Welcome to CSCL’05 workshop
Design and use of smart tasks in collaborativeclassrooms
Organized by Naomi Miyake
In collaboration with Hajime Shirouzu• Please come in front to discuss moreeasily. We may be a small group.

Welcome to CSCL’05 workshop

Design and use of smart tasks
in collaborative classrooms
Organized by Naomi Miyake
In collaboration withHajime Shirouzu

“Smart tasks” ?
• Some “tasks” work well in collaborativeclassrooms, as a good inducer of natural,
productive collaboration– Nice to share them– Nicer if we could come up with design rules
for making moreAim of this workshop• Collaboratively reflect upon tasks we use
in our practice• Identify “smart tasks,” which seem to work
• Extract commonalities

Schedule• We will provide you with some examples– Let’s discuss whether they are “smart”• May we solicit your contribution?
• Let’s discuss– Ideas for sharing– Ideas for design principles

Examples: Five Smart Tasks
1. How Far Does Light Go Projectfrom WISE
2. Book Support Challenge
from Learning by Design, Launcher task
3. Day Arithmetic Problem
4. Rolling Dice
5. Cutting Tapes
from our projectWISE Project
Marcia Linn and her group at UC Berkeley• Web-based Inquiry Science Environment project• Middle school science class• Curriculum covers heat, temperature and light• Students work in pairs using computers as
learning partners• Emphasizes knowledge integration throughcontroversy– Argumentation and debate enables students toactively construct an understanding of science andgain scientific skills

Smart Task 1: How far does light go?
• A comparison of two theories:– Light dies out as you move farther froma light source.
– Light goes forever until absorbed.

• Student activities:– Analyze, categorize, and create evidence– Create argument involving evidence and claims– Present and discuss their argument in classSenseMaker Argument Editor光はLight goes foreverLight dies out

Learning Outcome:Controversy at the heart of science“At a certain distance, you cannot see the light at all,which means that the light died out.”“With like a telescope you're like seeing farther away. So
the light would die out eventually because you can'tsee that so you have to look farther out to get the lightthat's farther out because it's died out before its got tous.”“You can see it closer with the [telescope] so obviously if
you were closer you could see it. It's seeing it closer
so you can see it.”
(Linn, M. C., Bell, P., & Hsi, S. Using the Internet to enhance science
understanding. Interactive Learning Environments, 1999.)

Learning by Design Project
Janet Kolodner and her group at Georgia Institute of Technology• A project-based inquiry approach toscience education for middle school wherestudents learn science content and skills inthe context of achieving design challenges– “Vehicle in motion” to learn about forces andmotion,– “Managing Erosion” to learn about erosion
and accretion…

Understanding the static as well as
collaborative skill• Collaborative learning requires skills like– borrowing ideas from each other and giving
credit to each other– appreciating the value of collaborating acrossgroups Iteration of design• Science learning requires skills like
– identifying and meeting criteria andconstraints– iteration (because you don't usually get it rightthe first time)…

Smart Task 2: Book Support Challenge
You’ve just taken a typing job to earn extra
money. The boss needs the job
completed immediately! But, a problem
arises that you forgot your glasses andcan’t read the textbook on a low table.
In the desk drawer, you find index cards,
rubber bands and paper clips. How canyou quickly construct a book stand thatwill raise the book 3 inches closer to yournearsighted eyes?

• Activity 1: Each group constructs a standin 10 minutes to share it with each other inthe class by “gallery walk.”• Activity 2: Each group redesigns the standto do gallery walk again.

Learning Outcome• “That group cheated our idea!”– A teacher takes this opportunity to let them knowthat scientists also uses each other’s ideas bygiving “credit.”– Students also watch the movie, “Apollo 13.”

• LBD project provides with similar projects;– Oreo Cookie– Parachute…

as a “launcher unit” for collaborative learning.

Understanding the construct of “schema”• Requiring meta-cognition on his or her
own cognitive processes• Target: Undergraduate Cognitive Science courses
24 classes (twelve weeks) in one semester
This task is for freshmen as their first set of experience.

Smart Task 3:“Day Arithmetic” problem
When Wednesday + Tuesday = Friday,
what is Tuesday + Friday?
• What to do when asked to solve many of them?
• How to solve the problem, “m+b=?”

What is a “schema”?

• Activity 1: Solve many problems

Activity 2: Think collaboratively “What is thefastest way to solve the many problems?” anddiscuss the trade-off between memory andprocess loads.

Memory: Rote memorization
Table: Look-up tables
Rules: Rules like“To add a Sunday, the addend is the answer.”“To add a Monday, choose the next day of the addend,”…

Activity 3: Create “Smart Tool” for Day Arithmetic

After all these activities, students solve the transfer
problem, “m+b=?”

Learning Outcome:

Abstraction levels of summaries
9080
70
60
50
40
30
20
100

Concrete
ModerateHighClass 1:
Solved 3problems

Class 2: 23problems

Class 3:
195
problems

Concrete experience is the basis for significant reflection.

Understanding the law of large numbers
Question: What does “The probability ofgetting ONE pip when you roll a die isone-sixth” mean?
…Even a college student answers that you
get ONE once per six rolls of a die.
Target: Undergraduate statistics courses
24 classes (twelve weeks) in one semester

Smart Task 4: Rolling Dice
• Activity 1: Each student rolled a die
100 times and tallied his or herresults.

• The class tallied the results to yield ahistogram of over 3000 trials.

Rolling Deformed Dice
• Activity 2: Each student rolled a deformed
die 200 times, which has four sides of 1.5
lengths of the other two.

• Each group tallied the results to compare
those of 20, 200 and 2000 trials.

200 trials
2000 trials

20 trials

Learning Outcome••The misconception was changed.
Levels of explanations at a term exam depended on the degree
how students explained the results on their own.
– In Class 1, over 35% students failed to tie their experience with
LofL, answering incorrectly like “p=r/n.”

45 %403530252015
1050

WRONG + NO ANSWER
OTHER
LofL:Concrete
LofL:Moderate+HighClass 1: Teacherguided

Class 2: StudentcenteredLearning Outcome••

The misconception was changed.
Levels of explanations at a term exam depended on the degree
how students explained the results on their own.
– In Class 2, over 40% students articulated the law of large numbers,
and most of them never went back to wrong answer.

45 %
40
35
30
25
20
15
1050

WRONG + NO ANSWEROTHER
LofL:Concrete
LofL:Moderate+High

Class 1: Teacherguided

Class 2: StudentcenteredUnderstanding the normal curve
and the central theorem• Highly abstract, hard-to-teach concept• Target: The same statistics courses

Smart Task 5: Cutting Tapes• Each students was shown thelength of 10cm, and asked to cut
100 tapes of “imaginary 10cm,”
without seeing the model, from aroll of paper tape.

• Each student individually tallied the 100
tape lengths to create own histogram,each of which comes out to have a uniqueshape.

• The class results of more than 6000 tapes
came very close to the normal curve.

Learning Outcome• By reflecting on these graphs, the students
formed a robust understanding of the concept.
• A series of activities of rolling dice, cutting tapes
and the like helped– half of the students to appreciate the significance of
trials of large number for probabilistic decision, and– one-third of the students to spontaneously gain theconcept of the central theory of extremity.

Discussion
1. Day arithmetic, dice, tape: Are theysmart tasks?
2. Do you have, or can you think of otherexamples?
3. Any design principles?

Design principles: set 1– engaging– Soliciting collaboration• Not aggregation; dice? tapes? Or another type ofcollabration• But different approaches/interpretations tocompare and integrate– Chances for reiteration;

Design principles: set 2• Importance of iteration– Something to go beyond the canonicalanswer– Involvement of critiquing phase to thecollaborative outcome• Importance of time frame• Gradual introduction of higher levels of
collaboration