Summary spring 06

1. Summary spring 06 Anders Mørch TOOL 5100, 16.05.06 & 20.05.06

2. Outline • 4-5 foils from each of the previous presentations, slightly edited • Tries to capture the important points, but strips off important context • It requires the viewers to have read the presented articles, otherwise the points may not make sense

3. CSCW and groupware • What is CSCW and groupware and their relation to CSCL • Historical development • Basic problems addressed • Research areas and concepts • Components of groupware

4. Aspects of groupware • Common task / goal • Interface to a shared environment • In addition, because there are more than one users: • Division of labor, explicit role assignment • Awareness of the others who are interacting with the shared environment (often not directly visible)

5. CSCW computer science HCI CSCL cognitive science AI distributed systems sociology pedagogical design distributed cognition office info. systems cooperative design communications eductational context Relationships between HCI, CSCW, and CSCL

6. Basic concepts in CSCW • Ellis et al. identify the following three terms are basic for CSCW research and design: • Communication • Coordination • Collaboration (sometimes divided into 2) • Cooperation • Collaboration

7. Time/place matrix

8. Extended matrix for CSCL • One of the approaches to CSCL we address in this course is to use asynchronous groupware for educational purposes • What additional dimensions or characteristics would be necessary or convenient to add to the time/place matrix in order to better account for the factors that emerge when groupware is put in an educational context, such as classrooms?

9. Basic concepts in CSCL • CSCL: Computer Supported Collaborative Learning • A field concerned with collaborative learning and how it can be supported by computers • The role of technology as “mediating artifact”, i.e. mediation becomes a key concern • It has been compared to the role of language in conventional education (e.g. Vygotsky)

10. Bannon’s deconstruction of CSCL • L: What do people mean by Learning? • CL: What do people mean by Collaborative Learning? • SCL: What do people mean by Support for Collaborative Learning? • CSCL: What do people mean by Computer Support for Collaborative Learning?

11. Pitfalls of collaborative learning • Collaborative learning has been criticized as having similar problems to those identified in problem-based learning and cased-based instruction (where learners work in groups) • The problem of lurkers (free passengers) • The complexity of modeling real situations • Reaching closure and scaling up • Process becomes more important than outcome • Many of these issues have been addressed by improvements to CSCL and integration or alignment with related fields (CSCW, Instructional design, etc.)

12. Factors important to CL • The nature of the collaborative task: e.g. physics problem solving vs. editing a school newspaper • The nature of collaborators (peer, teacher-student, student-computer, etc.) • The unit of analysis (individual, activity, group, classroom) • The number of collaborators • The previous relationship between collaborators • The motivation of collaborators • The setting of collaboration: classroom, workplace, home • The time period of collaboration: from minutes to years

13. An open issue for discussion • Schmidt identifies socialization as a bottleneck to Internet-based (distance) education , he believes it is not reachable by the current generation of virtual universities • Do you agree that this is the factor impeding distance education institutions to further progress, or are there other factors that needs to be taken into account as well? • Hint: Think of ways for “socialization” to be redefined for the network society so that it better aligns with the needs of distance learners, the technological possibilities they may have at their disposal, and the practices that can be expected to be adopted in the near future

14. Paradigms of instructional technology • Computer-aided instruction (CAI) • Since ca. 1960 • Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) • Since ca. 1970 • Logo-as-Latin • Since ca. 1980 • Computer Supported Collaborative Learning • Since ca. 1990 • Note: these fields are active today, but sometimes under new umbrellas and evolved to meet new needs (e.g. instructional design, Lego/Logo, e-learning)

15. Computer-Aided Instruction • Psychological roots in behavioral science • Focus on support for instruction in teaching situations (e.g. classroom) with the computer • The teacher’s role is to acquire knowledge and find efficient ways to share it with the students • Often referred to as to as the “acquisition-transmission” metaphor of teaching and learning • Today often associated with instructional design, such as reusable learning objects and domain-specific repositories that domain experts (e.g. teachers) can search to find teaching material

16. Intelligent Tutoring Systems • The focus here, as often in CAI, is on computer support for individual learning • More emphasis on the learner than the teacher • Psychological roots in cognitive science and Artificial Intelligence (e.g. Newell & Simon, 1972) • The computer provides a cognitive model of human information processing, representing novice and expert problem solving, and track performance • An ITS provides expert advice to students as they solve problems in well-defined domains (e.g. physics, math, medical procedures)

17. Logo-as-Latin • Instead of learning by being taught, this approach focuses on “learning by doing” • Psychological roots in the developmental psych of Piaget and the philosophy of education of Dewey • Constructionism is a term that is often used as a label for this approach • The student “constructs” by creating and running micro-worlds programmed in Logo (Papert, 1980) • Later efforts have extended this to higher level languages, e.g. using Lego/Logo (e.g. Resnick, 1990)

18. Computer Supported Collaborative Learning • Roots in several fields in the social sciences and socially oriented theories of learning (going back to Vygotsky, G H Mead, and others) • Focus on overarching concerns that attempts to bridge the individual-social gap in interaction • Common perspectives and sources of influence: • Social constructivism • Socio-cultural theories • Situated and shared cognition

19. Three factors that influence research design and experiments • Effects • Conditions • Group heterogeneity • Individual prerequisites • Task features • Interactions • Explanation • Control

20. Role of the computer • Tool for analysis • Interaction analysis • Analyzing and modeling collaborative learning practices, such as .. • Negotiation • Argumentation • Mediating artifact • This is not addressed in this article, but comes up in later articles

21. Concepts underlying CSCL research • Concepts of collaboration Collaboration can be considered as a special form of interaction. Engeström (1992) has elaborated a three-level notion of developmental forms of interaction; coordination, cooperation, and reflective communication. According to another definition Collaboration can be defined as a process of participating in knowledge communities. As pointed out by Brufee (1993, p.3) collaboration is "a reculturative process that helps students become members of knowledge communities whose common property is different from the common property of the knowledge communities they already belong to". Collaboration as seen as a special form of interaction, and collaboration as a process of participation in collective activities ("working together"), include the idea of achieving shared goals. It appears that we can--that perhaps we must--analyze collaborative activities on both micro and macro levels.

22. Challenges and advantages of CSCL • Why has CSCL been so slowly adopted? As proposed by Kling (1991) in the context of CSCW, it might be that the meanings attached to collaboration are too positively loaded, or the collaborative settings are interpreted too narrowly referring only to positive phenomenon. This may restrict one from seeing that collaborative situations are also full of contradictions, competition, and conflicts. • On the other hand, technology offers the kind of potentials for learning which are very different from those available in other contexts. One self-evident benefit is, that computer networks break down the physical and temporal barriers of schooling by removing time and space constraints. The delay of asynchronous communication allows time for reflection in interaction. Making thinking visible by writing should help students to reflect on their own and others' ideas and share their expertise.

23. Technology for collaboration • collaborative use of technology and collaborative technology are different. Imagine a pair of students working at the computer running a simulation program in physics. The simulations on the screen can help the students to collaborate, by creating a referential anchor, a point of shared reference (Crook, 1994). This referential anchor can function as a "concrete" shared representation, can support the negotiation of meanings, and mediate students’ communication activities in their development of reciprocal understanding (Hakkarainen, et al., 1998; Järvelä, et. al., 1999). In this case, the technology, the software developed for the individual user, is utilized in creating and establishing collaborative activities through its use as anchoring support.

24. From technical to social infrastructure • One of the major challenges of CSCL, or educational technology in general, is scaling-up; how to expand and implement the good practices that researcher and teachers have found and developed. • Bielaczyc (2001) has presented a parallel idea. According to her, one of the key factors in successful implementation of CSCL is to build an appropriate social infrastructure around the technical infrastructure.

25. The multidisciplinary CSCL • CSCL can presently be characterized as consisting of three methodological traditions: experimental, descriptive and iterative design. • Many empirical studies follow the dominant experimental paradigm that compares an intervention to a control condition in terms of one or more variables. • The ethno-methodological tradition (exemplified in CSCL by Koschmann et al., 2003; Koschmann et al., 2005; Roschelle, 1996; Stahl, 2006) is more suited for descriptive case analyses. • The iterative design tradition is exemplified by Fischer & Ostwald (2005), Lingnau, et al. (2003) and Guzdial et al. (1997)

26. Summary (F4) • Lipponen: To strengthen a set of coherent foundations for CSCL. This task is absolutely worthwhile of striving for, but also be a very demanding task • Stahl et al argued that CSCL requires a focus on the meaning-making practices of collaborating groups and on the design of technological artifacts to mediate interaction. Whether this focus can, will or should lead to a coherent theoretical framework and research methodology for CSCL remains to be seen.

27. A Model of Collaborative Knowledge-Building • The paper (F5) present a model of learning as a social process • Individual minds in relation to socio-cultural • Framework for the design of CSCL-SW (KBE) • 5 theories of learning (Koschmann) • The paper incorporating insights from these theories/philosophies • Multiple phases constitute a cycle => increasingly complex questions to be posed

28. A Diagram of Personal and Social Knowledge-Building

29. The Idea of a Computer System to Support the Knowledge-Building Process(1) • A KBE should: • go beyond a single-purpose system • retain a record of the knowledge that was built up • And it should therefore probably be: • “built on asynchronous, persistent collaborative technologies and be deployed on the Internet as a Web-based environment”

30. Collaboration scripts • Collaboration script is a set of instructions specifying how the group members should interact and collaborate to solve a problem. O’Donnell & Dansereau 1992) • Internal or external representations • A CSCL-script is a computational representation of a collaborative script • A general modelling language for formalising collaboration scripts is missing. • No tool for CSCL practitioners to create, reuse, integrate, and customize CSCL scripts.

31. IMS-LD as collaboration modeling language • Existing learning process modelling language IMS-LD provides insufficient support to model group-based, synchronous collaborative learning activities. • Some attempts have been done to extend IMS-LD, but still no good solutions. • The aim for the research work presented in this paper is to develop a scripting language for formalising CSCL scripts and exploring their potential types of usage and system support possibilities

32. An approach to formalize CSCL ScriptsCSCL Scripting language (from Miao et al., 2005)

33. Two modes in dealing with Knowledge • Belief Mode • Concerned with what we and other people believe or ought to believe • Our response to this mode is to agree or disagree, to present arguments and evidence for or against, to express and try to resolve doubts • Ex. ideas that presented for consideration • Design Mode • Concerned in the usefulness, adequacy, improvability and development potential ideas • The essence is IDEA IMPROVEMENT • Ex. There is no ultimate computer because with each advancement new possibilities arise for further advances

34. Four constructivist educational approaches in Design Mode • Learning by Design (developed at Georgia Tech.) • Project-Based Science ( developed at the University of Michigan) • Problem-Based Learning (developed at Southern Illinois University) • Knowledge Building (developed at Ontario Institute of Study in Education/University of Toronto)

35. Problem-based learning vs. kn bldg • Problem-Based Learning • Learners are expected to determine what information they need to solve the problem and work together to achieve the solution with a little direct help from the instructor. • Is often treated as synonymous with project-based learning. • Originated in the medical school to solve problem encounter in practice & Grows out in different tradition and focus • Disadvantage: Is not focused on tangible end product. The end product is a problem solution – purely conceptual artifact. • Knowledge Building • Defined as “creatively work with ideas that really matter to the people doing the work” • work directly aimed at creating and improving broadly significant theories, problem formulations, interpretations and the like. • Is the least bound to a particular activity structures and it is not confined to particular occasions or subjects but pervades (or spread through) mental life – and they claim in and out of school!!

36. Knowledge building vs. knowledge construction • Knowledge building May be defined as the production and continual improvement of ideas of value to a community, through means that increase the likelihood that what the community accomplishes will be greater than the sum of individual contributions and part of broader cultural efforts. [Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1987, 1989, 1993]. • Knowledge constructionIs evidenced by the accretion (accumulation) of interpretations on an information base that is simultaneously expanded by information seeking and transformations. [Suthers, 2005]

37. Technology to support knowledge building • Computer Support Intentional Learning Environment (CSILE) • Knowledge Forum

38. CSILE Study (Hakkarainen et al) • The aim is to study how different practices of CSCL learning influenced the epistemological nature of student’s inquiry. • The focus is in examining the condition for which CSCL facilitates higher-level practice inquiry in different classroom cultures ( Canadians and Finnish CSILE groups). • Can be abstracted as from potentially culture-specific factors • It is based on a conceptual, qualitative and quantitative analysis • It does not give direct information about psychological process involved in CSILE use

39. Method • Qualitative analysis of notes stored in CSILE database • Five steps scale research questions classification • Isolated Facts • Partially Organized Facts • Well-organized Fact • Partial explanation • Explanation • Production was made at the level of ideas and several observation • Interaction was analyzed through the content of their written communication with the use of CSILE network

40. Results 1 • Canadian Classroom A • has prominent role of a explanation-oriented process of inquiry • Higher proportion of explanation-seeking research questions, explanatory level of scientific information and intuitive knowledge • Canadian Classroom B and Finnish • Focused on processing factual knowledge and empirical generalization • Low proportion of explanation-oriented inquiry

41. Recommendations • All students, regardless of their individual cognitive competencies, might remain at more elementary level without the guidance of a teacher • Students needs a great deal of pedagogical and epistemological guidance to participate at a process of level of inquiry analogous to scientific inquiry • There is a need of the teacher to have a pre-service function and conceptual understanding of advanced processes of knowledge-seeking inquiry

42. Video-based research (workshop) • Emphasis on describing in detail the “wholeness” of what is going on in a particular activity or situation. • Video-based Interaction Analysis (Jordan and Henderson,1995), consists of : • the in-depth micro-analysis of how people interact with one another, • their physical environment, • and the documents, artifacts, and technologies in that environment. • Jordan (1992) used video data to explicate how authoritative knowledge is distributed in two highly computerized settings: • an airline operations room, where knowledge is continually jointly produced • and a hospital setting, where it is vested in the technology and the physician.

43. Advantages  • The ability to document nonverbal behavior and interpersonal communication (facial expressions and emotions). • It preserves the activity as it’s unfolding, so that the data material can be validated by other researchers. • Viewing it several times • Comments from others • Captures multiple views of a situation. • Enables the researcher to participate in the activity

44. Limitations  • Do the recordings manipulate the reality? • Note: without an exceptionally wide-angled lens, no camera can record all activity in a classroom • Capturing too much can also be a problem • Confidentiality can be a problem • Time consuming and expensive • Large amount of data • Expensive equipment • Subjects may get influenced by the presence of a camera

45. Empirical studies • The literature about distance education is dominated by enthusiastic studies and accounts • But some studies report the importance of students’ isolation in distance education course • Original research question was: ”How do the students in B555 overcome their feelings of isolation in a virtual classrom to create the sense of a community of learning?”

46. Methods • Three different techniques was used : • Observation: Online classrom discussion was observed to grasp how the instructor facilitated the dialogue among the students. And it was observed how each student interacted with the Web site • Interview: Was conducted immediately after the students had finished their tasks on the Web • Document review: Examination of various types of documents realted to B555, including the course syllabus, reading assigment, and the cataog`s course description. And the instructor´s personal log

47. Discussion • From the interviews and the observations it appared that there were two foci of fustrations among the students, the first was on the technological problems and the second was on the course content and the instructur`s practices in managing her communications with the students • The Instructor belived that she had reduced the students fustrations during the semester, but this was shown not to be true, as the student only had expressed some of their fustrations to the Instructor

48. Findings cont’d • Most articles about distance education emphasize the positive aspects • Only a few scholars examine important limitations and pervasive problems • According to the authors is time to seriously consider the actual experience among students in distance education courses an to critically discuss the phenomena of distance education • It is also question if technology can improve pedagogy with little special effort

49. Study 2 • The objective of the study was to intensivly examine the patterns of female and male students`participation in computer-supported collaborative learning in two classrooms • There are significant differences between male and female students in their attitudes towards, knowledge about, or use of computers (Durnell & Thompson, 1997, Hakkarainen et.al, 2000, Scott, Cole &Engel, 1992) • Male students are generally more enthusiastic about the use of information and communication technologies • Female students experience computer phobia or tend to minimize the use of their computers

50. Method • Participants; Classrooms A and B • Classroom A, 19 female, 9 male • Classroom B, 10 female, 20 male • Study material; The CSILE database • Qualitative analysis of the students’ written comments posted to the database within one academic year • The comments was first partitioned into ideas • Then the comments were classified according to type of communicative idea (agreement, neutral or disagreement) - Communicative ideas within a comment were analyzed by specifying the object of inquiry: Linguistic form, research question, research methods, information, explanation, other or unspecified