Learning Through Sharing and Regulation

Abstract

Many studies investigate the effects of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) and also explore how learning processes and social interaction contribute to learning outcomes in online learning environments. This study provides an appropriate design of web-supported collaborative learning (CL) with teacher’s initiation and self-regulated learning (SRL), and demonstrates the effects of this design on improving students’ involvement and helping students attain course goals in a blended course. The authors conducted an experiment with an intervention of web-supported CL with initiation and SRL in a course titled ‘Applied Information Technology: Networking’ that included 112 sophomores from two classes at an academic university in Taiwan. The class of web-supported CL with initiation and SRL was the experimental group, and online CL without initiation or SRL served the control group. The results illustrate that web-supported CL with initiation and SRL could significantly improve students’ involvement in this course. In addition, interviewed students also expressed their positive appreciation for web-supported CL with initiation and SRL. The authors expect the innovative learning activities and teaching method in this study could provide insights for online teachers.