DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO DISTANCE EDUCATION: review of the concept of "being together virtually" and its implications in the "knowing how to be" of teachers

Abstract

With the intention of providing relevant bibliography and quality theoretical-practical references in a course on "Mixed Teaching" aimed at the Faculty of Education of the University of Barcelona professors, we considered important to translate the article "Diferentes abordagens à educação a distância" by Valente (2001). In the beginning of this translation (2021) and taking into account the context of education and teacher training in Catalonia, as well as the profile and training necessities from the Faculty professors, there was the necessity to adapt, expand and contextualize all the contents and references to the reality of the moment. That’s why we made a commentated translation with some notes and the appropriated updates and complements, where we revise the concept of “Being together virtually” while connecting it with the Spiral of learning by Valente (2005a), to conclude with some reflections on the practical implications of shifting from face-to-face teaching to virtual or mixed learning, and the “Being together virtually”, the interactions, strategies and behavior which teachers have to take into account while working with virtual environments.