Figure 4.4. Changes in conception of learning

Dylan shared how his view about knowledge creation has changed. Coming from another school in the university, he was familiar with Nonaka and Takeuchi’s theory of organizational knowledge creation, but after attending this course, he was exposed to other theories of knowledge creation. A few learners (Thomas, Urijah) talked about changing conceptions of cooperative learning versus collaborative learning, as well as the meaning of constraints and affordances (Dylan, Urijah, Nolan). Nolan reflected that he realized the knowledge building approach can be applied with lower track learners, contrary to his preconception that it was only appropriate for “smart” students. This suggests that learners could achieve some of the learning objectives set up by the educators, particularly in understanding nuances of meaning behind some learning concepts.

Overall, learners’ perspectives about learning has changed. As part of the learning biography, the they were asked “What does learning mean to you?”. It was an open-ended question with no word limit. Learners worked on the learning biography during the first and the last lesson over 13 weeks. From their writing, four main views surfaced: learning as acquiring knowledge, learning as active processing of knowledge, learning as a social participatory process, and learning through knowledge building. For example, learner A wrote “Learning means acquiring knowledge and skills and a change in attitude” for the first attempt and “There are three metaphors of learning: acquisition, participation and knowledge-creation metaphors (Paavola, Lipponen, & Hakkarainen, 2002).”

What is learning?

9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Acquiring Active processing Social participatory knowledge building 1st 8 6 0 0 2nd 7 5 5 5

1st 2nd

Figure 4.4. Changes in conception of learning

A comparison (1st lesson and last lesson) of the frequency count of these four views of learning is shown in Figure 4.3. Note that there could be more than one view presented in the same statement, so the total frequency is higher than the number of students. Learners’ view about learning changed greatly. In the first round of survey, students predominantly viewed learning as acquiring knowledge, followed by active processing. They did not see learning as social participation and knowledge building. But in the second round of survey, students’ view of learning became more multifaceted. The emphasis on learning as acquiring knowledge and active processing decreased. This implies that learners started to consider learning as social participation and knowledge building.

The class’s level of knowledge co-construction was also coded using the interaction analysis model (IAM) proposed by Gunawardena, Lowe, and Anderson (1997). IAM has been adapted by Chai and Tan (2009) to analyse discourse of a group of teachers who were engaged in a series of professional development courses. The IAM model is appropriate because of its roots in social constructivist theories of learning, and variants of it has been applied in online interaction analyses (e.g., Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2001). The five phases are: (1) Sharing or comparing of information, (2)