University of Barcelona Interaction in collaborative texts constructed in an asynchronous written...

University of Barcelona

Interaction in collaborative texts constructed in an asynchronous

written communication environment

T.Mauri, M.Clarà, A.Remesal & R.Colomina

GRINTIEUniversity of Barcelona


Introduction

Task

StudentsTeacher

Interactivity

Discourse

Educational influence

Operational conditions

Coll et al. (2008)


Introduction: The task

Task type Collaborative writting of an essay. Four sections:

introduction, theoretical discussion, analysis of educational situations, conclusions.

Authenticity Usual task required in the subject “Educational Psychology and attending diversity”, from the Graduate level of Teacher Education, at the University of Barcelona.

Groups Four groups of four or three students (15 students altogether)

Duration Five weeks


Introduction:Operational conditions

Communicative conditions

Asynchronous written communication

Technological support Forum from Moodle

Spaces Postings in forum, and Microsoft word documents attached to the postings


Introduction

Task

StudentsTeacher

Interactivity

Discourse

Operational conditions

Collaborative writing

Asynchronous written communication

Conversational discourse

Non conversational discourse


Interaction by Conversational discourse

Student 1: Marga, I don’t think that attending diversity would refer to what all

students with special needs have in common with other students,

but to which needs has each student in order to help him.

Student 2: What I tried to say is that differences between students have to be

minimized and that in the classroom the characteristics that all

students share have to be fostered, but that doesn’t mean that diversity

is not attended. Only that in the classroom similarities have to be

fostered, not the aspects that make students different.


Interaction by Non conversational discourse

Student 1Student 2

During the first half of the 20th century (Time ago) the school performance of a child was considered (thought) to be dependent just on her innate capabilities, grounded thus on an inborn conception. By the decade of 1940s and 50s a change in this conception began, and so external factors were also considered as a cause explaining the lack of learning of some capabilities. Currently, environmental theories not only consider but show as determining learning (take many other factors into account) factors, external to the child herself: the environment, the society, the family and, obviously, the school. The kind of influence that the educational center has on the child is determined by variables such as the kind of school, its focus, and the educators’ attitudes.

Time ago the school performance of a child was thought to be dependent just on her innate But currently environmental theories take many other factors into account: the environment, the society, the family and obviously, the school. The kind of influence that the educational center has on the child is determined by variables such as the kind of school, its focus, and the educators’ attitudes.

capabilities.


Interaction by Conversational and Non conversational discourse



Prospectivity Demand/Give/Feedback Give

Agency Individual Collective

Subjectivity Personal Impersonal

Units of meaning One participant Two or more participants

Main localization Forum postings Attached documents


Questions

• What do the participants do by means of one or the other kind of discourse?

• How do the participants manage either kind of discourse?

• How are the two kinds of discourse connected in the interactivity?

• How does the interactivity pass from one kind of discourse to the other?

• Why does the change of discourse happen?


Methodology

• Educational influence as Teaching presence – Three subdimensions were considered

• Help led to task structure• Help led to collaboration structure• Help led to negotiation of meaning

• Interactivity as negotiation of meanings (Cognitive presence)– Five categories were considered

• Adding information• Reformulating• Characterizing• Explaining• Theorizing

Coll et al., 2007; Garrison et al., 2000; Gunawardena et al., 1997; Järvela & Hakkinen, 2000, 2002; Rochera et al., 2007; Schrire, 2006


Methodology

• Unit of analysis– Chain: a topic progression consisting of at least three thematically

related contributions of at least two different individuals in a back and forth communication sequence.

• Topics categories

– Five categories were identified from data:

• Conception of diversity

• Situations of educational assistance

• Attending diversity

• Educational needs

• Intermedium point


Results

Negotiation of meanings

Non conversational discourse combined with conversational discourse



Results: Negotiation of meanings


negotiation about the aspects

that have to be considered


Two patterns of combination between Non conversational and Conversational discourse :

Pattern 1:

Negotiation of the meanings of its aspects

Pattern 2:



Hard disagreement

Negotiation of the disagreement





Negotiation by modification

Non Conversational discourse:

Two kinds of negotiation

Negotiation by integration-disintegration

During the first half of the 20th century (Time ago) the school performance of a child was considered (thought) to be dependent just on her innate capabilities, grounded thus on an inborn conception. By the decade of 1940s and 50s a change in this conception began, and so external factors were also considered as a cause explaining the lack of learning of some capabilities. Currently, environmental theories not only consider but show as determining learning (take many other factors into account) factors, external to the child herself: the environment, the society, the family and, obviously, the school. The kind of influence that the educational center has on the child is determined by variables such as the kind of school, its focus, and the educators’ attitudes.

Time ago the school performance of a child was thought to be dependent just on her innate But currently environmental theories take many other factors into account: the environment, the society, the family and obviously, the school. The kind of influence that the educational center has on the child is determined by variables such as the kind of school, its focus, and the educators’ attitudes.

capabilities.



Two patterns of negotiation by modification

Pattern 1

Initial proposal Negotiation by modification

Pattern 2

Initial proposal 1 + (negotiation)

Initial proposal 2 + (negotiation)Integrative proposal + (negotiation)



Negotiation by modification Negotiation by integration-disintegration






Student 1: Student 2:

We have identified three messures of attending to pupils’ diversity in the film “Être et Avoir”, and after analising it we have related them with the theoretical referent of an interactionist conception, which is in which we can develop more the most relevant aspects of educational assitance that we are going to explain next:

1. each student of the class, helping and commenting the activity process

2.The oldest pupils take dictations in classroom

3.All the youngest pupils draw, but Jojo has some trouble with it

They write “MUM”

On a sheet, individually, the students that are at the table write the word mum. It seems that they have done it just a few times, but they seem to know the consonants and vocals of this word.

At this moment that teacher is using the blackboard, different levels of learning are observed. Although the teacher does one and the same activity for all pupils, he enables methodological adaptations, what allows the pupils to participate in a shared activity.

They write Mum:

They write number 7:






Student 1: Student 2:

On a sheet, individually, the students that are at the table write the word mum. It seems that they have done it just a few times, but they seem to know the consonants and vocals of this word.

At this moment that teacher is using the blackboard, different levels of learning are observed. Although the teacher does one and the same activity for all pupils, he enables methodological adaptations, what allows the pupils to participate in a shared activity.

They write Mum:

write number 7:

In the documentary film “Être et Avoir” there is no child with special educational needs, but we can appreciate some educational situations where the teacher attends the individual differences adjusting assitance to the needs of each pupil [...]-When the teacher talks with the two pupils that had fought: There is a situation where two pupils fight and the teacher lets them reflect and be aware of what they have done wrongly [...]

NÚRIA J. LÓPEZ Analysis – on the blackboard: This situation has points in common with the situation before regarding the kind of assitance that the teacher offers to the pupils. Everything begins with a scene where different levels of learning are observed and the teacher proposes to write number 7 on the blackboard.

They

When pupils write number 7

:This situation has points in common with the situation before regarding the kind of assistance that the teacher offers to the pupils. The teacher presents the activity of writting the number 7 on the blackboard and the pupils, individually, more or less manage to carry it out succesfully, even the youngest pupils of the group.



Pattern:

Proposal 1Proposal 2 that integrates or desintegrates proposal 1

Proposal 3 that integrates or desintegrates proposal 2





Conclusions

– The negotiation of meanings in a task of collaborative writing by asynchronous written communication takes place by means of an interweaving of conversational and non conversational discourse.

– When pedagogically designing this kind of tasks it is necessary to enable spaces where these to kinds of discourse are possible and where connections between them are easy.

– When analysing this kind of tasks from the join activity point of view, these two kinds of discourse and its interrelations have to be considered.


Next directions

– An improvement of analytical scheme is needed in order to be able to understand in more detail the connections between what all participants do in each kind of discourse.

– Analysing this kind of task with the support of other technological supports: wiki environments.

– Analysing this kind of task in other operational conditions is also needed: face-to-face and synchronous written communication.


THANK YOU VERY MUCH

T.Mauri, M.Clarà, A.Remesal & R.Colomina

GRINTIEUniversity of Barcelona

Interaction in collaborative texts constructed in an asynchronous written communication environment


BibliographyColl, C., Bustos, A. & Engel, A. (2007) Patterns of participation and teaching presence in an asynchronous learning

network: connecting structural and content analysis. In Simposium: Promoting knowledge construction in different online learning scenarios in Higher Education. 12 th European Conference for research on learning and instruction -EARLI. Budapest (Hungary).

Coll, C, Onrubia, J. & Mauri, T. (2008). Ayudar a aprender en contextos educativos: el ejercicio de la influencia educativa y el análisis de la enseñanza. Revista de Educación, 364, 33-70.

Garrison, D.R., Anderson, T. & Archer, W. (2000). Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education. Internet and Higher Education, 2(2-3), 87-105.

Gunawardena, C., Lowe, C. & Anderson, T. (1997). Analysis of a global on-line debate and the development of an interaction analysis model for examining social construction of knowledge in computer conferencing. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 17(4), 395-429.

Järvelä, S. & Häkkinen, P. (2000). Levels of Web-Based Discussion: Theory of Perspective-Taking as a Tool for Analyzing Interaction. Forth International Conference of the Learning Sciences (pp.22-26). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Järvelä, S. & Häkkinen, P. (2002). Web-based Cases in Teaching and Learning –the Quality of Discussions and a Stage of Perspective Taking in Asynchronous Communication. Interactive Learning Environments, 10 (1), 1-22.

Rochera, M.J., Mauri, T., Onrubia, J. & De Gispert, I. (2007).The potential of online discussions for effective learning. Combining individual and social perspectives to study cognitive presence. In Simposium: Promoting knowledge construction in different online learning scenarios in Higher Education. 12 th European Conference for research on learning and instruction-EARLI. Budapest (Hungary).

Schrire, S. (2006). Knowledge building in asynchronous discussion groups: Going beyond quantitative analysis. Computers & Education, 46, 49-70.


Appendix:Other results


Results


Non conversational discourse combined with conversational discourse



Results: Conversational discourse out of negotiation

• 8 functions identified regarding the negotiation of meanings:• as extension of typographical marks • to remember the task demands• to ask specific doubts about negotiation • to prevent or to justify a hard change in the text.• to plan the next development of text• to ask for help about how to negotiate meanings in non

conversational discourse• to establish the rules of the negotiation• to present what one has done in its negotiation



1- Conversational discourse as extension of typographical indications

(This [paragraf] is the same than the one before, but inverted because is more understandable, I think)

(changed place) [the paragraf]



2- Conversational discourse to remember the task demands

(Conclusion 1: about the main role of school regarding the

differences. I don’t think that we have to repeat everything

about what the differences are.)



3- Conversational discourse to ask specific doubts about negotiation

[in order to show satisfaction for the activity](I don’t understand)

Another interesting situation to analyze is when Jojo, one of the pupils, is in class drawing a picture of a fish (Was it a fish or a tree?)



4- Conversational discourse to prevent or to justify a hard change in the text

I wouldn’t put this paragraph because I think that it’s already clear with

what you have put before... What do you think?

[Cooperation between parents and teachers in order to their children

to improve in their development, out and inside school] (I would skip

this sentence because it’s twice there)



5- Conversational discourse to plan the next development of text

(Here I would put the list of situations that we have found)

(What do you think if we put the definition of Special Educational

Needs from reflection in order to introduce this term?)



6- Conversational discourse to ask for help about how to negotiate meanings in non conversational discourse

(I don’t know how to say it, so that affectivity and emotional and relational

development would be included)



7- Conversational discourse to establish the rules of the negotiation

Ha!! The first day I chose for the blue colour, I say it in order to

avoiding confusions, hahaha. Anyway if somebody wants to use

this colour as well, you can do it with italics, ok?



8- Conversational discourse to present what one has done in its negotiation

I have done two of the measures of attending in order for you to see

them, plus I want to say that I wanted to send it yesterday, but I hadn’t

internet at home, you already know my situation with internet, what’s a

shame, but...

Here I leave them and you will say something, won’t you?


Results: units of topic

Group Amount of units of topic

Non Conversacional Discourse

Conversational Discurse

Total %

G1 27 13 40 67% - 33%

G4 10 11 21 48% - 52%

G7 26 (2 errors) 14 40 65% - 35%

G8 19 12 31 61% - 39%


Results: units of topic

Group Amount of units of topic that are part of a chain

Non Conversacional

Discourse

Conversacional Discourse

Total %

G1 8 2 10 (25% of 40) 80% - 20%

G4 3 4 7 (33% of 21) 43% - 57%

G7 23 10 33 (82% of 40) 70% - 30%

G8 6 8 14 (45% of 31) 43% - 57%


Results: chainsChains Contributions in

Non Conv.Contributions in Conv.

Pattern of Non conversational negotiation

Pattern of combination Conv-NonConv

G1 Conception of diversity

5 1 By modification (1) Pattern 2 (hard desagreement)

Situations of educational assistance

3 3 By modification (1) Pattern 1

G4 Situations of educational help

4 6 By modification (1) Pattern 1 (6)

G7 Situations of educational assistance

6 5 By modification + By modification

Pattern 1 (3+1)Pattern 2 (1+0)

Attending diversity 10 6 By modification (2) 3 Pattern 2 (2+2+1)Pattern 1 (1)

Diversity of pupils 3 0 By modification (2)

Educational needs 5 2 By modification (1) Pattern 2 (2)

Intermedium point (from educational situations)

0 3 Pattern 2 (3)

G8 Attending diversity 2 1 (By modification (1)) Pattern 2 (1)

Situations of educational assistance

4 8 By Integration-Disintigration

2 Pattern 2 (1+2)Pattern 1 (5)

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