Rapid and flexible collaborative knowledge construction with GroupScribbles

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Rapid and flexible collaborative knowledge
construction with GroupScribbles
UNIVERSITY OF VALLADOLID GSIC/EMIC http//gsic.tel
.uva.es
Yannis Dimitriadis Professor of Telematics
Engineering bright side (but having already
crossed the line to the dark side) Group of
Intelligent and Cooperative Systems
(GSIC) /Education, Media, Information and Culture
(EMIC) Lyón, September 28th, 2009
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Summary

• Int. research work on GroupScribbles (GS) as a
  vehicle
• Reflect on lightweight, flexible coordination
  that may allow rapid collaborative knowledge
  building (RCKB) in wireless classes
• Discuss main design principles and tensions
  through some experiences (mainly at GSIC)
• Understand improvisation (flexibility-adaptation)
  during enactment
• Advance towards class orchestration (effective
  design routines-principles)
• Study adoption (teacher models - tools
  affordances)
• Reflect on the interdisciplinary research issues

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Presenting GS

• GroupScribbles (GS)
• http//groupscribbles.sri.com/
• Interesting, provocative design principles
• vehicle for research and experimentation in real
  classes

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Some RCKB recommendations

• Some recommendations for Rapid Collaborative
  Knowledge Building (RCKB) (Ng, Patton Looi,
  2009) based on principles by (Scardamalia, 2002)
• (1) Make everybody think, as individuals and in
  teams
• (2) Class accepts new ideas, and constantly
  improves ideas
• (3) Explore many ideas, and from many different
  angles
• (4) Students take initiative for their own
  learning
• (5) Everybody participates actively and
  contributes knowledge
• (6) Students organize their ideas and are
  self-reflective
• But how do we implement some recommendations?
• Are they accepted as general ideas or do they
  produce design tensions?

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And some GS design decisions (I)

• Write, type, draw
• Multimodal expression
• Arrange, sort and categorize using graphic
  organizers on background picture
• Higher-order thinking
• Private boards
• Democratized knowledge
• Public boards
• Symmetric knowledge advancement
• Easy creation of boards, data flow among boards
• Focus change on different topics and eventual
  work in flexible small groups

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And some GS design decisions (II)

• Intentional lightweight nature
• Participation can be spontaneous
• Sheets can be overlaid or annotated
• Ideas are improvable
• Sheets are improved not replaced
• Integrity of the original idea preserved
• Pieces of work are offered and students can take
  the tokens
• Volunteerism is promoted
• Choose work from public board, take it to private
  board, return the result to public board
• Learners take charge of their learning and
  actively engage one another
• Post-its
• Known metaphors that can be combined with
  physical artifacts

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The GS Community

• Menlo Park, USA, SRI Workshop July 2006
• Rhodes, Greece, CSCL Workshop June 2009
• http//butterfly.ctl.sri.com/scribbleprov/workshop
  s/CSCL-2009/
• Ethnographic studies (Singapore)
• Connection with LMS (Taiwan)
• Learning Design Editor (Nottingham)
• Patterns, Scripts (Spain)
• Improvisation, Flexibility (SRI, Spain)

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GroupScribbles_at_GSIC

• Study the design tension of
• Scripted technology-mediated collaboration vs.
  creative social coordination
• Analyze the definitions and relations among
• flexibility, adaptation, improvisation
• in design and enactment (orchestration) of CSCL
  activities
• within a Computer Integrated Class (CiC)
• Study adoption of GS in K-12 classes and propose
  remedial actions
• Analyze the relation between the KGB (Knowledge
  Goal Belief) teacher model and the GS affordances

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GS_at_UVA (2006-2007)
Script based on Jigsaw and Pyramid CLFP
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GS_at_K-12 (2007-2008)

• Quintanilla, Castrejón K-12 Primary Schools

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GS_at_K-12 (2007-2008)
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More GS_at_K-12 (2008-2009)

• Cigales K-12 Primary School

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Some notes on methodology
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More GS_at_K-12 (2008-2009)
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GS at school (Ana Marta)

• Example 1 Ana and Marta
• Tandem work for designing activities
• Novice teachers
• No prior experience in CSCL patterns or tools
• They like to be in control of the class
• Video

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GS at school (Raquel)

• Example 2 Raquel
• Background as kindergarten teacher
• Experienced (30) teacher
• Used to elaborate her own materials
• Favored collaborative work
• Creative, inquisitive, open minded
• VIDEO

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A look at the design process

1. Educational goals
2. Resources to use
3. Flow of tasks
4. Flow of groups
5. Set up in the tools

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Orchestration Multi-modal, multi-tool enactment
(planned and improvised)
Planned
Improv
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Routines and patterns

• Teacher improvisation is not free, but
  pattern-based
• Improvisation as mixing and matching internalized
  patterns
• Well-known in literature (about teaching, jazz)
• Improvised part is similar to one of the design
  patterns encountered

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What teachers think of improvisation?

• Some current conceptions drawn from interviews
  with teachers
• Improvisation occurs when technology fails
• necessary evil
• Improvisation as a symptom of insufficient lesson
  planning
• rejected
• Small-scale improvisations, normally as an
  adaptation mechanism to student unexpected
  reactions
• accepted

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What are teachers beliefs on improvisation,
flexibility, adaptation?

• Teachers do NOT want to improvise, they prefer
  good preparation.
• However, lack of time is an important limitation

T Y tienes 50 tareas pendientes también ... Y
Es una locura. No damos abasto. ... P Lo que
pasa es que cuando llegas aquí, pues yo creo, al
menos por experiencia propia que faltan tiempos y
espacios para poner en común todo esto
T Yo creo, desde mi punto de vista, que todos la
hemos proba- do (la improvisación) y visto el mal
resultado, pocas ganas te quedan.
Z no como una improvisación, porque yo entiendo
que con niños pequeños no puedes venir a la ...
aunque estés muy bien prepara- da como maestra,
aunque sepas muchas cosas, yo entiendo
que dejarlo todo a la improvisación no puede ser
X Con los niños no puede haber improvisación

• Small-scale improvisation is common (and it is OK)

Z ... Si en el transcurso de la explicación, o
de la actividad surge una cosa que para los niños
es importante, pues deriva por ahí la cuestión y
resuelvo lo que les puede interesar. S O sea,
improvisas cuando hay una situación en
clase... Z ... que me indica que debo de variar
lo que yo tenía previsto, por parte de los niños.
Porque muchas veces tienes una idea de lo que
quieres explicar, de cómo lo vas a explicar, y
los niños tienen otro interrogante
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Observations on improvisation

• In fact, little improvisation was observed
• Two kinds of improvisation
• Due to errors in the design or unexpected
  occurrences
• Improvisation as real-time re-design
• Improvisation embedded in the plans of teachers
• Contingency
• having a tool that allows for improvisation is
  not enough
• even having lots of ICT is not enough
• or even the support of the school principal is
  not enough
• But disciplined improvisation is enabled
• when teachers understand well the affordances of
  the tools and the routines-patterns that can be
  used mixed enacted when needed

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Improvisation as real-time design

• Improvisation as real-time design
• Appears in literature about musical improvisation

• Importance of GS affordances
• No difference between enacting and designing
• Designing CSCL activities is fast and easy
• Some routines and patterns can be easily adopted
• Tool is based on well-known metaphors (e.g.
  Post-it)
• So probably, can we think of fostering such a
  real-time design through
• Training and social sharing
• Providing useful sets of patterns and routines
• Or even implementing the help in tools (see also
  Collage)
• Or even build on orchestration of tools and
  modality affordances

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And an overview
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And what about teacher models?
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KGB vs. tools affordances (ChenLooi, 2009)
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Some open questions

• What is the role of teacher improvisation in
  CSCL?
• How can we understand and support teacher
  disciplined and informed improvisation?
• How GS or similar agile collaboration tools can
  contribute to more creative and effective
  collaborative TEL classes?
• Can we advance towards flexible and seamless
  classroom orchestration of lightweight
  tools/resources?
• How can we empower teachers taking into account
  the Knowledge-Beliefs-Goals model?
• Need to study and share findings about these
  tensions in communities of researchers and
  practitioners

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And some recommendations

• Recommendations for (flexible) CSCL enactment
  tools
• Allow real-time mixing of patterns
• Make enactment similar to design
• Make design fast and easy (as opposed to
  exhaustive and complete)
• Patterns should also be internalized by teachers
  (only a few)
• Take into account intrinsic factors of teachers
  (knowledge, goals, beliefs, emotional attitudes)
• Design for integration into the classroom
  ecosystem (symbioses)?
• Do not forget the student! One size does not fit
  all

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Acknowledgements and contacts

• GSIC
• Luis Pablo Prieto lprisan_at_gsic.uva.es
  (Engineering, PhD student)
• Sara Villagrá sarena_at_pdg.uva.es (Education, PhD
  Student)
• Dr. Rocío Anguita rocioan_at_pdg.uva.es (Education,
  Assoc. Prof.)
• Dr. Alejandra Martinez amartine_at_ulises.tel.uva.es
  (Eng., Assis. Prof.)
• Dr. Iván Jorrín ivanjo_at_pdg.uva.es (Education,
  Assis. Prof.)
• GS community
• SRI International (Jeremy, Patti, John, Charlie,
  Chris, ), Virginia Tech (Deborah),
  Newport-Alabama (Raj), Singapore National
  Institute of Education (Chee-Kit, Weinlin),
  Taiwan (Robin), Nottingham (Jitti, Mike), Univ.
  Pontificia de Chile (Camila, Miguel) etc.
• Teachers and students
• especially at Cigales, Quintanilla, Castrejón,