Chen Wenli

Learning Sciences Lab, National Institute of Education, Singapore

GroupScribbles enhance students' L2 (Chinese) learning in Singapore classrooms. Students collaboratively constructing language knowledge through authentic verbal discussion mediated and enhanced by GS.

A lot of kids don't like studying Chinese - can talk, but not read and write, think it's too difficult.

Theory: Rapid Collaborative Knowledge Improvement Pedagogy: Funnel model

Start by entering classroom to assess what the problem is.

• don't like studying Chinese
• don't like collaborative learning (because exam is individual)

Design research, programmers and researchers collaborate closely.

There are 7 “future schools” in Singapore, got lot's of support, very advanced in technology. Each student has their own MacBook.

4 students in each group. If we let all of them write on the same pad, it gets too messy, so now we have them in smaller groups.

SRI international developed this software with us. Above, shared pad, below, private pad. Like post-it notes.

Enables synergy between autonomy and collaboration by combining both private and collaborative learning.

Nice activity pattern - students / GS / F2F, private interaction / group interaction / class interaction.

Start by writing privately, drag it to group board, visit and critique other groups' boards.

RCKI – democratizing participation and idea refinement - in the context of live dynamic classroom settings, F2F collaborative knowledge construction and imrpovement over the duration of a class session, supported by certain technolgoies for lightweight instant interactoin. Rapid

• with limited time for participation
• using lightweight form of expression
• enabling quick cycles of interaction

Different from Knowledge Building – KB is asynchronous, very deep. This is in one class, students write very quick small notes.

Funnel model:

• seek diversity of ideas
• pool collective wisdom
• seek greater perfection

Start with an article, think about what the article is talking about - on their private board. Then on the group board. No idea is silly idea, contribute as much as you can. Whatever you can think about, just write about it. (it can be anonymous).

Rewrite, reorganize, number of ideas are fewer, quality increases.

They can look at different group boards, give them ideas and suggestions. Then, seek greater perfection. You can only have three posts - try to express your best ideas in these three postings.

• We observed successive communal engagements and knowledge building.
• Students able to enhance their language ability through generating, sharing and improving their GS artifacts by interacting with each other.
• They used to discuss in English and only write in Chinese, now they are quite good at using Chinese to discuss.
• In F2f GS environment, language knowledge is not an object that is required and possessed by individuals, but becomes embedded in conversations and social discourses.
• GS tech and funnel model jointly scaffold students' collaborative learning to achieve desired outcomes.
  • seamless integration of individual learning, small-group and whole-class interactions in the classroom
  • facilitate rapid collaborative knowledge improvement