This study extends research on perspectival understanding (Greeno & van de Sande, 2007) by using Du Bois' (2007) discourse work on stancetaking to investigate how students expressed their perspectives on course content through a variety of stances/positions as they negotiated meaning in online discussions. Participants were students in a…

This study examines emotion regulation strategies in written digital discussions revolving around controversial issues. Twenty-five undergraduate students, placed in five study groups, took part in written digital discussions. Two groups were chosen to participate in the study. Participants were interviewed and were asked to read the transcript of…

Difficulties with planning, such as negotiating task understandings and goals, can have a profound effect on regulation and task performance when students work collaboratively (Miller and Hadwin, "Computers in Human Behaviour", 52, 573-588, 2015a). Despite planning being a common challenge, teams often fail to identify strategies for…

Cognitive group awareness tools are a means to guide collaborative learning activities by providing knowledge-related information to the learners. While positive effects of such tools are firmly established, there is no consistency with regard to the awareness information used and a wide range of target concepts exist. However, attempts to compare…

Only a few studies have dealt with the challenge of bridging the linguistic gap between the dialogic realm and the talk of disengaged students. Bridging this gap is particularly relevant to the CSCL community since one of its utmost aims is to promote the dialogic. This study aims to articulate how to harness the CSCL design and affordances to…

Despite many years of research in CSCL, computers are still scarcely used in classrooms today. One reason for this is that the constraints of the classroom environment are neglected by designers. In this contribution, we present a CSCL environment designed for a classroom usage from the start. The system, called TapaCarp, is based on a tangible…

This paper illustrates the experience gained within an online course, where a collaborative technique, namely Role Play, was used within an asynchronous text-based environment to trigger collaboration and interactions among students. In a pilot study, the technique was analyzed using an evaluation model and two different means: on the one hand,…

This paper explores a labelling feature designed to support higher-level online dialogue. It investigates whether students use labels less often during a structured online dialogue than during an unstructured one, and looks at students' reactions to labelling and to both types of tasks. Participants are from three successive course offerings of a…

The skills of knowledge-creating inquiry are explored as a challenge for higher education. The knowledge-creation approach to learning provides a theoretical tool for addressing them: In addition to the individual and social aspects in regulation of inquiry, the knowledge-creation approach focuses on aspects related to advancing shared objects of…

This qualitative case study illustrates barriers to informal argumentation and reasoned debate, i.e., "critical discourse," in online forums. The case is the computer conference of a 15-week, graduate-level humanities course offered entirely at a distance. Twelve students, all with families and careers, were enrolled in the course. We read all…