skip to main content
10.1145/2675133.2675166acmconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagescscwConference Proceedingsconference-collections
research-article
Open access

Talkabout: Making Distance Matter with Small Groups in Massive Classes

Published: 28 February 2015 Publication History

Abstract

Massive online classes are global and diverse. How can we harness this diversity to improve engagement and learning? Currently, though enrollments are high, students' interactions with each other are minimal: most are alone together. This isolation is particularly disappointing given that a global community is a major draw of online classes. This paper illustrates the potential of leveraging geographic diversity in massive online classes. We connect students from around the world through small-group video discussions. Our peer discussion system, Talkabout, has connected over 5,000 students in fourteen online classes. Three studies with 2,670 students from two classes found that globally diverse discussions boost student performance and engagement: the more geographically diverse the discussion group, the better the students performed on later quizzes. Through this work, we challenge the view that online classes are useful only when in-person classes are unavailable. Instead, we demonstrate how diverse online classrooms can create benefits that are largely unavailable in a traditional classroom.

Supplementary Material

ZIP File (cscwf0237-file4.zip)
Auxiliary material contains appendices: Transcript of a student discussion, and the assessment materials used in studies.

References

[1]
Anderson, A. et al. Engaging with massive online courses. (2014), 687--698.
[2]
Aronson, E. and Bridgeman, D. Jigsaw groups and the desegregated classroom: In pursuit of common goals. In Readings About The Social Animal. Worth Publishers, 2004, 532.
[3]
Bos, N. et al. Effects of four computer-mediated communications channels on trust development. Proc CHI: ACM conference on Human factors in computing systems, ACM Press (2002).
[4]
Braskamp, L.A. et al. Assessing Progress in Global Learning and Development of Students with Education Abroad Experiences. Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad 18, (2008), 101--118.
[5]
Breslow, L.B. et al. Studying learning in the worldwide classroom: Research into edXfis first MOOC. Research & Practice in Assessment 8, (2013), 13--25.
[6]
Brookfield, S.D. and Preskill, S. Discussion as a Way of Teaching: Tools and Techniques for Democratic Classrooms. John Wiley & Sons, 2012.
[7]
Clementi, F. and Mauro Gallegati. Econophysics of Wealth Distributions. In Chatterjee, A. et al., eds., Econophysics of Wealth Distributions. Springer Milan, Milano, 2005.
[8]
Coetzee, D. et al. Chatrooms in MOOCs: all talk and no action. Proc. of the ACM conference on Learning @ scale, ACM Press (2014), 127--136.
[9]
Coser, R.L. The Complexity of Roles as a Seedbed of Individual Autonomy. In The Idea of Social Structure: Essays in Honor of Robert Merton. New York, New York, USA, 1975.
[10]
Crouch, C.H. and Mazur, E. Peer Instruction: Ten years of experience and results. American Journal of Physics 69, 9 (2001), 970.
[11]
Daft, R.L. and Lengel, R.H. Organizational Information Requirements, Media Richness and Structural Design. Management Science 32, 5 (1986), 554--571.
[12]
Desai, M. Human development: Concepts and measurement. European Economic Review 35, 2--3 (1991), 350--357.
[13]
DeSanctis, G. et al. Learning in Online Forums. European Management Journal 21, 5 (2003), 565--577.
[14]
Dillenbourg, P. Over-scripting CSCL: The risks of blending collaborative learning with instructional design. Three worlds of CSCL. Can we support CSCL, (2002), 61--91.
[15]
Freedman, J. MOOCs Are Usefully Middlebrow. The Chronicle of Higher Education. http://chronicle.com/article/MOOCs-Are-Usefully-Middlebrow/143183/.
[16]
Goesling, B. Changing Income Inequalities within and between Nations: New Evidence. American Sociological Review 66, 5 (2001), 745--761.
[17]
Green, E.G.T. Variation of Individualism and Collectivism within and between 20 Countries: A Typological Analysis. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 36, 3 (2005), 321--339.
[18]
Group, W.B. World Development Indicators 2012. World Bank Publications, 2012.
[19]
Gurin, P. et al. Diversity and higher education: Theory and impact on educational outcomes. .
[20]
Guzzetti, B.J. and Others, A. Promoting Conceptual Change in Science: A Comparative Meta-Analysis of Instructional Interventions from Reading Education and Science Education. Reading Research Quarterly 28, 2 (1992), 116--59.
[21]
Hambrick, D.C. et al. When Groups Consist of Multiple Nationalities: Towards a New Understanding of the Implications. Organization Studies 19, 2 (1998), 181--205.
[22]
Heine, S.J. Cultural Psychology. WW Norton, 2008.
[23]
Hewstone, M. Intergroup contact: Panacea for prejudice- Psychologist, 2003, 352--355. http://www.psy.ox.ac.uk/publications/28661.
[24]
Ho, A.D. et al. HarvardX and MITx: The First Year of Open Online Courses, Fall 2012-Summer 2013. SSRN Electronic Journal, (2014).
[25]
Hollan, J. and Stornetta, S. Beyond being there. Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems - CHI '92, ACM Press (1992), 119--125.
[26]
Hurtado, S. et al. The Climate for Diversity: Key Issues for Institutional Self-Study. New Directions for Institutional Research 1998, 98 (1998), 53--63.
[27]
Hurtado, S. et al. Enacting Diverse Learning Environments: Improving the Climate for Racial/Ethnic Diversity in Higher Education. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report, Vol. 26, No. 8. (1998).
[28]
Jacobs, A.J. Grading the MOOC University. The New York Times, 2013.
[29]
Joinson, A.N. Knowing Me, Knowing You: Reciprocal Self-Disclosure in Internet-Based Surveys. CyberPsychology & Behavior 4, 5 (2001).
[30]
Konstan, J.A. et al. Teaching recommender systems at large scale. Proc of the ACM conference on Learning @ scale conference, ACM Press (2014).
[31]
Kucsera, J. and Orfield, G. New York State's Extreme School Segregation: Inequality, Inaction and a Damaged Future. 2014.
[32]
Kulkarni, C. et al. Peer and self assessment in massive online classes. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI) 20, 6 (2013), 33.
[33]
Lin, X. and Schwartz, D.L. Reflection at the Crossroads of Cultures. Mind, Culture, and Activity 10, 1 (2003).
[34]
Losh, E. The War on Learning: Gaining Ground in the Digital University. MIT Press, 2014.
[35]
Mark, G. et al. Meeting at the Desktop: An Empirical Study of Virtually Collocated Teams. ECSCW, Kluwer Academic Publishers (1999).
[36]
Markus, H. and Kitayama, S. Culture and the self: Implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation. Psychological Review 98, 2 (1991), 224--253.
[37]
Marmot, M. Social determinants of health inequalities. Lancet 365, 9464 (2005), 1099--104.
[38]
Mazur, E. Farewell, lecture Science (New York, N.Y.) 323, 5910 (2009), 50--1.
[39]
Nemeth, C.J. Differential contributions of majority and minority influence. Psychological Review 93, 1986.
[40]
Nguyen, M. et al. Comparing online and offline self-disclosure: a systematic review. Cyberpsychology, behavior and social networking 15, 2 (2012).
[41]
Nora, A. and Cabrera, A.F. The Role of Perceptions in Prejudice and Discrimination and the Adjustment of Minority Students to College. Journal of Higher Education 67, 2 (1995), 119--48.
[42]
O'Donnell, A.M. and Dansereau, D.F. Scripted cooperation in student dyads: A method for analyzing and enhancing academic learning and performance. In Interaction in cooperative groups: The theoretical anatomy of group learning. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1995, 120--141.
[43]
Ogbu, J.U. Understanding Cultural Diversity and Learning. Educational Researcher 21, 8 (1992), 5--14.
[44]
Olds, K. Mapping Coursera's Global Footprint. Inside Higher Ed, 2013. http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/globalhighered/mapping-courseras-global-footprint.
[45]
Papadopoulos, K. et al. Community TAs scale high-touch learning, provide student-staff brokering, and build esprit de corps. Proceedings of the first ACM conference on Learning @ scale conference - L@S '14, ACM Press (2014), 163--164.
[46]
Parker, W.C. Classroom Discussion: Models for Leading Seminars and Deliberations. Social Education 65, 2 (2000), 111--15.
[47]
Pettigrew, T.F. Intergroup contact theory. Annual review of psychology 49, (1998), 65--85.
[48]
Purdie, N. and Hattie, J. Cultural Differences in the Use of Strategies for Self-Regulated Learning. American Educational Research Journal 33, 4 (1996), 845--871.
[49]
Rocco, E. Trust breaks down in electronic contexts but can be repaired by some initial face-to-face contact. Proc of CHI: ACM Conf on Human Factors in Computing Systems, ACM Press (1998).
[50]
Saltarelli, A.J. Effects of belongingness and synchronicity on face-to-face and computer-mediated online cooperative pedagogy. (2012).
[51]
Shenkar, S. and Oded, R. Clustering Countries on Attitudinal Dimensions: A Review and Synthesis. The Academy of Management Review 10, 3 (1985), 435--454.
[52]
Short, J.E. et al. The Social Psychology of Telecommunications. Wiley, London, 1976.
[53]
Star, S.L. and Griesemer, J.R. Institutional Ecology, 'Translations' and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907--39. Social Studies of Science 19, 3 (1989), 387--420.
[54]
Symons, C.S. and Johnson, B.T. The self-reference effect in memory: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin 121, 3 (1997), 371--394.
[55]
Tomkin, J.H. and Charlevoix, D. Do professors matter? Proc. of the ACM conference on Learning @ scale, ACM Press (2014), 71--78.
[56]
Tudge, J. The everyday lives of young children. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2008.
[57]
Varnum, Michael EW Grossmann, I. et al. The origin of cultural differences in cognition the social orientation hypothesis. Current directions in psychological science 19, 1 (2010).
[58]
Woolley, A.W. et al. Evidence for a collective intelligence factor in the performance of human groups. Science (New York, N.Y.) 330, 6004 (2010), 686--8.
[59]
World Values Survey (Wave 6). World Values Survey Association, 2014.

Cited By

View all
  • (2024)Forming Shared Interest Pods: Barriers to Self-Assembly of Interest-Based Small Groups, and Dynamics of Retaining and Giving up Control to Find Collective FitProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36869848:CSCW2(1-50)Online publication date: 8-Nov-2024
  • (2024)VizGroup: An AI-assisted Event-driven System for Collaborative Programming Learning AnalyticsProceedings of the 37th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology10.1145/3654777.3676347(1-22)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
  • (2024)Meeting Effectiveness and Inclusiveness: Large-scale Measurement, Identification of Key Features, and Prediction in Real-world Remote MeetingsProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36373708:CSCW1(1-39)Online publication date: 26-Apr-2024
  • Show More Cited By

Recommendations

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Conferences
CSCW '15: Proceedings of the 18th ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing
February 2015
1956 pages
ISBN:9781450329224
DOI:10.1145/2675133
Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

Sponsors

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 28 February 2015

Check for updates

Author Tags

  1. culture
  2. online education
  3. peer learning
  4. reflection

Qualifiers

  • Research-article

Conference

CSCW '15
Sponsor:

Acceptance Rates

CSCW '15 Paper Acceptance Rate 161 of 575 submissions, 28%;
Overall Acceptance Rate 2,235 of 8,521 submissions, 26%

Upcoming Conference

CSCW '25

Contributors

Other Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

  • Downloads (Last 12 months)284
  • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)50
Reflects downloads up to 19 Feb 2025

Other Metrics

Citations

Cited By

View all
  • (2024)Forming Shared Interest Pods: Barriers to Self-Assembly of Interest-Based Small Groups, and Dynamics of Retaining and Giving up Control to Find Collective FitProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36869848:CSCW2(1-50)Online publication date: 8-Nov-2024
  • (2024)VizGroup: An AI-assisted Event-driven System for Collaborative Programming Learning AnalyticsProceedings of the 37th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology10.1145/3654777.3676347(1-22)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
  • (2024)Meeting Effectiveness and Inclusiveness: Large-scale Measurement, Identification of Key Features, and Prediction in Real-world Remote MeetingsProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36373708:CSCW1(1-39)Online publication date: 26-Apr-2024
  • (2023)"I Want to Reveal, but I Also Want to Hide" Understanding the Conflict of Revealing and Hiding Needs in Virtual Study RoomsProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/36100917:CSCW2(1-27)Online publication date: 4-Oct-2023
  • (2023)Crowdsourcing and Crowdfunding in Higher Education in PeruCrowdfunding in Higher Education Institutions10.1007/978-3-031-30069-1_10(159-180)Online publication date: 2-Aug-2023
  • (2023)How Long Until We Are (Psychologically) Safe? A Longitudinal Investigation of Psychological Safety in Virtual Engineering Design Teams in EducationDesign Computing and Cognition’2210.1007/978-3-031-20418-0_45(767-784)Online publication date: 5-Jan-2023
  • (2022)Identifying Training-Based Functions of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in Leading Organizations' DevelopmentIranian Evolutionary and Educational Psychology10.52547/ieepj.4.4.1654:4(165-185)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2022
  • (2022)SmartGroup: A Tool for Small-Group Learning ActivitiesFuture Internet10.3390/fi1501000715:1(7)Online publication date: 26-Dec-2022
  • (2022)An Active Learning Didactic Proposal with Human-Computer Interaction in Engineering Education: A Direct Current Motor Case StudyElectronics10.3390/electronics1107105911:7(1059)Online publication date: 28-Mar-2022
  • (2022)Surfacing Equity Issues in Large Computing Courses with Peer-Ranked, Demographically-Labeled Student FeedbackProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35129126:CSCW1(1-39)Online publication date: 7-Apr-2022
  • Show More Cited By

View Options

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

PDF

eReader

View online with eReader.

eReader

Login options

Figures

Tables

Media

Share

Share

Share this Publication link

Share on social media