From Learning Environments and Implementation to Activity Systems and Expansive Learning

The paper argues that the notion of learning environment is not a theoretical concept that can serve as the centerpiece and unit of analysis in research on computer- supported collaborative learning, and that the preoccupation in this research domain with implementation of digital learning environments is a largely misguided consequence of the unquestioned expectation that technology will radically change learning. The pa- per suggests that these two pervasive weaknesses may be at least partially overcome by ex- amining activity systems as an alternative unit of analysis and by focusing on expansive learning instead of implementation as such. A case study of a Finnish middle school demonstrates that it is important to build the introduction of new technologies on the lo- cal realities of actual teachers and students. It is unlikely that the implementation and diffusion of advanced digital learning environments will be successful in a school where the teachers will not allow the students to use computers during recess and the students believe that their teachers will in any case take away the computers the next day. In the school examined in the case study, the building of trust and optimism by means of simple new practices and artifacts was the first step toward a serious collective engagement with the potentials of computers for instruction and learning.