Tablet-Mediated Collaboration During Informal Knowledge-Building Activities: Scaffolding Collaborative Sense-Making and Coordination of Scientific Evidence

• In Event: Making Museums an Integral Part of Formal Teaching and Learning

Abstract

Purpose and theoretical framework
This research examines how mobile learning experiences can support children’s engagement in science with the creation of shared knowledge artifacts that are mediated by tablet computers in outdoor learning settings. Guided by a trialogical sociocultural approach (Paavola & Hakkarainen, 2009) to tablet-mediated collaborative learning (which considers artifacts, practices, and collaborative activities together), our team is conducting design-based research (Authors, 2015) to enhance scientifically meaningful experiences for out-of-school-time. This project’s focus on social knowledge construction mediated with technology is guided by the Strands of Science Learning offered in Learning Science in Informal Environments (Bell, et al, 2009), with recommendations for integrating media into out-of-school-time settings.
In this analysis (the fifth iteration of our work), we investigated how observational practices could be supported by an augmented reality (AR) app that enabled digital construction of photographic artifacts as well as distributed supports for engaging collaborative science practices in small groups of two or three children.

Methods and data sources
The research followed a design-based research methodology (Sandoval & Bell, 2009), with iterations of theory development and of AR app redesign occurring at both a nature center and arboretum. For this project, researchers coded videos of small groups of youth (n=25 groups containing 56 children) engaged in the collaborative construction of digital photographic artifacts of tree life cycles at a nature center’s summer camp. Data sources included videos of learner interactions in one-hour naturalist-led programs, 56 matched pretest and posttest assessments, and 25 learner-created, digital photographic artifacts. Video data were transcribed and coded using a scoring rubric to identify the extent to which learners collaboratively (a) made accurate observations of trees at various life cycle stages, (b) explained explicit connections to evidence or criteria that supported their identifications, and (c) engaged in turn taking and negotiation discourse.

Results
Findings showed significant gains in science learning (p=.01) regarding trees from pretest to posttest. Our qualitative coding of video data showed, when collaborating on the creation of a digital artifact, all groups were able to make accurate identifications and tie them to at least one piece of supporting evidence. The small groups’ interactional data showed patterns of the knowledge building practices that learners used to create collaborative artifacts in a tablet-centered learning context. Correlational analyses provided further insights into relationships among learners, tools, and practices including a positive correlation between low pre-test score and high collaboration within small groups.

Significance
This work shows the importance of scaffolds within informal science learning experiences to support learners’ coordination of evidence and claims. Given the correlation between low pre-test scores and high group interactions, our work supports the use of small groups to mediate peers’ sensemaking in outdoor learning centers. Finally, the work contributes a refinement of the construct of the trialogic, which supports the inclusion of making of artifacts into out-of-school time activities as vital to the meaning-making process.

Authors

• Heather Toomey Zimmerman, The Pennsylvania State University

• Susan M. Land, The Pennsylvania State University