International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning

Computer-Supported Collaborative Blended Learning (CSCBL) scripts are complex learning situations in which formal and informal activities conducted at different spatial locations are coordinated and integrated into one unique learning setting through the use of technology. We define a conceptual model identifying four factors to be considered when addressing the design of these CSCBL scripts and of the technological system for supporting their enactment: the space, the pedagogical method, the participants and the history (4SPPIces factors). This paper presents and evaluates a CSCBL script designed according to the 4SPPIces factors. The script is proposed for extending the learning of geographic fieldwork in a geography course at a high school. In this script, students reflect about the urbanism and the socio-geographic characteristics of a Barcelona neighborhood. The script blends individual and collaborative activities supported by mobile and computer-based technologies conducted in the classroom, home and city. The script is evaluated in a case study involving thirty-four students and two teachers. The case study reports: (1) the CSCBL script designed with the teachers, considering the 4SPPIces factors and the associated technological environment and (2) the results of enacting the script in the actual learning context and analysing whether it fulfils the targeted learning objectives. The results from this case study show the impact of considering the 4SPPIces factors to enhance a real practice providing new learning and motivational benefits. The CSCBL script presented is an example that can encourage other practitioners and researchers to adopt the 4SPPices factors in similar educational situations.

We present COLLECT-UML, a constraint-based intelligent tutoring system (ITS) that teaches object-oriented analysis and design using Unified Modelling Language (UML). UML is easily the most popular object-oriented modelling technology in current practice. While teaching how to design UML class diagrams, COLLECT-UML also provides feedback on collaboration. Being one of constraint-based tutors, COLLECT-UML represents the domain knowledge as a set of constraints. However, it is the first system to also represent a higher-level skill such as collaboration using the same formalism. We started by developing a single-user ITS that supported students in learning UML class diagrams. The system was evaluated in a real classroom, and the results showed that students’ performance increased significantly. In this paper, we present our experiences in extending the system to provide support for collaboration as well as domain-level support. We describe the architecture, interface and support for collaboration in the new, multi-user system. The effectiveness of the system has been evaluated in two studies. In addition to improved problem-solving skills, the participants both acquired declarative knowledge about effective collaboration and did collaborate more effectively. The participants have enjoyed working with the system and found it a valuable asset to their learning.

This paper proposes the Learning in Embodied Activity Framework (LEAF) which aims to synthesize across individual and sociocultural theories of learning to provide a more robust account of how the body plays a role in collaborative learning, particularly when students are learning about a collective phenomenon where coordination between and across students is important to their learning. To demonstrate the uses and limits of LEAF, we apply it to data from several iterations of the Science through Technology Enhanced Play (STEP) project. This project involved first and second-grade students using an embodied, mixed-reality simulation to learn about the particulate nature of matter. We use data from this project to demonstrate the ways in which students’ embodied actions serve as a resource in understanding their embodied activity both individually and collectively. We demonstrate how both dimensions provide insight into student cognition and learning. Supported by this analysis, we present LEAF as a useful tool to help researchers, designers, and instructors thoughtfully design collective activities.

Knowledge sharing and transfer are essential for learning in groups, especially when group members have different disciplinary expertise and collaborate online. Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) environments have been designed to facilitate transactive knowledge sharing and transfer in collaborative problem-solving settings. This study investigates how knowledge sharing and transfer can be facilitated using CSCL scripts supporting transactive memory and discussion in a multidisciplinary problem-solving setting. We also examine the effects of these CSCL scripts on the quality of both joint and individual problem-solution plans. In a laboratory experiment, 120 university students were randomly divided into pairs based only on their disciplinary backgrounds (each pair had one partner with a background in water management and one partner with a background in international development studies). These dyads were then randomly assigned to one of four conditions: transactive memory script, transactive discussion script, both scripts, or no scripts (control). Learning partners were asked to analyze, discuss, and solve an authentic problem that required knowledge of both their domains, i.e., applying the concept of community-based social marketing in fostering sustainable agricultural water management. The results showed interaction effects for the transactive memory and discussion scripts on transactive knowledge sharing and transfer. Furthermore, transactive memory and discussion scripts individually, but not in combination, led to better quality demonstrated in both joint and individual problem solutions. We discuss how these results advance the research investigating the value of using scripts delivered in CSCL systems for supporting knowledge sharing and transfer.

This squib continues the ongoing conversation put forward by Wise and Schwarz around the direction and future of CSCL. We focus here on the question of whether or not CSCL should seek to make educational change. Here, we take the affirmative position by conceptualizing the network of design-centric research practice partnerships. We illustrate how this could work through an ongoing instantiation called Taking Citizen Science to School, a multi-year research center with joint funding from research and practice-based governmental institutions.

This article presents a model whose primary concern and design rationale is to offer users (teachers) with basic ICT skills an intuitive, easy, and flexible way of editing scripts. The proposal is based on relating an end-user representation as a table and a machine model as a tree. The table-tree model introduces structural expressiveness and semantics that are limited but straightforward and intuitive. This approach is less expressive and introduces less semantics than approaches based on workflow representations and complex meta-models. However, it may be enhanced to represent complex features such as by-intention grouping mechanisms, constraint checking or configuration of enactment frameworks. A usability test suggests that the model/interface is easy to use and that teachers avail themselves of the flexibility available to model scripts according to their perspectives.