Intelligent Discussion System
for Collaborative Learning

iDiscuss

Distance learning continues to increase in popularity and importance as non-traditional students seek additional education. Yet, the physical isolation of students and teachers in distance learning creates challenges for both students and teachers, especially in communication: student motivation often suffers and the quality of education declines.

Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) has been recognized as an emerging paradigm of instructional technology and has become a major method for bringing the benefits of collaborative learning to students via networked computers. This interdisciplinary field draws upon technology, psychology, and pedagogy. CSCL supports the communication of ideas and information among learners, enhances peer interaction, and facilitates sharing and distributing knowledge and expertise among members in a learning community.

Unfortunately, existing tools for CSCL suffer from significant limitations:

  1. Students may lack motivation to collaborate with peers, not recognizing that they will benefit from peer-to-peer interactions.
  2. Students may have difficulty adapting to new rules and cultural practices of CSCL.
  3. Teachers may feel challenged by the technical demands of CSCL.
  4. Teachers may be unprepared for the amount of time and effort they need invest in managing and supporting students in CSCL.

This project addresses these issues and challenges. We will design, develop, and test an asynchronous online discussion system, iDiscuss, to support collaborative learning in STEM distance learning classes. We have already developed an initial version of iDiscuss that collects data from users as they interact with the system. Although our current version does not incorporate the intelligent support components, iDiscuss includes preliminary data analysis modules and has been implemented and tested in several online classes at Mississippi State University. The research team is extending the iDiscuss system: modules will be added that can monitor students' interactive discourse, analyze students' behavior, diagnose students' motivational states, and then, intelligently provide scaffolding strategies to promote students' motivation and cognitive engagement in CSCL activities.

iDiscuss will promote collaborative learning by providing an effective tool for students and instructors to communicate and collaborate with one another. This system will improve the quality of distance learning so that it equals or even exceeds that of traditional classroom instruction. Locally, several distance education instructors in STEM fields are eager to incorporate our collaborative system into their distance education classes. As the benefits of iDiscuss become more widely known, we hope it will be adopted on other campuses, so that students can enjoy the benefits of computer-supported collaborative learning.