Forming shared inquiry structures to support knowledge building in a grade 5 community

This study explores the reflective processes by which a grade 5 science community co-constructed shared inquiry structures to focus and guide its inquiry about human body systems over a school year supported by a collaborative online environment. The co-constructed structures included a list of collective wondering areas as the shared focus of inquiry and models of the inquiry process in the form of “research cycle.” Qualitative analyses of field notes, classroom videos, student notebooks and interviews elaborate the evolution of the inquiry areas and the “research cycle” model as well as students’ adaptive use of the structures to guide deeper inquiry. Content analyses of students’ individual research questions and collaborative online discourse indicate that students used the structures to develop more advanced inquiry and make productive contributions. The results contribute to elaborating a reflective structuration approach to co-organizing and sustaining long-term, open-ended inquiry in knowledge building communities.     

Collective reflective assessment for shared epistemic agency by undergraduates in knowledge building

We examined the facilitation of shared epistemic agency through a knowledge-building (KB) design that included analytics-supported collective reflective assessment (AsCRA). Forty undergraduate students taking a Liberal Studies course at a university in central China used the promising ideas tool and the knowledge building discourse explorer to self-analyze the online discourse they had created in Knowledge Forum® (KF), an online discourse environment; 34 students in a comparison section of the same course used KF but did not use the additional tools. Both classes were taught by the same teacher and studied the same inquiry topics. Multifaceted analysis of students' interaction in and the quality of discourse on KF, an educational online platform, indicated that analytics-supported reflective assessment helped them to develop high-level shared epistemic agency in the KB process. Qualitative analysis showed that AsCRA helped students to focus on high-level goals (idea negotiation, synthesis of ideas and rise above thinking) in KB, and to engage in continuous assessment, reflection, and action planning to regulate and improve their discourse. The findings have important implications for the design of technology-rich environments to support learners, and may help teachers identify the potential uses of such environments to encourage learners to engage in productive collaborative inquiry and develop metacognition and agency.     

Reading for idea advancement in a Grade 4 knowledge building community

This study looks into the reading practice in a Grade 4 knowledge building community that involved 22 students and a veteran teacher. The students investigated light over a three-month period supported by Knowledge Forum, a networked collaborative knowledge-building environment. The classroom designs encouraged the students to take on high-level responsibility for advancing the community’s knowledge, as represented in their online discourse in Knowledge Forum. The tracing of student conversations in Knowledge Forum and content analysis of their portfolio notes demonstrate productive advancement of scientific understanding. Qualitative analyses of classroom videos, online discourse, and the teacher’s reflection journal characterize student reading practice along four themes: reading for the purpose of advancing community knowledge; as progressive problem solving; embedded in sustained knowledge-building discourse; and as dialogues between local understanding and knowledge in the larger world. These results contribute to elaborating the possibility and processes of integrating reading with creative knowledge work in content areas. Classroom strategies are identified and discussed in relation to the role of collaborative online technologies.     

Toward pervasive knowledge building discourse: analyzing online and offline discourses of primary science learning in Singapore

This research examined discourses in classroom and online learning environments where the Knowledge Building Community model was enacted to foster deep understanding in science learning in Singapore primary classes. This study posited that discourse is a fundamental form of learning that reveals how knowledge building is enacted and embodied by a community of learners. Discourses in classroom lessons and online postings were analyzed from both quantitative and qualitative views. Overall, the discourse analysis of the verbal activities in classroom lessons showed clear signs of IRE (Initiation–Response–Evaluation) patterns of discourse, while more diversity of ideas and questions were found in Knowledge Forum postings. However, online discourse showed some instances of incorrect group thinking and fear of appearing ignorant. In conclusion, we discuss implications of findings and future research directions for creating pervasive knowledge building discourse.     

Towards Knowledge Building: From Facts to Explanations in Primary Students' Computer Mediated Discourse

Educational institutions are required to find new pedagogical and cognitive models and practices to cope with the challenges of an emerging knowledge society. In creating a theoretical and practical model for future education, Scardamalia and Bereiter have proposed the concept of knowledge building. An early implementation of this idea was in the networked classroom software and ancillary structures known as Computer-Supported Intentional Learning Environment (CSILE). The present study aimed to explore the indicators of knowledge building in computer-mediated discourse among 26 11-year-old Finnish students. The data were collected during a four-week course on Energy, and consisted of students' postings stored in the CSILE database. Analysis revealed three pedagogically and cognitively different modes of discourse: social-oriented, fact-oriented, and explanation-oriented. These modes differed essentially from each other in the nature of the knowledge which students constructed during discourse and in the object and focus of students' communication. During explanation-oriented discourse, students actively used abstract and scientific concepts and the objects of their comments were theories, ideas and methods of research. Such activity is a component of knowledge building. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Student-Directed Assessment of Knowledge Building Using Electronic Portfolios

Despite emphasis and progress in developing collaborative inquiry in computer-supported collaborative learning research, little attention has been given to examining how collective learning can be assessed in computer-supported collaborative learning classrooms, and how students can have agency in assessing their own collaborative process. We propose that assessments should capture both individual and collective aspects of learning and be designed in ways that foster collaboration. We describe the design of student-directed electronic portfolio assessments to characterize and “scaffold” collaborative inquiry using Knowledge Forum?. Our design involved asking students to identify exemplary notes in the computer discourse depicting knowledge building episodes using four knowledge building principles as criteria. We report three studies that examined the designs and roles of knowledge building portfolios with graduate and Grade 12 students in Hong Kong and Canada. The findings suggest that knowledge building portfolios help to characterize collective knowledge advances and foster domain understanding. We discuss lessons learned regarding how knowledge building may be fostered and provide principles for designing assessments that can be used to evaluate and foster deep inquiry in asynchronous online discussion environments.     

运用知识建构圈促进学生课堂深度互动研究

课堂话语是促进学生参与课堂互动的核心要素之一,而现有的课堂话语体系多是围绕教师展开的"师生对话"或是被少数"话霸"主导的"生生对话",缺乏全员互动的"广度"与探究的"深度"。该文以南京市某小学四年一班学生为研究对象,采用准实验方法和基于设计的研究方法相结合的方式,根据知识建构理论利用知识建构圈教学策略开展了为期12周的教学实践。教学实践中通过更改教室座椅布局、调整知识建构圈中师生位次、建立会话规则、明确协商机制以及整合教学内容等教学手段进行多次教学迭代,尝试改进课堂互动效果。在将全程班级课堂互动录像转录为文本的基础上,根据知识深度模型、问题解释深度量表对其编码并进行语义分析。结果表明:采用知识建构圈教学策略能有效的提升学生互动的参与度以及提出问题的"量"与"质";能推进学生互动的"广度"与"深度";能提高学生的言语表达能力和人际交往能力,初步实现了课堂由"浅层"互动向"深层"互动的转变。     

Activity Theory as a Framework for Analysing Knowledge Building

Content analyses of computer databases parsed into notes or ideas do not shed adequate light on the role of collaboration and the Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning environment in knowledge building; analysis of what is happening in the classroom and how students interpret that is also needed. This study used ethnographic methods to explore activity theory as an analytic framework for knowledge building, drawing from a class of Grade 4 students’ contributions to online and face-to-face discourse over a period of five months, as well as end-of-year interviews with the students. The analysis focuses on four issues: community; rules; mediating artefacts; and division of labour. The findings indicate how understanding such issues can lead to better understanding of collaboration and of the role of the online environment. The use of activity theory as a framework for improving pedagogy aimed at knowledge building is also outlined.     

知识建构共同体及其支撑环境

面对知识社会的挑战,我们需要将学校改造成为知识建构共同体。知识建构共同体是以思想的形成和持续改进为关注点的团体,其成员通过建构性的互动过程发展对于共同体有价值的思想。为了支持和促进知识建构共同体,本课题组研制了CSILE/知识论坛系统。本文对上述理论观点、技术系统以及有关的实验研究结果做了简要介绍。     

Re-negotiating the discourse of lower track high school students

The purpose of this study was to examine how lower track science students would understand shifts in standard classroom discourse patterns. The researcher videotaped his daily efforts to renegotiate the lower track classroom environment to become more representative of a scientific community. This paper is an analysis of the implicit obstacles inherent in shifting class discussions to classroom arguments examining tentative hypotheses. Students have inserted struggles for social status into classroom arguments about scientific ideas making it difficult to separate in a group discussion when the evidence convinced a student or whether the social politics of the class had persuaded her. As a result of changing classroom rules for participation, engagement, and collaborative inquiry, students' abilities to argue scientifically were changed. Despite these shifts students continued to insert their own interpretations of argumentation, social norms, and strategies for active re-negotiation of the teacher's agenda for the construction of scientific classroom discourse.     

高中生物教学中思维可视化技术的实践研究

教师在高中生物教学中利用思维可视化技术,可以给学生呈现完整的知识链条,帮助学生形成良好的知识体系认知,促进学生思维的发展。运用思维可视化技术的策略有:绘画课堂教学板书,构建核心知识体系;设置探究路径,实现思维逻辑的可视化;重视复习课、试卷解题分析,提高学习能力;打造学习共同体,促进合作与对话。     

Future Oriented Colleges and Universities

The AIR model we describe in this article is a practical framework for cultivating reflective inquiry into ethical issues that students, faculty, and administrators experience in the midst of busy daily lives and encounter in classroom discussions in a discipline field. The model is highly adaptable to academic and workplace settings and enables students to clarify and refine their ethical thinking and make more caring, compassionate, and respectful choices. Quantitative and qualitative assessment indicates that students who use AIR as an organizing framework become more empowered and competent to engage in reflective ethical inquiry.     

Promoting cognitive and social aspects of inquiry through classroom discourse

We investigated how Chinese physics teachers structured classroom discourse to support the cognitive and social aspects of inquiry-based science learning. Regarding the cognitive aspect, we examined to what extent the cognitive processes underlying the scientific skills and the disciplinary reasoning behind the content knowledge were taught. Regarding the social aspect, we examined how classroom discourse supported student learning in terms of students' opportunities to talk and interaction patterns. Our participants were 17 physics teachers who were actively engaged in teacher education programs in universities and professional development programs in local school districts. We analyzed one lesson video from each participating teacher. The results suggest both promises and challenges. Regarding the cognitive aspect of inquiry, the teachers in general recognized the importance of teaching the cognitive processes and disciplinary reasoning. However, they were less likely to address common intuitive ideas about science concepts and principles. Regarding the social aspect of inquiry, the teachers frequently interacted with students in class. However, it appeared that facilitating conversations among students and prompting students to talk about their own ideas are challenging. We discuss the implications of these findings for teacher education programs and professional development programs in China.     

Camila,the earth,and the sun: Constructing an idea as shared intellectual property

Recent research has challenged traditional assumptions that scientific practice and knowledge are essentially individual accomplishments, highlighting instead the social nature of scientific practices, and the co‐construction of scientific knowledge. Similarly, new research paradigms for studying learning go beyond focusing on what is “in the head” of individual students, to study collective practices, distributed cognition, and emergent understandings of groups. These developments require new tools for assessing what it means to learn to “think like a scientist.” Toward this goal, the present case study analyzes the discourse of a 6th‐grade class discussing one student's explanation for seasonal variations in daylight hours. The analysis identifies discourse moves that map to disciplinary practices of the social construction of science knowledge, including (1) beginning an explanation by reviewing the community's shared assumptions; (2) referencing peers' work as warrants for an argument; and (3) building from isolated ideas, attributed to individuals, toward a coherent situation model, attributed to the community. The study then identifies discourse moves through which the proposed explanation was taken up and developed by the group, including (4) using multiple shared representations; (5) leveraging peers' language to clarify ideas; and (6) negotiating language and representations for new, shared explanations. Implications of this case for rethinking instruction, assessment, and classroom research are explored. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47:619–642, 2010     

Socio-cognitive dynamics of knowledge building in the work of 9- and 10-year-olds

This study examines four months of online discourse of 22 Grade 4 students engaged in efforts to advance their understanding of optics. Their work is part of a school-wide knowledge building initiative, the essence of which is giving students collective responsibility for idea improvement. This goal is supported by software—Knowledge Forum—designed to provide a public and collaborative space for continual improvement of ideas. A new analytic tool—inquiry threads—was developed to analyze the discourse used by these students as they worked in this environment. Data analyses focus on four knowledge building principles: idea improvement; real ideas, authentic problems (involving concrete/empirical and abstract/conceptual artifacts); community knowledge (knowledge constructed for the benefit of the community as a whole); and constructive use of authoritative sources. Results indicate that these young students generated theories and explanation-seeking questions, designed experiments to produce real-world empirical data to support their theories, located and introduced expert resources, revised ideas, and responded to problems and ideas that emerged as community knowledge evolved. Advances were reflected in progress in refining ideas and evidence of growth of knowledge for the community as a whole. Design strategies and challenges for collective idea improvement are discussed.