Collaboration in Situated Social and Cognitive Learning Theory

Introduction

This paper investigates situated learning research in educational models and explores the complexities of learning and knowledge transfer from the probes of design schemes and outputs in situated cognition and learning environments. This learning theory was chosen with the objective to identify how social interactions, which is critical of the situated learning theory, can influence learning and knowledge procurement in technology-based learning environments. As an important pedagogy, situated learning (Lave, 1988) or situated cognition (Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989; Choi & Hannafin, 1995), puts the learning process in the “real world” to provide meaningful learning and promote the transfer of knowledge. It is proposed that this learning theory is advanced because it evaluates two key principals as described by Lave (1988), knowledge presented incredible context and learning requires social collaboration.

Background

A major premise of a situated learning environment is to have learning based on a socially organized activity (Lave & Wenger, 1991). In terms of the instructional design of a situated learning environment, the design must promote the view of thinking as situated and is, therefore, 'better explained by concepts of perception and action than by the concept of information processing psychology (M.F.,1993,p. 43). Equally, Brown, Collins, and Duguid (1989) propose that the learning environment should take place in the “context of realistic settings” (p.39). Moreover, Brown et al (1989) described the process of students being immersed in the culture of the learning environment realm enables an authentic task.

Technological advances have enabled the growth of online learning environments to disseminate knowledge transferring without the barriers of location. This advancement has increased accessibility to more students and has changed the landscape of education delivery. For example, online courses and programs in higher education are on the rise, according to the US Education Department National Center for Education Statistics (2017), the proportion of all students who were enrolled exclusively online grew to 15.4 percent. Therefore, the need for quality instruction and student engagement is paramount.

Theoretical model

The following paragraph summarizes the situated learning theory employed in existing research. First, the research presupposes that learning is unintentional and situated within a culture, context, and authentic activity (Lave, 1991). Additionally, prior research substantiates that the definition of situated learning as learning as a form of “social co-participation in which members of a community are not only engaged in common work practices but also create knowledge and shared ways of knowing”(Carter, 2017, p. 113). As Lave and Wenger (1991) suggest, the human mind “develops in social situations, and that they use tools and representational media that culture provides to support, extend, and reorganize mental functioning' (p. 11). Wagner (1993) hypothesize that situated learning also phrased situated cognition, and has the probable opportunity to advance teaching and learning in education. Hendricks (2001) has described situated learning as the recognition that 'learning and doing are inseparable and that learning is a process of enculturation' (p. 1). The academic community has extensively stated that situated learning needs the students to be uncovered to the authentic social situations and that knowledge that comes from the experience. Lave and Wenger highlight this process as “legitimate peripheral participation” (p.85). Lastly, discussions about educational immersive technologies have dramatically shaped the design of the online situated learning environment, the following assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the aforementioned virtual environments.

Strengths and Weaknesses

The framework for the strengths and weaknesses will look at virtual reality and augmented reality. Situated learning considerably influences virtual worlds and riveting simulations in which the learner experiences a compelling, collaborative, and interactive environment (Dawley & Dede, 2013). Additionally, as related to situated cognition theory, augmented reality users are more likely to be engaged with authentic activities so the learning is situated in socially and culturally meaningful contexts through practice, which leads to enhanced learning performance (Chang et al.,2016).

Virtual Reality Strengths

As previous research contends, first, virtual reality is significantly perceived as contributing to a fully immersive learning environment (Schott &Marshall, 2017). Second, virtual reality content for learning and training includes tasks that can be solved through social interactions and collaborations, in which a learner feels connected to others (Enyedy et al., 2012; Mateu et al.,2014). Lastly, as described by Yilmaz (2016), “argue that the content features of virtual reality can encourage learners to feel a sense of connectedness because such features facilitate learners’ cognitive attainments and positive emotions while performing learning activities” (p. 22).

Virtual Reality Weaknesses

In contrast to the aforementioned strengths, the following deduces the weakness with virtual reality as a situated learning environment. As detected by Carneiro et al., (2015) the cost and complicated technology could halt the process of designing these learning environments. Furthermore, if the learners do not have access to a realistic virtual experience, then the situated learning may fall short, and there will be no benefit compared to a physical learning space.

AR strengths

In an immersive environment (especially in a location-based AR context), users can cognitively blend virtual information and real context, which gives users the feeling that they are situated in authentic contexts and enhances their learning performance (Kourouthanssis et al. (2015) found pleasure and arousal, which could help with learning outcomes and engagement. Learning effectiveness was also found as a trend in the research, defined as improvement in the learning process and outcomes (Frank & Kapila, 2017; Ibanez et al.,2016).

AR weaknesses

The first weakness highlighted by the literature was the amount of user’s experience with motion sickness, as defined by Munafo et al. (2017) as, “an aversive sense of discomfort, disorientation, nausea, vomiting, etc.”(p.141). Motion sickness is common in users of head-mounted display systems for immersive technology (Coxon et al., 2016). Secondly, the cognitive overload could be present in AR environments due to how big the screen that displays the technology, and how much information is being presented at a given time (Goh et al., 2016). Lastly, as Chang et al. (2014) illuminate, the increased potential of distracted attention spans with fails to balance the user's physical space and virtual space.

Strength and Weaknesses Conclusion

Wong (1994) strongly stated that achieving conceptual understanding is advocated by arranged pedagogical practices that enhance active construction of relationships between pieces of information and through experiences in which learners make decisions about how knowledge is related. As stated by Dawley and Dede (2013), virtual environments and immersive simulations are arranged to support learning in a collaborative, fascinating, and student engaged friendly environment. The literature has shown that there are opportunities for situated learning to be achieved in these environments. However, it was also found that the use of these technologies may incite negative consequences as well. There is not a lot of scholarly articles on the outcomes of learning in this environments, and the major gap found thus far, which needs to be addressed is how these environments can be incorporated with ADA compliance. The major limitation of these virtual and immersive technology-based learning environments is how to design these environments to learners who may be blind or deaf

Proposed Multi-Strategy Research Design

The proposed multi-strategy research design would include varied approaches including survey, in-depth interview, pre-test/post-test, and experiment. From the review of the current literature, the most common administered research methods for analyzing immersive technologies with a situated learning framework included, the experimental method as the most popular, followed by the survey method (Suh and Prophet, 2018).

Summary of research methods (as cited in Suh & Prohet, (2018)

Proposed Immersive Technology Survey

To validate the previous research on immersive technology as a situated learning environment, the research design would attempt to measure the feel, perception, and learning outcomes with participants. The proposed questions would be asked to the participants in the form of a survey to attempt to measure their experience with learning in an immersive technology situated learning environment. For example, questions would be based in a sense of presence, interactions with students, collaboration, and user satisfaction.

Proposed Immersive Technology Experiment

The proposed method of the experiment would be a pretest-postest experiential, mixed design to attempt to determine if there were any statistically significant difference between the immersive learning environment and a non-immersive learning environment compared to a control group.

Conclusion

The findings from the situated learning/situated cognition learning theory based immersive technology literature review found that there is an increase in the academic literature on the subject. As technology in education becomes more available and cheaper to implement into higher education learning designs, it is increasingly important for future rigors studies to be conducted to confirm the beneficial outcomes. As stated earlier, a major gap in the research was revealed in the form of how to interact with a student with visual and hearing disabilities. As the desire for technology-enhanced learning environments increase, and the desire to create real-world experiences to learners, future research must explore all users' experience. Currently, the research has shown that these environments do not always create positive experiences, and more specifically, the negative experiences of cognitive overload, distraction, motion sickness, and disabilities is a full stop of the technology for the user. More research is needed to explore the user experience and make appropriate changes to the design. The situated experience in education is a critical pedagogical approach to assist students in with the vulnerability to the real world, which is the main underlining tone of the situated learning theory.