2011
Duration:
2 years
Organisation:
University of Otago
Sector:
School
sector
Project start date:
January 2012
Project end date:
June 2014
Principal investigator(s):
Dr. Kwok-Wing Lai
Research team members:
Ann Trewern, University of Otago; Ken Pullar,
OtagoNet
Research partners:
Darren Sudlow, CantaNet; Joel Dodd, TaraNet/Coastal
Taranaki School; Trevor Storr, CantaNet/Waimate High School; Conor Bolton,
Volcanics; Carolyn Bennett, FarNet; Pauline Meinung, DunedinNet/Kavanagh
College; Sharon Kelly, OtagoNet/Fiordland College; Madeline Campbell,
WestNet/Westland High School; Tamara Yuill Proctor, GCSN/Avonside Girls School;
Leeana Duncan, Bayfield High School
Project Description
In
2012-2013 sixteen senior secondary classes participated in this study, with
eight of them being distance classes. Approximately 220 Year 11-13 students and
8 teachers took part in this study.
Aims
This
project aimed at designing and evaluating a computer-supported knowledge
building community in senior secondary classes. We would like to find out:
·
The roles of teachers and the
strategies they used to support students’ advancement of knowledge.
·
The effects of the knowledge building
community on the change of students’ domain knowledge, collaborative learning
skills, skills of learning how to learn, and dispositions as a lifelong
knowledge builder.
·
How to develop a knowledge building
culture in secondary schools.
Information
and communication technology has the potential to support students to acquire
the metacognitive, problem solving, collaborative, and learning how to learn
skills that are required to work with and create knowledge in the knowledge
society. One of the very few of the technology-supported learning environments
that is based on a well-designed pedagogical model is knowledge building
communities. The goal of knowledge building is “the production and continual
improvement of ideas of value to a community” (Scardamalia & Bereiter,
2003, p.1370) and is based on the premise that all students can create
authentic knowledge work and advance communal knowledge in their classes,
similar to what research and science communities do. In a knowledge building
community, students use Knowledge Forum, a Web-based networking software system
designed to support knowledge building discussions with a set of scaffolding
tools. Knowledge building communities have been systematically researched
internationally and have demonstrated success in enhancing students’ knowledge
building competency.
Why is this research important?
New
Zealand is shifting from an industrial society to a knowledge society and there
is an urgent need to develop young people’s competency to work creatively and
innovatively with knowledge. This research has generated evidence of how this
could be effectively done in secondary schools.
Data
Teachers
used the knowledge building principles and Knowledge Forum to teach selected
topics. Data were collected from:
·
Class and online observations.
·
Online discussion notes and student
portfolios
·
Teachers and students interviews.
·
Student questionnaires
·
Participation data.
·
The SPOCK instrument developed by
Shell et al (2005) - data on collaborative learning, knowledge building,
self-regulation and questioning
Analysis
Content
analysis on the discussion notes, document analysis, thematic analysis of the
interview transcripts, and statistical analyses on the student questionnaires
and SPOCK data were conducted.
Project Contact
Professor Kwok-Wing Lai
Director, Centre for Distance Education and Learning Technologies
University of Otago College of Education
Email:wing.lai@otago.ac.nz
Director, Centre for Distance Education and Learning Technologies
University of Otago College of Education
Email:wing.lai@otago.ac.nz
·
Lai, K.-W., (2014) Designing knowledge building communities
in secondary schools. - PDF - 798.21
KB
A copy of the PDF document can be found here
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