"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."
Plevinski, J., Weible, J., & DeSchryver, M. (2017). Anchored Annotation to Support Collaborative Knowledge Construction In Smith, B. K., Borge, M., Mercier, E., and Lim, K. Y. (Eds.). (2017). Making a Difference: Prioritizing Equity and Access in CSCL, 12th International Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) 2017, Volume 1. Philadelphia, PA: International Society of the Learning Sciences.
1. SUMMARY
The paper uses the tool Framebench (Agarwal, 2015) for evaluating the effects of anchored annotations on improving the comprehension of assigned readings. The paper found that anchored annotations support better, more focused elaboration of ideas, reducing coordination activities. It was possible due to two main factors. First, anchored comments are in close proximity to related texts. It makes the context clear and learners are more encouraged to use specific references. Second, multiple knowledge construction activities are supported.
2. STRENGTHS
Research methodology appears to be quite well established with reliance on various previous works. The paper clearly stated research questions and was able to answer with results.
3. WEAKNESSES
Analysis of gathered data was not rigorous enough. In addition, citing too many previous works in a short discussion section does not increase the persuasiveness of the paper. 12 participants for the experiment can arguably be a small number. What will happen if we run the same experiment with 50 undergrad students?
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