Combining qualitative evaluation and social network analysis for the study of classroom social interactions

By Alejandra Martínez-Monés, Yannis A. Dimitriadis, Bartolomé Rubia-Avi, Eduardo Gómez-Sánchez, P. Fuente. Comput. Educ., 2003

462 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Studying and evaluating real experiences that promote active and collaborative learning is a crucial field in CSCL. Major issues that remain unsolved deal with the merging of qualitative and quantitative methods and data, especially in educational settings that involve both physical and computer-supported collaboration. In this paper we present a mixed evaluation method that combines traditional sources of data with computer logs, and integrates quantitative statistics, qualitative data analysis and social network analysis in an overall interpretative approach. Several computer tools have been developed to assist in this process, integrated with generic software for qualitative analysis. The evaluation method and tools have been incrementally applied and validated in the context of an educational and research project that has been going on during the last three years. The use of the method is illustrated in this paper by an example consisting of the evaluation of a particular category within this project. The proposed method and tools aim at giving an answer to the need of innovative techniques for the study of new forms of interaction emerging in CSCL; at increasing the efficiency of the traditionally demanding qualitative methods, so that they can be used by teachers in curriculum-based experiences; and at the definition of a set of guidelines for bridging different data sources and analysis perspectives.

Subfields: Computer Science Applications, Developmental and Educational Psychology, Education

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/852af3907f3890fd6b1ddd2d83f34b26781acdb3

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In Computer Science Applications

In Developmental and Educational Psychology

In Education

Citations in the corpus

COLLAGE: A collaborative Learning Design editor based on patterns (2006, methodology): “The evaluation method that has been applied is a simplification of the mixed method proposed in (Martínez et al., 2003).”
Game object model version II: a theoretical framework for educational game development (2007, result): “Martı´nez Mone´s et al. (2002) show that the inclusion of SNA techniques results in a richer data set and that SNA data complements other traditional research instruments.”
Investigating patterns of interaction in networked learning and computer-supported collaborative learning: A role for Social Network Analysis (2007, background): “Martinez, Dimitriadis, Rubia, Gomez, and de la Fuente (2003) found that the density of a network was affected by the teacher ’ s presence.”