CIDER: a collaborative learn-technology-by-design framework using peer feedback and individual reflection

The broader outcomes and learning benefits for students that are developed when learners work through a design process have been noted for a wide range of age groups and contexts, including practising teachers (Kali, Goodyear, & Markauskaite, 2011); and graduate education students (Kali & Ronen-Fuhrmann, 2011). There have also been numerous studies on cooperative and collaborative learning which have focused on the higher-order benefits, such as motivation, social cohesion, and higher levels of learning, that result from collaborative learning (Johnson & Johnson, 2002; Slavin, 1996). In this study, we combine a learn-by-design approach with a long-term collaborative task to harness the learning benefits of collaboration, where students are designing and building learning resources in a process which requires them to collaborate with each other and to make extensive use of technology. In this study, we investigate how technology can be used to support collaborative learning and peer assessment in a Graduate Certificate in Higher Education unit centred on diversity in Higher Education and the use of information and communication technologies. We have developed a CIDER (Collaborative Investigation, Design, Evaluation and Review) framework, a learn-technology-by-collaborative-design approach which modifies the ADDIE model to support collaborative working, so that students work collaboratively during design, development and peer review processes while reflecting individually on the design and learning processes. The semester-long assessment task for this unit is that students, working in small groups, collaboratively build two learning resources on diversity in Higher Education, one resource being a digital story and the other a website. Students collaborate on an investigation into the purpose of the resource, formulate and articulate a design, evaluate and provide critical peer feedback to their classmates on their artefacts and review the evaluations they receive in order to modify their final design. The aim of the study is to investigate the following questions: how is a learn-technology-by collaborative-design best implemented in the classroom? What do students experience and learn from a CIDER approach? Does using peer feedback enable students to reflect in a more effective and critical way? To gather data on these questions, this study uses a mixed method approach, where our data sources include students' individual reflective journals, student focus groups, students' critical peer reflections (video analysis) and records of the groups' design processes.  A critical textual analysis will be employed to analyse texts that are produced by participants.