Maarit Arvaja

Collaborative processes during report writing of a science learning project: The nature of discourse as a function of task requirements

The aim of this article is to specify how different aspects of task assignments are related to different types of student discourse during the report writing phase of a science learning project. A group of four ninth-grade students of the Finnish comprehensive school (about 15-year-olds) participated in a project work involving laboratory experiments, reading literature, and analysing and reporting research findings. The empirical data were collected through videotaping and interviews in authentic classroom settings. The results indicated that construction of shared, high-level understanding was quite rare in this case of small group interaction. As one of the main reasons for this, we suggest that the learning tasks were defined in a way that did not encourage shared reflection and high-level discourse. The students’ task was mostly to answer fact-seeking questions made by their teacher to guide the report writing, which promoted recollection rather than reasoning. In order to facilitate high-level discourse and learning, more attention should be paid to the kind of processes that task assignment triggers. The findings are discussed in the framework of how teachers could formulate their task assignments to promote high-level discourse.

Social Processes and Knowledge Building During Small Group Interaction in a School Science Project

The aim of this study was to investigate the meaning of symmetry of knowledge-based roles for knowledge construction and sharing in social interaction during the report writing phase of an experimental science learning project. A group of four 9th grade students in a Finnish comprehensive school (15-16-year-olds) participated in a project involving laboratory experiments, reading literature and analysing and reporting research findings. The empirical data were collected through videotaping and interviews in authentic classroom settings. In the data four patterns of interaction were identified, which differed in terms of their symmetry of knowledge-based roles and nature of the talk. The context of high level collaboration was realized in the framework of joint critical knowledge building, where students had equal knowledge-based roles and close relationships. The discussion was, however, mostly uncritical in its nature, partly due to the evident social inconvenience between some group members.

Contextual perspective in analysing collaborative knowledge construction of two small groups in web-based discussion

This paper presents a methodology designed to explore the role of context in collaborative knowledge construction activity in asynchronous web-based discussion. The discussions of two student groups participating in a web-based teacher education course were compared. The comparison aimed to highlight the differences and similarities between the groups’ knowledge construction activity through studying the thematic structure, communicative functions and contextual resources used in their discussions. The results indicated that the different backgrounds of the two student groups influenced the way context was created and interpreted, and how meanings were negotiated. The differences and similarities between the groups’ activity illuminated the situated and mediated nature of learning. The possibilities of the methodology used in this study for evaluating collaborative knowledge construction in context are also discussed.

Collaborative Learning and Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning Environments

A focus on purely individual cognition has set a stage to social construction of knowledge. New learning environments, in many cases supported by computer technology, are often based on collaborating and sharing expertise. As a result research on Computer Supported Collaborative learning (CSCL) environments is a significant and growing field, which actively seeks new methods to resolve the challenges of human learning across diverse levels of interaction in a modern information society. In this chapter we will discuss the concept of collaborative learning and the issues involved in using information and communication technology to support collaborative learning. We begin with the definition of collaboration, which lays the foundation for diverse research perspectives and methodologies on collaborative learning. The chapter also reviews the potential of CSCL environments, and addresses the challenges CSCL environments face.

Constructing Knowledge through a Role-Play in a Web-Based Learning Environment

This study aimed to find out how and on what level the students of two separate secondary schools shared and constructed knowledge on imperialism by interacting through historical role characters in a Web-based environment. Furthermore, the study aimed to find out how social and contextual features affected the nature of knowledge sharing and construction. The data about the history project were gathered by various means in order to validate the findings of the case study. The results demonstrated that the level of the Web-based messages remained quite low. Also the use of the Web-based environment in terms of shared knowledge construction was rather weak. In comparison, different instructional activities of the two teachers resulted in different learning activities in the two schools and, thus, different level of interaction in the Web-based environment. The findings of this research are discussed in terms of important factors influencing the knowledge sharing and constructing activities.

Instructional support in CSCL

Computer-supported collaborative cearning (CSCL) is a recent approach to creating 1 powerful learning and communication environments in combination with 2 collaborative learn ing ideas and networked technology. Many advanced technical 3 infrastructures for fostering higher-level processes of inquiry-based interaction have 4 been developed (Edelson, Gordin, & Pea, 1999; Scardamalia & Bereiter, 1996). This 5 chapter discusses instructional support in CSCL. First, the basic processes of 6 instructional scaffolding in the context of CSCL are discussed, then relevant 7 instructional models dealing with collaborative learning are presented. The specific 8 focus is to introduce ‘basic models’ from the cooperative learning tradition to the 9 more recent inquiry models, which are applicable to CSCL. The relationship 10 between instructional support and issues of human learning and the educational 11 setting is also discussed and cases of instructional support in CSCL are presented. 12

Personal and Shared Experiences as Resources for Meaning Making in a Philosophy of Science Course.

The aim of this case study was to explore health-education students’ personal and collaborative meaning making activities during an online science philosophy course in the higher-education context. Through applying the dialogical perspective for learning, the focus was on studying how different contextual resources were used in building understanding within the philosophy of science and what kind of understanding the students constructed and reflected through these resources. The study focused especially on exploring how the students’ life experiences and fellow students served as resources in their meaning making activities. The results showed that prior work and discipline-related knowledge and experiences provided the students with resources for understanding the philosophical texts by applying, conceptualizing, or critically evaluating the philosophical knowledge presented in the texts. In their discursive activities, the students used fellow students as resources in elaborating the theoretical conceptualizations further, or they were engaged in sharing their similar work or discipline-related experiences and conceptions. These different resources offered tools for understanding, conceptualizing, and critically evaluating both the philosophical themes studied and the practices of one’s own work and those of the scientific community.

Teachers' instructional scaffolding in an innovative information and communication technology-based history learning environment

Abstract The nature of the role assumed by the teacher is crucial in the promotion of successful learning and collaboration in Information and Communication Technologybased (ICT-based) environments. The aim of this study was to examine how teachers with different conceptions of their teacher roles use different types of instructional scaffolding while working in an innovative learning environment. Our further aim was finding out how instructional scaffolding is related to learning activities of different kinds. The study was carried out at two secondary schools with a shared network-based learning environment. The results showed that teachers with different conceptions of the teachers role demonstrated clear differences in the nature of their instructional activities. The article describes how the different instructional scaffolding interacts with the students’ learning activities and what this implies for the development of ICT as a teachers tool for monitoring students’ learning processes.

Experiences in Sense Making: Health Science Students’ I-Positioning in an Online Philosophy of Science Course

This article reports on a qualitative study on the dialogical approach to learning in the context of higher education. The aim was to shed light on the I-Position and multivoicedness in students’ identity building and to provide empirical substantiation for these theoretical constructs, focusing especially on the connection between personal knowledge and theoretical knowledge. The study explored how health science students’ reflections on their work and discipline-related experiences provided resources for making personal sense of and understanding the subject studied. The students took an online course on the philosophy of science. To study students’ internal and external dialogue in terms of multivoicedness in their sense-making processes I combined a discourse analysis with a dialogical approach. The results showed that in reflecting on their experiences in light of different scientific approaches, the students became engaged in dialogues with different voices, thereby experiencing tensions in their professional positioning. The reasoning tasks gave rise to internal dialogue, involving negotiation between different I-Positions of the self or heterodialogue with the texts. These identity negotiations were manifested in refining, strengthening, and reconstructing professional and scientific I-Positions and in sharing and constructing a We-Position.

Tensions and striving for coherence in an academic’s professional identity work

ABSTRACT The emergence of ‘new managerialism’ in academic institutions and professions has given rise to tensions between one’s professional self and work context. Such tensions often originate from a misalignment between institutional and personal values. This study builds on a dialogical approach to identity and discusses the role of inner tensions and conflicts in terms of making sense of one’s professional identity. These aspects are explored and exemplified by introducing a sample case of one individual student and university researcher/teacher, Anna, who participated in one-year Pedagogical Studies for Adult Educators. Leaning on the narratives of Anna’s learning diaries and a later interview, the article describes tensions and critical conflicts in her professional I-positioning. The study shows how tensions and their resolutions, at their best, can lead to constructive identity work, thereby finding a new personal sense resulting in a more integrated professional identity.