Anchored Annotation to Support Collaborative Knowledge Construction

Abstract

Online discussion forums have been shown to support collaborative reflection, critique, and construction of knowledge. However, when these discussions are reading-centered and hosted in traditional threaded discussion forums, it is often difficult to maintain focus on the readings themselves, as well as navigating the difficulty of attributing ideas to just one discussion post within a thread. This study demonstrates how an anchored annotation system was used in a first semester online, asynchronous doctoral course to support more effective reading-centered knowledge construction. We investigated the discussion activities of 12 online doctoral students as they explored seven articles during two non-consecutive weeks. Through analysis of 591 student comments and replies, we examined how students used the anchoring system as a support to help make sense of the articles. We found that using anchored annotation reduced coordination activities and supported knowledge construction, particularly interpretation and elaboration of ideas.