Knowledge building by collaborating in computer-supported intentional learning environments

Computer-Supported Intentional Learning Environments (CSILE) is a computer-network system which supports learners in efficiently constructing knowledge represented in the database through cooperative learning. The thesis, composed of three different studies, examines how students use CSILE for their intentional learning through cooperation and how two different versions of CSILE support their activities. As an analytic tool, Activity Theory by Engestrom (1987) and Leontiev (1981) was used to describe students' activities mediated by CSILE. Two different levels of students' activities, cognitive actions and computer operations, are discussed in two different psychological planes of cooperative work, solo- and joint-plane. The first study was an in-depth case study of four students (two high-conceptual-progress and two low-conceptual-progress learners) to build a hypothetical cognitive framework of students' activities in CSILE. The second study was conducted to test the hypotheses induced from the case study; it examined corresponding computer operations. Twenty-nine students in a grade 5-6 classroom were evaluated as high- (HCP) or low-conceptual-progress (LCP) learners based on changes in their explanatory discourse in the database. Comparisons of students' activities showed that HCP learners constructed more problem-centred knowledge through interactive information flow between problem-based and referent-based knowledge, and HCP learners more frequently used the graphic medium to represent problem-based knowledge. The third study was a follow-up to generalize the results. Twenty-seven 5th- and 6th-grade students were introduced to a new shared note-entry function (called "discussion note") to facilitate their collaboration. Data analyses mostly confirmed the previous results. However, because of the change in the system, the interactive information flow was amplified particularly in the joint-plane of cooperative learning. On the basis of the above results, this thesis discusses: (1) how information flows within/among students when they build their knowledge in CSILE, (2) what aspects of students' information flow are critical to high conceptual progress, and (3) how CSILE affordance affects students' information flow.