Process and Output: Relation Between Transactivity, Temporal Synchronicity, and Quality of Group Work During CSCL

Abstract

Do the simultaneous alignment of student activities (temporal synchronicity) and students successively building on each other's reasoning (transactivity) predict the quality of collaborative learning products? A mixed method approach was used to study 74 first year university students who were randomly assigned to work in dyads on an ill-defined problem of biodiversity collapse in tropical forests within a CSCL setting. The study results revealed that neither temporal synchronicity nor transactivity correlated with the quality of group products. The qualitative analysis of chat transcripts showed the variability between the groups can be explained by group dynamics, students’ prior knowledge, confidence in managing the learning task, collaborative strategy, and communication skills.