How Can We Study Learning with Geovisual Analytics Applied to Statistics?

Linnea Stenliden,Mikael Jern

doi:10.3390/fi4010022

Abstract

It is vital to understand what kind of processes for learning that Geovisual Analytics creates, as certain activities and conditions are produced when employing Geovisual Anlytic tools in education. To understand learning processes created by Geovisual Analytics, first requires an understanding of the interactions between the technology, the workplace where the learning takes place, and learners’ specific knowledge formation. When studying these types of interaction it demands a most critical consideration from theoretical perspectives on research design and methods. This paper first discusses common, and then a more uncommon, theoretical approach used within the fields of learning with multimedia environments and Geovisual Analytics, the socio-cultural theoretical perspective. The paper next advocates this constructivist theoretical and empirical perspective when studying learning with multiple representational Geovisual Analytic tools. To illustrate, an outline of a study made within this theoretical tradition is offered. The study is conducted in an educational setting where the Open Statistics eXplorer platform is used. Discussion of our study results shows that the socio-cultural perspective has much to offer in terms of what kind of understanding can be reached in conducting this kind of studies. Therefore, we argue that empirical research to analyze how specific communities use various Geovisual Analytics to evaluate information is best positioned in a socio-cultural theoretical perspective.

Highlights

We are situated in a rapidly growing and complex digital environment which has in turn increased our dependency on information, but at the same time there is increasing evidence that our information skills are not keeping pace in any systematic fashion
The aim is to highlight what factors the socio cultural theoretical perspective implies when studying learning with Geovisual Analytics, since there are important questions that need to be answered: What do we know about teachers’ management of Geovisual Analytics when used in education and as educational material? What do we know about the tools’ usability for learners’ knowledge construction and elucidating meaning? and what do we know about the processes of how visualized information turns into knowledge for the learners? The aim is not to answer these questions; it is rather to suggest methods that make it possible to answer those questions that are the central topic in this paper
As Wertsch [29], citing Vygotskij, describes learning as being embedded within social events and occurring as individuals interact with other people, objects and events in the environment, there are implications for what kind of research questions that can be addressed; the research design and methods are influenced by a socio-cultural theoretical perspective

Summary

Introduction

We are situated in a rapidly growing and complex digital environment which has in turn increased our dependency on information, but at the same time there is increasing evidence that our information skills are not keeping pace in any systematic fashion. Today more data are produced and access to information is greater than ever before, largely as a result of the development of information and communication technology (ICT). People have, in their daily life, to face the problem of sorting, filtering, interpreting and evaluating huge quantities of information. More data will be generated than during all previous human history How is it possible, in this (over) flow of information and unsorted media, to give people better potential to create their own well-founded meaning to orient themselves and act and communicate in a meaningful way [2]?

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