Student Use of a Wiki in Support of Articulating Collaborative Understanding

• In Event: Group Cognition and Social Media

Abstract

I use sociocultural perspectives on learning to investigate how high school chemistry students organize and categorize other’s published ideas about alternative energies as a way of making sense of the information and articulating their understandings. Learners (n=34) used Web 2.0 tools of social bookmarking, a wiki, and podcasting to support participation in the three goals of argumentation: sensemaking, articulating, and persuading (Berland & Reiser, 2009). For this analysis, I focus on how small groups of students used a wiki to support participation in science practices. The students used the wiki as (1) a tool to support co- construction of knowledge and articulating understandings, (2) support communication, and (3) facilitate project management. However, attribution of work creates methodological challenges in analysis.

Author

• Jennifer Lynn Weible, Central Michigan University