IMPROVING COORDINATION IN STUDENT COLLABORATIVE PROBLEM
SOLVING ACTIVITIES: AN ACTION RESEARCH PROGRAM.
Piliouras Panagiotis, Panos
Kokkotas, Malamitsa Katerina, Plakitsi Katerina, Vlaxos Ioannis
Pedagogical Department of Primary Education, University of Athens, Greece
Introduction
– Aims
This paper concerns the first results of an action
research program. The overall purpose of this program is threefold: (a) to
identify the pedagogical strategies necessary to promote student discursive
and collaborative problem solving skills in elementary science lessons, (b)
to trial these pedagogical strategies and determine the extent to which
their implementation enhances teacher pedagogical practices and (c) evaluate
the extent to which properly designed lessons that adopt these pedagogical
strategies lead to enhanced quality in student discursive and collaborative
problem solving abilities.
Theoretical and
educational importance
In recent years, the “discursive” (Harre and
Gillett, 1994) and “cultural” turn (Bruner 1996) in psychology has involved
a shift in focus away from viewing meaning-making in terms of cognitive
processes in the individual, towards an account of individuals as they
function in social contexts. There has been a similar focus shift in
research into teaching and learning science (Solomon, 1994). From the social
constructivism point of view, many researchers suggest that schools should
provide students with more opportunities to negotiate, compromise, and
appreciate each other’s opinions (Hogan 2000, Newton 1999, Simon et al 2002)
when they are engaging in problem-based or inquiry-based activities (Roth
1996, Wells 1999). Although, there is a substantial body of evidence
demonstrating the positive effects that the social interaction has on
individual learning (Scott 1998, Crawfort et al 1999, Wegerif and Mercer
2000), however, social interactions in collaborative problem solving
activities do not always seem to create effective learning processes. Peer
interactions may vary a lot, and only some of these with specific cognitive,
social and functional characteristics lead in a mutual understanding and
construction of shared meanings. Therefore, it is important to conduct an
action research programme that aims to increase students’ competencies for
regulating their co-construction of knowledge when tackling complex
collaborative learning tasks. Furthermore, this program must help teachers
to take steps towards improving the way students engage collaboratively in
authentic scientific thinking practices.
Methodology/research
design
An action research framework is being used for the
research. Initially, we created a group of ten teachers interested in
collaborating with us in order to develop their understanding of our
theoretical approach to dialogic, inquiry and problem-based nature of
learning science. In the present phase of the project we meet semimonthly in
order to plan and try in practice lessons that incorporate practices, which
help students to communicate more effectively within a group and to improve
their ability to reason and solve together problem-based tasks. In this
initial project phase we focus our analysis on the recordings and
transcripts of the student discussions and the discursive patterns and
strategies that are used by teachers participating in the program before
they get familiar with and develop the proper theoretical and practical
background. For analyzing the data we use a descriptive system of analysis
proposed by Kumpulainen and Mutanen (1999).
Outcomes
The preliminary results of our research, though they
bring to light some persistent problems, which have also been revealed by
other researchers, (for example, the fact that when students solve problems
collaboratively tend to approach their tasks procedurally rather than
intellectually and so on), are encouraging. Student groups little by little
communicate more effectively and improve their ability to reason and solve
together problem-based tasks. Also, teachers, who in initial phase lack the
competency to implement effective discourse and collaborative problem
solving strategies, develop a first critical “armory” of skills.
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