Learning about Online Learning: How Do Students Use Interactive Web-Based Materials?

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Learning about Online Learning How Do Students
Use Interactive Web-Based Materials?

• Jack Bookman, David Malone,
• Lawrence Moore, David Smith
• Duke University

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Web-Based Interactive Materials The Connected
Curriculum Project
http//www.math.duke.edu/education/ccp/

• Materials for labs and projects
• Web pages with text, hyperlinks, graphics, Java
  applets, problems
• Downloadable CAS files in which students respond
  to challenges, control the interaction, write a
  report

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Transmission Myth

• Knowledge can be transmitted from knower to
  learner.

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Classroom reality Constructing knowledge
together
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Classroom reality Constructing knowledge
together
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Constructivist Perspective

• a self-regulated process of resolving inner
  cognitive conflicts that often become apparent
  through concrete experience, collaborative
  discourse, and reflection
• Fosnot, J. Res. Sci. Ed. 1993

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Constructivist Perspective

• ... constructivism has more relevance in
  education today because the dawn of the
  Information Age has rapidly increased the amount
  of, and accessibility to, information.
• scarcity of studies of how students learn in this
  environment
• Portela, Ed. Media International 1999

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Experimental Setup
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Experimental Setup
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Methodology

• Glaser and Strauss (1967) grounded theory, the
  discovery of theory from data systematically
  obtained from social research.
• contrast with theory generated by logical
  deduction from a priori assumptions.
• Romberg (1992) clinical observations, what
  one observes shifts from predetermined
  categories to new categories, depending upon
  initial observations.

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Categories of Research Questions

• The role of the instructor
• The role of the developer
• Types of behavior and thinking processes as
  students work
• Importance of self-monitoring, metacognition
• Opportunities and obstacles raised by the
  technology itself

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Role of the Instructor

• When/how to intervene, support, guide
• Whether to assign roles to students
• How to structure lesson so no one student takes
  over a group
• How to encourage discrimination between problems
  with tools and with concepts
• How to facilitate dialogue

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Role of the Developer

• How to get students to reflect on quality of
  interactions
• How to build in interdependence, shared
  responsibility
• How to encourage self-monitoring and metacognition

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What Students Do

• Choice of tools (paper, calculator, CAS) how,
  when, why?
• Assuming roles who decides?
• When and why do students use links?
• Online/offline help cognition, metacognition
• Productive dialogue environment or content?

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Self-monitoring Metacognition

• Time management reflection, guessing/checking,
  calculating
• Learning to check reasonableness, accuracy
• Determining whether discrepancies are due to
  mathematical or technical errors

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Technology Problems and Opportunities

• Learning nuances of software
• Hardware/software interactions how
  students/teachers react to problems
• Avoiding time-consuming calculations
• Growing technical sophistication of new college
  students

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Forthcoming Paper
The Nature of Learning in Interactive
Technological Environments A Proposal for a
Research Agenda Based on Grounded Theory Jack
Bookman and David Malone Duke University