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The electronic index to the NATO ASI Series provides full bibliographical references (with keywords and/or abstracts) to more than 30000 contributions from international scientists published in all sections of the NATO ASI Series. Access to the NATO-PCO DATABASE compiled by the NATO Publication Coordination Office is possible in two ways:

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Series F: Computer and Systems Sciences, Vol. 133

The ASI Series F Books Published as a Result of Activities of the Special Programme on ADVANCED EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY

This book contains the proceedings of a NATO Advanced Research Work­shop held within the activities of the NATO Special Programme on Advanced Educational Technology, running from 1988 to 1993 underthe auspices of the NATO Science Committee.

The volumes published so far in the Special Programme are as follows (further details are given at the end of this volume):

67: Designing Hypermedia for Learning. 1990. 76: Multimedia Interface Design in Education. 1992. 78: Integrating Advanced Technology into Technology Education. 1991. 80: Intelligent Tutoring Systems for Foreign Language Learning. 1992. 81: Cognitive Tools for Learning. 1992. 84: Computer-Based Learning Environments and Problem Solving. 1992. 85: Adaptive Learning Environments: Foundations and Frontiers. 1992. 86: Intelligent Learning Environments and Knowledge Acquisition in Physics. 1992. 87: Cognitive Modelling and Interactive Environments in Language Learning. 1992. 89: Mathematical Problem Solving and New Information Technologies. 1992. 90: Collaborative Learning Through Computer Conferencing. 1992. 91: New Directions for Intelligent Tutoring Systems. 1992. 92: Hypermedia Courseware: Structures of Communication and Intelligent Help. 1992. 93: Interactive Multimedia Learning Environments. 1992. 95: Comprehensive System Design: A New Educational Technology. 1993. 96: New Directions in Educational Technology. 1992. 97: Advanced Models of Cognition for Medical Training and Practice. 1992.

104: Instructional Models in Computer-Based Learning Environments. 1992. 105: Designing Environments for Constructive Learning. 1993. 107: Advanced Educational Technology for Mathematics and Science. 1993. 109: Advanced Educational Technology in Technology Education. 1993. 111: Cognitive Models and Intelligent Environments for Learning Programming. 1993. 112: Item Banking: Interactive Testing and Self-Assessment. 1993. 113: Interactive Learning Technology for the Deaf. 1993. 115: Learning Electricity and Electronics with Advanced Educational Technology. 1993. 116: Control Technology in Elementary Education. 1993. 117: Intelligent Learning Environments: The Case of Geometry. 1994. 119: Automating Instructional Design, Development, and Delivery. 1993. 121: Learning from Computers: Mathematics Education and Technology. 1993. 122: Simulation-Based Experiential Learning. 1993. 125: Student Modelling: The Key to Individualized Knowledge-Based Instruction. 1994. 128: Computer Supported Collaborative Learning. 1994. 129: Human-Machine Communication for Educational Systems Design. 1994. 132: Design of Mathematical Modelling Courses for Engineering Education. 1994. 133: Collaborative Dialogue Technologies in Distance Learning. 1994.

Collaborative Dialogue Technologies in Distance Learning

Edited by

M. Felisa Verdejo Departamento de Ingenieria Electrica, Electrönica y de Control Escuela Tecnica Superior de Ingenieros Industriales Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia Apdo 60149, E-28080 Madrid, Spain

Stefano A. Cerri Dipartimento di Scienze dell' Informazione Universitä di Milano Via Comelico 39,1-20135 Milano, Italy

Springer-Verlag

Berlin Heidelberg GmbH

Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Collaborative Dialogue Technologies in Distance Learning, held in Segovia, Spain, April 24-27, 1993

CR Subject Classification (1991): K.3, H.5

ISBN 978-3-642-63394-2 ISBN 978-3-642-57899-1 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-57899-1

CIP data applied for

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcast­ing, reproduction on microfilms or in any other way, and storage in data banks. Duplication of this publication or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the German Copyright Law of September 9, 1965, in its current version, and permission for use must always be obtained from Springer-Verlag. Violations are liable for prosecution under the German Copyright Law.

© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 1994 Originally published by Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg New York in 1994 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1 st edition 1994

Typesetting: Camera-ready by authors/editors SPIN: 10130750 45/3140 - 5 4 3 2 1 0 - Printed on acid-free paper

Preface

In April 1993, an interdisciplinary NATO Advanced Research Workshop on "Collaborative dialogue technologies in distance learning" was held in Segovia, Spain. The workshop brought together researchers in fields related to distance learning using computer-mediated communication. The statement of justification of the NATO ARW follows hereafter.

Justification of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Collaborative Dialogue Technologies in Distance Learning

Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) systems have features that reduce some temporal, physical and social constraints on communication. Theories of communication have shifted from viewing communication as a linear transmission of messages by a sender to a receiver, to viewing it as a social paradigm, where individuals are actors in a network of interdependent relationships embedded in organizational and social structures. Recent research focuses on models of information-sharing to support not only the activities of individuals but also the problem-solving activities of groups, such as decision-making, planning or co­writing. This area of research is called Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). The Artificial Intelligence (AI) approach uses knowledge-based systems to enhance and facilitate all these processes, including the possibility of using natural language.

The traditional model of distance education places a strong emphasis on indepen­dent study, supported by well developed learning materials. This model can be characterized as one-way media. However, the potential of CMC to provide better guidance to the student in Higher Distance Education has been quickly recognized for at least two kind of activities: information sharing and interaction. This is a first step towards a change from stand-alone study to a more cooperative situation.

The shift from individual to collaborative learning is also an emerging approach in recent learning theories and experiments. Distance learning is one setting in particular that deserves more and more attention (as, for example, in the current CEC DELTA programme). The scenario may include: a) a group of students performing different kinds of cooperative learning activities such as discussion or problem solving, using conventional or multimedia-based material; b) a group of teachers, organizing, facilitating and controlling the cooperative learning; c) a group of authors creating courseware; and d) a computer environment supporting all these activities.

The proposed workshop is organized around themes related to three main activities involved in collaborative distance learning scenarios: learning, coordination and co-authoring. The title "collaborative dialogue technologies" stresses the focus on conversational models of group interaction. Leading lecturers have been carefully selected as experts in at least one of the topics, reaching a balance from theoretical

VI Preface

and practical background, covering the fields mentioned above, and coming from industry and academy. Other participants, to be chosen by means of a limited call for papers, will enrich the presentations and discussions.

Group activities commenting on each other's ideas will be an important component of the workshop. Three groups will be organized to facilitate active discussions. Their work will be presented in plenary meetings. Participants will be assigned to a specific group, in order to facilitate the sharing of different profiles. An in-depth synthesis will close the workshop. Presentations, a summary of the group's discus­sions and the synthesis will form the basis of the book.

Maria Felisa Verdejo, November 1992

Eighteen papers were presented at the workshop: thirteen were invited and five selected from responses to an electronic call for contributions. Presentations and group discussions were interleaved. Three working groups were organized to discuss further issues concerning:

• Pedagogical framework • Learning experiences • Models and systems

This volume comprises an edited and refereed version of those papers, plus three additional papers that synthesize the discussions of the three working groups. The introduction presents the papers and points out some of the links between them.

April 1994 Maria Felisa Verdejo, Stefano Alessandro Cerri

Acknowledgments VII

Acknowledgments

The workshop was sponsored by NATO Advanced Educational Technology Programme. Additional funding was provided by the Spanish Distance Learning University (U.N.E.D) through Media & Technologies and Continuum Education Vice-Rectories, the Engineering School, and the Associated Center of U.N.E.D in Segovia. Our thanks to these organizations.

We would like to acknowledge the contribution of our co-organizers, Morten Flate Paulsen and Cristina Simon, the speakers and participants in making the workshop a shared success.

Local arrangements, apart from the weather, were the effort of many people, from U.N.E.D and the Centro Asociado de Segovia. Let us specially mention Miguel Padilla, M. Soledad Salafranca, Miguel Angel Sebastian, as well as other Spanish colleagues: M.Teresa Abad, Beatriz Barros, Ana Garda Serrano, Encarna Pastor.

This book is an outcome of the presentations and group work that took place at the workshop. Pre-proceedings were circulated at the workshop and each paper has been later reviewed by at least two reviewers who were asked to collaborate directly with the author, preferably via e-mail, in order to help himlher to enhance the paper content and formulation. The paper review process has been in this respect quite uncommon, as the taSk was not to accept the papers but to criticize constructively papers already accepted. In most cases this brought significant improvements with respect to the originally circulated versions. To all of the authors, as well to the referees we express our sincere gratitude for their time and efforts.

In producing this volume, Bruna Zonta handled the formatting and lexical check and Gordon Davies made a linguistic proofreading. Their essential and profes­sional work is gratefully acknowledged.

We would like to mention the special contribution of Cristina Simon, from the very beginning of the workshop organization to the last stage of the book preparation. Her availability and assistance was a great personal and professional support.

Referees

Monique Baron, Nur Erol, Camillo Falcone, Peter Goodyear, Guy Gouarderes, Monique Grandbastien, Roger Hartley, Gordon McCalla, Angus McIntyre, Jean Francois Nicaud, Helen Pain, Morten Flate Paulsen, Domenico Rotondi, John Self, Cristina Simon, Kris Van Marcke, Martial Vivet, Radboud Winkels

Foreword

This book is an important contribution to the growing literature and research on the use of technology-mediated interaction in distance education and open learning. It may seem paradoxical to some people that technology can be used successfully to bring a strong element of inter-personal interaction, dialogue, and social networking into educational programmes, but this in fact is the case in what we recognise now as 'third generation' distance education. The first generation of distance education is represented by the traditional, relatively artisanal, correspondence course, where the learner is isolated, and the only communication is by letter, with one's correspondence tutor. The second generation is represented by institutions such as the British Open University or Spain's Universidad Nacional de Educaci6n a Distancia, which operate more on a broadcast and mass production model, with economies of scale due to large numbers of students following individual courses; tuition by written correspondence is still an important element of interaction, but this is supplemented by periodic face-to-face tutorials and residential sessions. Third generation distance education courses are characterised by the combination of well­prepared course materials designed for independent study (print, audio-visual, computer-based ... ), with the possibility of various forms of technology-mediated interaction amongst learners, tutors, and resource people dispersed in space and time The technology is thus used as a medium for conducting conversations and dialogues around the courseware, allowing for the co-construction of new knowledge and understandings amongst groups of learners and tutors, who might otherwise have little opportunity to interact with each other.

Over a third of the papers in this book are concerned in one way or another with the use of computer conferencing and electronic mail in education; this relatively low cost technology for deferred time, text-based communication, is proving to be a powerful and increasingly popular medium - either for totally 'online' courses based on the virtual classroom model, or as an adjunct to more conventional, second generation, distance education courses. Computer conferencing has in fact the potential to blur many of the traditional distinctions between face-to-face and distance education methods, and to help promote a resource-based approach to learning which no longer emphasises the teacher as the main source of knOWledge. Conferencing supports many to-many communication, and conferencing software includes features specifically designed to help in the organisation, structuring, and retrieval of messages. Messages can be linked to each other (eg as 'comments'), organised in different 'branches' or 'topics' of a conference, and search commands can rapidly identify messages with particular key words in their titles, or in the body of the text. Support is also provided for tracking the activity of individual group members: for example, it is generally possible to see which messages in a conference a given member has read, or which messages have been written by a given member. Special commands are available to the person responsible for a conference (the 'moderator' or 'organiser') which can help in defining the membership of the conference, in keeping the discussion on track, and in scheduling the opening and closing of discussion topics.

X Foreword

Computer conferencing is by no means a new or advanced technology (the fIrst systems were developed twenty years ago), but its use in education on a signifIcant scale, along with other computer networking posibilities, is a relatively recent phenomenom associated with the more widespread availability of personal computers, modems, and communications software. Over the next few years, the appearance on the consumer market of 'teleputers' (personal computers with built-in features for both real time and deferred time multimedia communication) and of access to ISDN facilities, will no doubt lead to an increase in the use of real time document sharing, audio graphic conferencing, and video-conferencing in distance education. Several of the papers in this book explore the potential for educational dialogue, and the associated research issues, which will arise from the new and very rich communicative environments which these technological developments will make available.

Perhaps the strongest potential in terms of the development of third generation distance education lies in the area which has come to be known as computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) - an emerging fIeld of research and practice to which this book makes an important contribution. There are three classes of technology which, combined, can provide groupware environments suitable for CSCL:

- communication systems (synchronous text, audio, audio graphics, and video communication; asynchronous electronic mail, computer conferencing, voice­mail, and fax), - resource sharing systems (synchronous screen-sharing and electronic white­boards, concept mapping tools; asynchronous access to fIle systems and databases), - group process support systems (project management systems, shared calendars, co-authoring tools, voting tools, ideas generation and brainstorming tools).

Previously, these systems tended to be used independently, and the classic audio, audio graphic, and videoconferencing systems, of course, were in use long before the advent of multimedia personal computers. However, it is the bringing together of these three classes of technology into one computer-supported environment, on the desktop, or in educational resource centres, that will make a major qualitative difference in the educational potential of computer support for collaborative learning, multiple dialogue structures, and group work.

Why is the interest in collaborative learning, and its support and mediation through computers and telecommunications, so strong at the moment? This quote from another book* in the NATO ASI Series provides a succinct answer:

" ... Computers can provide a conversational environment in which the learner can apply knowledge to problems and consider their actions as reusable events. Learners can control their learning, learn from others, and develop reflection on actions as metacognitive skills .... We believe that learning environments should support collaborative construc­tion of knowledge involving both teachers and students. [ ... J Collaborative knowledge construction environments enable all members of a class or learning

Foreword XI

group the opportunity to contribute their interpretation. It is important for advanced knowledge acquisition that learners realise that there exist multiple interpretations for every event or object. Those interpretations may be dissonant or consonant, but they reflect the natural complexity that defines most advanced knowledge domains. Collaborative environments enable learners to identify and reconcile those multiple perspectives in order to solve problems."

* from: Jonassen, D., Mayes, T., and McAleese, R. (1993) A manifesto for a constructivist approach to uses of technology in higher education. In: Duffy, T.M., Lowyck, J., Jonassen, D.H. (eds.) Designing Environments for Con­structive Learning. NATO ASI Series F, Vol. 105, Berlin, Springer-Verlag, pp. 231-247.

The effectiveness of collaborative learning approaches can be attributed to the fact that participants simultaneously experience the active construction of knowledge; that they engage in peer teaching and develop oral, written, and graphical explanation skills; that they learn from each other through exposure to different models for problem-solving and interaction; all this in a context which can provide motivating feedback from others. This is not to suggest that collaborative learning is a panacea to be applied to any subject, to any target group, and to any situation. Participants need some prior level of competence in the domain, they need to share and understand common goals, to respect and trust each other, and to accept that decisions do not have to be based on consensus. If these conditions can be fulfilled amongst a group of dispersed learners, then it is highly probable that groupware technologies, with their range and variety of communication modes and group support tools, can provide the necessary infrastructure for effective collaborative learning.

The pressures underlying the development of flexible education, training, and re­training programmes for school-Ieavers and adults, and the increasing emphasis on the importance of team work in many organisations, provide a favourable socio­economic climate for the development of collaborative learning approaches. Technological developments in computer networking and in design of software for support of group work provide an increasingly accessible infrastructure for social networking and exchange of knowledge and skills. In an era when the growth of users of the InterNet has become exponential (under 2 million in January 1991 to over 10 million by the end of 1992), and when corporate mergers between telecoms operators, electronics manufacturers, software companies, and broadcasting and cable organisations are becoming commonplace in an international market, this book will have an important role to play in raising basic questions about the effective use of interactive technologies in education and training at both local and global levels.

Anthony R. Kaye

Institute of Educational Technology, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK. UK Representative, NATO Science Committee Special Programme Panel on

Advanced Educational Technologies, 1992-93

Table of Contents

Introduction .... ..... ... ...... .... ...... ...... ......... ..... ..... ... ........... ..... ......... ... .......... ....... 1 M. Felisa Verdejo, Stefano A. Cerri

Part 1 Pedagogy and Learning Experiences

Pedagogy

1 A Pedagogical Framework for CMC Programmes ..................................... 11 Morten Flate Paulsen, Beatriz Barros, Peter Busch, Benita Compostela, Mirabelle Quesnel

2 Computer Support for Collaboration .......................................................... 21 Thore Danielsen

3 Some Pedagogical Techniques for Computer-Mediated Communication.. 33 Morten Flate Paulsen

4 Learning in Groups: Some Experiences of Online Work David McConnell

Learning Experiences

5 Learning Experiences with Collaborative Working Technologies:

46

Some Critical Factors ...................................................................................... 60 Cristina Simon

6 Towards Collaborative Learning at a Distance Gary Alexander, Paul Lefrere, Steve Matheson

7 An Experimental Network-Mediated Study Support System in

65

Higher Distance Education .............................................................................. 78 Henk Ellerman, Ad Schellekens, Willibrord Huisman

8 Innovative Support Technologies for Tele- and Team-Work at Universities 97 Ralph Seitz, Freimut Bodendoif

9 Remote Collaboration in Medicine: Some Tools and Experiences in Portugal 109 A. Sousa Pereira, I. Amaldo Martins, 1.A. Veiga Pires

Part 2 Models and Systems

10 Models and Systems for Collaborative Dialogues in Distance Learning.. 119 Stefano A. Cerri

XIV Table of Contents

Models

11 Cooperative Open Systems Architecture .................................................. 126 Christian Lemaitre, Victor German Sanchez, Cristina Loyo

12 The Role of Knowledge Based Systems for Automatic Coordination in Distance Learning ........................................................................................... 142 Jose Cuena, Ana Garcia-Serrano, M. Felisa Verdejo

13 Supporting Collaborative Dialogues in Distance Learning Carla Simone

14 Towards Models of Interaction Between an Artificial Agent and a

156

Human One ..................................................................................................... 170 Dominique Guin

15 The "Natural Laboratory" Methodology Supporting Computer Mediated Generic Dialogues ...... .......... ......... ........ ........ ...... ...... ......... .................. ........... 181 Stefano A. Cerri

16 Building an Evolving Knowledge-Base from Computer Teleconferencing 202 Andre Boder, Christine Gardiol

17 Educational Scenarios for Telecommunication Applications Peter Zorkoczy

Systems

18 Developing a Tool to Support Collaborative Dialogues and Graphical

210

Representation of Ideas ................................................................................... 219 M.B. Twidale, T. Rodden, l. Sommerville

19 Real-Time Multimedia Conferencing System and Collaborative Learning 236 A. C. Derycke, C. Vieville

20 Distributed Multimedia Environment for Distance Learning Encarna Pastor, Gonzalo Sanchez, Javier Alvarez

258

21 Production of Flexible and Modulized Course Material in COSYS 270 Mette Ringsted, Finn Groenbaek, Peter Busch, Hanne Shapiro

22 OSCAR: A System for Collaborative Distributed Authoring of Multimedia Training Materials ....................................................................... 282 Antonio Ulloa, Antonio De Girolamo, Stephen Delaney

List of Contributors ................................. ........................................................ 291

Subject Index .. .......................... ............. ... .................................... ......... .......... 293