A collaborative learning approach and its evaluation

The use of new technologies does not mean that the applied education model is modern. New technologies can be used in a way that follows the traditional education model, with all its deficiencies. The collaborative education model involves students in reflection, participation, and construction of their knowledge, or to collaboratively learn. This article aims to present mechanisms to stimulate collaborative learning, in present education, through the aid of virtual learning environments.Education for the 21 st century - impact of ICT and Digital Resources ConferenceRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Understanding the INDA Student Summer Camp Experience

poster abstractSERI conducted an evaluation of IUPUI’s Nanotechnology Discovery Academy (INDA) for students (n=47) during the summer of 2013. SERI evaluators utilized an explanatory sequential mixed methods evaluation plan comprised of surveys (pre- and post-), observations, and four student focus groups. Using a mixed methods approach facilitates a dialogue between quantitative representations of change and the everyday experiences and perceptions of participating students, thereby constructing insights into the complexity of the learning process and its effects. Student learning outcomes and comfort with collaborative learning were measured through pre- and post-question change. A student Nanoscore was determined using survey questions assessing nanotechnology comfort, confidence, and understanding. Both the change in student Nanoscore and their comfort with collaborative learning had statistically significant increases. Qualitative data was used to elaborate on the significance of these changes, suggesting that INDA provided an educational environment that emphasized and improved nanotechnology awareness and collaborative abilities. However, findings from this evaluation also reveal that many participants struggled with the interdisciplinarity of nanotechnology. More specifically, students who had yet to take high school physics reported struggling with INDA content due to their lack of physics knowledge

Involving Users to Improve the Collaborative Logical Framework

In order to support collaboration in web-based learning, there is a need for an intelligent support that facilitates its management during the design, development, and analysis of the collaborative learning experience and supports both students and instructors. At aDeNu research group we have proposed the Collaborative Logical Framework (CLF) to create effective scenarios that support learning through interaction, exploration, discussion, and collaborative knowledge construction. This approach draws on artificial intelligence techniques to support and foster an effective involvement of students to collaborate. At the same time, the instructors’ workload is reduced as some of their tasks—especially those related to the monitoring of the students behavior—are automated. After introducing the CLF approach, in this paper, we present two formative evaluations with users carried out to improve the design of this collaborative tool and thus enrich the personalized support provided. In the first one, we analyze, following the layered evaluation approach, the results of an observational study with 56 participants. In the second one, we tested the infrastructure to gather emotional data when carrying out another observational study with 17 participants

Between analysis and transformation: technology, methodology and evaluation on the SPLICE project

This paper concerns the ways in which technological change may entail methodological development in e-learning research. The focus of our argument centres on the subject of evaluation in e-learning and how technology can contribute to consensus-building on the value of project outcomes, and the identification of mechanisms behind those outcomes. We argue that a critical approach to the methodology of evaluation which harnesses technology in this way is vital to agile and effective policy and strategy-making in institutions as the challenges of transformation in a rapidly changing educational and technological environment are grappled with. With its focus on mechanisms and multiple stakeholder perspectives, we identify Pawson and Tilley’s ‘Realistic Evaluation’ as an appropriate methodological approach for this purpose, and we report on its use within a JISC-funded project on social software, SPLICE (Social Practices, Learning and Interoperability in Connected Environments). The project created new tools to assist the identification of mechanisms responsible for change to personal and institutional technological practice. These tools included collaborative mind-mapping and focused questioning, and tools for the animated modelling of complex mechanisms. By using these tools, large numbers of project stakeholders could engage in a process where they were encouraged to articulate and share their theories and ideas as to why project outcomes occurred. Using the technology, this process led towards the identification and agreement of common mechanisms which had explanatory power for all stakeholders. In conclusion, we argue that SPLICE has shown the potential of technologically-mediated Realistic Evaluation. Given the technologies we now have, a methodology based on the mass cumulation of stakeholder theories and ideas about mechanisms is feasible. Furthermore, the summative outcomes of such a process are rich in explanatory and predictive power, and therefore useful to the immediate and strategic problems of the sector. Finally, we argue that as well as generating better explanations for phenomena, the evaluation process can itself become transformative for stakeholders

An Examination of the Student Work Study Collaborative Inquiry in Ontario Schools

This major paper examines a unique approach to a professional collaborative inquiry in schools, in Ontario, called The Student Work Study Initiative. It was a job embedded approach which sought to uncover how students academically achieving Level 2 could improve to Level 3. This paper will explore the benefits of using a collaborative inquiry process which includes the student as a central partner through systematic co analysis, co description, and co reflection of student work captured through the use of pedagogical documentation. The Student Work Study approach will be examined in its entirety and its benefits and implications will be compared with more traditional ways of educational reform. Methods analyzed will include qualitative data drawn from pedagogical documentation. Anticipated findings of this review include a study of the impact of this approach on student learning and well- being in the classroom, descriptions of learning cultures and partnerships formed amongst and between teachers and student and content, producing students with increased agency and power in classrooms, the use of systematic pedagogical documentation in the process, and engaging students and teachers as researchers in a community of learning. This paper highlights tensions including: lack of time, inconsistent assessment and evaluation practices, implications for introverted learners amidst collaborative learning structures in classrooms, and the challenge of continuing this work beyond the life of the actual funded intervention to include its premise as part of regular classroom and school structures, in order to foster lasting change for school leaders, students, teachers, and system partners

Designed to be employed? Measuring the impact of a multidisciplinary collaborative design project on learner perceptions of employability attributes

A collaborative building design project undertaken within an internationally-distributed team involves a dynamic process, characterised by generation and sharing of information, and synthesis of knowledge between participants. Learning within this dynamic environment is challenging, but can bring a number of notable benefits for the participants. Inherent within successful collaborative learning is the required ability to co-produce design ‘content’ with others from different disciplines, and to manage the ‘relationship’ between all participants involved in the design team (Leinonen et al., 2005). The ‘content’ constitutes individuals’ inputs, which originate from disciplinary knowledge, skills and expertise, whereas managing the relationship requires a set of ‘soft’ people management skills. During the design process, the participants are presented with a problem (in a building project, it is usually a client brief), which has multiple potential solutions. To arrive at an optimum solution, the participants should explore the rationale of each alternative, and present and negotiate alternatives with the other participants. This process encourages deep-learning of the subject discipline and helps to develop people management skills, such as teamwork, communication, and other performance-enhancing behaviours which have been linked to ‘proactive personality’ (Tymon 2013). In the present and future labour market, graduates are expected to be able to work across disciplinary and geographical boundaries (Becerik-Gerber et al. 2012, BIM2050 group 2014), and these people management skills have been identified as the skills for developing sustainable built environment (BE) (Egan 2004). In a report commissioned by the UNESCO, Beanland and Hadgraft (2014) further stressed the importance of the development of appropriate interpersonal attributes and capabilities as an integral part of engineering education worldwide. The evaluation of the skills developed from the learning activity is critical to demonstrate the success of learning endeavour, and is reflected in the achievement of learning outcomes. There exist examples which explore and evaluate the impacts and benefits of collaborative design projects in the built environment (e.g. Becerik-Gerber et al. 2012), but none evaluate pedagogical and personal development skills from the learner perspective, and then compare the developed skills before and after a learning intervention. This evaluation is presented in this chapter, with a view to enhance understanding of the effectiveness of this learning approach, and to inform key requirements of its successful implementation. This chapter considers several issues in the evaluation of collaborative design project, including measures which allow consistency of evaluation of pre- and post-implementation across several disciplines involved in the collaboration, learning outcomes of each discipline, and the influence of the participants’ beliefs about the benefits of collaborative design project. Thus, key research questions are suggested as follows. 1. What are the impacts of a collaborative design project on learning outcomes, defined by attributes including understanding, ability, skills and qualities, as perceived by the participants, pre- and post-implementation? 2. Is there any difference in perceived impact between participants from different disciplines, and those with different beliefs about the efficacy of the learning approach? 3. What attributes can facilitate successful collaborative design

Scenario-based evaluation of an ethical framework for the use of digital media in learning and teaching

nterest in educational podcasting, audio feedback and media-enhanced learning, in its various forms, has grown due to the increased access academic staff and students have to new technologies. The benefits have been widely reported in the educational development and disciplinary literature on learning technology, mobile learning, digital age learning, and assessment and feedback. However, such literature focuses more on what can be done, rather than if it should be done. Hargreaves (2008) signals the need to balance ethical risk in the creative curriculum with actions that maximise beneficence, especially within the context of a sector that espouses to develop critical skills in learners. In a world of constantly developing technology, it is not always easy to appraise the implications of a pedagogic innovation. As practitioners concerned with academic development, our aim is to facilitate academics to reflect on their practice from a variety of perspectives, and we felt that an easy–to-use ethical framework could assist academics to identify potential ethical problems. The Media-Enhanced Learning Special Interest Group (MELSIG) is a UK network of academics, developers and learning technologists. They identified the need to consider the ethical risk associated with using digital media in response to examples described in recent literature, and ideas generated by its community. It was as a result of discussions at MELSIG that this collaborative work began. The three members of MELSIG were joined by a colleague with an interest in ethics but who was relatively inexperienced with new technologies. When this work began we looked primarily at digital media, but it is considered that such a framework can be used to appraise the use of other new technologies in learning and teaching. This paper will begin by giving a brief explanation of ethics, as a discipline, and the approach to ethics which underpins this framework. We will then discuss the results from a scenario-based evaluation of the framework, undertaken by the four authors. Following this evaluation, the framework is now being evaluated by a wider community of practitioners, on real examples, and continues to develop as it is exposed to wider use. However, it is considered that the initial scenario-based evaluation raised some interim findings that will be of interest to a wider audience

Staff-student Partnership in Practice in Higher Education : The Impact on Learning and Teaching

© 2012 The Authors. Published with open access by Elsevier Ltd.This staff-student collaborative project involved six small project teams each composed of staff and undergraduate students studying within the University of Hertfordshire, UK. Each project team engaged in a mini-project designed to research an aspect of learning and teaching to develop learning and teaching and to enhance students’ employability skills. The ‘student researchers’ from the small project teams were also members of a larger coaching group that met with the project lead and other experienced colleagues and undertook joint enquiry. Students used reflective logs as one means of recording data on their developing employability skills and their learning from the project. Evaluation activities included documentation of all coaching group workshops and collecting quantitative and qualitative data for each learning and teaching research project. The usefulness of this data was evaluated by staff members in relation to its impact on their module planning. The main implication of this approach is that staff-student partnership in learning and teaching has a significant impact on learning and teaching development and enhancement, learning to learn, raising the profile of research into learning and teaching, and employability skills and attributes. The student researchers came to a much deeper understanding of learning and teaching, and became much more aware of their responsibility for their own learning and committed to enhancing the learning of others. Members of staff noted that working with students had been ‘extremely inspirational’- seeing students work with other students and what they could achieve that could not be achieved by members of staff