Multidisciplinary, Crosscultural Collaboration

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Multi-disciplinary, Cross-cultural Collaboration

• A pilot project between Staffordshire University
  (UK) and Purdue University

Scott Schaffer, Educational Technology
sschaff_at_purdue.edu
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The Participants

• Staffordshire University
• Multimedia Design
• Graphic Design (primarily Flash)
• Students have similar interests and backgrounds -
  cohort
• Online course
• Hybrid of Computing, Art Design

• Purdue University
• Computer-assisted Learning (EDCI 561)
• Instructional Design focus (Dreamweaver)
• Wide variety of student a mixed bag
• F2F Course
• Introductory course

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Work on common problems

• Both settings have a multimedia product as the
  end goal so students should experience similar
  problems/challenges

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Talk about design issues

• Facilitate deep discussion (strategic thinking)
  about design process issues.
• Recognize issues, goals, and constraints

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Create a sense of community

• Gain a mutual appreciation for one anothers
  professional design perspectives through
  interaction, collaboration, and shared experiences

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Theoretical Perspectives

• Performance-based skills
• Conceptual understanding
• Understand problem from multiple perspectives
• Understand goals and constraints of other
  disciplines
• Understand impact of constraints, workarounds
• Situative Learning
• Participation in community
• Thinking strategies

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What can we do to stimulate more design thinking
and interaction across disciplines?
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Research Method

• Pilot study
• Random group assignment 6 groups
• Structured/Non-structured groups
• Focus on project critique

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Design Task

• Provide critiques of one anothers prototype
• Purdue in the role of pedagogical consultant
• Staffordshire in the role of techie

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Assessment of Learner Satisfaction

• Logistics
• Experience
• Perceived Effectiveness

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Assessment of Cross-Disciplinary Learning

• Islands of knowledge the student masters his/her
  discipline, but does not have experience in other
  disciplines.

• Awareness the student is aware of the other
  disciplines goals and constraints.

• Appreciation the student begins to build a
  conceptual framework of the other disciplines, is
  interested to understand and support the other
  disciplines' goals and concepts, and knows what
  questions to ask.

• Understanding the student develops a conceptual
  understanding of the other disciplines, can
  negotiate, is proactive in discussions with
  participants from the other disciplines, provides
  input before the input is requested, and begins
  to use the language of other disciplines.

Fruchter, R. Emery, K. (1999). Proceedings of
the Computer Support for Collaborative Learning
(CSCL) 1999 Conference, C. Hoadley J. Roschelle
(Eds.) Dec. 12-15, Stanford University, Palo
Alto, California. Mahwah, NJ Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates.
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Learner Satisfaction

• High levels of agreement with these statements
• Tutor intervention was sufficient
• Posting ideas was not an intimidating experience
• There were some memberscontributions I regarded
  as more valuable than others
• The online group discussions would have benefited
  from more tutor-led questions
• Working with students with a different
  educational and cultural background was a
  beneficial experience
• I gave little or no thought to the fact that
  severalwere from another university or country
• Overall, I enjoyed the experience of the online
  groups

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Learner Satisfaction

• Moderate to High levels of Disagreement
• I would like to repeat this learning
  experiencein another class module
• Anonymitygave me confidence to say what I really
  thought
• Happier seeking advice online vs. face-to-face
• It helped me express myself more effectively
• Online sessions more valuable than F2F sessions
  (75)
• My course grade will be better as a result of
  participating in online groups

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Cross-Disciplinary Learning the good news

• 33 of students reached Appreciation stage
• Two of three structured groups asked more
  questions of one another and appeared to
  understand perspectives

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Cross-Disciplinary Learning the bad news

• Less than ½ of students made it to Appreciation
  stage all were in structured groups
• Most struggled with mastery of their own
  discipline Islands of Knowledge
• None of the unstructured groups reached
  Awareness level
• what can we possibly tell them about design?
  common ET student refrain
• show us some prototypes common graphics student
  refrain

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Conclusions

• Appealing to highly motivated students
• Intrinsic value of cross-disciplinary
  collaboration not enough to push unmotivated
  students to Awareness
• Problem space (task) not defined well enough for
  groups
• Time frame too short to achieve Appreciation
  level or develop sense of community
• Maturity of projects diverged greatly

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Lessons Learned

• Match learning environment and expertise levels
  of students across disciplines
• Create several mini-projects/problems for
  students to solve collaboratively
• Provide synchronous communication options
• Provide mentor models to demonstrate effective
  cross-disciplinary collaboration in action

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Future projects

• Integrated final project between Educational
  Technology, Computer Graphics, and Software
  Engineering students at Purdue
• Integrated final project between same groups of
  students across 2 or 3 universities