163

Quest in the Learning Environment: Computer Assisted Information Handling as a Tool For Learning and Curriculum Development *

D i a n a F R E E M A N and John L E V E T T The Advisory Unit for Computer Based Education, Endymion Road, Hatfield, Herts, U.K.

Information technology should be an integral part of the exist- ing curriculum in primary and secondary schools in England and Wales. The information handling program QUEST forms a basis for two research projects which the authors are currently coordinating. A model of information handling is proposed in which a 'common core' of information skills can be elaborated by computer approaches within any subject discipline. The design, interrogation and evaluation of data files are discussed in relation to the restraints imposed by the child's stage of development and the nature of the software employed. In conclusion, the implications of computer-related information handling for curriculum design and children's learning are briefly discussed.

Diana Freeman graduated from London University with a BA (Hons) degree in geography. After spending some years in publishing with the Readers Digest Association she moved into the teaching profession and gained an MA in Education at the Institute of Education, London University. Since 1981 Diana has been involved in both software and curriculum development for computer education in the Human- ities at the Advisory Unit for Com- puter-Based Education, Hatfield, and

is co-ordinator of the Chiltern Region of the Microelectronic Education Programme Information Handling Project.

* This article was reprinted from Computers in Education: Proceedings of the Worm Conference on Computers in Educa- tion, WCCE '85, North-Holland, with kind permission of IFIP.

North-Hollandl (1985) 163-171 Education & Computing

1. Introduction

This paper in tends to propose that in format ion technology can be an integral part of the existing

curr iculum of pr imary and secondary schools in England and Wales. The in format ion handl ing program QUEST, which allows teachers and pupils to insert, interrogate and manipu la te in format ion in numerous ways, forms the basis of this pro-

posal. The authors are current ly invest igat ing the use of Q U E S T in the curr iculum in selected

pr imary and secondary schools in the Chil tern Microelectronic Educa t ion Programme Region,

There are three ma in funct ions of QUEST: first, the program has an edit ing function. This

allows previously structured in format ion about i tems ( R E C O R D S ) to be entered in to the program under headings (FIELDS): secondly, items can be

interrogated by matching attr ibutes within one or more fields using a flexible, bu t precise, Q U E R Y language: thirdly, there are uti l i ty programs that

can classify, graph, map or re-order the data, results or a selection of the results. This presents

teachers with a powerful tool that can be fitted in to any subject area within the curr iculum be-

cause the program is content-free and is able to reflect an individual teacher's style, approach and

John Leveu graduated from the Uni- versity of Leicester with BA (Hons) in Economics. He spent the following two years in postgraduate research into West African economic history before entering the teaching profession. He spent twelve years as a primary school teacher in Hertfordshire before becoming involved in the provision of inservice courses for teachers adopting the use of microcomputers in the primary classroom. In October 1983 he was invited to co-ordinate the

Hertingfordbury Project: an investigation into the use of com- puters for information handling in the primary school. He is currently an Advisory Teacher for Hertfordshire in the field of microcomputers and investigative leanaing.

0067-9287/85/$3.30 © 1985, Elsevier Science Publishers B.V. (North-Holland)

164 D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST: Computer Assisted Information Handling

philosophy. It is proposed to outline the following for consideration:

(i) The nature of two information handling projects.

(ii) Development of a model of information handling based on skills and concepts which can be elaborated by computer approaches.

(iii) Interpretive and stage development re- straints on the design, interrogation and evalua- tion of datafiles.

(iv) The future: can we identify the effects of computer-related information handling on both curriculum design and children's learning?

(i) (a) The Chiltern MEP Region Information Han- dling Project (April, 1984 to March, 1986).

The project aims to discover the extent to which QUEST can be used within the existing humani- ties curriculum in the 11 to 19 year age range. Five Local Education Authorities elected to join the projec t - Buckinghamshire , Bedfordshire , Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire and the London Borough of Harrow. Project teachers in the five schools have been provided with a microcomputer by their LEA. This would be a departmental re- source; four of the project schools also have a room with computer network of up to 8 stations which are also available to the teachers. The schools and project teachers were selected because of the nature of teaching and learning that took place in the school within the humanities. Because QUEST requires skills and techniques for information han- dling, history and geography courses that are skills-based, rather than content-based, or that encourage enquiry learning, rather than factual recall, would most readily assimilate a computer aided approach. So, the project schools were cho- sen from those that use the Schools Council Geography or History courses. Three of the schools have Humanities Departments which have already established a cross-curricula approach.

The aims of the project are: to identify skills and techniques of information handling that are common to both subjects; to help teachers and pupils become familiar with these techniques within the classroom; to apply these techniques to appropriate parts of the humanities curriculum; to produce sample data files and support materials that may ,be helpful to other teachers; to identify the nature of learning that takes place through information handling on computer.

(i) (b) The Hertingfordbury Project (January, 1984 to December, 1985)

The Project is being conducted within six primary schools in a single Education Authority. The participating schools were selected to provide a balance of characteristics: size, age, location, socio-economic intake of pupils, internal organisa- tion, curriculum content, teaching style and com- puter availability. It was intended, in establishing such a balance, to reflect the varied circumstances of working environment current within the major- ity of English primary schools. The schools encom- pass the full primary age range of 5 to 11 years.

Under the 1983/1984 Government Department of Trade and Industry initiative of providing financial assistance to Local Education Authorities to equip every primary school within the United Kingdom with a microcomputer each school within the Project was in possession of at least one com- puter. Certain schools had voluntarily increased their own hardware support with resulting com- puter /pupi l ratios varying from 1 to 15.1 to 1 to 69. It was decided to increase hardware support within certain schools at appropriate times accord- ing to the demands of the Project.

The general terms of reference for the Project were to document the nature and content of inves- tigations undertaken with the assistance of com- puter storage, interrogation and retrieval of infor- mation, i.e. as it is applied to current studies and those that are prompted by the facilities of a particular program. Particular reference is made to the QUEST program and investigations of its ap- propriateness for curriculum activities pursued by primary age children. Further note will be taken of teacher development, strategies for in-service edu- cation of teachers and the influence of computer- assisted information handling upon curriculum development. Generally, the methods to be adopted within the project are those of chi ld /group/ teacher case studies to establish developmental and cur-

r i cu lum influences and formal procedures for establishing strategies employed in software use.

2. A Model of Information Handling

If we identify the concepts that are generally accepted to underlie learning they can broadly be divided into concrete operations and formal oper- ations. Concrete operations include concepts of

D. Freeman and J. Leuett / QUEST." Computer Assisted Information Handling 165

classification, succession, magnitude and relation- ships between items and are developed in primary schools. The children are also beginning to de- velop skills of reading, writing, numeracy, observa- tion, listening and personal communication. It is proposed that availability of information handling on computer can give children the power to seek, organise, question and draw conclusions from data. These conceptual developments are generally accepted to belong to the realm of formal oper- ations through the hypothetico-deductive model, and are not fully applicable until 12 + to 15 + , but we propose that this model is central to a model of Information Handling on computer.

The hypothetico-deductive scientific model con- tains the framework within which information handling resides. Most teachers now identify this model with a logically sound method of inference. In this way one's perceptual experiences help to form an image of the real world. The formal presentation of this image creates an 'a priori' model, a hunch, a guess, as to the real image. A hypothesis can then be postulated and an experi- mental design envisaged whereby the hypothesis can be tested. The experimental design starts with the 'a priori' and sets about defining criteria by which the hypothesis can be fully tested. Decisions about what data to collect, how to measure, define,

structure and classify that data all have a bearing on the hypothesis. The danger lies in collecting data only to satisfy the hypothesis, and not look- ing at wider issues. The hypothesis is tested by means of verifying data that has been collected. This can be by statistical tests which synthesise and summarise data and so enable a hypothesis to be accepted or rejected. (Figure 1).

Information handling on computer allows for data to be more elaborately analysed. Data can be ordered and reordered, made into lists or diagrams, selected, or matched, so that any relationships can be fully explored. Analysis and explanation can be based on full evaluation of the data rather than a statistical summary so that attempts to provide answers or explanations to support the hypothesis have a much firmer foundation. This is much more satisfactory in the social and environmental sci- ences where generalisations are much more dif- ficult to achieve and normative theories are much more common. Handling data on computer means that the richness of individual items is still ap- parent. Information handling on the computer al- lows more effective exploration of these two meth- odological aims by allowing both quantitative and qualitative evaluation.

It is our contention that this route to enquiry is common to all disciplines. If we follow this argu-

The relationships between the hypothetic - deductive model I skills of information handling generated by this model and additional ~kills exemplified by information handling on a computer.

Hypothetico-deductive model

Perceptual experience

Image of the real world

'a~priori model'

Hypothesis

Experimental design

Data +

Verification

Hypothesis accepted or rejected.

Explanation

Information handlin~ skills

Indentifying sources Finding sources Extracting information Defining, classifying selecting, structuring classifying data Collating data Testing data:statisticall by inspection, looking for relationships Evaluating data Analysing data Drawing conclusions.

Information handling

Collecting data ~ Datafile Structuring data ~ design Collating data ~ and Entering data | construction Checking data J

Sorting Ordering Selecting Matching Questioning

Regrouping data and Testing relationships:

statistically numerically textually diagrammatically spatially

Datafile

interrogation

Data

Evaluation

Figure 1.

166 D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST: Computer Assisted Information Handling

ment further, then the skills of information han- dling and those of handling data on the computer are also common to all disciplines. It is apparent that information handling on the computer is a common core within the curriculum and is subject-independent. Nevertheless this core is embedded within a subject-specific context. Images of the real world, identification of sources of study about phenomena, and finding and extracting information from these sources are firmly related to subject-specific skills. For instance, historical enquiry specifically requires skills in using archive materials such as transcribing, translating and searching for original sources. In a scientific con- text the requirements may be observation, record- ing, measuring or using instruments to collect data. These are skills, among many others, that are taught in different disciplines as a means of col- lecting information towards achieving greater un- derstanding of the world. Deciding what data to collect and how to collect it is an important part of this process and reflects the methodology of indi- vidual subjects.

Once data has been collected it can be struc- tured to enable the hypothesis to be fully tested. The structure depends on the hypothesis, but it should be flexible enough to allow for a multi- faceted approach. Design and construction of a datafile is a common core activity related to all subject areas. These are additional skills of infor- mation handling on computer, but essential if full interrogation of data is to take place. Datafile interrogation and evaluation are the key factors. Once the datafile has been created, the skills of computer interrogation, sorting, ordering, select-

ing, matching and questioning allow both gener- alisations and serendipitous revelations to be made. The methods of the enquiry dictate the nature of the result. Preliminary evaluation can take place on the computer because of the capacity to re- group data and test relationships in a variety of different ways. So many methods may be tried in a short space of time that give different perspectives to the data that they provide a sound basis for conclusions to be made and full analysis to take place.

The methods are chosen from a wide range of data evaluation available on computer, but the final analysis and conclusions reflect subject meth- odology. The relationship of information handling on computer to common core and subject specific skills can be shown in fig. 2.

It is therefore apparent that information han- dling is a fundamental part of a child's learning process. This paper attempts to show some of the ways in which early researches by two information handling projects, one in secondary schools and one in primary schools, demonstrate that process. We believe that information handling on computer should not be taught as a separate subject, or to elite groups, but that it is essential in all subjects and to all children.

3. Child/Computer Interface

It is proposed that the instantiation of a com- puter program for the purposes of information handling imposes certain restraints regarding the form of data capture, its encoding within the con-

A ocmr~a oore,of l n f o z m a ~ handlin~ 1~, cu,lmter (tim 'cracker' model)

SubJ~ a ~ i f l c %u,,,,i,; core" o~ Infom~tlcm subject specific dat~ enal~Is

data collectlt~ handling by , . , . , , ,~ter t o accept o r r e j e c t to sa t i s fy a

Figure 2.

D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST: Computer Assisted Information Handling 167

fines of the program and the utifity of the availa- ble method of interrogation. It is equally suggested that restraints arise by virtue of the learning con- text and specific instructional outcomes.

The term 'restraints' is defined as factors inher- ent within a computer program which inhibit the child in achieving desired goals as defined by the child, articulated through whichever agency (software restraints) or factors which inhibit the child in utilising the available utilities of a com- puter program (stage developments restraints).

The two types of restraints may be further refined, software restraints refer to the attributes of the program and thus may appropriately refer to the style of the program (command/menu), the syntax of the command structure, and the de- mands upon coding and /o r abbreviating informa- tion as made by the specifications of data files.

Stage development restraints refer to the attri- butes of the child; the computer program is made available to the child to the extent that the child is in possession of the skills/concepts implied by the facilities of the program. One may include, for example, such factors as the ability of the child to appreciate, to the extent that it facilitates the process of an enquiry, the way in which informa- tion is stored, handled and retrieved, the ability of the child to pose questions which form a valid basis for an enquiry and the ability of the child to select from the stored information an output that is appropriate for evaluation purposes.

Software Related Approaches

The activity of information handling can be described as follows: i) Approaches defined (con- fined) by the software (software related ap- proaches), ii) Approaches defined (confined) by the intellectual, social and psycho-motor develop- ment of the child (information skills approaches).

Before further considering software related ap- proaches it is important to define certain terms more closely, i) Collection refers to the assembly of data from primary and /o r secondary sources, its arrangement into a form appropriate for inclu- sion in a data file, the design of the file, the input of data and "its amendment, addition, maintenance and preparation for use. ii) Interrogation refers to the retrieval of data of required characteristics from the file for specified purposes, iii) Evaluation refers to the relating of displayed results of inter-

rogation to the enquiry which prompted it, the refinement of queries and assessment of the need for future action.

Each stage is influential in constraining subse- quent stages. Thus, the structure of the program and the form of file design restrain the form within which data is collected; the form of collec- tion restrains the freedom to interrogate data; the methods of interrogation restrain the ease in evaluating the result in terms of the desired end. Equally the nature of the interrogation progress will influence the process of data file design.

Information Skills Approaches

In considering information skills approaches reference is being made to the capacity of the child to undertake enquiries of an investigative nature. Such approaches are categorised as follows:

i) Ethical/Social/Relational: those attributed which are conditions of the child being able to engage in activity in a social context and relate to the different roles required during social activity;

ii) Verbal/Linguistic: those attributes which indicate that the child is disposed to ask questions, engage in investigations and communicate find- ings;

iii) Represen ta t iona l /Spa t ia l /Mathemat ica l : those attributes which are required to interpret and represent observations relating to different sources;

iv) Organisational/Logical: those attributes that indicate that a child can evaluate the context of an enquiry and engage in such within a self-de- fined or pre-defined scheme. The basis for the validation of such categories is as follows:

i) observation of the behavioural responses evident in responding to the demands of an en- quiry in a social environment;

ii) the specific verbal / l inguis t ic ski l ls / concepts implicit in, and required by, interroga- tion of related sources and communicating responses to it;

iii) the specific spatial/mathematical skills/ concepts implicit in, and required by, the organisa- tion, interpretation and representation of data in related areas;

iv) the implied cognitive and affective responses required in relating ii) and iii) above to the pro- pose and desired aims of an enquiry.

168 D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST." Computer Assisted Information Handling

The dwell in the acquisition of the skills/con- cepts/at tr ibutes related to each category can im- pose limitations upon the achievement of desired goals if such goals are to be pursued by the implementation of a computer program. This relates specifically to the child's perception of the structure of the data and the processes adopted by the program in handling such data or, alterna- tively, the creation of appropriate metaphors to compensate for invalid perceptions. Further limi- tations will be imposed according to the ability of the child to categorise and classify data, the re- sponse of the child to constraints regarding f ield/record size, the ability of the child to recog- nise the properties of data and recognition that file design imposes restraints upon interrogation.

Restraints imposed by information skills ap- proaches at the evaluation stage of information handling are of a different nature in that their relationship to a computer program relates less to the content of data files than to the format of the output. Restraints at the evaluation stage are valid to the extent that a child appreciates certain ele- ments of the output. In this respect one would note the ability to recognise patterns and trends in results, the ability to distinguish fact from opinion in conclusions and the disposition to propose fur- ther enquiries to confirm such conclusions.

Stage Development Restraints.

It has been suggested that computer-assisted information handling is constrained by two fac- tors: the attributes of a computer program and the attributes of the child. It is now proposed to outline those elements of the child's development which influence the child's acquisition of the ap- propriate qualities to both use a computer pro- gram for purposes of information handling and engage in investigative activity. Three elements are proposed:

i) physical: related to psycho-motor develop- ment and the ability of the child to acquire ap- propriate skills;

ii) emotional: related to the capacity of the child to respond to the social demands of peer relations and to the positive/negative aspects of expectations regarding the pursuit of enquiries.

iii) intellectual/conceptual: related to defin- able mathematical/spatial generalisations and ap- preciations and the ability of the child to make

logical relations between different classes of ideas. It is not proposed to enter into a debate regard-

ing the validation of stages a n d / o r their content as the evidence in relation to information activities is inadequate at this stage of the current projects. It is appropriate, however, to outline those areas to which attention will be given, namely: the content of chronological relations to and pedagogic impli- cations of stages and their validation in terms of experiences qualitatively different, i.e. information activities generally and those undertaken specifi- cally by virtue of a computer program. The latter point is of interest as it is questionable whether or not the qualitative nature of a computer program resets the boundaries within which validation of stages and their constituents is established.

Datafile design

It is now proposed to consider in further detail the practical and conceptual issues relating to data file design, interrogation and evaluation and to outline those questions with which the current projects are presently concerning themselves. Matters relating to datafile design might conveni- ently be grouped as follows: i) Sources of data; ii) File content; iii) Pedagogic issues.

Whether or not the child is involved in the collection/creation of data from direct activity or the rearranging of previously collected/collated data according to a different purpose raises matters regarding the proximity of the user to the sources. The issue of children's appreciation of the 'shape' of information within a file is frequently cited in support of introducing file design through initial experience of interrogation. Proponents of this view argue that children will recognise certain features and conventions of file construction fundamental to good practice which can be incor- porated into their own design, that familiarity with the demands and restraints of interrogation will influence design, that future data may be recog- nised in a familiar form, and that, as file design directly influences data collection, familiarity with the structure of the program is essential if data collection is to be undertaken in a purposeful manner. In reply it can be noted that instructional objectives relating to file design are as readily accomplished through refinement of children's own files as through interrogation of those of others.

Discussion of data sources leads to considera-

D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST." Computer Assisted Information Handling 169

tion of the nature of enquiries suitable for com- puter-assisted information handling. The predomi- nant criteria would appear to be as follows: the nature of the data to be handled (considered quantitatively and qualitatively), the specific in- structional objectives, the stage of development of the child and the skills/concepts demanded by, and the investigative nature of, the enquiry. There is insufficient evidence to abstract any valid gener- alisations regarding the nature of the investiga- tions which are appropriate for computer-assisted information handling but certain features are dis- cernible, namely: identity between the creator and user of files, the predominance of numeric data elements, creation arising from personal/direct observation of phenomena containing many varia- bles and file design arising from questions of relationship between variables.

The first issue for consideration of file content is that of restraints upon design. Design can be considered as both a function of use and of pur- pose: 'use' relates to the activity of file creation from the point of view of the creator/user (the specific intentions for which the file was created and the implications of these for interrogation); 'purpose' relates to the specific instructional ob- jectives that can be related to the file. Each func- tion creates related restraints.

A computer program will offer certain facilities to prepare and operate upon data. Such facilities require the input of data in a form capable of being handled and a uniformity of input between fields and between records and, also, between files if such are required for comparison. Restrictions of field and record length determine loss of infor- mation as a feature of file design, where the form and size of collected data may be inappropriate for inclusion, with concomitant requirements for con- sistency in abbreviating and coding data: con- sistency with accepted conventions, consistency within the file and between files if data is of a similar nature and /o r designed for other than the creator of the file. Consideration must also be given to incorporation elsewhere in the file of details of such coding.

Equally, interrogation of numeric data requires an appreciation, not only of the nature of the data, but of its characteristics and the inclusion of such details (maximum/minimum values, standard de- viation, mean, median, etc.) within the file is a

further responsibility of the designer. Amongst the pedagogic issues relating to file

design are those which concern the nature of the investigations that prompt the design. Such inves- tigations can be categorised according to the na- ture of the learning environment as closed (restric- tive) or open (speculative). Restrictive investiga- tions are those which are designed to accomodate a specific determined use while speculative investi- gations refer to those which are designed with a view to establishing a relationship between the various elements. Such open enquiries contain considerable implications for file design. Files of this type may require extensive maintenance and demand certain predispositions towards seeing/ seeking relationships between variables within the data. Similarly investigations involving large num- bers of variables require a sophisticated apprecia- tion in selection of data the validity of which will only be apparent at the interrogation/evaluation stage. It may equally be true that within such investigations there is a bias towards obtaining a positive result which may be inappropriate given the nature of the data. The value of computer activity for this type of enquiry is influenced by the extent to which the child can recognise the validity of representative samples and compensate accordingly at the evaluation stage for inadequate samples. A similar distinction might be drawn between teaching styles. A didactic approach is more likely to relate data file creation to previ- ously specified instructional outcomes while a heuristic approach is more likely to fashion in- structional outcomes to the issues that arise from data file creation. The validity of either approach lies, however, not within the response to file design but in the nature of the learning environment which it creates and its encouragement of ap- propriate prerequisities for design. Such prere- quisites, or predispositions, would include the abil- ity of the child to undertake an enquiry, to appre- ciate that there are different ways of investigating, the ability to pose questions likely to be answered by investigation, the capacity to pursue relevant lines of enquiry and relate methods of approach to a defined purpose, the ability to propose ap- propriate methods for collecting, classifying and coding information and the ability to organise information according to different purposes.

170 D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST: Computer Assisted Information Handling

Datafi le Interrogation.

Issues relating to the interrogation of datafiles can be conveniently be discussed under the follow- ing headings: i) command syntax; ii) presentation of output. The use of a computer program for the purposes of data handling requires certain conven- tions. Such conventions might be responses to the character of the hardware, to those universally, or nationally, accepted in relation to data handling or to the nature of the data. Our concerns here are those of the conventions of command status syn- tax and the general implications of command status approaches.

The distinction between menu and command- driven programs requires brief comment. Menu- driven programs create a question which can be answered by positive or negative responses or by reference to the contents of the file which has been created; command-driven programs employ a user or non-user defined vocabulary and a non-user defined syntax. Frequently preference is expressed in favour of the former, in terms of ease of achiev- ing instructional objectives, over the latter where concerns are raised that the syntax, which does not universally correspond to children's experiences, must be learnt. It would appear that in order for children to employ such syntax for their own purposes the conditions under which it is first encountered are crucial. Thus it is important that the child can relate the command to the result that corresponds to a stated request of data (a mental picture) and that the child can form a substitution for the syntax (a metaphor).

Questions of design are different from those of interrogation to the extent that in designing a file the child is aware of the universality of the data being compiled when with interrogating it the unit of data (the field) and its relations (the record) can be divorced not in the actuality but in terms of presented output. The commands which sum- marise a) questions relating to one or a number of fields and b) the requested output, are QUERY and PRINT. In such conditions the child is required to appreciate that a QUERY is made of a field but that PRINTed fields can be other than those interrogated. The child's response to this appears to be hierarchical. In early experience of data handling the child recognises that the data relating to a need is contained in particular fields, PRINTs the required fields, sorts the fields thus

output and then attempts to relate the data from the output of these sorted fields. The child thus makes a distinction, by preference, between PRINT and QUERY; in the former the child is required only to specify the source of the result but in the latter must specify possible values. This is ap- propriate for the child. The question of establish- ing relationships via a QUERY statement which relate fields and their elements presupposes a pre- disposition for seeking relationships; establishing the same via PRINT statements may encourage such a disposition arising from the nature of the output. It might similarly be argued that a QUERY statement presupposes a predisposition for seeing a relationship in that values for the QUERY need to be specified; a PRINT statement presents possi- ble values for consideration.

The apparently random nature of children's early experiences of file interrogation serves a val- uable purpose: it enables familiarisation with the nature of the stored data, it establishes the quali- ties of particular fields and their relationship to other fields and encourages recognition of similari- ties or divergencies between records. Note must also be taken of the apparent encouragement that is derived from printer in preference to VDU output and from numeric in preference to string data.

" Dataf i le Evaluation

Once results of a QUERY or PRINT statement have been obtained they do not constitute the 'answer' but merely a yardstick from which to judge and interpret the data. The child can make inferences, reject or accept a hypothesis, or wish to further interpret the results before a definite con- clusion can be drawn.The results may just be one step on the way to a conclusion.

There are opportunities to reorganise the results appertaining to one field graphically in barcharts, histograms and pie charts. Relationships between two fields can be found by correlating items graphically. Numeric descriptions of the variance and frequency of results can be obtained. Certain simple statistical tests, such as correlation or devi- ation may be applied. Results may be analysed textually for key words or phrases, or be displayed as a map to show the spatial relationships between data items. All these opportunities are present, and it requires skill and judgement to choose the

D. Freeman and J. Levett / QUEST." Computer Assisted Information Handling 171

appropriate methods for displaying results on the computer so that logical inferences may be drawn.

The ease by which the data can be transformed very rapidly between different methods of display or analysis means that methods can be tried out to see if they are appropriate. The child has the capability of choosing, but also of testing and trialing. There are obvious limitations which the child will discover: restraints of string and numeric methods of display such as the discovery that numeric data has far more opportunities for transformation and description. There are also restraints on spatial data, which must have accu- rate, numeric description of each point to which it belongs. Thus a child learns that there are limita- tions of transforming the results, and can thus select, test and choose within these constraints. Seeing their own data made into another form helps children want to interpret the results more fully. It is more motivating to leave the computer with a printed copy of a diagram that has been carefully chosen and then spend more time think- ing about what conclusions to draw from it, than to spend a long time on the lower level task of drawing a diagram. I t gives children the opportun- ity to become familiar with more techniques and so make more rational judgements.

4. Further Questions

In conclusion, it is pertinent to outline those questions to which further attention might be di- rected. Having considered information handling in relation to the ski l ls /concepts /a t t r ibutes it im- p l ies /demands and the restraints computer-as- sisted activity imposes consideration might also be given to its subject matter.

There might exist a dichotomy between the overlay of skil ls/concepts inherent in the activity of information handling upon defined disciplines and the methodology prescribed or described by such disciplines. Is it the case that the use of a computer program encourages a methodology in the handling of sources which is at variance with the methodology of the disciplines? In this connec-

tion it might be said that such conflict is more likely to arise in those disciplines in which consid- eration of the nuances of the validity of sources and their subsequent validation by reference to factors unrelated to their actual content is paramount (e.g the validation of historical data is of a different order to that of chemical data).

Equally, is it appropriate to ask if there exists a common core of information handling skills which are independent of the methodology of that of individual disciplines? Investigation of the cur- riculum might reveal parts of individual syllabuses which are free of a large content base and activi- ties which, by the nature of their sources, are implicitly suitable for computer-assisted data han- dling.

A related matter is that of the implications of confining data within a file. It might be asked whether or not there exists a liability, in defining a boundary of a data base, to consider the data base as representing a universal set ignoring significant factors outside the boundary and factors unclas- sifiable in terms of a data field. Such factors, combined with a possible bias towards obtaining a positive result from interrogations, have significant implications for proposed enquiries.

References

[1] D. Freeman, J. Levett. "QUEST in the learning environ- ment - computer assisted information handling as a tool for learning and curriculum development". Proceedings WCCE, Norfolk, Virginia, USA. 1985.

[2] D. Freeman, J. Levett. "QUEST - Two curriculum pro- jects: perspectives, practice and evidence." Proceedings CAL85 Symposium on Computer Assisted Learning, Not- tingham, UK. 1985.

[3] D. Freeman, J. Levett. "QUEST: a tool for curriculum development". Computer Education. 1985.

[4] D. Freeman, W. Tagg. "Databases in schools". Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, ed. R. Lewis, Blackwells, UK. 1985.

[5] D. Freeman, "Using information effectively". A Parent's Guide to Educational Software, Daily Telegraph Publica- tions, UK. 1985.

[6] J. Levett. "The Hertingfordbury project: computer-assisted approaches to inquiry learning". CARN International Con- ference, Cambridge Institute of Education, Cambridge, UK. 1986.