CSCL Tools and Critical Thinking in History Education

Program Overview and Research Questions

This school program evaluates the necessity of disseminating current events in the area of critical thinking skills and the Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) tool's contribution to this area. History is a subject that students generally consider dry and boring because it is typically delivered in the form of a lecture. The objective of this school program is to make the learning of history more insightful, meaningful, and engaging for Normal Academic students. The project also aims to inculcate school values of Graciousness, Determination, Loyalty, and Sincerity.

Evidence provided in the work of many researchers suggests that the approach known as "drill and kill" — in which students read voluminous textbooks — reduces motivation to learn. The development of critical thinking skills is a central consideration of this study. Wright (2002) wrote about the necessity of challenging students through tools of critical thinking and providing integration of critical thinking skills into history instruction through the usage of a CSCL tool. The effectiveness of the CSCL tool will be measured through an experimental design, making use of qualitative and quantitative measures in the form of questionnaires administered during pre- and post-study tests. The results found in this study suggest that a Tablet PC or Notebook-based classroom interaction system can be harnessed to enhance the argumentation process. The teacher is able to collect and review students' work in real time, incorporating selected students' answers into the discussion. The researcher believes that the application of technology as illustrated in this work can bring similar benefits to instruction in other disciplines.

The primary research question for this study is whether a dialogic approach through CSCL has an impact upon students' learning of history. The impact will be measured not only by outcomes but also through the process of the intervention itself. Specific questions this research sought to answer include:

1. Are there changes in students' critical thinking skills and history knowledge during the process of the intervention?

2. To what extent will the 20-week treatment in the CSCL environment help improve students' results?

Introduction and Theoretical Background

This study highlights the necessity of disseminating current events in the area of critical thinking skills and the CSCL tool's contribution to this area. History is a subject that students generally consider dry and boring because it is typically delivered in lecture format. Rittel and Webber (1973) held that critical thinking skills cannot develop without debate, negotiation, and conflict. Lehtinen et al. (2004) held that education must serve the most basic requirement of preparing learners to fully participate in a highly networked information society in which the most critical resource for social and economic development is knowledge. To this end, schools and educational institutions must find more advanced pedagogical tools and methods to meet the challenges presented in today's networked information society.

According to Lehtinen et al. (2004), cognitive interaction among peers drives the development of critical thinking and argumentative skills. Lehtinen et al. (2004) also noted that the CSCL tool appears to engage students in in-depth inquiry over a substantial period of time and provides socially distributed cognitive resources for monitoring comprehension and other metacognitive activities.

Method, Sample, and Design

The method employed in this study is an experimental static-group comparison design, used to assess the effectiveness of the CSCL tool in developing students' critical thinking skills in the subject area of history. The length of this study is one semester (20 weeks). A questionnaire and test will be administered during pre- and post-study phases. The researcher and teachers will also evaluate the study through direct observations. The data generated will be used to answer the research questions this study posed.

This experiment will be conducted using a sample of Secondary One Normal Academic students undertaking history tests, and teachers completing questionnaires in the form of self-reflection. This study identifies two dependent variables. The first is students' attitude toward the study of history, measured through questionnaires designed by the researcher. These questionnaires examined factors such as students' perception of their achievement in history and their attitude toward learning history after using CSCL. The second dependent variable is students' achievement in history as measured by pre- and post-test results.

This study will be conducted through an experimental comparison design (Gall, Borg & Gall, 1996) to assess the effectiveness of the CSCL tool in developing critical thinking skills in history students over one semester (20 weeks). The main sources of data include pre- and post-survey responses from students, pre- and post-tests, and the discussion forum. The criterion for measurement in this study is the effectiveness of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning tools in teaching history, specifically with regard to "collaborative argumentation."

The subjects are Secondary One students in the Normal stream undertaking history. History tests and questionnaires for students will be administered pre- and post-study. The researcher teaches all four classes of Secondary One Normal stream students in the school. From each class, five students will be randomly selected to undergo the CSCL teaching method. These students will be classified as Group A, while the remaining students will be classified as Group B. Group A will undergo the CSCL teaching method, while Group B students will experience the existing teaching method used by the school. Group B's outcomes will be used to compare with Group A's results based on the research questions.

Independent variables are often regarded as the "treatment" given to one group in a study. In this study, the treatment is the use of CSCL with one group of students. The control condition is researcher-led, face-to-face discussion — the normal mode of instruction in the classroom.

There are two dependent variables in this study. First, students' attitude toward the study of history is measured by questionnaires designed by the researcher, examining factors such as students' perception of their achievement in history and their attitude toward learning history after using CSCL. The second dependent variable is students' achievement in history as measured by their pre- and post-test results.

The CSCL Tool: EduLearn and AskNLearn

The CSCL tool chosen for this study is called EduLearn, a software product provided by the company AsknLearn. This software permits any number of users to collaborate online in real time. Its design provides all the tools necessary for successful collaboration, including general chat capabilities (with the added feature of printing verbatim transcripts of chat sessions), file sharing, private chat, document review, voice communications, a shared calendar, a web links tool, email, and an outline tool. Many of these tools may be used simultaneously by participants, with continuous updates of any changes made available to each participant. Participation in collaborative meetings may be synchronous or asynchronous (Tan, 2000).

For the purposes of this study, the primary tool used will be the online forum, through which questions will be posted and students will discuss them. In either synchronous or asynchronous mode, the software provides all participants with instant updates of any changes that have occurred during collaboration. Furthermore, the software provides full encryption of all data before it leaves a user's computer and travels over the Internet, and full decryption after it enters another user's computer, ensuring a fully secured peer-to-peer environment. Transcripts of each collaborative session can be printed verbatim for further analysis, allowing researchers to gather data that might not be expressed by subjects in their questionnaire responses or self-reflection writing.

Conclusion

The analysis of data collected from the two instruments was used to answer the two research questions. The pre- and post-treatment questionnaire findings helped to answer the first research question: "Are there changes in students' critical thinking skills and history knowledge in the process of the intervention?" Student interviews and teacher feedback suggested that the positive responses in the post-treatment questionnaire were the result of the 20-week intervention. The findings implied that students had come to understand that regurgitation of learned facts is not an effective way of answering examination questions; instead, the application of analytical and critical thinking skills is required.

The second instrument — the pre- and post-test scores — helped to answer the second research question concerning the extent to which the 20-week treatment in the CSCL environment improved students' results. The comparison of the two sets of test scores showed that the CSCL tool helped students perform substantially better. This improvement, as reflected in the test scores, suggests that the CSCL tool was successful in facilitating the acquisition of critical thinking skills, resulting in better post-test results for Group A.

The findings from interviews with teachers and students and the observations provided by teachers further substantiated the results from the questionnaire and achievement test. They showed that Group A students had developed and were actively applying critical thinking skills. The numerous examples given by teachers in interviews provided the investigator with strong reasons to believe that the 20-week treatment had helped to change students' self-perceived ability to answer examination questions while simultaneously improving their actual results. Together, these findings suggest that CSCL-mediated collaborative argumentation holds meaningful promise for enriching history instruction and developing higher-order thinking in secondary school students.

Gall, M.D., Borg, W.R., & Gall, J.P. (1996). Educational Research: An Introduction. London: Longman.

Lehtinen, E., Hakkarainen, K., Lipponen, L., Rahikainen, M., & Muukkonen, H. (1999). Computer Supported Collaborative Learning: A review. Retrieved October 02, 2006.

Rittel, H., & Webber, M. (1973). Dilemmas in a general theory of planning. Policy Sciences, 4, 155–169.

Tan, S.C. (2000). Supporting Collaborative Problem-Solving Through Computer-Supported Collaborative Argumentation. Pennsylvania State University: Pennsylvania.

Wright, I. (2002). Challenging students with the tools of critical thinking. The Social Studies, 93(5). Retrieved October 18, 2006, from