Holy COW: Scaffolding Case Based Conferencing on the Web with Preservice Teachers.

This study explored how to use the Web to foster collaboration and interaction among preservice teachers in undergraduate educational psychology. These preservice teachers conversed electronically with peers, mentors, and instructors on the Web about cases related to their early field experiences using an asynchronous conferencing tool called Conferencing on the Web (COW). Whereas earlier research compared levels of scaffolding on student generation and discussion of cases in COW within specific time periods, this particular study allowed longer amounts of time for students to post and discuss cases. In addition, there was more qualitative data collected here than in the previous study. The 157 student participants in this study produced 319 cases during the conference with 620 peer replies and 298 mentor replies. Students submitted the majority of their cases to the secondary-school conference, while less than ten percent of the cases were submitted to the general-case conference. In effect, they failed to perceive the generalizability of their field experiences. Students received on average about three peer or mentor comments on their cases. Transcript analyses from 75 randomly selected cases indicated that students failed to justify most of their comments. In addition, peer feedback was extremely conversational and opinionated. Conversely, instructor mentoring was focused on high level questioning, providing examples, and case specific feedback. While data from student interviews and evaluative surveys on their electronic conferencing experience were mixed, students who experienced this activity as part of an entire Web-based course claimed more benefits. Holy COW: Scaffolding Case-Based Conferencing on the Web With Preservice Teachers The past decade has been an exciting period for building cognitive apprenticeships with electronic learning tools. The power of asynchronous conferencing tools to facilitate college student reflection on field experiences and internships is without precedence (Bonk & King, 1998). Technology tools can now bind students, peers, mentors, instructors, practicing teachers, and experts in an array of resources, discussions, and curriculum recommendations. There are daily advances in tools to foster student generation of ideas, collaboration, and knowledge integration and evaluation. Unfortunately, there is minimal guidance as to their pedagogical significance and scant research to make firm claims as to how teacher educators might use such technology. In fact, there is growing recognition that the field of computer-supported collaboration learning (CSCL) lacks clear theoretical housing (Koschmann, 1994). It is hard to discount the fact that various technologies are transforming the formats of teaching and learning in most higher education and public school settings (Bonk, Hara, Dennen, Malikowski, & Supplee, 2000; Bonk, Kirkley, Hara, & Dennen 2001). The generation of computing networks to support live and delayed group collaboration has fortuitously paralleled the emergence of models and techniques for promoting cooperative learning and collaborative work in schools (Blumenfeld, Marx, Soloway, & Krajcik, 1996). Many questions remain, however, related to whether such tools for collaboration and communication have increased student access to education and resulting learning (Owston, 1997). Do unique student interactions and rich discussion threads increase student learning and comprehension? Does greater access to resources and the ability to browse instructional materials from multiple locations lead to more highly linked and accessible knowledge structures? Equally important, how does communication with students from other locales and countries enhance student perspective taking abilities and ensuing attitudes and beliefs about the rest of the world (Bonk, Appelman, & Hay, 1996; Windschitl, 1998)? As new learning technologies emerge, informed researchers, talented teachers, and innovative instructional designers must find new paths for their creative use. Electronic Cases in Teacher Education This particular study combines the recent movement toward apprenticing students in more meaningful and authentic learning environments (Lave & Wenger, 1991) with teacher education research highlighting the importance of case-based reasoning (Lundeberg, Levin, & Harrington, 1999; Kowalski, Weaver, & Henson, 1994, Shulman, 1991; Silverman, Welty, & Lyon, 1992). While aspects of each area are elaborated below, more thorough reviews of each topic can be found in Bonk, Hansen, Grabner, Lazar, and Mirabelli (1998) and Bonk, Malikowski, Angeli, and East (1998). Bonk, Charouli, Malikowski & Supplee: Holy COW 2 Case-based learning emphasizes the importance of realistic or authentic learning settings. More authentic problems can serve to anchor instruction in complex events that rely on the application of course concepts and principles for their resolution (Williams, 1992). It is the application of concepts to real world events that make this learning format appealing. Important to this particular study, many teacher education researchers point to the utility of cases for distinguishing expert and novice teacher performance, and, simultaneously, moving preservice teachers down the road to teaching expertise (Barnett, 1991; Livingston & Borko, 1989; Westerman, 1991). Other researchers have begun to discuss and illustrate how technologies might be employed to create reusable cases that preservice teachers can reflect on, discuss, debate, and evaluate (Admiraal, Lockhorst, Wubbels, Korthagen, & Veen, 1997; Bonk, Hansen, et al., 1998; Bonk, Hara, et al., 2000; Bonk, Malikowski, et al., 1998; Copeland, 1989; Merseth, 1991). Some of these technology innovations and pedagogical strategies focus on ways to reduce the relative isolation students teachers often feel by discussing field experiences in the form of electronic problem cases and success stories. Other novel technology applications in teacher education focus on typical teaching and learning environments and problems before students head to the field. In either situation, the goal is the professionalization of teacher education programs and the preparation of more skilled and competent teachers. Web-based collaboration and learning tools, for instance, can offer an assortment of richly textured cases in accessible, expedient, visually interactive, broad, diverse, and cheap formats. In fact, there are plenty of opportunities available to college instructors wanting to apprentice students in the teaching profession with cases (Riesbeck, 1996). For instance, some Web support sites for teaching education courses contain simulations embedded with realistic student records and images, expert commenting, personalized feedback mechanisms, and other key instructional help and task structuring. Sociocultural Underpinnings of Electronic Environments As such electronic learning environments emerge for apprenticing teachers and other professionals, educators have increasingly found sociocultural theory attractive for explaining how student learning and development unfolds in these environments (Bonk & Cunningham, 1998). In fact, Bonk and Kim (1998) detail how sociocultural theory can be applied in adult learning settings. For instance, Vygotsky’s (1986) arguments about the benefits of learning in a social context certainly have applicability in Web-based conferencing in higher-education environments. When students engage in social interaction and discourse about real world teaching and learning settings, such as electronic case conferencing about field experiences, they are exposed to the strategies and skills of peers and mentors which should help them internalize new competencies (Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989). One key sociocultural principle, the zone of proximal development (ZPD), relates to finding ways for experts and more capable peers to assist student learning and problem solving beyond their independent reach. In effect, the ZPD represents the area between the student's actual or unassisted performance on a