Anindito Aditomo

The synthesis approach to analysing educational design dataset: Application of three scaffolds to a learning by design task for postgraduate education students

The aims of the Synthesis and Scaffolding Project were to understand: the role of specific scaffolds in relation to the activity of learners, and the activity of learners during a collaborative design task from multiple perspectives, through the collection and analysis of multiple streams of data and the adoption of a synthesis approach to the research. The Synthesis Approach to Analysing Educational Design (SAAED) dataset is comprised of video, audio and image files, transcripts of the discourse, as well as copies of physical artefacts generated by three groups of three postgraduate education students during a 90-minute design session. The data were collected in January 2013. Each group was given a different scaffold related to the design process, the social interactions or the use of the tools available to the participants. Researchers interested in analysing the SAAED are required to sign a collaborator agreement to become part of the project team.

Learning from virtual interaction: a review of research on online synchronous groups

Although in general collaborative learning is effective, it is clear that this is not always the case. To explain this, researchers have been suggested to investigate the interaction process occurring in the course of collaboration. Research on face-to-face (FTF) groups have provided clues as to what types of interaction are productive for learning, both at the individual and group level. However, the extent to which these findings apply to online groups is not yet clear. This paper reports a conceptual systematic review of recent studies of online synchronous learning groups. There is little evidence that the types of online interaction deemed favorable are actually associated with individual conceptual learning. These findings challenge the implicit assumption held by many educational technology designers. Implications for future research are discussed.

Students engaged in collaborative modeling

The chat communication between students engaged in a collaborative modeling task, using a system dynamics modeling approach, was analysed. The analysis revealed a pattern to how students begin new problems in a chat and the analysis of the objects of learning identified issues with both communication between students and the design of one of the tasks. We describe a number of the emerging interactional practices and draw conclusions regarding the instructional use of modeling problems.