Virtual group study rooms for MOOCS

E-Learning has been growing exponentially in the past few years due to the advent of MOOCs. But the collaborative modes of study, which are complimentary to the online learning experience, are still in its infant stage. In this paper, we propose a framework for collaborative mode of learning using online group study, which can complement the existing methods for collaboration and interaction such as forums and meetups in MOOCs. This framework can be seamlessly integrated with MOOCs and students can create small groups and share their ideas to work collaboratively like as if they do in a physical group study that students often conduct just before their exams, among their classmates. Here, we also present comparative study of features of the existing collaboration tools to analyze the suitable features for improved collaboration in E-Learning platforms. We have also included the specifications of the proposed framework that we developed and integrated with the Open edX platform to measure the effectiveness of group study in a private instance of MOOC.