

orientation concept is an essential departure point.

Understanding entrepreneurial orientations provides

direction for information search activities that can be

used when creating new ventures and anticipating

opportunities and barriers in the entrepreneurial

process. Lumpkin and Dess (1996) have suggested

that entrepreneurial orientation represents

entrepreneurial processes, practices and decision-

making styles that address the question of how new

ventures are established. Their concept of

entrepreneurial orientation identifies five dimensions

– autonomy, innovativeness, risk-taking, pro-

activeness and competitive aggressiveness.

Elenurm and Moisala (2008) have applied a self-

assessment tool for specifying three different

entrepreneurial orientations that influence the

application of computer supported learning – co-

creative, innovative and imitative orientations.

Learning for co-creative entrepreneurship

should build mutual understanding, and emotional

and social competence for joint actions. The learning

process is not limited to transferring existing

knowledge from the trainer or tutor to learners by

using e-learning tools. New knowledge is also

created through knowledge sharing between all

participants in the process and by re-using

knowledge that is created or combined by

participants in earlier courses that have been

supported by e-learning (Elenurm et. al., 2002).

The co-creative entrepreneurial orientation

assumes a readiness for knowledge sharing both in

face-to-face communication and online learning

communities. Imitative and innovative

entrepreneurial orientations also benefit from

computer supported monitoring of new

technological and business information, but we

cannot assume full readiness for such learners to

disclose their business ideas in a learning

community. Computer supported learning has to find

the right balance between co-creative knowledge

sharing and the right of an innovative entrepreneur

not to disclose his/her business ideas and various

types of sensitive business information to other

learners.

3 BLENDED LEARNING

OPPORTUNITIES

Blended learning has been defined as the integration

of face-to-face learning experiences with online

experiences (Garrison and Kanuka, 2004). There is

evidence that for certain subject matters, reflective

teaching practices and collaborative learning may

work better in online learning than in face-to-face

classes (Picciano, 2006). Owston et al. (2006) report

that the online component of blended learning

encourages critical thinking. Benefiting from the

advantages of information technology supported

learning while compensating for its disadvantages

through additional face-to-face sessions is an

important feature of blended learning (Rosenberg,

2001).

Estonia has experienced a rapid transition to a

market economy. Among present Estonian

entrepreneurs many started their entrepreneurial

activities after the collapse of the command

economy at the beginning of the 90s at around 20-30

years of age. These entrepreneurs actively use the

internet for daily communication and information

searches. They are however, not experienced online

course clients or systematic virtual networkers and

are not aware of online networking opportunities

that have been developed for entrepreneurs by the

European Union (Elenurm, 2004). Flexible online

access to knowledge at any time and place (Carroll,

2003) is important for busy students that are already

involved in entrepreneurial activities.

Graham (2006) has proposed space, time,

fidelity and humanness as four key dimensions of

interaction in face-to-face and distributed learning

environments. These dimensions are especially

relevant for entrepreneurship development

programmes that try to bring together full-time

students interested in understanding entrepreneurial

experience, part-time students with some

entrepreneurship experience and entrepreneurs that

are not enrolled in any academic degree

programmes. The goals and needs of organisations

have to be taken into consideration in the strategic

blending (Yoon and Lim, 2007) in order to serve

training needs that can be related to different

entrepreneurial orientations, business development

stages, as well as the domestic and international

marketing needs of small and medium-sized

enterprises.

Salmon (2000) has introduced a five-stage

model of e-Tutoring: access and motivation, online

socialisation, information exchange, knowledge

construction and development. These stages should

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194

be taken into consideration, when involving present

and potential entrepreneurs in the blended learning

process. The role of online learning and face-to-face

learning in developing entrepreneurs should,

however, be discussed in the broader context that in

addition to e-learning and classroom activities

involves field studies and action learning.

4 BLENDED LEARNING

APPLICATIONS AND

CHALLENGES

4.1 Action Learning

Classical action learning developed by Revans

(1980) represents a problem-based approach to

learning, where co-learners cooperate as members of

small groups whose goal is to complete a task and

achieve learning through the process of problem-

solving and reflection. In the blended learning

context action learning means that the balance of

face-to-face learning and online learning is

influenced by clients and learning by doing activities

outside the classroom. Over 3 years at the Estonian

Business School we have applied international

student teams as a key feature of a course on

International business opportunities around the

Baltic Sea. The teams assist Estonian small and

medium-sized enterprises in finding international

business opportunities and learn from their

entrepreneurial experience.

This action learning process is supported by the

WebCT online course environment, where students

can access additional study materials and present

their company project progress reports. An essential

feature of the online learning is the task of uploading

overviews to the WebCT discussion forum of

websites that offer relevant information to different

stakeholders interested in international business

opportunities. The results of these assignments are

not presented through the WebCT assignment tool.

This is because the discussion forum is more

appropriate for sharing and commenting on the

contributions of peer students and re-using business

information search results found earlier by students

from other countries, in order to create new practical

knowledge for their team and for their client-SME.

Courses on Baltic business have also been conducted

in Helsinki and Budapest, and students at these

locations have posted their overviews of websites to

the same WebCT course environments. WebCT has

been invaluable for overcoming the cross-border

barrier, but the time dimension has been an obstacle

for giving cross-border feedback to students in other

countries. It has been administratively difficult to

align the time schedules of courses arranged in

different countries.

Stone (2008) has stressed the need for dynamic

learning management systems that makes the most

popular LMS products on the market like

Blackboard, WebCT and even Moodle a bad fit for

the holistic blended learning. Developing suitable

learning management system for blended learning is

not limited to comparing Blackboard and Moodle or

other LMS software. It also assumes finding the

right balance between open and closed learning

communities and encouraging students to search

additional new information from online sources that

are not incorporated in ready-made e-learning

courseware.

Student teams act as gatekeepers that combine

international business information, and search

potential business contacts for small and medium-

sized enterprises mainly by using internet sources.

Regular inter-team knowledge sharing has been

useful for creating synergy between students

representing information sources from different

countries. Wenger (2002) stresses the role of

peripheral participation in order to develop

competencies that are needed in a community of

practice. At a WebCT discussion forum, motivated

students can experience peripheral participation by

offering other teams additional ideas after studying

their progress reports. Regular rating of inter-team

contributions in the WebCT e-learning environment

is one way to develop the action learning process in

the direction of a larger community of practice.

Entrepreneurs would prefer that the composition

of their student team could be aligned with the

foreign target markets of their enterprise by

involving mainly those international students that

have arrived in the Erasmus exchange framework

from those target countries. It is however, difficult

to match the entrepreneurs' project requests with the

countries represented by Erasmus exchange students

that arrive at the Estonian Business School each

semester. One solution could be to involve foreign

students that have participated in the course earlier

and have already left for their home country. They

could be motivated to continue to act as external

online experts for new cross-border project teams

after they have returned to their home university. In

order to increase the continuity of the learning

process, one option is to disseminate information

about potential company projects to future Erasmus

exchange students already before they arrive in

COMPUTER SUPPORTED LEARNING AS A TOOL FOR DEVELOPING ENTREPRENEURIAL LEARNING

COMMUNITIES

195

Estonia and are asked to join a project team. This

would assume linking the course to a broader online

Erasmus exchange student community.

A systematic and long-term approach to

developing partnerships between Erasmus exchange

students and enterprises interested in international

knowledge gatekeepers assumes the creation of a

knowledge base that will help to match the

international business information search requests of

companies and the profiles of interested students.

The profiles should describe the work experience of

the students, their possible involvement in

international projects or foreign trade, participation

in international organisations and networks,

priorities for developing international contacts with

firms in order to support future career opportunities,

their readiness to conduct information searches in

different business sectors and fields, and what

support the student is looking for from the enterprise

and the business school in order to accomplish

his/her international business opportunity and

business contact gatekeeper mission.

4.2 Collaborative Learning Challenges

Collaborative learning in the course "International

Business around the Baltic Sea" tries to balance the

application of WebCT discussion forums and the

discussion of company project outcomes in the

classroom setting.

International student teams have to analyse the

knowledge gaps of their client entrepreneurs and

present a self-reflection of their teamwork

experience. Such information is too sensitive to be

explicitly presented in WebCT. In order to bring the

learning process more fidelity and humanness of

interactions, students are involved in a face-to-face

role play, where they have to “sell” their ideas to a

“manager” that demonstrates some degree of

ignorance.

The role of group work exercises in the

classroom is also essential to overcome cross-

cultural co-operation barriers between students from

different countries. Problems of online

communication emerged, especially between

southern European, northern European and Asian

students that assumed different approaches to

structuring their tasks and giving feedback to other

team members by using WebCT or e-mails. Students

from Germany insisted to the tutor in the

e-learning environment that it would be good to

have pre-defined tasks for team members and much

more background information in the preliminary

company brief to serve as the departure point for the

action learning process. Demanding from enterprises

more comprehensive pre-information in a unified

format, although helpful for diminishing uncertainty

for the team, would have, however, been in conflict

with the emergent nature of action research and

diminished the learning in the process of co-defining

the worthwhile practical task through conversations

between students and entrepreneurs. In fact, training

skills for identifying and finding relevant tacit and

documented business information was an essential

part of the gatekeeper role.

Some student teams that chose to start their

interaction with the enterprise by e-mailing a long

list of questions to the entrepreneur did not receive

detailed answers to help focus their project on a

meaningful task. Efficient communication was often

hindered when the first face-to-face meeting with

entrepreneurs occurred too late, but also due to

asking the entrepreneur to answer too many

irrelevant questions as a result of insufficient

preparatory study of internet sources. Italian and

French students were often eager to discuss the

preliminary task and ideas at some length before

deciding on their input for a specific subtask. They

preferred to go to the first meeting with the

entrepreneur without sufficiently studying the

information that was available at the company

website or from other online sources. At the same

time, Estonian small entrepreneurs did not welcome

the conversation style with such student teams that

used face-to-face meetings to ask questions, where

such answers could easily be found from their

website already before the meeting. An important

contribution of the blended learning process is

helping students to reflect the impact of synchronous

and asynchronous, face-to-face and online, text-

based and richer communication tools on business

interactions. That process also reveals cultural

differences of using explicit knowledge that can be

interpreted without the personal involvement of the

knowledge provider and tacit knowledge that has to

be shared through socialization (Nonaka and

Takeuchi, 1995).

Entrepreneurs that act as clients for company

projects can also be included in online discussions in

WebCT together with student teams. We have

however, so far considered it a risky solution. The

main risk is that small entrepreneurs may not be so

ready to disclose their business development needs

to other entrepreneurs although the participating

enterprises are not competitors. That can be

interpreted as a lack of the co-creative

entrepreneurial orientation.

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In order to facilitate online knowledge sharing

between students and entrepreneurs, the latter should

also be supported by e-tutoring. They should have

access to WebCT and the motivation to learn how to

use WebCT tools. Entrepreneurs could definitely

contribute a lot to the knowledge construction and

development stages in such an extended virtual

community. In the present situation, however, we

consider direct face-to-face and e-mail contact with

only one student team to be a less time-consuming

option than introducing busy entrepreneurs to the

technicalities of WebCT. We also admit the right of

the student team to decide when they want to present

their draft recommendations to their client. That is

an additional reason for not disclosing student

progress reports and related discussions to

entrepreneurs on WebCT.

4.3 Business Opportunities in Virtual

Networks

The co-creative entrepreneurial orientation is a

reflection of the emerging network economy of the

21st century. Social software enables socialization in

virtual communities, but also monitoring new

business opportunities, knowledge capture and

refinement in wikis, easy web publication in

weblogs and the sharing of links and photos (Avram,

2005). A weblog can be seen as an online learning

opportunity that does not have the quiz and

assignment tools of WebCT and other classical e-

leaning platforms, but demonstrates the logic of

social and business networking software and

opportunities. Blended learning in the course

"Business Opportunities in International Networks"

combines three face-to-face classes with

contributing to the weblog at

http://elenurmnetworking.blogspot.com that enables

knowledge sharing outside the classroom. Student

post their analysis of the social or business

networking site they are involved or consider to be

involved to the weblog. One aim of the course is to

assist students in understanding co-creative

entrepreneurship opportunities that are enabled by

global virtual networks.

Younger students are generally well informed

about social networking opportunities but often do

not have strategic priorities for choosing virtual

networks that could enhance their career in large

organisations or link them to entrepreneurs in other

countries in order to search for new business

opportunities for co-creative entrepreneurship.

Distant learning students that are a bit older and

already have entrepreneurial experience tend to lack

the time and experience of online social networking.

During the course, however, they discover business

opportunities in virtual networking and become

more positive about investing their time in virtual

networking.

Students are asked to develop a vision of some

virtual networking application in small teams. This

task is in fact a learning-by-doing exercise that

demonstrates the challenges of integrating

contributions from team members in the course

framework, where face-to-face interaction time

during classes is quite limited.

5 CONCLUSIONS

The applications of blended learning have

demonstrated that computer supported learning can

be used to develop learning communities for action

research that enables knowledge sharing between

present and potential entrepreneurs. In the action

learning process international student teams learn to

understand the real entrepreneurship environment,

but small entrepreneurs as clients of the student

teams are also learning to monitor new international

business opportunities and to co-operate with cross-

cultural teams. There is, however, the challenge of

involving co-creative entrepreneurs in WebCT

discussions. That assumes finding technical

solutions for arranging selective access to different

discussion forums and the systematic application of

the five stage e-tutoring model in order to increase

the added value of WebCT involvement for

entrepreneurs.

Cross-border collaboration of students to search

for new business contacts and to study business

information compiled by students in other countries

is a way to add more value to computer supported

learning compared to overcoming space and time

limitations only inside one country. Advanced

applications in this field, however, assume the

knowledge base of student competence profiles and

potential company projects. The knowledge sharing

process should be supported by a learning

community that is created already before a specific

course and is ready to reuse new knowledge

constructed and developed during the course in

follow-up activities and in new projects.

Space, time, fidelity and humanness in blended

learning, where students interact in the classroom

and in the online learning environment in order to

plan and reflect upon their interactions with

entrepreneurs outside the campus, are influenced by

the logic of the action learning process. Co-creative

COMPUTER SUPPORTED LEARNING AS A TOOL FOR DEVELOPING ENTREPRENEURIAL LEARNING

COMMUNITIES

197

entrepreneurial orientations of students and

entrepreneurs support the fidelity of their

interactions and create broader opportunities for

online knowledge sharing and reusing some part of

the created knowledge in new courses

Blended learning can assist students in acquiring

knowledge management skills and involve them in

communities of practice that are not limited to the

time and space of the blended course itself.

Business and entrepreneurship students should

be encouraged to study their attitudes towards

international knowledge sharing for identifying new

business opportunities that can be implemented in

virtual communities.

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