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Collaborative Interactions at theMicrocomputer KeyboardPaul Light a , Teresa Foot a , Christopher Colbourn a & Ian McClelland ba Department of Psychology , University of Southamptonb Department of Psychology , University of UlsterPublished online: 19 Nov 2006.

To cite this article: Paul Light , Teresa Foot , Christopher Colbourn & Ian Mc Clelland(1987) Collaborative Interactions at the Microcomputer Keyboard, Educational Psychology:An International Journal of Experimental Educational Psychology, 7:1, 13-21, DOI:10.1080/0144341870070103

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Educational Psychology, Vol. 7, No. 1, 1987 13

Collaborative Interactions at theMicrocomputer Keyboard

PAUL LIGHT, TERESA FOOT, CHRISTOPHER COLBOURN,Department of Psychology, University of SouthamptonIAN McCLELLAND, Department of Psychology, University of Ulster

ABSTRACT Two studies are reported, both concerned with microcomputer use in thecontext of collaborative groups. The first study, conducted with eight year-olds, examineswhether the opportunity to practise a problem solving task in pairs produces bettersubsequent individual performance on the task than does individual practice. Evidencewas found for such peer-facilitation only when children were constrained to collaborateby the imposition of a 'dual key' entry requirement. The second study, conducted with11-year-olds, compares the functioning of two types of group over a series of sessionsduring which the children were introduced to database software. Groups formed on thebasis of nominations of preferred working partners were found to demand less teacherintervention and to make fewer minor errors than groups formed on the basis of arbitraryallocation. The possibilities offered by the microcomputer in the classroom for experimen-tally rigorous but ecologically valid research are discussed.

Introduction

In recent years a number of factors have conspired to make the issue of socialprocesses in young children's microcomputer use a lively focus of research. After abrief consideration of these factors we shall describe two empirical studies designed tomake a contribution to our understanding of such processes.

Within developmental psychology, one of the most conspicuous trends of recentyears has been the increase in interest in social aspects of children's development andespecially in the role of social processes in children's cognitive development (e.g.Hinde, Perret-Clermont & Stevenson-Hinde, 1985; Richards & Light, 1986). Thefacilitatory effects of both adult-child and child-child interaction have also receivedattention (Light, 1983). The influential work of Doise and colleagues in Geneva (e.g.Doise & Mugny, 1984; Perret-Clermont, 1980) has given particular impetus to the

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14 P. Light et al.

study of the role of child-child interaction in stimulating the development of logicalthinking.

During the same period the microcomputer has become commonplace in theclassroom and the realisation of its educational potential has come to be seen as animportant issue (Sage & Smith, 1983). The issue is clearly multi-faceted but its socialdimension has been widely recognised. Whereas some years ago the potential of themicrocomputer was discussed largely in terms of the individualisation of the curricu-lum, more recent proponents of microcomputer use in education (Fletcher, 1985;Hawkins, 1983; Hoyles, Sutherland & Evans, 1986), have emphasised its capacity tostimulate active collaboration and discussion between children.

In practice, not least because of resource limitations, young children's microcompu-ter use very frequently takes place in the context of collaborative groups (Jackson,Fletcher & Messer, 1986). Moreover, at primary and middle school level it is notunusual for children in such groups to be undertaking microcomputer tasks unrelatedto the other activities going on in the classroom at the time. This in itself opens up thepossibility of conducting rather highly structured experimental studies of learning inthis context without at the same time departing too radically from the normalconditions of microcomputer use in the classroom. Our own research interests in thisarea stem from a series of experimental studies of peer interaction as a factor inlearning and problem solving (Glachan & Light, 1982; Light & Glachan, 1985). Inthese studies children, usually in the age range 8-12 years, were pre-tested individuallyon a task and then assigned at random to either an individual or a paired practicecondition. About a week later they were post-tested individually. Using this experi-mental design we were able to establish that under some circumstances children'sperformance on such problem solving tasks was significantly better following pairedcooperative practice than following individual practice. However, this was the caseonly for children who at the outset already showed some grasp of the appropriatestrategy and peer facilitation only occurred when steps were taken to prevent one orother of the children in the pair from wholly dominating the interaction.

The first study to be described here represents a direct extension of this series andemploys a problem solving task used in several of our previous studies, namely the'Towers of Hanoi' puzzle. However, whereas our previous studies had employed athree dimensional wooden version of the puzzle, the present study uses a microcompu-ter version of the task, and allows us to examine some of the features of children'scollaborative use of a microcomputer.

Experiment One

For this study we employed a specially written computer program run on a BBC 'B'microcomputer with a colour monitor. The equipment was familiar to the children whoacted as subjects and the study was conducted in a small study area adjacent to theirclassroom.

The screen image (see Fig. 1) represents the Towers of Hanoi by three positions ona baseboard, numbered 1, 2 and 3.

The discs which in the 3D version are placed in diminishing order of size on one ofthe pegs are represented on the screen by coloured bands. The object of the game is tomove a 'tower' from an initial position (say, position 1, as shown) to another position(say, position 3) under the constraints that only one disc may be moved at a time, anda larger disc may never be placed on top of a smaller one. The 'goal' position is

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Collaborative Interactions on the Micro 15

FIG. 1. The screen presentation for the microcomputer version of the 'Towers of Hanoi' task.

indicated by the position of the letter G on the screen. Moves are executed by pressingappropriately numbered keys to indicate first the position from which a disc is to beremoved and then the position in which it is to be placed. Illegal moves produce awarning tone and are automatically cancelled.

Sixty eight-year-olds participated in this experiment, which was conducted in amiddle school in Dorset which served a predominantly middle class catchment area.Boys and girls were represented in approximately equal numbers. Twenty childrenwere assigned to each of three conditions at random. All were pre-tested individuallyon the task which none of them had encountered before. After a few moves had beendemonstrated to them in the course of introducing the task, each child completed thetask twice, moving three discs first from positions 1 to 3 and then from 2 to 3. On eachoccasion children were asked to try to complete the task in the minimum number ofmoves. The number of moves taken was recorded automatically.

A week later, the children all had a further session of practice, completing the sametwo 'trials' three times each. Twenty of them, assigned to the individual condition,worked alone just as in the pre-test. Twenty others, assigned to the unstructuredinteraction condition, worked in randomly assigned pairs and were asked to work outeach move together, not pressing any keys until they had agreed a course of action.Random assignment resulted in approximately equal numbers of single sex and mixed-sex pairs. The remaining 20 children, assigned to the structured interaction condition,were also randomly assigned to pairs and were given similar instructions.

However, the computer program was amended in such a way that 'dual key'operation was required. Groups of keys at opposite ends of the keyboard were suitablylabelled and inputs were only accepted by the computer if simultaneously enteredthrough each of these sub-keyboards, one of which was assigned to each child. Theengagement of both children in the task at every stage was thus effectively enforced.

One week later, all children were tested again, individually, this time being requiredto complete four 'trials'; the two that they had encountered previously and two others(positions 3 to 1 and 2 to 1). On every trial the correct solution required seven moves.At pre-test the average number of moves actually taken was 13.5. This was reduced in

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16 P. Light et al.

the practice session a week later to 11.1 in the individual condition, 9.5 in theunstructured interaction condition and 9.4 in the structured ('dual key') interactioncondition. The tendency for pairs to perform better than individuals may of coursehave arisen simply from the domination of the interaction by the more capable child.Our principal interest was in the possibility that this pair advantage might carry overto subsequent individual post-test performance.

The means for the children who had experienced each of the three conditions werenot markedly different at post-test (individual condition 10.5 moves, unstructuredinteraction 10.6, structured interaction 10.1). An overall analysis of variance on thepre- and post-test data showed a substantial overall main effect for pre- to post-testimprovement (.F=42.9, d.f.= l, 57,/><0.001) but no significant differences attribu-table to conditions.

However, as Fig. 2 illustrates, this analysis obscures a rather striking difference inthe number of optimal (7 move) solutions at post-test.

45

40

35

& 30

I -£ 20

15

10

5

| Structured Interaction

|~| Unstructured Interaction

HH Individual

9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

FIG. 2. Overall frequencies of the number of moves in each of the three conditions at post-test.

Indeed if the results of the experiment are considered, not in terms of meannumbers of moves, but more simply in terms of how many subjects come up with thecorrect seven move sequence at post-test then a different picture emerges. Table Ishows the relevant data.

TABLE I. Number of subjects achieving the optimal score at each post-test trial

Individual condition

Unstructuredinteraction condition

Structuredinteraction condition

Trial 1

4

4

12

Trial 2

5

4

10

Trial 3

4

6

9

Trial 4

5

2

5

(n=20 in each condition)

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Collaborative Interactions on the Micro 17

It is apparent that, on each of the first two trials (i.e. the trials which were identicalwith those used in the pre-test and practice sessions) substantially more childrenachieved the optimal score. The difference is statistically reliable at trial 1 (x2 = 9.6,d.f. = 2,/><0.01, one tailed) and at trial 2 (x2=4.8, d.f. = 2,/><0.05, one tailed). Thedifferences in the children's performances on the 'generalisation' trials, 3 and 4 are notstatistically significant.

There is thus some evidence that the structured interaction condition producesindividual post-test performance superior to that produced by either the unstructuredinteraction or the individual condition, though only in respect of trials which directlyecho those used in the paired practice session. This restriction suggests that what isbeing learned is not at the level of a generalised representation of the solution strategy.Rather the children would appear to be learning a particular sequence of moves (orpossibly just the appropriate direction for the critical first move) for the particulartrials encountered in the practice session.

To the extent that only the structured interaction condition led to any superiority inpost-test performance, it would appear that the constraint imposed on the children bythe 'dual key' arrangement contributed significantly to the productivity of the interac-tion. While clearly a more robust set of results would be needed to establish this pointbeyond doubt, the possible implications of such a finding for the design of educationalsoftware may be worth noting. As to the mechanisms involved we can only speculate.Levels of task-related verbal discussion were rather low in both paired conditions—afinding consistent with previous studies using non-computer versions of this task(Light & Glachan, 1985). But interaction in the pairs, to the extent that both partieswere effectively engaged in that interaction, may have enabled a significant minority ofthe children to 'short-circuit' their previous inefficient strategies and come up with theoptimal solution.

The evidence for peer-facilitation of performance is perhaps somewhat less robustthan that obtained in earlier studies using a 3D wooden version of this task (cf.Glachan & Light, 1982). However, there was every indication that the childrenapproached the computer version in essentially the same way as the wooden version.Foot (1986) found that following practice on the computer version, post tests on bothcomputer and wooden versions produced very similar levels of performance. Bycontrast, when the Klahr (1978) Monkey Can version, which is essentially an invertedTower of Hanoi task with a triangular rather than linear arrangement of pegs, wasincluded as an additional post test it produced noticeably poorer performance than thecomputer version. Thus it would appear that children may be able to transposebetween 3D manipulative tasks and screen representations of them more readily insome cases than they can transpose between differently arranged 3D versions of thetask. However, this issue can only be adequately addressed in terms of transfer oflearning effects between computer and non-computer versions and we have not as yetaddressed this problem directly.

The experiment which we have described in this section took place under conditionswhich in many respects resembled the normal pattern of classroom activity. In theschool in which the study was conducted, as in many others, it was quite usual forchildren in ones, twos or threes to be directed to leave off their main classroom activityfor a short period in order to work on a particular computer program in a sideroom ora corner of the class. One respect in which our experimental procedure departed fromnormal classroom practice, however, was in the random allocation of children toconditions and, within the paired conditions, the random allocation to pairs. While the

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18 P. Light et al.

children thus allocated were always members of the same class, the pairings took noaccount of the children's relationships with one another or their previous experience ofworking together. As a number of teachers remarked to us, one might expect suchfactors to have a substantial effect upon the patterning and effectiveness of collabora-tive use of the computer. The second study to be described in this paper represents anattempt to approach this issue empirically.

Experiment Two

This study was conducted with eleven-year-old children from two parallel classes of amiddle school in Hampshire. The children were initially asked by their teachers tonominate the three classmates with whom they most liked to work. Their responseswere used as a basis for constructing four trios of subjects each of whom had includedthe other two in their nominations. All trios were single sex (nearly all nominationswere 'within sex') and one trio of each sex was drawn from each class. From amongstthe remaining children four further trios were constructed, again one of each sex fromeach class. These were constructed so as not to include children who had nominatedeach other. Children were selected such that these 'arbitrary' trios were well matchedto the 'self-selecting' trios in terms of both the means and the ranges of their abilitylevels as indexed by the Cognitive Abilities Test, which all children had completed inthe previous term. The research intervention did not begin until a week after thechildren's 'nominations' had been elicited and there was no indication that any of thechildren perceived any connection between these two exercises.

No individual control subjects were used in this study, nor were children individu-ally pre- or post-tested. Our interest was primarily in observing the patterns ofinteraction in our 'self-selecting' and 'arbitrary' trios and in establishing whether therewere any noticeable differences in the achievements of the two types of group whenworking on a computer-based task. A task was selected which was relevant to thechildren's future classroom use of computers. This involved introducing the childrento QUEST, a database software package published by the Advisory Unit for ComputerBased Education (Freeman & Tagg, 1985). None of the children had encountered thisbefore, though they had some previous experience with FACTFILE database software.

Slight modifications to the software enabled us to obtain hard copy of all keyboardentries made by subjects. A database consisting of a small file of geograpical informa-tion on 48 countries was constructed. Two worksheets were prepared which remindedthe children of the commands needed and these were presented with a graded series ofquestions to which they were required to find answers using the database. All sessionstook place in a small study area adjacent to the classroom. The children worked at acomputer trolley which carried a BBC 'B' Microcomputer, disc drives, a colourmonitor and a printer.

Each of the eight groups had one twenty minute session on each of four successivedays. The first session was devoted to introducing the idea of a database and theelementary commands required for interrogating a QUEST database. The second andthird sessions were worksheet-based and for these sessions a video camera was used torecord the children's behaviour. The final session consisted of a computer-basedquestionnaire. For the second, third and fourth sessions the experimenter acted merelyas, an observer except where children sought help on particular points. They werereminded at the start of each of these sessions that they were to work together and onlyto make agreed keyboard entries.

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Collaborative Interactions on the Micro 19

Videotapes were analysed in terms of the following categories: acceptance of aproposal for input, ignoring of a proposal for input, verbal agreement with another'sproposal, verbal disagreement with another's proposal and referring to the worksheet.Each child's behaviour was categorised in these terms (using frequency counts) duringarbitrary five minute sequences drawn from the first and second worksheet sessions.Analyses of variance were carried out for each category of behaviour but fewstatistically significant differences emerged. Proposals tended to be ignored morefrequently in the first than in the second worksheet session (F=3.73, d.f. 1, 20,/><0.1). Girls made significantly more reference to the worksheets than boys did(/7=8.64, d.f. 1, 20, p<0.05). While the means for 'self-selecting' groups were lowerthan those of 'arbitrary' groups for ignoring others' proposals and disagreeing with oneanother and higher than those of arbitrary groups for expressed agreement, none ofthese differences even approached statistical significance.

The 'self-selecting' groups made, on average, less than half as many requests forhelp from the experimenter as the 'arbitrary' groups and the total time spent in suchinterventions by the experimenter was substantially less with the 'self-selecting'groups. However, since the data here relate to groups rather than individuals thenumbers are rather small and the differences only marginally significant (for interven-tion time .F=6.41, d.f. 1, 4,/><0.1).

Turning to the actual keyboard entries, errors made during the worksheet sessionswere subdivided into minor errors (such as spelling mistakes or inappropriate insertionof spaces) and major errors, which implied a lack of grasp of the appropriate syntax.The mean number of major errors was very similar for the two conditions, though boysmade significantly more of such errors than girls (F= 10.67, d.f. 1, 4, p<0.05). Forminor errors, though, there was a significant conditions difference, with the 'arbitrary'groups making almost twice as many such errors as the 'self-selecting' groups(F=9.95, d.f. 1, 4, /><0.05). It should be noted that although these errors do notreflect serious misunderstanding of the task, they are sufficient to prevent thecomputer processing the relevant command.

The final session was devoted to a questionnaire concerning attitudes to such groupwork on computers. Attitudes were in general very positive, there being no differencebetween the two conditions, though overall the girls showed somewhat more positiveattitudes than the boys (£=3.7, d.f. 6,/><0.05).

Thus, while one cannot expect to obtain definitive answers from any study on thisscale, it has at least produced a number of interesting pointers. Those groupscomposed of children who nominated one another as partners (and who, as the teacherconfirmed, had had a good deal of experience of working together previously) tendedto show more positive and supportive patterns of interaction, but the differences werenot statistically reliable. These 'self-selecting' groups demanded somewhat less in theway of interventions from the teacher and made significantly fewer careless minorerrors. Given the widespread concern about gender stereotyping in relation to schoolcomputer use (e.g. Hawkins, 1984) it is perhaps worth noting that in this study thegirls showed even more positive attitudes than the boys to collaborative microcompu-ter work. They also referred to the worksheets significantly more and, perhaps becauseof this, ended up making significantly fewer substantial errors than the boys.

Discussion

The first of the studies reported in this paper concerned the effects of opportunity for

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20 P. Light et al.

collaborative practice upon subsequent individual task performance. As in mostprevious studies of this type, the opportunity for collaboration took the form of asingle fairly brief practice session and the task was chosen without regard to itspossible educational value. Subjects were allocated to conditions and to pairs entirelyat random. Overall post-test performance expressed in terms of mean numbers ofmoves required for solution of the problem showed no differences between the pairedand the individual practice conditions. However, at the top end of the range ofperformance, significantly more of the children from the 'structured interaction'condition were able to solve those particular problems in which they had hadcollaborative practice in the optimal number of moves. This echoes the results ofGlachan & Light (1982), who found using a 'physical' version of the same task, thatdifferential gains from the peer interaction condition were only evidenced by thechildren who performed best on the task and then only when steps were taken toenforce collaborative interaction during the practice session. Such similarities point tothe conclusion that collaborative problem solving on microcomputers is not so verydifferent from any other kind of collaborative problem solving. On the one hand thesame kinds of gains are possible but on the other hand the same kinds of limitationsand constraints are in evidence.

The second study reported was concerned with the analysis of the interactions in,and the achievements of, different types of groups. The children's opportunities forinteraction extended over four sessions and the 'task' consisted in the introduction of apiece of complex but educationally relevant software. Groups of three children whohad selected one another as preferred working partners were contrasted with three-somes who had not. The former proved the more effective groups in a number of waysbut the differences in patterns of interaction were not as marked as one might haveexpected.

The two studies reported differ from one another considerably in their designs andtheir objectives. What they have in common, though, is a fundamentally experimentalapproach. This approach, characterised by the systematic manipulation of variablesthought to be of importance, imposes many limitations on the researcher and has neverreally established its value in the field of educational research. It is perhaps not toomuch to hope that the relatively segregated and self-contained nature of muchcontemporary microcomputer use in schools may provide a sheltered site in whicheffective experimental approaches to the study of learning can be nurtured. It could beargued, though, that the microcomputer offers more than just a different medium forlearning and that it offers new and qualitatively different possibilities as a learningenvironment. Those (most notably Papert, 1980) who have developed this argumenthave emphasized computer programming rather than the kinds of tasks used here. Theintellectual benefits claimed for programming (largely in terms of increasing the child'sreflective awareness of what he is doing) are not dissimilar from those claimed for peerinteraction and the direction of our current research (Colbourn, Light & Smith, 1987)is toward an exploration of the interplay of peer interaction and the acquisition ofprogramming skills in a classroom setting.

Acknowledgement

The research discussed in this paper has been supported by an ESRC Linked ResearchStudentship held by Mrs T. Foot and an ESRC Project Grant to P. H. Light, C. J.Colbourn and D. J. Smith (COO-232167).

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Collaborative Interactions on the Micro 21

Correspondence: Dr Paul Light, Department of Psychology, University of Southamp-ton, Southampton SO9 5NH, Hants, England.

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