Developing a Grounded Theory Model on Collaboration in Learning

The purpose of this research is to develop a grounded theory model to explain the factors influencing collaborative learning in higher education, the role of technology in facilitating collaboration, and the outcome of collaboration. We assigned 28 participants to small groups to work on course-related questions; half of the groups were face-to-face groups and the other half groups were collaborating in a simulated virtual environment with the aid of information technology. Interview data was collected and analyzed following the grounded theory approach. Congruent with distributed cognition theories, the results of our study suggest that both social and technological factors were important and interlocking. We also discussed the importance of designing learning technologies that have strong social and communications features

Knowledge management for disaster response: A proposed framework

Knowledge management encompasses a wide range of disciplines. Most organizations face difficult challenges in managing knowledge for emergency response, but it is crucial for response effectiveness that such challenges be overcome.Organizational members must share the knowledge needed to plan for emergencies. They also must be able during an emergency to access relevant plans and communicate about their responses to it.In this paper we purport the idea that knowledge management systems allow more effective and timely disaster management efforts.We present our idea based on our experience in working with knowledge management systems to support emergency preparedness initiatives in North America. We propose a framework that can be used by local researchers and practitioners to better understand the influence of knowledge management on disaster management

The impacts of Delphi communication structure on small and medium sized asynchronous virtual teams

The improvement of Internet technology has motivated distributed work groups to collaborate without meeting face to face. Although asynchronous meetings through Web-based group communications systems enable groups dispersed temporarily and geographically to collaborate more flexibly, parallel and non-linear communication among dispersed members also challenge effective and efficient group coordination. Moreover, the Web-based asynchronous meeting is distinguished not only from the face-to-face meeting but also from the synchronous computer-supported meeting in terms of coordination process. However, previous asynchronous group communications or virtual team research focused more on the comparison of this new type of meeting with the face-to-face meeting. Not many research efforts have been exerted to improve the productivity of this new form of meeting and find ways to overcome its disadvantages. Facilitation was proved effective to enhance the productivity of synchronous meetings. However the effect of structured discussion through facilitation was not clear in asynchronous meeting settings even though facilitation is a common practice in asynchronous group communication systems. This study examined the effect of a facilitated structure in improving the productivity of asynchronous decision-making groups. Delphi was chosen as the facilitated structure because it has been widely used as the paper-and-pencil-based structure to facilitate dispersed experts in collecting their opinions. In this study a computer-based Delphi structure was implemented through asynchronous Computer-Mediated Communication. A 2X2 controlled experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of Delphi structure on the effectiveness of small-sized (5-6 members) and medium-sized (10-12 members) asynchronous computer-supported groups. The formal facilitation using Delphi structure was effective to improve the productivity of asynchronous groups in generating more ideas. On the contrary, informal leadership by group coordinators seems to have played a more important role in producing better reports. In terms of per person ideas, small-sized groups were more productive, even though medium-sized groups produced more total ideas than small-sized groups. The superiority of Delphi groups and small-sized groups is related to their higher equality of participation. This result suggests that in asynchronous meetings, equal participation of group members in discussion is important in improving idea generation productivity while in synchronous meetings, the process loss of production blocking plays a crucial role