Computer-supported collaborative learning

under construction

Research topics

Stahl (2002:2) defines four themes important for thinking about CSCL

a) Collaborative knowledge building
b) Group and personal perspectives
c) Mediation by artifacts
d) Interaction analysis

Hakkarainen & Sintonen (2002) link CSCL research to a model of scientific inquiry:

• "Scardamalia and Bereiter (1994) have argued that there is a close relationship between the process of scientific thinking and learning science as well as between the philosophy of science and science education." (Hakkarainen 2002: 26)

• An analogy between the history of science and the development of scientific thinking in childhood as well as between scientific thinking and children's thinking has been a very important foundation of cognitive research on educational practices. (Hakkarainen 2002: 26)

• Knowledge-seeking inquiry entails that knowledge is not simply assimilated but constructed through solving problems of explanation and understanding. Through intensive collaboration and peer interaction, resources of the whole learning community may be used to facilitate advancement of inquiry. (Hakkarainen 2002: 27)

• It is generally believed that children are not capable of participating in these kinds of advanced scientific processes of inquiry, and, therefore, conventional pedagogical practices are not aimed at encouraging them. However, new computersupported learning environments emerging from cognitive research promise to facilitate participation in these higher-level processes of inquiry in education. (Hakkarainen 2002: 29)

References

• Hakkarainen, K. & Sintonen, M. (2002) The Interrogative Model of Inquiry and Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning, Science & Education 11: 25.

• Scardamalia,M. & Bereiter, C.: 1992, \u2018Text-Based and Knowledge-Based Questioning by Children\u2019, Cognition and Instruction 9, 177\u2013199.

• Scardamalia, M. & Bereiter, C.: 1993, \u2018Technologies for Knowledge-Building Discourse\u2019, Communications of the ACM 36, 37\u201341.

• Scardamalia, M. & Bereiter, C.: 1994, \u2018Computer Support for Knowledge-building Communities\u2019, The Journal of the Learning Sciences 3, 265\u2013283.

• Stahl, G. (2002), Contributions to a theoretical framework for CSCL, Proceedings of CSCL 2002.