The Collaborative Electronic Learning Project
The Collaborative Electronic Learning Project is an initiative of the Sport Technology Research Centre at the University of Calgary. Its purpose is to bring schools together to collaborate, using electronic communications technologies, in special projects of common interest to a number of schools. Children collaborate using asynchronous and synchronous modes of distance communication, including e-mail, document sharing, and telephone conferencing. In the experimental model, students never actually met their partners in person during the project, yet were able to collaborate together and complete their projects quite efficiently, with appropriate guidance from their teachers.
In the experimental phase of the project, three school projects from the Alberta Curriculum were used: Environmental Science, (a science project) Urban Studies, (a social studies project) and KID TV (a language arts project). All of these were originally designed as group projects. We simply took them one step further by making the groups to be composed of children from several different schools.
Research in the Collaborative Electronic Learning Project included discoveries about:
The "CyberSelf" - how the child presents himself as a bodiless entity toward those who cannot meet or see him, yet who must interact with him. Each child was required to provide an alias, a resume, and a logo, which became the foundation of the CyberSelf. Children were told that they must not provide hints about their true identity, and that information about gender, age, real name, address, and any other identifying information was never to be disclosed. This provided each child with a safe environment in which to practise and develop his or her online personality. Guidance was provided to the children through lessons on Netiquette and on how to present oneself at a telephone conference.
Discourse Analysis - how children interact with one another synchronously and asynchronously, as cyber-persons. Recordings were made of their telephone conferences, and copies were kept of their e-mail messages to each other. On topic and off topic behaviours were identified and recorded.
In some cases, teacher behaviours were also recorded, and categorized as on-topic passive, (allowing children to solve their own problems, but providing hints) on-topic active (solving problems for the children) off topic passive (available to the children, but not providing any information to them) and off topic active (actively engaged in doing something else while the children are working on the CEL project.)
Changes in School Performance - After doing a CEL project, do children have better problem solving skills than they did before? If so, do children who participate in a CEL project take the problem solving skills they have learned into other areas of school life? Research in this area is ongoing.
HISTORY
Nine schools participated in the experimental phase of the CEL project. They were: Terrace Road Elementary School, St. Helena Junior High, Akiva Academy, Webber Academy, Masters Academy, R. J. Hawkey Elementary School, St. Jean de Brebeuf Junior High School, St. Bonaventure Junior High School, and Cambrian Heights Elementary School. Each school experienced varying degrees of success with the programs, allowing researchers to determine elements that contribute to the success of participants in the project, and to take note of those elements which were missing in schools which did not do as well.
LESSONS LEARNED
Success in the Collaborative Electronic Learning Project requires the following prerequisites: