Vol. 18, No. 1, March 2002

Special issue: Context, collaboration, computers and learning

Editorial: the impact of ICT on learning

The recent publication of the ‘emerging’ findings of the ImpaCT2 project (http://www.becta.org.uk/impact2) is a welcome addition to the debate on the role and value of ICT in classrooms. ImpaCT2 started in 1998 and will finish later this year. This makes it just 10 years after the earlier ImpacT study based at King’s College London (see: Johnson, D.C., Cox, M.J. & Watson, D.M. (1994) Evaluating the impact of IT on pupils’ achievement. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 10, 3, 138-156)

The scale of the two studies is similar (though one suspects that the current one is rather better financed) with over 2000 pupils studied in a range of schools. A similar distinction is made between the IT provision in the schools studied with ‘high’ and ‘low’ used in the ImpacT study and ‘high’ and ‘average’ in ImpaCT2. This seems to be a dubious distinction to have been made in both projects.

The data gathering approach of ImpaCT2 is innovative and should be fruitful so long as the analysis is undertaken cautiously. Data sources are teacher researchers, pupil researchers (including log books, interviewing peers), link researchers (from the universities running the study), a pupil questionnaire and a concept mapping task (to explore pupils’ perceptions of networked computers).

An interesting dimension of the study is the inclusion of data on home use of computers and communications functions. The emerging findings indicate that as national school leaving examinations approach, the use of computers in school time is reduced but by that stage pupils are skilled enough to use computers on their own at home and parents respond by making home computers available. The analysis also looks at socio-economic factors and finds that, in the highest ranking groups, the differential in terms of computer access becomes significant as the children get older (although mobile phones are owned equally by pupils in all social groups!).

Findings concerning the teacher data reveals that little has changed in the past 15 years: many teachers are not confident about using technology in their classrooms; training makes high demands on personal time; little IT integration into subject teaching; and so on. There is a small indication that teachers are starting to consider taking on a new role but classroom approaches are far from being significantly influenced by the use of ICT. The positive factors are also identified as in the past: having a computer at home is a great help; allowance of school time helps familiarisation with software; ‘leadership by example’ from senior staff is an important motivating factor.

There are a number of mentions about lack of bandwidth and/or slow Internet connectivity (sometimes faster at home than in school!) and so worries still remain about national policy being overdependant on the so-called ¢National Grid for Learning’, with part of the evaluation being undertaken by ImpaCT2.

The study is likely to produce the results that many researchers in the field would expect but it is being well-conducted by all accounts and benefits greatly from having a consortia of universities involved, each taking specific lines of research. The final report later this year should have interesting data about ICT richness in schools and the way that this impacts on national examination results — assuming that that remains an overriding priority.

Attitudes affecting college students’ preferences for distance learning

Y.J. Katz, School of Education, Bar-Ilan University, Israel

Email: katzya@mail.biu.ac.il

Empirical studies that have examined psychological aspects of the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) have indicated that certain psychological attitudes of students towards the use of ICT are of paramount importance when evaluating the effective use of distance learning approaches to instruction and learning. Distance learning at the tertiary level, through the medium of ICT, is seemingly affected by the same psychological attitudes that are known to be related to other successful ICT applications to learning and instruction. In the present study the relationship between two distance learning ICT-based configurations were examined. The results indicate that psychological attitudes held by students differentially facilitate efficient use of distance learning approaches. Satisfaction with learning, level of control of the learning process, and study motivation for distance learning are all positively related to the students’ preferences for structured distance learning, whereas independence in learning is positively connected to students’ preferences for the more open Internet functionality.

Keywords: Attitude; Conferencing; Distance; Internet; Psychology; Questionnaire; Undergraduate; Video

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 2-9

Accepted: 5 May 2001

The effect of questioning on concept learning within a hypertext system

P.A. Howard-Jones & R.J. Martin, School of Education, University of Wales Institute Cardiff

Email: PAJones@uwic.ac.uk

Two studies report upon the effect of asking learners to answer questions when learning in a hypertext environment, even when no immediate feedback is given to learners about the appropriateness of their responses. Such questions may be useful as a means to induce responses that can be used to monitor learning, but here the hypothesis was investigated that their inclusion would also improve learning directly. In the first study, 80 student teachers answered embedded multiple-choice questions that encouraged analysis of examples. Concept learning achieved using this environment was significantly reduced when compared with an environment requiring no such responses. In the second study, a cohort of 68 students were asked to summarise the information illustrated by the examples. Here, learning was significantly improved as compared with the no-response condition.

Keywords: Constructivist; Hypermedia; Mediated; Problem solving; Qualitative; Questionnaire; Teachers; Training

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 10-20

Accepted: 3 April 2001

The effects of mediation in computer assisted dynamic assessment

D.Tzuriel & A. Shamir, School of Education, Bar Ilan University, Israel

Email: tzuried@mail.biu.ac.il

This study examined the effects of the computer-assisted dynamic assessment (DA) on cognitive performance as compared to DA with an examiner. The DA approach is based on Feuerstein’s mediated learning experience theory and Tzuriel’s DA approach with young children. A sample of kindergarden children (n = 60) were assigned to either a Computer Assisted (CA, n = 30) or Examiner Only (EO, n = 30) groups. The sample was randomly chosen from three kindergardens in a middle-SES area. Initial intelligence level of both groups was controlled by matching their frequency distribution on the Raven’s Colored Progressive Matrices score. The CA group was administered the Think-in-Order program, which is a multimedia program designed specifically for this study and is based on the Children’s Seriational Thinking Modifiability (CSTM) test. The EO group was administered the CSTM test by an examiner. The findings revealed that intervention involving mediation processes in a CA dynamic assessment procedure was more effective in bringing about significant cognitive changes than mediation with only an examiner.

Keywords: Assessment; Change; Computer; Kindergarden; Mediated; Modifiability; Problem solving; Process

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 21-32

Preliminary acceptance: 24 March 2001

The effects of metacognition and email interactions on learning graphing

B. Kramarski & R. Ritkof, School of Education, Bar Ilan University, Israel

Email: kramab@mail.biu.ac.il

The purpose of this study was twofold: First, to investigate the effects of metacognition and email interaction between teacher-student on learning to interpret and construct graphs. Second, to describe the email interaction on three levels of interaction: tutorial, metacognitive and life. Participants were 50 ninth-grade students (boys and girls) who studied graphs in two classes. One class (n = 25) was exposed to EXCEL software embedded within email interaction (EMAIL) and the other class (n = 25) was exposed to EXCEL software embedded within email interaction and metacognitive instruction (EMAIL + META). Results indicated that the EMAIL + META students significantly outperformed the EMAIL students on graph interpretation and graph construction. In particular the effects were observed on students’ ability to explain mathematical reasoning and on reducing misconceptions regarding graphs. Furthermore, qualitative analysis of the EMAIL messages indicated that the EMAIL + META students frequently used different levels of interaction in their email interactions than the EMAIL students.

Keywords: Comparative study; Email; Graphs; Interaction; Mathematics; Metacognition; School

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 33-43

Accepted: 9 May 2001

Guest Editorial: Erica Morris (The Open University) and Richard Joiner (University of Bath)

In October 2000, the Computers and Learning Research Group (CALRG) at the Open University held a Symposium on Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL). The CALRG aims to support interdisciplinary research by holding symposia and an annual conference to encourage discussion and debate, and the exchange of information on current research work.

The rationale for the symposium was that much work in the area of CSCL had been done by members of the Group and there was a need to look at current projects and activities involving members at the OU and researchers from other institutions. Previous research work involved both adults and children in schools and investigated computer-supported collaborative learning in the area of science education (Scanlon, 1995). In recent years, CALRG had a programme of work with an interrelated set of projects that had the common aim of describing how ICT can provide learners with productive experiences of collaborative learning using a variety of computer systems. For example, a Gameshow project looked at collaboration in the context of adults working on a shared simulation of a statistics problem which was implemented in a distributed classroom environment (Joiner et al., 2001).

The papers in this Special Issue are the outcome of the symposium and provide a stimulating picture of current work in the area of CSCL. Initially, research in this area was concerned with the preconditions and consequences of computer-based collaborative activity on individuals’ cognitive behaviour. Collaboration was viewed as the ‘mutual engagement of participants in a co-ordinated effort to solve the problem together’ (Roschelle & Teasley, 1995). Research now tends to focus on the context of collaborative activity, uses broader definitions of collaboration and investigates it in a wider range of settings. The following papers address these issues.

The first two papers report studies that concern how the social setting alters the nature of collaborative activity. Hammond and Bennett explore how academic disci-plines differ in their use of ICT to support small group activities in higher education. They present a framework for examining discipline differences and present evidence from surveys and case studies conducted by the ASTER project. The authors use a framework as a means of describing and identifying those differences and use this to examine the use of ICT to support small group learning in three disciplines: physics, psychology and humanities. The most striking difference they found was that between the physical sciences and the other disciplines. Humanities and psychology used ICT to support discussion, whereas there were no instances of this use of ICT in physics. All ICT use in physics focussed on task-based activities. This difference, the authors argue, reflects a difference in underlying concepts and representations between the disciplines and/or a difference in discipline beliefs and assumptions. The authors argue that it is vital that such differences are considered when advising on the take-up of innovative teaching and learning methods.

Crook’s paper describes a study which involved observing students engaged in an authentic form of normal study practice: revising for a course in preparation for an examination. Collaboration has typically been defined as ‘mutual engagement of participants solving a problem together’, but Crook adopts a slightly different definition, which is the co-ordination of effort to build common knowledge. One of the implications of this change in definition is that it changes the outcome of collaboration from an answer or product to consolidation, elaboration or refreshing understanding of some shared interest. Crook has two parts to his study. In the first part he conducted a study sociogram where he compared students’ nominations of social friends with their nominations of work partners. He found that students meeting to engage in work activities are rare, whereas there is considerable meeting for social reasons. The second part of the study compared pairs of students revising from their own notes compared with pairs of students revising from computer-based notes. The computer-based documents led to less on-task collaborative talk and led to conversation that was more fragmented and focussed around successive short topics. Crook argues that discussion is more readily afforded when revision talk is mediated by a less singular, authorised and directive form of document.

The following two papers use activity theory to describe the changes and difficulties in collaborative activities. Although they investigate very different domains (higher education and organisational knowledge) they both conclude that Activity Theory is a framework for describing these activities which provides insights that can inform the design of educational activities in different settings.

Issroff and Scanlon present a paper that describes the application of activity theory to enhancing learning through the use of technology in higher education. They present a review of the theory, apply it to analyse the use of technology in context and consider two case studies of teaching and learning in higher education. The first case study examines the use of ICT in the studies in science strand of an OU MSc science programme. The second case study concerns a history course, which uses the web to provide a range of resources and communication facilities for students. They show how ‘inconsistencies’ were found and were then used to inform the design of the learning activities. Activity theory provides a language for describing and understanding the changes, difficulties and development of the web site and the practice surrounding the activity.

Mwanza reports an investigation into the design requirements for a computer-assisted learning system for supporting knowledge sharing. The design of such systems is difficult because of the need to accommodate local social and cultural habits of the user. There can be formal and informal methods of knowledge sharing. Companies need to implement new systems quickly to remain competitive, which requires conceptualising human activity. This conceptualisation helps identify the mechanisms by which users introduce tools to mediate their work activity. An activity theory framework is used to conceptualise work practices in two organisations. These organisations used formalisation of work procedures as a means for encouraging knowledge sharing amongst workers. Workers in both organisations had established practices for sharing knowledge which were informal and unstructured. Formalisation misrepresented these practices. The activity theory analysis revealed certain common themes with regards to knowledge sharing: the need to be sensitive to social and cultural aspects of the intended user, and to understand the context of the tool and the influence of established local patterns of collaboration.

The final two papers focus on the process of collaborative learning and in particular on the dialogue processes involved. The first paper argues that CSCL could be designed using developments in our understanding of dialogue. Ravenscroft and Matheson argue that there is a need to develop methodologies which transform informal models of educational dialogue into cognitive tools that are suitable for students. They present a methodology for designing e-learning, called ‘investigation by design’ and use this methodology to design computer-based dialogue games for supporting conceptual change in science. In this paper, they describe a study where they evaluated two dialogue games for collaborative interaction: a facilitating game and an elicit-inform game. They found that both these games produced significant gains in students’ understanding compared to conventional teaching. However, the findings indicated that they affected students’ learning in different ways. The facilitating dialogue game was more useful in addressing alternative conceptions about the context, whereas the eliciting dialogue game was more effective in addressing the incompleteness of the students’ models.

The final paper analyses the discourse between friends and acquaintances. Vass reports a case study investigating the nature of paired talk and the role of friendship in collaborative creative writing activities. The joint poem writing episodes of four 8 year-old girls, one friendship and one acquaintanceship pair, were observed on a number of occasions during a two-week long literacy project. The pairs were compared using a functional model of discourse and this analysis revealed important differences in the discourse of the two pairs. The friendship pair’s discourse was described as reflecting more ‘collective thinking’ (a key feature differentiating the pairs), which was regarded as an advanced form of mutual engagement and the possible key to productive collaboration in the context of creative writing. Vass explains this finding in terms of differences in the shared histories and collaborative experience of the two pairs. Finally, it is suggested that differences between individualised and collective thinking — influenced by the nature of the relationship between partners — may determine the productivity of collaboration in the context of paired creative writing.

In conclusion, this special issue brings together papers which have extended the study of computer-supported collaborative learning in significant ways. The processes of constructive joint activity are examined both observationally and experimentally. Moreover, learning activities are examined in a broad range of contexts, which to date have not been considered in the literature.

References

Joiner, R., Scanlon, E., O’Shea, T. & Smith, R.B. (2001) Technological mediation for supporting synchronous collaboration in science and statistics. In Euro CSCL 2001. European Perspectives on Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (eds. P. Dillenbourg, A. Eurelings & K. Hakkarainen), pp. 332–339. Maastricht McLuhan Institute, Maastricht.

Roschelle, J. & Teasley, S. (1995) The construction of shared knowledge in collaborative problem solving. In Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (ed. C. O’Malley) pp. 69–97. Springer-Verlag, Heidelberg.

Scanlon, E. (1995) Collaboration and problem solving in science using information technology. British Journal of Educational Technology, 26, 3, 227–228.

Discipline differences in role and use of ICT to support group-based learning

N. Hammond & C. Bennett, University of York

Email: n.hammond@psych.york.ac.uk

Small-group teaching and learning is traditionally central to UK Higher Education. This paper explores how disciplines differ in their use of information and communication technologies (ICT) to support small-group activities. A framework for considering discipline differences and evidence from surveys and case studies conducted by the ASTER Project are presented. While many uses of ICT are common across the disciplines studied (drawn from the Humanities, Physical Sciences and Psychology), there are also some striking differences, in particular the infrequent use of ICT to facilitate discussion in the Physical Sciences compared to the pattern of use in the other disciplines studied. It is vital that such differences are considered when advising on the take-up of innovative teaching and learning methods.

Keywords: Communication; Case study; Higher education; Humanities; Interview; Physical sciences; Questionnaire; Small group; Survey; Web

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 55-63

Accepted: 6 November 2001

Deferring to resources: collaborations around traditional vs computer-based notes

C. Crook, Loughborough University

Email: c.k.crook@lboro.ac.uk

Undergraduate students were observed engaged in a species of collaboration rarely studied and yet which is grounded in an authentic form of normal study practice: namely, revising a course in preparation for an exam. Pairs of undergraduates were convened for recorded sessions in which they did this around either their own personal lecture notes or around a set of notes authored by the lecturer and made available as web-readable computer documents. Although the goals, motives and orientations of these pairings were similar, the nature of the collaborative resource effected the character and rhythm of the joint conversation. The computer-based documents led to less on-task collaborative talk. Moreover, these documents sustained conversation that was more fragmented around successive short topics. Observations are made regarding how certain discursive openings are more readily afforded when revision talk is mediated by a less singular, authorised, and directive form of document.

Keywords: Collaboration; Dialogue; Discourse analysis; Undergraduate

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 64-76

Accepted: 6 November 2001

Using technology in Higher Education: an Activity Theory perspective

K.Issroff & E. Scanlon, University College London & The Open University

Email: K.Issroff@ucl.ac.uk

This paper describes the application of Activity Theory to considerations of enhancing learning through the use of technology in Higher Education. The theory is reviewed and its extended version which uses the idea of an activity system to help analyse the use of technology in context described. Two case studies of teaching and learning in Higher Education are described: one exploring the use of ICT in a postgraduate study of science communication and the other a history course using the web to provide a range of resources and communication facilities for students. These two case studies represent different uses of technology in different disciplines and lead to a consideration of how the use of Activity Theory informs understanding of these learning experiences.

Keywords: Activity Theory: Case studies; Conferencing; Higher education; Humanities; Multimedia; Science

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 77-83

Accepted: 6 November 2001

Conceptualising work activity for CAL systems design

D.Mwanza, Knowledge Media Institute, The Open University

Email: D.Mwanza@open.ac.uk

As computing technology has increasingly become relevant to people’s everyday lives, emphasis is being placed on ensuring Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) tools support users in ways that are meaningful to them. This requirement has highlighted the need to understand the complex and often dynamic social and cultural organisation of collaborating individuals in context. Here, the aim is to conceptualise the natural flow and evolution of work practices so as to inform the design of these systems. This paper reports on empirical findings of an investigation into the design requirements for a CAL system for supporting knowledge sharing activities in an organisation.

Keywords: Case study; Collaboration; Information systems; Mediated; Professional

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 84-92

Accepted: 6 November 2001

Developing and evaluating dialogue games for collaborative e–learning

A. Ravenscroft & M.P. Matheson, The Open University

Email: a.ravenscroft@open.ac.uk

This paper argues that developments in collaborative e-learning dialogue should be based on pedagogically sound principles of discourse, and therefore, by implication, there is a need to develop methodologies which transpose — typically informal — models of educational dialogue into cognitive tools that are suitable for students. A methodology of ‘investigation by design’ is described which has been used to design computer-based dialogue games supporting conceptual change and development in science — based on the findings of empirical studies. An evaluation of two dialogue games for collaborative interaction, a facilitating game and an elicit-inform game, has shown that they produce significant improvements in students conceptual understanding, and they are differentially successful — depending on the nature of the conceptual difficulties experienced by the learners. The implications this study has for the role of collaborative dialogue in learning and designing computer-based and computer–mediated collaborative interaction are discussed.

Keywords: Belief change; Collaboration; Dialogue; Empirical; Modelling; School; Science

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 93-101

Accepted: 6 November 2001

Friendship and collaborative creative writing in the primary classroom

E.Vass, Psychology Department, The Open University

Email: E.Vass@open.ac.uk

A case study is reported investigating the nature of paired talk and the role of friendship in collaborative creative writing activities. This forms the initial phase of a larger research project driven by socio-cultural theory, studying the beneficial effects of friendship pairing and the role of the computer tool in the development of creative writing skills. The joint poem writing episodes of four 8-year-old girls, one friendship and one acquaintance pair, were observed on a number of occasions during a two-week long literacy project. The observations were of ongoing classroom activities in the IT suite and in the literacy classroom of their school; the observed children worked alongside the rest of the class in their natural context. It was predicted that there would be differences between the two pairs in terms of the process and the outcome of their collaborations which could be explained by the differences in their respective relationships. To investigate such differences (if any), a ‘functional model’ of discourse analysis was used, developed specifically for the context of collaborative creative writing. It is claimed that the proposed model is useful to describe discourse patterns characteristic of paired writing and to identify productive discourse styles in this specific setting. It helps understand how the collaborating writers engage in talk to cope with the demands of the task, and how they use discourse to support different phases of the joint writing process.

Keywords: Case study; Collaboration; Communication; Computer; Creativity; Friendship; Literacy; Primary, Socio-cultural theory

Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 18, 1, 102-110

Accepted: 6 November 2001