ecml/celv
European Centre for Modern Languages
Centre européen pour les langues vivantes
Project 1.3.2: Information & Communication Technologies in Distance Language Learning

General introductionProject teamProject descriptionWorkshop participants Workshop reportIn the face of (workshop) adversityBibliography & Webography
Tier 1: Teacher education and distance language learning
Tier 2: Teaching - Studying - Learning process
Evaluation & Conclusions
Workshop cartoonVideo album — Photo album 1Photo album 2BSCW demo

Tier 3 : Collaborative Learning Environments

Introduction

Integrated Distributed Learning Environments (IDLEs)
IDLEs refer to network-based groupware applications and programs that allow a large num-ber of users to collaborate over the net. IDLEs are also called technical platforms when tech-nological and technical aspects are underlined, or learning environments, particularly when pedagogical and didactic viewpoints are emphasized. Here we are referring to IDLEs as Inte-grated Distributed Learning Environments, which underscores the importance of distributed expertise through integration.

IDLEs are part of a larger and somewhat older concept of CSCW (computer-supported col-laborative work) or CSCL (computer-supported collaborative learning). IDLEs, however, place more emphasis on the shared use of the Internet, although they can also be used in an intranet.

IDLEs are a type of computer program that has grown more and more popular since the sec-ond half of the 1990s. Hundreds of IDLEs are currently available, both commercially and as freeware. Some of the best-known IDLEs include WebCT, BlackBoard, BSCW, but the list is almost endless. Business companies, university departments and private citizens have spent thousands of hours in developing "still one more" of them.

Most IDLEs comprise at least two basic functions:

(i) a possibility to upload and download files, such as Word documents, Excel charts, PowerPoint presentations or JPEG photos, and share them with the rest of the users, and
(ii) a discussion forum, which is in practical terms an enlarged e-mail system, a mailing list or a newsgroup, in which all messages can be accessed by everybody else, thanks to a sophisticated threading system.

In addition to these basic functions, other functionalities abound. Some IDLEs have their own internal e-mail system. Many have course management tools, such as the possibility of timed tests or a shared calendar.


The BSCW as an example of IDLEs
In this ECML project, BSCW was used as the major IDLE. BSCW, standing for Basic Sup-port for Collaborative Work, is an IDLE developed with European Union resources for edu-cational purposes. It was chosen to be used in this project for several reasons:

Using the BSCW in the project
BSCW was presented to the other project coordinators by Seppo Tella in January 2002 and was accepted. Since for security reasons the BSCW could not be installed on the ECML server in Graz, the project team decided to use it from the server of the University of Helsinki Computing Centre. Permission was requested and granted in April 2002, after which the pro-ject team started collecting and sharing their materials via the BSCW.



Figure 1. An example of the first page of BSCW.

BSCW continued to be used in the project until the finishing stages in May 2003.


IDLEs in the Framework of Cultural Theories
New emerging network-based study communities will greatly benefit from technological and intellectual tools, as well as from seeing the learning environments as new contexts. In our thinking, IDLEs are ideal for use in the framework of contextualism. They represent two mainstream cultural theories: first, they represent ideational theories, suggesting that change is a result of mental activities and ideas enabled by language. Second, they represent materi-alistic theories, holding that material conditions, like resources, money, and modes of produc-tion, are prime movers. We believe that these two theories merge beneficially in IDLEs. Their use calls for ideas related to teaching, studying and learning, but they also represent a context or a forum of action, a "centre stage", on which different actors interact. IDLEs are often particularly well designed for communal modes of inquiry and studying, as in the pre-sent project.


The Teaching-Studying-Learning Process ( see also Tier 2)
In new digital environments and in network-based education, the teacher must have a strong and theoretically well justified methodological view of his/her own. This view can be founded on various theories and conceptions of learning and knowledge, such as constructiv-ism, socio-constructivism or socio-culturalism. In pedagogical terms, this view can be ex-pressed briefly as the teaching-studying-learning (TSL) process (Uljens 1997), which under-lines the importance of all three components, not only learning or teaching, as used to be the case. The TSL process is based on the idea that in institutionalised education, teaching does not lead to learning directly; rather, we need the studying component in between. Thus, learn-ing is influenced indirectly by teaching via the learner's conscious and purposive studying. In our thinking, IDLEs are excellent tools, intellectual partners and new contexts when empowering the learner toward the educational aims and goals.

In the TSL process, the teacher is bound to change from a 'sage on the stage' to a 'guide on the side'. One could even take a step further: in network-based education, the real question is concerned with the dual stance (Willis 1995) of the learner and the teacher. The teacher is still on the centre stage as an actor and as a moderator or a facilitator of all activities but at the same time (s)he will be on the side, observing the teaching-studying-learning process with an attentive eye, reviewing the whole situation. The teacher, then, is both an actor and a critic. And so is the student: playing his or her part but also analysing his or her own studying process at the metacognitive level. The teacher can easily contribute to this process by giving cognitive support, such as scaffolding.

Tella (1999, 213) has argued that media educators will need a "media educational" eye in the spirit of Bourdieu's reflexive sociology (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992, 248). The question, then, is not only of reciprocity and addressivity between the different actors but also of the changes of the changing roles. One way to express this change is to describe the teacher as the student's cognitive coach and as a motivating and emotional counsellor. These will also help her to act as an interpreter of the student's relations with the world. This kind of 'eye' is needed when we think of a dialog as the metaphor of an network-based education (NBE) en-vironment, which contextualises the process of individual empowerment and raises the awareness of individual actors.

See also:

BSCW explanations and sample screens
BSCW explanations - discussion forums
BSCW explanations - downloading and uploading
BSCW explanations - track changes
Integrated Distributed Learning Environments
    (a PowerPoint presentation)
Follow up ideas for the use of IDLEs
Learning Management Systems (LMS) in foreign
     language teaching
(Tier 1)


To read more on the subject:
Tella, S. & Mononen-Aaltonen, M. (1998). Developing Dialogic Communication Culture in Media Education: Integrating Dialogism and Technology. University of Helsinki. De-partment of Teacher Education. Media Education Centre. Media Education Publica-tions 7. ERIC ED426620.
[http://www.helsinki.fi/~tella/mep7.html]

Mononen-Aaltonen, M. & Tella, S. (2000). From Brawn to Brain: Towards an Emerging Minds-on Approach in Integrated Distributed Learning Environments (IDLEs). In Bourdeau, J. & Heller, R. (eds.) Proceedings of ED-MEDIA 2000. World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia & Telecommunications. AACE / Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education. Montréal, Canada. June 27-July 1, 2000, 729-734.
[http://www.helsinki.fi/~tella/montreal.html]

Bourdieu, P. & Wacquant, L. J. D. (1992). An invitation to Reflexive Sociology. Chicago: Polity Press.

Tella, S. (1999). Mediakasvatus - aikamme arvoinen. (Media education for our times.) Kas-vatus 30 (3), 205-221. [http://www.helsinki.fi/~tella/tellakasvatus399.pdf]
[Abstrakti http://www.jyu.fi/ktl/kasvat99.htm]
[Abstract http://www.jyu.fi/ktl/journal.htm]

Uljens, M. (1997). School Didactics and Learning. Hove, East Sussex: Psychology Press.

Willis, J. A. (1995). Recursive, Reflective Instructional Design Model Based on Constructiv-ist-Interpretivist Theory. Educational Technology/November-December 5-23.


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