Year: 2012
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Finnish summary Diss.The aim of the study was to clarify how upper secondary school students locate and evaluate information and engage in content processing when they use the Internet as a source for writing an essay either in an individual or collaborative reading situation.Another aim was to illuminate how student pairs coconstruct meaning and knowledge when they read on the Internet in order to explore a controversial issue.Further, the study clarified how the construction of an argument graph promotes students' collaborative online reading.Two teaching experiments were arranged.In both experiments, the students were asked to write an essay on a given topic and search for source material for their essay on the Internet.In the first experiment, the students (n = 25) worked individually and in the second experiment the students (n = 76) worked in pairs.In the second experiment, the half of the students constructed an argument graph whereas half of the students took notes during online reading.Data consists of either think-aloud and interaction protocols, screen captures, and students' essays.The quantitative-based qualitative approach was applied to analyze the data.The study found that some individual and collaborative readers had considerable difficulties in locating information.It was also found that the students more frequently evaluated the relevance of information than credibility of information in both individual and collaborative reading situation.Further, collaborative reading of online information, within an argumentative framework, seems to promote content processing that goes beyond simple gathering of facts.However, the differences in the way in which students interacted with one another were remarkable.When some students engaged in co-construction of meaning and knowledge, the other students had a stronger preference for working alone.Furthermore, the depth of content processing during online reading was related to the quality of students' essays in both individual and collaborative reading situations.Finally, it was found that the construction of an argument graph may promote students' collaborative online reading, in particular, their synthesizing processes.
Author: Carita Kiili
Language: English
Subfield: Developmental and Educational Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W939332420