Schmitz Megan J, Winskel Heather
University of Western Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
Br J Educ Psychol. 2008 Dec;78(Pt 4):581-96. doi: 10.1348/000709908X281619. Epub 2008 Feb 6.
Collaborative learning is recognized as an effective learning tool in the classroom. In order to optimize the collaborative learning experience for children within a collaborative partnership, it is important to understand how to match the children by ability level, and whether assigning roles within these dyads is beneficial or not.
The current study investigated the effect of partnering children with different task-specific abilities and assigning or not assigning helping roles within the dyads on the quality of talk used in a collaborative learning task.
The participants in this study comprised 54 year 6 pupils from a Western Sydney government primary school (boys=26, girls=28). The ages ranged from 10 years 10 months to 12 years 4 months with a mean age of 11 years 4 months.
The children were formed into 27 single sex dyads of low-middle- and low-high-ability partnerships. In half of each of these dyads the higher ability partner was asked to help the lower ability partner, which was compared with just asking partners to work together. The quality of talk used by the dyads while working collaboratively on the problem-solving task was analysed using a language analysis framework developed by Mercer and colleagues (e.g. Littleton et al., 2005; Mercer, 1994, 1996).
Results of this study found that children who worked collaboratively in the low-middle-ability dyad condition demonstrated significantly more high-quality exploratory talk than those in the low-high-ability dyad condition. Although there was no significant difference between dyads who were assigned roles and those who were asked to work together, there was an interaction trend which suggests that low-high-ability dyads, who were given the roles of helper and learner, showed more exploratory talk than dyads who were asked just to work together.
Mercer's re-conceptualization of Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) in terms of the Intermental Development Zone (IDZ), which is reliant on constructive challenging discourse, can potentially provide a platform upon which all learners in the classroom can benefit from collaborative learning experiences.
合作学习被认为是课堂上一种有效的学习工具。为了在合作关系中优化儿童的合作学习体验，了解如何根据能力水平对儿童进行匹配，以及在这些二元组中分配角色是否有益至关重要。
本研究调查了将具有不同特定任务能力的儿童配对，并在二元组中分配或不分配帮助角色对合作学习任务中使用的谈话质量的影响。
本研究的参与者包括来自悉尼西部一所政府小学的54名六年级学生（男生26名，女生28名）。年龄范围从10岁10个月到12岁4个月，平均年龄为11岁4个月。
将儿童分成27个单性别二元组，形成低-中能力和低-高能力配对。在这些二元组中的每一组的一半中，要求能力较强的伙伴帮助能力较弱的伙伴，并将其与只要求伙伴一起工作的情况进行比较。使用由默瑟及其同事开发的语言分析框架（例如利特尔顿等人，2005年；默瑟，1994年、1996年）分析二元组在合作解决问题任务时使用的谈话质量。
本研究结果发现，在低-中能力二元组条件下合作的儿童比在低-高能力二元组条件下的儿童表现出显著更多的高质量探索性谈话。虽然分配角色的二元组和被要求一起工作的二元组之间没有显著差异，但存在一种交互趋势，这表明被赋予帮助者和学习者角色的低-高能力二元组比只被要求一起工作的二元组表现出更多的探索性谈话。
默瑟根据心理间发展区（IDZ）对维果茨基的最近发展区（ZPD）进行的重新概念化，依赖于建设性的挑战性话语，有可能提供一个平台，让课堂上的所有学习者都能从合作学习体验中受益。
