What Do Nonverbal Indicators Tell Us About Collaboration in Small Groups? (Poster 47)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Nine
  In Poster Session: Learning Sciences SIG Poster Session Two: Health, Higher Education, Representations, and Reasoning

Abstract

Verbal and non-verbal communication are different facets of social interactions. Most studies on collaborative learning rely on analyzing discourse and transcripts, which does not adequately capture the richness of face-to-face interactions. This preliminary study aims to identify non-verbal indicators, in addition to verbal indicators of collaboration. We observed two small group collaborations during a Biology unit in a Midwestern middle school in the US. Although similar features were identified in their verbal discourse, the two groups varied in their non-verbal interactions. The group exhibiting higher non-verbal indicators of collaboration also showed greater learning gains. This illustrates the importance of examining both verbal and non-verbal interactions to better understand the process of collaboration.

Authors

• Indrani Dey, University of Wisconsin - Madison
  Presenting Author

• Ruofan Li
  Non-Presenting Author

• Sadhana Puntambekar, University of Wisconsin - Madison
  Non-Presenting Author