PhD Proposal Details.2

Current Literature and Practice: ‘How Is e-Learning Happening?’

In current academic practice we are able to adapt and utilise a vast array of theory and practical expertise to enable us to engage with the learner. This research proposal recognises the wealth of past experience open to us as teachers and offers a means to re-define and focus current e-learning practice. To begin to evaluate this hereditary evolution of current practice let us begin by referring to the theoretical constructs at the forefront of e-elearning.

Gagne (1962) provides a theoretical framework with which to consider how we learn. He identifies five levels of learning: verbal information, intellectual skills, cognitive strategies, motor skills and attitudes. With these in mind instructional designers may act upon each and provide suitable stimuli that enables the learner to interact and demonstrate a fundamental attaining of each level. This can be further noted in Gagne’s nine instructional events (Kearsley 1994a).

Gagne (1985) 9 steps of instructional design, firmly based on a behavourist stance, offers the learner a means of self actualisation by engaging in a hierarchical process of knowledge building. It is interesting to note the amount of debate that has occurred (Resnick & Resnick 1991) as to the validity of this sequential approach to knowledge acquisition, an approach that offers (for an instructional designer) the ideal opportunity to customise and personalise a learning environment on behalf of the end user.

Perhaps key to any online learning instance is the accommodation of the variety of learning styles represented in any given student cohort. By allowing for this variety the learner may navigate the content and tasks in a way that is directly applicable to themselves, thus enabling a student centred approach and promoting intellectual diversity (Fahy, 1999, 237).

Socio-Constructivism advocates the mastery of new approaches to learning by interaction with others (Doise 1984). An individual’s interaction within a given social environment enables the production (development) of a new personal state. This new state makes it possible to return to or move into another social environment and allows for more sophisticated interactions to take place (Dillenbourg et al 1994). In essence collaborating may unlock and produce a series of criteria (culminating in a new state) within the individual. It focuses on the personal development of the individual as a result of social interactions. Crucial to any successful online experience is the establishment of a community and sense of personal ownership this is often achieved through peer inductions / icebreakers and social forums. Such social orientated tasks are used as the foundation for future collaborative endeavours, often a sense of community, trust and mutual cooperation is achieved outside of the day to day curriculum work and only becomes apparent when a group is presented with a collaborative task relating to the core discipline (Billet 1996).

The concept of Socio-Cultural ideals springs out of Vygotsky’s (1978) concept of proximal development, whereby individual development is a casual result of social interaction. In effect the individual internalizes any processes whilst party to social interactions and brings them to light at a later date independently. Notably he goes further to state that instruction is most efficient when students engage in activities within a supportive environment and when in receipt of appropriate guidance. This is never more apparent than in an online environment where it is essential to provide an identified framework (scaffold), in the form of peer support / mentoring and clear instructional design and learning outcomes to enable a learner to engage in a learning process whereby they may attain their own personal learning objective/s.

Shared Cognition is seen as being situation dependant; it specifically enables social interactions (and knowledge sharing) within a given context that is immediately applicable to the task at hand. By linking context and knowledge the learner is made aware of the conditions under which the knowledge should be applied. In the wider realm the learner may thus see how such knowledge can best be applied in outside situations – thus fostering critical and creative thinking within an online environment, as with traditional face to face teaching, the relevancy of case based scenarios, or contextualised data is essential to focusing the learners attentions on the immediate needs of a problem or example and on the identified module learning outcomes in assuring strategic approaches to online experiences (Evans et al 2003).

The idea of co-construction of shared knowledge supports the premise that shared cognition is not just reliant on the factual knowledge and the common social grounding around that knowledge but on the processes and practices in which one may attain knowledge (Resnick, Levine, Teasley 1991). This implies that collaboration is most effective when there are common objectives i.e. that individual participants are working towards the same goal or set of goals, e.g. engaged in mutual problem solving. However work by Boxtel et al (2000) noted no discernable differences whilst testing collaborative and individual learning outcomes, this is an area of study that requires further quantitative analysis in particular.

In discussing the concept of shared cognition one inevitably has to consider the social element, how individuals interact within an environment and with one another. Etienne Wenger (1998) developed the concept of Communities of Practice, in which there are three key elements: the domain, the community and the practice. The key to each of these domains (and indeed the community itself) is the interactions between individuals, their joint purpose and their actual endeavours. Wenger sees this as a means by which to promote collaboration online, more often than not it is mistakenly perceived that a community of practice is a mere website, network or shared concern. All of these may indeed form the constituent parts of a community of practice but they require activities to bring them to fruition e.g. Problem solving, Requests for info, Seeking experience, Reusing assets, Coordination and synergy, Discussing developments, Documentation projects, Visits, Mapping knowledge and identifying gaps.

Wenger refers to a “community of practice seen as a living curriculum…” it is this entity that may form the foundation for collaboration and in turn the structure within which shared cognition occurs on an ongoing basis, promoting both life long learning and continuing professional development. A study by Olivera and Straus (2004) testing the transfer of knowledge in a lab-based cooperative learning scenario indicates that learning occurred primarily around cognitive tasks rather than actual social factors, thus highlighting the need for structure based scenarios or a framework to facilitate collaborative efforts such as may be found Wenger’ Communities.

Thomas (2002) puts forward the proposal that the use of discussion boards may aid in the level of thinking undertaken by students. In particular the attainment of critical thinking and deep cognitive processing. In her paper she explores the idea of measuring the environmental impact of the use of facilitators and collaborative tasks. Cooke and Sheeran (2004) also cite the use of moderators to determine behavioral changes in cognitive relations. Problem-based learning is often chaired and run by the learners themselves, in this online version a facilitator was in place to ensure the process was followed through to fruition and to offer any additional and necessary support factors (such as technical assistance, course guidance and mentoring).

An individual’s construction of knowledge, can be suggested as being a ‘collaboration with oneself’, drawing on experience, practice and implementation to achieve a desired objective e.g. a particular learning goal. This is brought into a group dynamic where such implicit experiences are often made explicit via cognitive conflict (i.e. challenging and exploring concepts co-operatively). Each group member may demonstrate a ‘personal’ interaction with the curriculum elements that is interpreted internally yet shared externally. This interaction offers an increased range of experience demonstrated, explored and shared via the entire group. Van Boxtel et al suggest that a key element in the positive perception of collaboration “...is the notion that social interaction stimulates elaboration of conceptual knowledge’ (313, 2000). It provides a forum within which individual learners have the opportunity to engage with the process and express their understanding.

Though this may appear elementary, i.e. differing group members applying personal learning styles or social perspectives for instance. What is not as apparent is the effect upon the group dynamic. According to Vygotsky (1978) the internalization of a shared event by an individual may only be revealed at a later date when that individual is confronted by a similar problem/context within which to react. Thus the results of shared cognition may be seen to be internalized/referenced for future interactions. Furthermore the exposure to differing learning styles may actually affect the way in which individuals decide to learn themselves in future - collaboration leading to co-construction of knowledge.