Browsing by Subject "SVA"

As computer technology evolves, both the need for knowledge workers and the pressure to increase the effectiveness of teaching with the help of ICT increase. Teaching of the skills needed by the knowledge workers requires new pedagogy, where instead facts and obedience the focus is on skills, independence and learning to learn. The use of ICT in education brings its own challenges to learning situations. Social constructivist computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) is becoming a major challenger for the traditional teacher-centered learning. One of these methodologies is Progressive Inquiry, which is developed in Finland. Since the social constructive theory emphasizes the relations between learners more than the individuals' actions, research in this field must also take into account the interactions that occur in learning situations. While traditional psychological and pedagogical methods are not applicable, an old method of social sciences, SNA or social network analysis is designed specifically for the analysis of groups of people. Applications of SNA in psychology and collaborative learning are however few and preliminary, and no reliable evidence on the applicability nor useful results exist. The purpose of this study is to find out if SNA can be applied to this field of research. In this study SNA was used to analyze the learning situations of 23 classes in comprehensive and secondary schools that used Progressive inquiry. The results show that SNA can be applied to the study of CSCL, since the analysis produced preliminary measurements that were related to the quality of the course. The results are also in concordance with social constructivist theory: a course's usefulness increases as the several students write high quality messages and participate widely in different conversations.