Ubiquitous Collaborative Support (UbiCoS)
The goal of this project is to develop a tool that encourages students to collaborate more effectively across different types of digital platforms in the context of a middle school math curriculum. Giving help to one's peers is a critically important collaboration skill that promotes one's own learning (through the process of explaining to others) and the overall learning of one's communities. However, little is understood about how the context one is in changes one's ability to give help, and how technology can support learners in giving help across multiple contexts. We created a tool that spanned three types of digital collaboration models: synchronous interaction within the context of an e-learning platform, asynchronous interaction on a Q&A forum, and interaction with a teachable agent. We then investigated how students' help-giving behaviors changed across different platforms, how we can use technology to assess and model students' help-giving behaviors in different contexts, and how a badge-based approach can be used to support students' help-giving behaviors. Outcomes of this project include a math curriculum designed to inspire collaborative work, principles for the design of adaptive collaborative tools, and takeaways on how, why, and when students give help.
This NSF-funded project (under Grant No. 1736103 and Grant No. 1912044) is a collaboration with Dr. Ruth Wylie at Arizona State University. Within the lab, Ishrat Ahmed works on this project. For more information, visit the project website at: https://csi.asu.edu/ubicos.
Publications
Ahmed, I., Mawasi, A., Wang, S., Wylie, R., Bergner, Y., Whitehurst, A., & Walker, E. (2019, June). Investigating help-giving behavior in a cross-platform learning environment. In International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (pp. 14-25). Springer, Cham.
Ahmed, I., Girotto, V., Mawasi, A., Whitehurst, A., Wylie, R., & Walker, E. (2019). Co-Design for Learner Help-Giving Across Physical and Digital Contexts. International Conference on the Learning Sciences.
Clark AT, Ahmed I, Metzger S, Walker E, Wylie R. Moving From Co-Design to Co-Research: Engaging Youth Participation in Guided Qualitative Inquiry. International Journal of Qualitative Methods. January 2022. doi:10.1177/16094069221084793
Mawasi, A., Ahmed, I., Walker, E., Wang, S., Marasli, Z., Whitehurst, A., & Wylie, R. (2020). Using design-based research to improve peer help-giving in a middle school math classroom. International Conference on the Learning Sciences.