International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning

Knowledge building (KB) competencies are crucial for undergraduates’ creative knowledge work and academic success. While there is substantial research on KB discourse, there are limited efforts in examining how KB competencies in the conceptual, metacognitive, socio-emotional, and epistemic dimensions are demonstrated in KB discourse and how the competencies can be scaffolded. Previous studies suggest the effectiveness of reflective assessment on sustainable and productive KB discourse. This study developed a framework for analyzing KB competencies using KB discourse moves. It also examined whether a KB design augmented by reflective assessment enriched by analytic tools and artifacts could foster undergraduates’ KB competencies, and if so, how. This KB design involves principle-based pedagogy with the participants engaging in collaborative inquiry and discussion on Knowledge Forum, and reflective assessment using (a) super synthesis notes, (b) KB interaction rubrics, and (c) learning analytics visualization tools. Qualitative tracking and lag sequential pattern analysis of Knowledge Forum’s discourse revealed that implementing reflective assessment supported by analytics and artifacts could help the undergraduate students develop KB competencies manifested in discourse with evidence of conceptual advance, epistemic engagement, metacognition, and productive socio-emotional interactions with a collective focus. The thematic analysis illustrated the dynamics through which the design enriched by standards and visualizations helped the undergraduates develop KB competencies: leveraging synthesis super notes to promote conceptual and metacognitive advancement and epistemic engagement; employing KB interaction rubrics to cultivate metacognitive, socio-emotional, and epistemic competencies; and harnessing KBDeX visualizations to promote metacognitive and conceptual advancement and to facilitate epistemic engagement. The implications of scaffolding students’ epistemic agency, metacognition, productive collaborative inquiry, and developing KB competencies in a technology-supported metacognitive learning environment are discussed.

In this study, we investigate how pre-service teachers’ group dialogues emerged and intersected across time and space as students collaboratively constructed a video-based mind map to prepare for oral exams in a pedagogy course. The study was conducted as part of a design-based research project investigating the ways that video-based mind maps can support learning as both a collaborative activity and a classroom resource. We applied interaction analysis methods to recordings taken during the production of the mind map as well as the videos made by students within the mind map itself to analyze synchronous and asynchronous dialogues among group members as they viewed, recorded, and uploaded videos. The findings offer an in-depth understanding of how collaboration occurs in different space-time configurations within and across groups as mediated by video resources. We discuss how these findings contribute to computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) research on the ways collaboration can emerge across different levels of activity as well as the pedagogical implications for introducing video-based dialogues into the classroom.

Group awareness (GA) is essential for computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL), as it informs learners about other group members’ activities, knowledge, and emotions. A key advantage of GA support is that it can collect, process, and visualize GA information, which provides a basis for students’ reflection and adjustment during collaborative learning, thus facilitating their learning performance. However, empirical findings regarding the effectiveness of GA support have been inconsistent. The present study conducted the first three-level meta-analysis of 46 empirical studies to examine the effects of GA support on students’ learning performance and further explore the possible moderating factors that may have contributed to the inconsistencies of primary studies. The results indicated the following: (1) GA support in CSCL had a moderate significant effect on students’ learning performance (Hedges’g = 0.46, p < 0.001); (2) GA support in CSCL had the greatest influence on students’ cognitive development (Hedges’g = 0.49, p < 0.001), followed by behavioral participation (Hedges’g = 0.47, p < 0.001), and then social emotion (Hedges’g = 0.38, p < 0.001); and (3) GA support type and group size were the only two significant moderating factors. Based on these findings, we propose several theoretical and pedagogical implications.

This study extends research on perspectival understanding (Greeno & van de Sande, 2007) by using Du Bois’ (2007) discourse work on stancetaking to investigate how students expressed their perspectives on course content through a variety of stances/positions as they negotiated meaning in online discussions. Participants were students in a hybrid graduate-level course with weekly synchronous computer-mediated discussions. Adapting Du Bois’ stancetaking triangle, we coded discussion transcripts for shifts in stance and for evidence of influence on students’ perspective taking as they considered course concepts. Findings were that stances and stance objects (that is, topics) were introduced as students collaborated in discussion, with an epistemic stance indicating students’ primary focus on wanting to learn and understand course concepts. Evaluative and affective stances were less frequent and most often intertwined with an epistemic stance but nevertheless important in supporting the group’s discussion. Synchronous online discussions afforded a venue for iterative discourse interactions of evaluation, positioning, and alignment and for shared knowledge co-construction and perspectival understanding.

A key commitment of computer-supported collaborative learning research is to study how people learn in collaborative settings to guide development of methods for capture and design for learning. Computer-supported collaborative learning research has a tradition of studying how the physical world plays a part in collaborative learning. Within the field, a material turn is emerging that considers how digital and tangible technologies actively contribute to collaborative learning processes. Studying how tangible materials produce collaborative learning visibly and algorithmically is particularly important at a time when advanced algorithms are integrated into educational contexts in ways that are not always transparent. However, the needed methodologies for capturing how non-human agents take part in collaborative learning remains underdeveloped. The present study builds on current CSCL research that investigates materials in collaborative learning and introduces posthumanist perspectives with the aim to decenter humans methodologically and to probe empirically whether and how these perspectives contribute to empirical understanding of collaborative learning processes. Taking fiber crafts (e.g., weaving and fabric manipulation) as a context for computational learning, the present study conducted a posthumanist analysis of differences among human and non-human participants in collaboration using video data to investigate how middle school youths and fiber craft components performed algorithms over time. The findings show how both youths and craft materials actively contributed to the performance of algorithms. In weaving, algorithms became repeated youth-material movements one dimension at a time. In fabric manipulation, algorithms became a repeated confluence of component parts. Decentering humans through an analysis of differences among human and non-human introduced human-material collaboration as a productive unit of analysis for understanding how materials and people together contribute to producing what can be recognized as computational performance. The findings of this research contribute to ongoing conversations in CSCL research on how computational materials can be considered in collaborative learning and present a new approach to capture collaborative learning as physical expansion over time. The study has implications for future research on capturing collaborative computational learning and designing physical computational learning opportunities that show technology as evolving.

By adopting a situated and interactional approach, we explore students’ immersive VR experiences as resources for collaborative meaning making and learning. We draw on data from a project in which teachers and researchers co-developed a learning design for upper secondary students involving immersive VR technology. In this learning design, students viewed a cinematic VR film where they encountered different people telling personal stories about exclusion and discrimination, followed by reflective group dialogues with their teacher about their experiences in this environment. Through a detailed interaction analysis of these dialogues, we identify four dimensions that characterize students’ meaning making: (1) the feeling of taking part in conversations, (2) attending to bodily expressions of others, (3) students’ own bodily responses, (4) teacher guidance. We discuss how the findings from our analysis contribute to the field of CSCL, and which also have implications for instructional work that includes the use of immersive VR environments.