Teaching how to learn with a wiki in primary education: What classroom interaction can tell us

Abstract

Understanding how wikis are used to support collaborative learning is an important concern for researchers and teachers. Adopting a discourse analytic approach, this article attempts to understand the teaching processes when a wiki is embedded in a science project in primary education to foster collaborative learning. Through studying interaction between the teacher and students, our findings not only identify ways in which the teacher prompts collaborative learning but also shed light on the difficulties for the teacher in supporting student collective collaboration. It is argued that technological wiki features supporting collaborative learning can be realized only if teacher talk and pedagogy are aligned with the characteristics of wiki collaborative work: the freedom of students to organize and participate by themselves, creating dialogic space and promoting student participation. We argue that a dialogic approach for examining interaction can be used to help to design a more effective pedagogic approach in the use of wikis in education, to shift into Web 2.0 learning paradigm and to equip learners with the competences they need to participate in knowledge co-construction.