Sharing Perspectives in Virtual Interaction: Review of Methods of Analysis

The aim of this paper is to describe the methodological solutions made in the studies that are part of the SHAPE research project. The SHAPE project investigates the quality and nature of virtual interaction in a higher education context. The study aims to find out variables that mediate the process of collaboration, particularly the emerging processes of sharing and constructing perspectives in virtual interaction. For conducting these studies we have developed various methods and models of analysis in order to gain better understanding of the process of collaboration in virtual interaction. In this paper, we will make a review of some of the SHAPE analysis methods used in the series of ou…

A Participant Experience Method for Illustrating Individuals’ Experiences in the Course of an Evolving Virtual Learning Community

Early definitions of virtual learning communities often abstracted participants from their offline environments. However, often students’ virtual and physical environments are not essentially separated. Likewise, scholars should become more sensitive to and aware of their research principles and practices guiding studies in virtual settings and especially, in the intersections of on- and offline contexts. The participant experience method discussed in this paper, grants access also to the events outside the virtual learning context connecting various social settings and simultaneous events. However, the use of participant experience methods requires critical reflection during its various ph…

Interaction in online learning environments : how to support collaborative activities in higher education settings

Collaboration promoted and supported by instructional technology has the potential to lead learners to deeper understanding and knowledge building. There have been optimistic views that any web based interaction can be educationally valuable. However, online learning environments do not, as such, guarantee that learners will achieve genuine collaboration. It seems that there are several difficulties facing those who wish to employ online learning environments as a medium for productive learner interaction. The particular aim of this exploration of interaction and learning in computer supported collaborative learning environments was to study the interplay between learners and consider the w…

Skills Behind the Robotics : How to Re-educate Workers for the Future

The aim of this study is to respond to the educational needs of the future, considering automation and robotics. It is inevitable that automation and robotics are changing our lives and they create challenges for the future work life and education. In this study, we investigate what is the educational background of the unemployed people who are in danger of being replaced by automation and what is their educational resilience for adapting work life changes. The data of this study consist of the latest PIAAC data (The Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies). Based on the research we develop a model for re-educating the people who have lost their jobs. peerReviewed

Uncertainty-reducing cooperation scripts in online learning environments

Online learning courses can create new interaction situations for participants who have not previously worked with each other. Initially, there is some degree of uncertainty between participants in these interaction situations. According to the uncertainty reduction theory, low uncertainty increases theamount of discourse and decreases information seeking. Thus, uncertainty may influence online discourseand learning. However, the relation of uncertainty reduction to learning outcomes has not yet been investigated systematically. Cooperation scripts may reduce uncertainty, and therefore enhance learning.A cooperation script, which aims to reduce uncertainty at a cognitive level, was chosen f…

Building and Maintaining the Common Ground in Web-Based Interaction

In this paper, the main purpose is to explore how participants establish and maintain the common ground in the computer-based conferences. Previous studies assume that before the participants can reach the deeper level interaction and learning, they have to gain an adequate level of common ground (Dillenbourg, 1999; Baker et al., 1999; Veerman, 2000). Subjects were 68 pre-service teachers and 7 mentors from three universities who participated in the web-based conferencing course for eight weeks. The results assume that in deeper level discussions it is essential that participants, especially fellow students did give not only the evidence about their own understanding by using written feedba…

Eri-ikäisten oppilaiden toverisuhteet vuosiluokattomassa esi- ja alkuopetuksessa sekä toverisuhteiden merkitys oppilaille

Mechanisms of common ground in case-based web discussions in teacher education

Previous studies suggest that before participants in web-based conferencing can reach deeper level interaction and learning, they have to gain an adequate level of common ground in terms of shared mutual understanding, knowledge, beliefs, assumptions, and presuppositions (Clark & Schaefer, 1989; Dillenbourg, 1999). In this paper, the purpose is to explore how participants establish and maintain common ground in order to reach deeper level interaction in case-based web discussions. The subjects in this study consisted of 68 preservice teachers and 7 mentors from 3 universities, who participated in a web-based conferencing course for 8 weeks. The written discussion data were analyzed by means…

Analysing the mechanisms of common ground in collaborative web-based interaction

The ideas presented in this paper are challenged especially by the certain critical questions concerning web-based interaction and the qualitative analysis of such interaction and learning. The question arises whether the students from different contexts and countries are able to reach such interaction that would lead them to educationally relevant higher-level discussion and learning in web-based environments. Furthermore, as this field of study is fairly novel, there is a shortage of established methodologies for analysing computer-mediated communication and the complex phenomena it encompasses. In this presentation, we attempt to find new approaches to discover how people establish and m…

Epistemic cooperation scripts in online learning environments: Fostering learning by reducing uncertainty in discourse?

Using online learning environments in higher education offers innovative possibilities to support collaborative learning. However, online learning creates new kinds of problems for participants who have not previously worked with each other. One of these problems is uncertainty which occurs when participants do not know each other. According to the uncertainty reduction theory, low uncertainty level increases the amount of discourse and decreases the amount of information seeking. Therefore, uncertainty may influence online discourse and learning. This study investigates the effects of an epistemic cooperation script with respect to the amount of discourse, information seeking and learning …