TeleLearning Network of Centres of Excellence (Canada) Alain Breuleux, McGill University, Ron Owston...

TeleLearning Network of Centres of Excellence (Canada)

Alain Breuleux, McGill University,

Ron Owston (York University),Mary Lamon, M. Scardamalia, & R. Reeve (OISE/UT),

Gaalen Erickson & J. Mitchell (U. of British Columbia),

Robert Bracewell & A. Renaud (McGill University),

Thérèse Laferrière (Laval University)

LEARNING TO TEACH IN THE NETWORKED CLASSROOM THROUGH COLLABORATIVE INQUIRY


The TeleLearning NetworkTeleLearning:

The use of on-line resources and tools for learning purposes


About the TeleLearning•NCE

A Pan-Canadian research network linking researchers and members of the public and private sector communities

80 researchers participating in an integrated national research program merging key developments in the areas of education, social sciences, computing sciences, and engineering

Research projects explore new models of learning, new technologies, socio-economic issues, and pedagogies

Outcomes include software tools, online resources, pedagogical know-how


Theme 1: Learning models

Theme 2: Social and political issues

Theme 3: Technology

Theme 4: K-12

Theme 5: Post-secondary

Theme 6: Workplace

Theme 7: Educating educators -

Research Themes


To share findings and/or representations of emerging practices in networked classrooms,

and to identify promising uses and potential pitfalls

-s

Theme 7: Educating Educators AERA 2001 Interactive symposium


Changing Roles

Deep Understanding

Promising uses, potential pitfalls

Teamwork and Learner Responsibility


• To present the learning-to-teach principles emerging out of functional and collaborative communities of inquiry supported by networked technologies

• To illustrate the work being carried out in teacher preparation and professional development

• To discuss the conditions of, and issues related to computer-supported collaborative inquiry in networked classrooms

Plan


An elementary, secondary or post-secondary classroom in which goals, roles and activities are enhanced by the availability of online resources and tools (more on the one-pager)

The networked classroom

Inquiring into the thoughtful and effective uses of online resources and tools into school and university classrooms

The networked teacher-educator classroom


• A socio-constructivist perspective with an emphasis on participative design & knowledge building

• A design-experiment

• Sites: Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, Quebec City

• Face-to-face and on-line interaction

• The professional development school (PDS) Model

Collaborative inquiry


Objective: To pinpoint upcoming issues related to collaborative inquiry

The networked classroom problematizes the locus of research, which becomes a highly distributed "multi-site", de-localised and digital (dematerialized).

Collaborative research Alain Breuleux, McGill U


A number of issues are raised by the design of networked classes concerning the conduct of inquiry:

• the actors, participants, authors and their roles in the inquiry (different researchers need to pay attention, in a coordinated way, to what is going on in these multiple locations),

• the scope of situations under investigation and their relations to specific places, methods and tools that are adequate for the inquiry.

Collaborative research: Findings


• The networked classroom also improves opportunities for inquiry because of the important text that it makes available (mostly in digital form) from the online productions, web projects, databases, forums, etc.

Collaborative research: Findings


The evaluation of networked classrooms Ron Owston, York U

The GrassRoots

Case Studies


• Initiative of Canada’s SchoolNet• Provides small grants to encourage

collaborative projects• Over 9000 projects have been funded• Primarily oriented at developing students’ ICT

skills -but teacher development is an important outcome too

• More info at http://www.schoolnet.ca/grassroots

The GrassRoots Program


• Conducted in Ontario (2 schools) and Quebec (11 schools) by researchers from York U and U Laval

• Goal was to study how preservice and inservice teachers in selected schools were implementing the GrassRoots programme, with the view to making recommendations to SchoolNet to guide the program’s future development

• Qualitative research methods were employed, which entailed on-site visits, interviewing, questionnaires, and document analysis

Case Studies


Student outcomes

Most commonly reported were outcomes such as:

• increased technical competencies,

• the learning of teamwork and collaboration skills, and

• more positive attitudes toward school in general

Findings


Teacher outcomes

• teachers almost universally reported increased confidence and skill in ICT use and in organizing project-based instruction in their classrooms

• communities of practice and knowledge building in evidence—but this doesn’t happen

spontaneously

Findings cont’d


Findings cont’d

Curriculum

GrassRoots programme was a strong incentive for teachers to apply student-centred approaches to teaching their curriculum

Technical support

Considerable variation in the amount of technical support which was available


Preservice issues

• Frequently teacher candidates were placed with host teachers who had little or no ICT skill

• Candidates formed support networks in some cases

Findings cont’d


Conclusions-Programmatic

Projects such as GrassRoots provide a strongmotivation for classroom teachers to innovate with

• more powerful uses of technology

• become involved in communities of practice

• seek help from those with expertise outside of the school


Conclusions-Methodological

• Multiple data sources and methods essential to evaluate the networked classroom (see Owston & Wideman, 2001)

• The comprehensive delineation of a classroom’s various contexts is a critical step in the evaluation

• Longitudinal studies are essential to answer questions such as what pre-service programs best promote constructivist practice with ICT, how programs can be made sustainable and transferable, etc.


Science student teacher’s collaborative knowledge buildingMary Lamon, OISE/UT, Marlene Scardamalia, OISE/UT, Richard Reeve Institute of child Study Laboratory School of the University of Toronto OISE/UT

Science Student Teachers’ Collaborative Knowledge Building


Purpose

There is a large gap between theory and practice in education. The goal of the courses we have designed and implemented is to bridge this gap.


Theoretical Stance: Knowledge Building

• Students work on authentic problems over a sustained period and are proud of being in charge of their own learning.

• Students learn to identify their own theories and bring them into contact with others’ theories giving multiple perspectives.

• Knowledge transforming discourse is aimed at reworking ideas both in Knowledge Forum® and in face to face dialogue.


Theoretical Stance: Knowledge Building

• Students try to understand how the world works (in science, history, or literature) by producing conceptual artifacts – ideas that represent the best in what the classroom community currently knows and dealing with the messiness of questions that arise daily.

• If pre-service teachers are going to become knowledge-building teachers they too need to create a knowledge-building community. There is a large gap between theory and practice in education. The goal of the courses we have designed and implemented is to bridge this gap.


Implementation

• Successful knowledge building classrooms provide a model for other communities. In this study, our pre-service teachers got ideas about knowledge building through readings, class discussions and virtual visits to knowledge building classrooms and communities. We enlisted an experienced classroom teacher and her grade 5/6 students as a resource.

• Our course “Knowledge Building in Science” is co-taught by a researcher and a teacher to bring these perspectives together.


• Begin with pre-service teachers’ visits to the teacher planning View in a Knowledge Forum® database.

• Establish a dialogue between the classroom teacher and pre-service teachers on curriculum planning.

• Pre-service teachers visit the elementary classroom Knowledge Forum database.

• Use the elementary students’ problems of understanding for pre-service teachers to create their own questions in the same domain.

Implementation


• Use the same kinds of classroom processes used in the elementary classroom in the pre-service class. (Knowledge Forum®, knowledge transforming discourse in whole class settings, establishment of somewhat stable research groups, a reliance on learners to bring in resources)

• Encourage simultaneous knowledge transforming discourse on the scientific problem of understanding and on teaching and learning issues.

Implementation


• Both elementary and pre-service teachers encountered a similar and deep problem of understanding in biogeography

• In both cases, students became deeply involved in finding solutions to the dominant problem of understanding evolution. We are not sure that a consensus emerged but better theories did. (Some elementary students still held on to their Lamarckian theories of evolution.)

What We Found


• For both groups, knowledge transforming discourse occurred both in the class and through Knowledge Forum®. Large messy sets of ideas developed first. Through discourse both in face to face and written dialogue and resources led to a restructuring in the database.

• Pre-service teachers constructed individual portfolios of understanding. Qualitative analyses of their portfolio notes showed that most gained a deepening understanding of knowledge building classrooms.

What We Found


• We did not directly involve pre-service and elementary students in a dialogue together. This could have led to a symmetric knowledge advance for both groups.

• This course is an elective. Follow up data on these teachers that compared them to pre-service teachers who did not take our course would provide more compelling evidence.

• This study occurred at a micro level. I will leave to my colleagues the need for a meso level of analysis of pre-service education. Our course was but one of many that our pre-service teachers were enrolled in.

Limitations of the Study


We have constructed a virtual visit to this pre-service database.

http://kf.oise.utoronto.ca/VirtualTours/


Networked Learning in Nested Communities of PracticeGaalen Erickson & Jane Mitchell, UBC

Context of the CITE Program

The Context The CITE Program


• A cohort of 36 pre-service teachers in a 12 month elementary teacher education program

• A team of 10 teacher educators working in the campus-based components of the program

• A cluster of 7 participating schools and about 44 affiliated school advisors

Network of Three Communities of Practice


Unique Features of CITE

Technology used as a programmatic integrative tool

- Used selected functions of WebCT

- Used public webpage as a primary communicative

tool among communities

- Introduced webpage design and multi-media

authoring tools for presentation and communication


Unique Features of CITE cont’d

Nested communities of practice (with different interests and needs)

- Campus-based pre-service teachers - Campus-based teacher educators- School-based teacher educators


Purpose of Collaborative Inquiry in CITE

To extend community participants’ learning and intellectual engagement through the use of a variety of communicative, inquiry and design technologies


Conditions of Learning in Networked Communities • A well defined and purposeful activity (usually with a written artifact)• A public audience to engage and extend the work• Access to electronic resources• Participants engage in collaborative design of tasks and outcomes• Access to multiple perspectives and views of experienced educators• Co-construction and editing of written work • Peer evaluation of collaborative work• Integration of modes of communication


Examples of Dialogue from Online DiscussionFocused on “Technology and Equity Issues”

Teresa, a pre-service Teacher“In the GenTech Research Findings Final Report by Bryson and de Castell, they stated ‘evidence from research on gender and access to, and uses of, new information technologies indicates that in public schools, female staff and students (in comparison to male students) are: (a) disenfranchised with respect to access and kind of usage, (b) less likely to acquire technological competence, and (c) likely to be discouraged from assuming a leadership role in this domain.’


It is obvious from the references sited in this article that there is a lot of research out there regarding this statement. I think it would be interesting if we discussed any one of the three areas mentioned. A question that comes to mind is are female and male users of technology using technology for the same purposes? If you would like to read the final report before responding, here it is:” http://www.educ.sfu.ca/gentech/research.html


Nancy, A Practicing Teacher: “Dr. Mary Bryson worked closely with our school to help us identify goals for technology and then to select appropriate software and hardware to achieve them. Conversations with Dr. Bryson helped me to acknowledge the power imbalance that exists around girls and technology, and I tried to ensure that this imbalance did not prevail in my classroom.”


Elizabeth, a pre-service teacher “Nancy, I am also interested in hearing about the specific changes you made to your teaching style and the selection of models and mentors you made in your classroom. Also who did you allow access to in the computer lab at lunch and recess? Did you permit those students who showed initiative and productive working habits, or did you allow access to those who did not have computers at home? What were your strategies because as a pre-service teacher, I am not all that confident I would recognise the power imbalance you are talking about.”


Research question. What factors facilitate or block the adoption of new practices by teachers and students?

Teacher knowledge about and for the networked classroom:

New teaching and learning practices: Moving beyond the protected environment

Robert Bracewell & André Renaud, McGill U


• Effective new practices come from protected environments

• Majority of teachers are ‘private practice’ (Becker & Riel, 2000)

• Fidelity of innovations (Fishman, 2000)

• Systemic approach to innovation (Blumenfeld, Fishman, Krajcik, and Marx, 2000)

• More comprehensive theoretical approaches

Issues in scalability of new practices


Constructs and relations for:

Teachers and studentsICTsCurriculum contentSchool communityRoles of participantsRules of interaction

Activity Systems Theory


Activity Systems Theory: Overview

POPULATION

INDIVIDUAL ENVIRONMENT



POPULATION


Emerging tool use

Emerging division of laborEmerging rules



POPULATION


Emerging tool use

COMMUNITY

OBJECT/MOTIVEAGENT

Emerging rules Emerging division of labor



POPULATION


Emerging tool use

COMMUNITY

OBJECT/MOTIVEAGENT

Emerging division of labor

Emerging rules


Activity Systems Theory: OverviewTool use

COMMUNITY

OBJECT/MOTIVEAGENT

Division of labor

Rules


Technobuddy Activity System

TEACHERS AND STUDENTS

TECHNOBUDDY

Technobuddies repair and train, teachers and students notify

technical knowledge and software tools

ENABLE ICT USE

sharing of responsibilities,recognition of status

interact in classroom,


Reading Buddy Activity System

TEACHERS AND STUDENTS

READING BUDDY

Reading buddies read with younger students, teachers monitor

literacy skills

ENABLE LITERACY

sharing of responsibilities,recognition of status

interact in classroom,


Envisioned Professional Development Activity System

COLLEAGUES

TEACHER

reciprocal sharingof expertise

consultant, funding,exercises, documentation

ICT COMPETENCE

visibility of interests and competence


Existing Professional Development Activity System

COLLEAGUES?

TEACHER

teachers as novices.others as experts

documentation,remote workshops

ICT COMPETENCE

do it alone,conceal ignorance


Implications

• Likelihood of adoption of new practices

• Importance of mediational constructs

• Reduction of differences

• a priori analysis of differences


Learning to teach in networked PDSsThérèse Laferrière, Laval U

Setting

2000 pre-service teachers, 700 field-experience hours, 150 schools, online support and collaborative reflective practice (3rd-year cohorts, over 400 student teachers) Findings

Online collaborative problem solving and inquiry into innovative classroom organization and management(B. Ed. in Sec. Ed : 15%; B. Ed. in El. Ed.: 30%)


Student teachers are invited, from day one, to engage in collaborative inquiry into the thoughtful and effective use of ICT in secondary education.

Half are doing their practicum in classes where every student owns a laptop. They meet daily in the professional development room; some commute together; they participate in seminars, and also engage online in collaborative problem solving and inquiry on a regular basis.

Finding –a consistent result since 1996 These students use to use Virtual-U VGroups at a more intensive level than all other groups.

Advanced setting


This finding was shared with the 1999 cohort (12 student teachers); the question of the added-value of online dialogue was raised.

Methodology

Participants as co-researchers -submitted questions wrote statements, revised inquiry materials

Content analysis was conducted over the 300 hundred written messages (330K) that focused on project-based classroom organization and management.

Collaborative inquiry - an example


• Student teachers worked on authentic problems experienced in their classroom. Some were briefly shared or solicited no response while others (4) endured, drawing the attention of most participants.

• Student teachers learned project-based organization and management of a networked classroom

• Gains in professional knowledge about or within network-enabled communities of learners were scarce –compared to the 2000 cohort.

Findings - Content Level


• Contributions were as follows: . Socio-affective contributions : 20% . Metacognitive contributions : 10% . Sociocognitive contributions: 70%

• Online problem setting was more multifaceted or informed than individual or small-group face-to-face conversations.

• Online dialogues were referred to in other courses and assignments.

Findings - Process


• A knowledge-building community is emerging, in which pre-service teachers,beginning teachers, graduate students, and teacher educators participate. They prepare presentations,reports, case studies, and articles. But they are a tiny fraction of the whole.

• Graduating student teachers see the value of remaining connected after graduation (ID &PW).

• New design & knowledge-management issues relate to the professional-development continuum (e.g., sustainability, accreditation of a knowledge-building- oriented and network-enabled community of practice).

General observations


When the classroom is networked...

• There is a shift to a learner-centered model.

• The teacher remains the principal organizer aiming at developing, in rare cases, a learning community in his or her classroom:

The teacher becomes the expert learner, providing metacognitive guidance to students’ efforts. Under proper resources and guidance, knowledge building communities emerge.

Potentials and Pitfalls of TeleLearning


“Beyond software and hardware, there is a further technology that can very directly address educational challenges. It is a technology of use… Without a successful technology of use, there is a serious possibility that the infusion of expensive new electronic resources into the schools will have little, or even a negative effect on educational outcomes”.

TeleLearning•NCE: Building a Knowledge Society, Proposal to the Government of Canada.

Potentials and Pitfalls of TeleLearning


Where to find us on the Web

• YORK : www.edu.yorku.ca/csce/gr.html

• OISE : http://csile.oise.utoronto.ca

• CITE : www.educ.ubc.ca/courses/cite

• McGill : http://telelearning.mcgill.ca

• TACT: www.tact.fse.ulaval.ca

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