Knowledge community: A knowledge-building system for global collaborative project learning

Abstract

The wave of a knowledge economy drives today's education to equip students with knowledge building abilities. While collaborative learning has been proven to be an effective constructivist pedagogy, it is difficult to elicit, coordinate, and capture the corresponding knowledge construction process. The situation becomes more challenging when learning is conducted in a distributed environment in which the participants are scattered in different geographical locations. In this paper, we depict the theories, architecture, applications, and analysis of a Web-based computer-supported collaborative learning and knowledge-building system called Knowledge Community (KC), which currently serves a series of 3I (interdisciplinary, interschool, and international) Project Learning activities with more than 10 000 students and teachers participating globally. We also describe the corresponding 3I Project Learning model, a novel technology-enabled pedagogy in which learners perform collaborative, comparative study projects with peers from other countries. Technologically, KC is the use of Web technologies to provide a collaborative learning environment. Pedagogically, KC with its embedded learning theories has created a new learning culture that meets the demands of knowledge economy. © 2008 IEEE.