The Every Student Succeeds Act supports personalized learning (PL) to close achievement gaps of diverse K-12 learners in the United States. Implementing PL into a classroom entails a paradigm change of the educational system. However, it is demanding to transform traditional practice into a personalized one under the pressure of the annual standardized testing while it is unclear which PL approaches are more likely to result in better academic outcomes than others. Using national survey data of ELA teachers in identified learner-centered schools, this study compared high and low-performing learner-centered schools (determined by their standardized test results) in terms of their use of five PL features (personalized learning plan, competency-based student progress, criterion-referenced assessment, project- or problem-based learning, and multi-year mentoring) and their use of technology for the four functions of planning, learning, assessment, and recordkeeping. Generally, teachers in high-performing schools implemented PL more thoroughly and utilized technology for more functions than those in low-performing schools. Teachers in high-performing schools more frequently considered career goals when creating personal learning plans, shared the project outcomes with the community, and assessed non-academic outcomes. They stayed longer with the same students and developed close relationships with more students. Also, they more frequently used technology for sharing resources and reported having a more powerful technology system than those in low-performing schools. This study informs educators, administrators, and researchers of which PL approaches and technology uses are more likely to result in better academic outcomes measured by standardized assessments.
While educators value wikis' potential, wikis may fail to support collaborative constructive learning without careful scaffolding. This article proposes literature-based instructional methods, revised based on two expert instructors' input, presents the collected empirical evidence on the effects of these methods and proposes directions for future refinements. The instructional methods were implemented by an expert instructor teaching a 12-week 68-student undergraduate design class in Canada. Data were collected from observations, interviews and content analysis of wikis. The findings revealed that in small-group project (SGP), the wiki instructional methods enhanced collaborative learning with most instructional methods derived from cooperative learning, but in whole-class collaborative knowledge building (CKB), the wiki instructional mehtods failed to turn the class into a self-sustained learning community after the scaffolding faded. We conclude that the genre of wikis should be different for SGP and CKB. While the students easily adopted the 'reproduced' genre of wikis for SGP with familiar tasks, they felt overwhelmed or resistant to the unfamiliar 'emergent' genre of wikis for CKB in massive collaborative constructive learning. Therefore, we propose that future refinements for wiki-supported CKB should focus on providing students scaffolding for intersubjectivity (understanding collaborative constructive learning) and transfer of responsibility (developing autonomy).Keywords collaborative knowledge building, collaborative learning, genre of wikis, scaffolding, smallgroup project-based learning, wikis.
Prior research has revealed resistance against wiki collaboration in higher education classrooms. Compared with small‐group projects, whole‐class knowledge building (KB) on a wiki is difficult, given students’ lack of similar experiences, which requires scaffolding intersubjectivity and transfer of responsibility. This paper focuses on the second cycle of a design‐based research study to develop learner autonomy in wiki‐supported KB. A learner autonomy framework guided the re‐design of the instructional theory with content from the relevant literature. The theory was implemented in an undergraduate design course to validate and refine the theory. We analyzed the data from observations, wiki content, interviews with the expert instructor and two other instructors and a focus‐group interview with students. We found that the KB principles helped students understand KB; and the self‐regulation and meta‐cognition strategies increased motivation and confidence in KB. From the success of this case, we propose that scaffolding learner autonomy for a wiki‐supported KB calls for a change in students’ learning mindsets and requires careful instructional design to support the cognitive, behavioral and affective aspects of change to reduce resistance.
Practitioner NotesWhat is already known about this topic
Knowledge building (KB) should be practiced to enhance students’ competency in innovating and improving ideas collaboratively for societal progress.
Wiki‐supported whole‐class KB is more difficult than wiki‐supported small‐group projects owing to students’ lack of experience in KB.
What this paper adds
An instructional theory designed to foster learner autonomy in KB on a class wiki.
Success in fostering KB on a class wiki validates the instructional methods and suggests refinements to help students understand KB and increase their motivation and confidence in doing so.
Implications for practice and/or policy
Autonomy in KB requires scaffolding in the behavioral, cognitive and affective aspects.
Although wiki‐supported KB challenges students who have a teacher‐centered mindset of learning or have been immersed in a culture of competition, it brings an opportunity to change students’ mindset to favor co‐constructed learning and create a culture of sharing in the process of adopting it.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.