The 2 nd Factor: Group leader structure In our previous experience in conducting KB activities, we found that group leaders play a substantial role in affecting the outcome of KB activities. There could be a variety of ways to organize groups: Single group leader Single group leader Multiple group leaders Multiple group leaders Group members take turns to be the leaderGroup members take turns to be the leader And different ways of preparing group leaders for their tasks and setting up expectations for their roles. We still have not conducted systematic enquiry on this, but in one of our participating schools…… The 3 rd Factor: Project Discussion vs. Theme Discussion Promoting higher level of knowledge building outcome: design issues By Nancy Law, Allan Yuen, Johnny Yuen and Elaine Wong Centre for Information Technology in School and Teacher Education, University of Hong Kong T he design of learning activities has been a major area of research in education. When the focus of education moves from learning to knowledge building, are there design factors that affect the depth of knowledge building that students could reach? Theoretically, the depth of engagement of the students and the kind of facilitation/scaffolding that teacher could provide are key factors. Could certain kinds of learning task facilitate deeper engagement? Does the structure of the discussion tasks or the time duration of the learning task matter? As students are generally working in groups, would particular group structures/organizations affect the ease with which student groups develop into autonomous knowledge building team? Do team leaders matter? Would team leaders with specific training/knowledge building experience contribute to deeper levels of knowledge building of the entire team? The 1 st factor: Nature of the task for KB I t is generally known that open-ended enquiry tasks rather than close- ended ones are necessary for knowledge building. However, reflecting on the level of KB activities exhibited in different task designs over the past year, we found that there is more to task design than just openness and appeal to students. Tasks that can be accomplished by simply putting some information together would be far less productive than ones that will require real engagement with the ideas, demanding that contributions must link with concepts and ideas already held. Case Study: ATK analysis 1 st Trial (20 students) 2 nd Trial (20 students) Total number of new notes created by all students 57 notes 249 notes Mean number of notes contributed per student 2.85 notes (S.D. 1.77) notes (S.D. 2.77) Mean percentage of new notes that are linked to other notes per student 63.7% (S.D %) 76.8% (S.D. 13.8%) Mean percentage of new notes with key words per student 85.4% (S.D %) 52.5% (S.D %) Mean number of notes read per student 42.3 notes (S.D ) notes (S.D ) Mean number of note revisions made per student 0.8 revisions (S.D. 1.09) 2.9 revisions (S.D. 3.15) Mean number of times of scaffold support used per student 2.9 scaffolds (S.D. 2.35) 9.2 scaffolds (S.D. 5.02) Staged, guided discussion Unstructured, thematic discussion the in-depth investigation processthe in-depth investigation process interconnected stagesinterconnected stages outputs from earlier stages are the input of later stagesoutputs from earlier stages are the input of later stages achieve certain stage at certain timeachieve certain stage at certain time freedom of explorationfreedom of exploration teachers propose a topic and students decide aspects of that topic that they are interested to talk aboutteachers propose a topic and students decide aspects of that topic that they are interested to talk about aspects of the topic are discussed simultaneouslyaspects of the topic are discussed simultaneously both the breath and depth of discussion can occur at the same timeboth the breath and depth of discussion can occur at the same time Summary some apparent differences in terms of idea interactionsome apparent differences in terms of idea interaction - more exploration & relating of ideas in unstructured discussions - more evaluation of ideas in guided staged discussions Findings inconclusive, need further researchFindings inconclusive, need further research There were 14 students participating in the Peer Tutoring Project 2002:  And in subsequent KB activities, these students became group leaders:            ………   Results Under the 12 KB principles analysis, 5 groups scored 18 points or above (out of 36 points) according to a 4 point scoring scale. In 4 groups out of the 5 high scoring groups, their leaders were award-winners in the Peer Tutoring Project. These groups were characterized by outstanding performance in contributing real ideas and authentic problems, idea diversity, collective responsibility, democratizing knowledge and knowledge building discourse, under the 12 KB principles analysis. Averageof High score groups with award winning leaders (4) (4) The rest of the groups (10) Mean score of KB principles 22.5 (S.D. 3.42) 10.8 (S.D. 5.75) Mean number of notes created per group (S.D ) 70 (S.D. 26.5) Mean number of revisions done per group 65.5 (S.D. 45) 20.4 (S.D. 15.9) Mean percentage of notes linked per group 78% (S.D. 15%) 60% (S.D. 16%) Mean percentage of intra-group note read per group 68% (S.D. 22%) 43% (S.D. 33%) Main task for this stage: Introduce an application of EMI Trial 1: Electromagnetic induction (EMI) 20 Form 6 students Which appliance? Info. Task Ends Trial 2: Electromagnetic Induction (EMI) Same group of 20 Form 6 students Describe and explain teacher’s question without using technical terms. Students give comments to other groups Students re-answer the questions with appropriate phrases Task Ends Students present what they find about EMI ATK analysis Analysis of the level of idea interaction found in the KF notes created by same group of students in two types of discussions Nature of notes Guided, staged discussions (PTP2002) Unstructure d, thematic discussion (2003) The Coding rubic for analyzing the level of idea interaction found in the KF notes created by the students Ideas as discrete items Staged,INF Presenting information which may not be targeted at a specific problem or indicate understanding 51.9%47.7% NID A new idea or problem or new information which is addresses the problem being discussed RPT Repeating the ideas similar to those expressed by others without contributing further interpretation or extension TEC Introducing technical terms relevant to the topic of discussion SUM Summarizing various contributed information without evaluation or synthesis DEF Providing the definition for a term or a concept Explore or relate ideas REL Relating to another group's discussion notes 35.2%42.7% QRY Raising content-related query, which may be fact finding, or explanation seeking RCT Relating different concepts EID Elaborating one's own idea XID Extending idea contributed by others Evaluate Ideas CHL Posing challenges to ideas contributed by others 13%9.7% ADW Admitting own idea as wrong CFM Confirming one's own or someone else's idea as correct PlanningPLN Planning (presenting or asking for) course of action to take for task completion 0%0% MON Monitoring plan execution or time schedule CLR Seeking clarification for task progress KB performance of the same students engaging in two types of discussions using the KB principles analysis Staged, guided discussion (PTP2002) Unstructured, thematic discussion (Activity in 2003) Mean Score Accessibility Accessibility Real ideas, authentic problems Improvable ideas Idea diversity Rise above Epistemic agency Community knowledge, collective responsibility Democratizing knowledge Constructive use of authoritative sources Knowledge building discourse Embedded and transformative assessment References Brown, A. L. (1992). Design Experiments: Theoretical and Methodological Challenges in Creating Complex Interventions in Classroom Settings. The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 2(2), Brown, A. L. (1992). Design Experiments: Theoretical and Methodological Challenges in Creating Complex Interventions in Classroom Settings. The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 2(2), Scardamalia, M., & Bereiter, C. (1999). Schools as knowledge building organizations. In D. Keating & C. Hertzman (Eds.), Today’s children, tomorrow’s society: The developmental health and wealth of nations (pp ). New York: Guilford. Scardamalia, M., & Bereiter, C. (1999). Schools as knowledge building organizations. In D. Keating & C. Hertzman (Eds.), Today’s children, tomorrow’s society: The developmental health and wealth of nations (pp ). New York: Guilford. Bielaczyc, K. (1997). Designing Social Infrastructure: The Challenge of Building Computer-Supported Learning Communities. Proceedings of the Computer Supported Collaborative Learning Conference, 1997.