Overdijk, M., Van Diggelen, W., Kirschner, P. A., & Baker, M. (2012). Connecting agents and artifacts in CSCL: Towards a rationale of mutual shaping. International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning, 7, 193-210. doi:10.1007/s11412-012-9143-2Studying how collaborative activity takes shape interactionally in the context of technological settings is one of the main challenges in the field of Computer- Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL). It requires us, amongst other things, to look into the ‘black box’ of how technical artifacts are brought into use, or rather, how they are attuned to, interacted with, and shaped in various and varied practices. This article explores the establishment of a purposeful connection of human agents and technical artifacts in CSCL, that we call ‘the agent-artifact connection’. In order to contribute to a grounded conception of this connection, we reviewed three theoretical positions: affordance, structures and instrument. Although these three positions differ in how they conceptualise the connection, they share the assumption that a technical artifact carries a potential for action that becomes available when artifact and agent connect, and that the availability of action opportunities is relative to the ones who interact with the artifact. In this article, we map out the conceptual and methodological implications for each of the positions. We argue that the rationale of ‘shaping’ collaborative interactions that underlies a part of CSCL research should be replaced by a rationale of ‘mutual shaping’ of human agents and technical artifacts
The use and effects of a CSCL-tool are not always predictable from the properties of the tool alone, but depend on how that tool is appropriated. This paper presents the findings from a case study about the appropriation of a graphical shared workspace. When students are presented with a new tool they may encounter competing constraints and multiple possibilities for interacting with it. We argue that during critical events the students make choices, and in order to collaborate, coordinate these choices as a group. We study appropriation by looking into the ways in which small groups organize their contributions during a computer-mediated argumentative discussion. The results of our study illustrate how certain principles for organization emerge from an implicit negotiation of conventions, with mutual influence between the students and the tool.
In order to understand how technical artifacts are attuned to, interacted with, and shaped in various and varied classrooms, it is necessary to construct detailed accounts of the use of particular artifacts in particular classrooms. This paper presents a descriptive account of how a shared workspace was brought into use by a student pair in a face-to-face planning task. A micro-developmental perspective was adopted to describe how the pair established a purposeful connection with this unfamiliar artifact over a relatively short time frame. This appropriation was examined against the background of their regular planning practice. We describe how situational resources present in the classroom-norms, practices and artifactsframe possible action, and how these possibilities are enacted by the pair. Analysis shows that the association of norms and practices with the technical artifact lead to a contradiction that surfaced as resistance experienced from the artifact. This resistance played an important part in the appropriation process of the pair. It signaled tension in the activity, triggered reflection on the interaction with the artifact, and had a coordinative function. The absence of resistance was equally important. It allowed the pair to transpose or depart from regular procedure without reflection.
This paper presents a relatively new direction of CSCL research: small-group learning in the classroom. This research direction has received relatively little attention within the CSCL community. In this paper we explore the possibilities of collaborative technology in the classroom. We use the distinction between task-related and social-emotional interactions as a criterion for computer support. It is hypothesized that the students will use the collaborative technology purely for task-related interactions when the characteristics of the tool closely match the conditions for an effective task performance. It is assumed that these task-related interactions stimulate knowledge elaboration and learning within the student group. Our findings indicate that all computermediated interactions were task-related and facilitated knowledge elaboration. Oral communication was about the social-emotional aspects of the collaboration, and the planning and regulation of the collaborative activities.
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