Relating CSCW to CSCL

Relating CSCW to CSCL Anders Mørch TOOL 5100, 09.02.06

Outline • What is CSCL • Historical development • Collaborative learning • Computer as a “mediating artifact” • Commonalities in CSCW and CSCL • Disagreements between the two fields, where and how they diverge

What is CSCL • CSCL: Computer Supported Collaborative Learning • A field concerned with collaborative learning and how it can be supported by computers • The role of technology as “mediating artifact”, i.e. mediation becomes a key concern • It has been compared to the role of language in conventional education (citing Vygotsky)

Bannon’s deconstruction of CSCL • L: What do people mean by Learning? • CL: What do people mean by Collaborative Learning? • SCL: What do people mean by Support for Collaborative Learning? • CSCL: What do people mean by Computer Support for Collaborative Learning?

Collaborative Learning • Involves 2 or more participants • Usually 2 or more students, but can also be one teacher and one student • An goal of CL is to reach a learning objective or take part in in a knowledge creation process that exceeds the sum of what the individuals can achieve on their own • In a good collaborative learning process the learner takes advantage of the “asymmetry” between own and others’ skill level

Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) • ZPD is a concept introduced by the Soviet scholar and psychologist Lev Vygotsky (1978) • It states that learning should occur in the “zone” between one’s actual development and potential developed when guided by more capable peers • How to scaffold this with computer support in the context of a collaborative learning session is a shared concern in CSCL research

Pitfalls of collaborative learning • Collaborative learning have been criticized as having similar problems to those identified in problem-based learning and cased-based instruction (where learners work in groups) • The problem of lurkers (free passengers) • The complexity of modeling real situations • Reaching closure and scaling up • Process becomes more important than outcome • Many of these issues have been addressed by improvements to CSCL and integration or alignment with related fields (CSCW, Instructional design, etc.)

Factors important to CL • The nature of the collaborative task: e.g. physics problem solving vs. editing a school newspaper • The nature of collaborators (peer, teacher-student, student-computer, etc.) • The unit of analysis (individual, activity, group, classroom) • The number of collaborators • The previous relationship between collaborators • The motivation of collaborators • The setting of collaboration: classroom, workplace, home • The time period of collaboration: from minutes to years

The role of the computer • Artifact mediation is the primary role of the computer in CSCL according to Bannon • This is different from the role the computer has had in previous approaches to educational technology: • Intelligent tutoring systems (acquisition) • Micro-worlds (simulation) • Computer-mediated communication (social interaction) • As a mediating artifact the computer may be used as an ordinary tool or even language (a resource for CL); it can therefore also be used in the above roles • In other ways the computer is not the limiting component of a CSCL environment

Role of the computer, cont’d • Among the technologies Bannon mentions many of them are today taken for granted, such as email and local area networks • The most interesting technology platform for CSCL today is arguable the world-wide web (referred to as hypermedia in Bannon’s article) • Related to this is knowledge management (referred to as “community memory” by Bannon) • A technology not mentioned by Bannon, for obvious reasons, is mobile CSCL (handheld devices in education)

Commonalities of CSCW and CSCL • Schmidt makes a comparison between CSCW and CSCL • He uses the term “Cooperative learning” instead of “Collaborative learning” when referring to CSCL • However, cooperative learning is different from CSCL, originally not connected with computer support at all, and older than CSCL (we come back to this later in the course)

Learning in cooperative work • Learning and working must goes hand in hand when work is complex (problems and goals may need to be questioned and solution approaches may need discussing, and evolving practices requires updating) • Learning and working when work requires “learning on demand” (i.e. learning takes place when the knowledge needed to solve a problem or accomplish a task exceeds what is currently known) • Many of the conceptual frameworks for studying workplace learning takes this for granted, but without going into the details of how it is actually carried out

Cooperative work in learning • Problem-based learning and project-oriented group work (associated with CSCL settings) requires, at least rudimentary, skills in working with others • Both CSCW and CSCL are concerned with the identifying the positive effects of group work, i.e. what are the factors to be stimulated in order to make a group be more than the sum of its individuals • Classrooms and workplaces tend to be organized along similar models defined by the society they are part of, whether it be the large hall (i.e. the “old classroom”) or the (theme-based) office of the future (like many current classrooms)

Diverging concerns • CSCW is computer support for experts working in teams rather than for novices learning together • This is related to “memberships” in communities of practice (e.g. central or peripheral members) • CSCW is more about “business” and common goals, whereas CSCL is more about process of reaching a goal (and reflecting on it along the way) and identifying learning experiences

Diverging concerns, cont’d • In CSCW mutual help is taken for granted and as result cooperating teams have members with a great deal of shared knowledge of the application domain and the task to complete • Domain specific applications dominate in CSCW, whereas in CSCL generic ones dominate (this can be seen analogous to speech in ordinary language vs. profession-oriented languages) • The need for coordination support is often more articulated in CSCW and can therefore be more tightly integrated into the computer system • This can explain the keen interest in awareness mechanisms in CSCW and pedagogical agents and scripts for CSCL • Soft rule (loose coupling) vs. hard rules (tight coupling)

Where the distinction breaks down • Many aspects of CSCL are better modeled by specialized practices rather than generic ones (e.g. scientific discourse, argumentation) • In heterogeneous work teams there is an asymmetry of knowledge between participants, meaning an expert in one domain may be a novice in another, • The same blurred distinction in education: a novice in the learning environment may be an expert in a related area (e.g. using computers, his/her hobbies)

An open issue • Schmidt identifies socialization as a bottleneck to Internet-based (distance) education , he believes it is not reachable by the current generation of virtual universities • Do you agree that this is the factor impeding distance education institutions to further progress, or are there other factors that needs to be taken into account as well? • Hint: Think of ways for “socialization” to be redefined for the network society so that it better aligns with the needs of distance learners, the technological possibilities they may have at their disposal, and the practices that can be expected to be adopted in the near future

Relating CSCW to CSCL