Collaborative Learning Drives Critical Thinking in the Classroom

Collaborative Learning Activities for Students to Participate In

Collaborative learning activities brings up the image of a group of students sitting together with their notebooks out, maybe around a lab table, talking about a specific topic or manipulating objects in an experiment. Today’s collaborative activities, with the use of Echo360, are a little bit different. Dr. Kuppuswami encourages collaborative learning culture in her classes by having groups of students work online to develop their various leadership roles. She harnesses the power of Echo360 in academic settings to meet her goals of strengthening relationships, incorporating diverse perspectives, using active listening skills, and focusing on solutions rather than problems. Continue reading to hear more about this in her interview with Echo360’s Jeff Peterson.

Jeff Peterson: Welcome to EchoCast and welcome Rukmani Kuppuswami. Rukmani is a Professor of Biology at the Hill College in the great state of Texas and has taught for over 25 years at places like Hill, Northwest Vista College, Laredo Community College. Prior to her inspiring work to inspire students in higher ed, she worked in research at Cornell and Hershey Medical Center, and she has a distinguished academic background of her own with degrees from Sophia College, Iowa State University, and is currently studying for her Ed.D degree with an E-learning specialization, so we’ve got a ringer here on the show this morning. We’re very excited to have her here today, also, as a 2022 Echo360 e3 Impact Grant Award winner. Kind of a mouthful there. And to have her share more about her exciting work that she’s been leading, actually for a while now, with engaged learning technologies like EchoVideo, and how that work is now poised to be evolving and advancing further. So welcome, Rukmani. Great to have you on EchoCast.

Rukmani Kuppuswami: Thank you very much, sir. So I’m going to go ahead and share my screen over here with a presentation. So I have termed it now. I have to make a modification. I know that the EchoCast mentioned Exam U, but since I have been consulting with Dr. Bussing, it is actually going to be Echo360 plus Point Solution and yes, definitely Echo360 plus Point Solution, I find it very powerful. So here is my presentation outline. A bit of introduction as to when I’ve been using Echo360 and I would like to also share some student work that I have been doing for nearly five years now. Then I’ll get into aspects of my title and then talk about the various types of activities that the students are going to be working upon. So let me go ahead and start for the share with you and I’m going to pull out the screen of the course. The current course, this is actually a current course, and this student is a student in my current class, the A&P Part 1. And this is from the study guide of the student, so you can see that the students take down notes as they are watching these audio videos for each of the topics that they are presented with every week. Plus they also respond to some clicker questions, so let me go ahead and refresh this so you can take a look that within the LMS that we utilize, which is Schoology, we have this avenue of creating this Echo360, I guess it’s called an app. In any case, and then you can actually post all these audio videos along with any other items that you have for the class. Very good. So I am going to go ahead and stop this and return to my presentation and would like to just add that I do this exercise for every class I teach. So for every class I teach, I use those EchoVideos and then the students have to submit, and they are obliged to do it, because they have to work at the break for this one here. So notes, discussion points, and then any other responses, clicker question responses, etc. I wanted to make certain that I did share the audio. So I want to make certain that there might be a place where there is an audio I don’t recall in case I did that one. Sorry. 

So now I’m going to get into the types of the grant project. First of all, I’m so appreciative, again, of receiving this grant and having this opportunity to actually sort of crystalize my thoughts as well. So this is the grant project that I arrived at. This is actually rather similar to my dissertation topic as well, which is stimulating critical thinking with collaborative learning in community colleges. So the grant course I have added, which I think I’ll be using for my dissertation as well, using the Echo360 and if I recall, it was Echo360 platform, but it’s going to be that Point Solutions. So these are some of the research questions. I may not do all these research questions for the grant purposes, so that way I can take it in stages. But for my dissertation, actually, it is all these research questions that are going to drive the study. How does participation in collaborative learning affect the true mean differences of participants’ pre-test and post-test critical thinking scores? In what ways do collaboration assignments scores and post-test critical thinking scores correlate with each other? So to drive that correlation. It’s not exactly a cause-and-effect study. So it is quasi-experimental. What are the differences in the mean score between collaboration assignment and the post-test critical scores of participants? So this is the critical thinking measurement that I’m going to use with the Cornell Critical Thinking Test Level C, very credible. You know that validity, etc., has been worked out for it. This is what I’ll be obtaining and the students will complete this at the beginning of the term and then once at the end of the term after they have completed the collaborative exercise. 

So collaboration is a big deal. In the 21st century, it includes the capacity to work productively with different individuals and groups towards a common goal. This is from the education design lab that says these are the four cores of competencies that have to be completed. Strengthening relationship, incorporating diverse perspectives, using active listening skills, and then focusing on solutions rather than problems. So here are a bit more details about each of these four competencies. Strengthening creative networks to which they can access, provide resource information support, listening actively ensuring that others are feeling that they are heard and valued. Also, when you’re hearing, you’re grasping and retaining that information and creating that forward momentum that is going to advance the work. In other words, always focused, task-oriented, focus on solution. And then incorporating those diverse perspectives to enlarge the conversation, definitely challenge their own thinking, and to maximize that group effectiveness. So here are the, sort of an overview that I’m not going to read out, but it’s essentially going to be four assessments. The students will be given an overview of that one, and then instructions will follow as to how they can complete these assignments or assessments. So here [inaudible 07:40] for the first sub-competency, strengthen relationship, this is two, which is listening actively. And then this is three, to focus on solution, and then this is the fourth one, to incorporate those diverse perspectives. Now here is the assignment that they will be working on for this collaborative activity. The students will choose a research topic, which is at the very beginning of the term, and the numbers indicate the sub-competencies, which actually will be assessed through this one here. So this is going to be one and three, so one again was strength in relationship and then three is that focus on solution. And then gather sources from the library databases, internet, according to some internet criteria. This is actually going to be individual so they have that individual accountability as well. And then analysis and synthesis of all those sources, which is again, going to be for competencies one, two, and three. And then they create this PowerPoint presentation to submit for the class report, plus it is also going to be assigned for peer review.

So I have given here an example again of current students who are working on this research topic, Covid 19. In fact, they have just modified it to Covid 19 and these students are once again in the A&P Part 1. And then here is an example of a reference article that has been submitted by the student. It is actually about 12 pages long. I just gave the very beginning. So using all this, so as mentioned, they will create this PowerPoint presentation, which I will be uploading on the Echo website, so I’m just going to go ahead and go to the Echo website, which allows me to create these groups. Now it does not pertain to Covid 19 because these students are still working on a presentation. But I went ahead and pulled up a presentation from a student in a previous class and so these will be a way for the students toward the end of the semester. And they will cover that one so they are sharing the results plus they will be assigned that peer review. And again, this PowerPoint has certain strictures, certain criteria, that they have to follow to create that PowerPoint. I’m not going to go over the entire one, but just to show you as an example, so let me return to the slide presentation. That is that Echo website.

Now this is the measurement tool, which will also be used for the collaboration exercise, the science evaluating their assessment, etc. And this is something that has been posted on the internet, again, which has met all the criteria for the credit. This is going to be done by the learner and then there is another section by the instructor, and then there is also this part three, which is student reflection. So I decided that I think I can utilize the Point Solution over here, where I prepare these questions. So right now I have prepared a few questions and then actually I can also assign maybe numeric values for each of these options. Maybe they can be a 0, 1, 2, and 3. Then based upon once they complete the—so here I just picked up a few questions and created this Point Solution multiple-choice based upon the training that I received again from Echo. Thank you very much for that one. Then also, I have an opportunity, so these are multiple-choice, but they can also write out their descriptive one, which is one other issue or reason, so they can actually be writing out, which again, I will have the avenue to go through them and maybe provide some qualitative data besides that quantitative data. 

Now in terms of data analysis, the quantitative part, I just wanted to quickly touch upon that one. The first research question, because it’s comparing that pre- and post-test, I’ll be utilizing first of all SPSS software, which again, I have got some experience because of one of the courses that I completed. So I will do the paired samples T-test and also the ANOVA. And in terms of research question 2, it’s going to be a simple regression. And then in terms of the question 3, it is the Pearson correlation and also that Pearson art square indexes that will describe the strength of that relationship or the strength of that correlation. 

So this comes to the end of my presentation. Thank you for your attention.

Jeff: Thank you. I mean, I have to say, that is an impressive, and to get all of that in. That is a great initiative. Just everything—I’m a little speechless. What’s so evident, Rukmani, is the attention, first of all, your fluency with the technology itself. I would imagine that your own personal interest in education technology has helped you introduce it and help your students adopt it and integrate it. But we talk a lot here at Echo360 about engagement, evidence, and equity. That presentation you just gave was probably one of the beset embodiments of all three of those elements. Great stuff with the engagement and you can tell how quickly and easily you can get engaged with the technology. The evidence with your scorecard there. But I’d love to talk a little about that third E around equity. I love that when you were going over those four subsets of your work, and the first one about relationship building and helping students develop. What I would imagine you’re also seeing is not only relationship, but some sort of confidence in participating and everything. So talk a little bit about how, because you’ve been dealing and working with technology, and you’re going to continue to work with it as you get your PhD, talk about the interplay between technology and how it helps create more of an equitable learning opportunity for all types of students.

Rukmani: Thank you for asking that question. First of all, I think there are various aspects of equity. So one thing is, I’m not very certain, because students always, especially online students, they may not have proper working computers and proper internet. However, in terms of Echo360 reaching the student, definitely that equity aspect is there. But then of course, the technology has to be present from the other end as well. And now, in terms of that strengthening relationships, first of all, it’s always been a challenge. I have to say that I do this collaboration work because I see the value in it and I see that it is important and does matter. However, in many instances, I don’t [inaudible 15:58] and I have to say that maybe sometimes I fail rather miserably. But I continue to do it because, again, I think it is important. Because there is always, there are classes where students simply do not want to get together with other students or they get irritated or frustrated because others are not responding to them. So those are things that always I have to contend with and then to find ways to—I just want them to, of course, do the exercises. Not doing it at all is not an option. I still want them to carry it out, but they do, I think, they sort of short change in that collaboration aspect. But then, of course, I do always have students who are working together, willing to work together, and I do find that when they work together, definitely their presentation and their report is far more, much more enriching. It is much more enhanced because now they have multiple sources. They can put their heads together so they do create a much better report or presentation.

Jeff: And as the whole world has tried to find any kind of silver lining with any of the Covid 19 and all the disruption that it caused in education and business and everything, I do think that what you’re doing is a great example of capitalizing on something that everybody was forced to get into. You’ve been working clearly and so fluently with this technology so now, as we’re moving forward, you’re able to take the best elements that technology can bring forward and still retain and make sure you’ve got that focus on the collaboration, the relationships, wherever it happens. Whether it is remote or whether it is in the classrooms. So I think that’s just—

Rukmani: That’s just right. Because I see that one phrase that I have come across is to bridge that physical and digital space. So yes. But I find, like I said, I am just so enamored and in love with technology. Look at Zoom. This is the next best thing to in-person meetings. And these days, actually, I don’t even feel that I am far removed from the person. It’s almost like the person is right next to you. So Zoom is just so awesome or any of these collaborative platforms. They are just so awesome. And I think students who are sort of hesitant or reticent, unfortunately, maybe they have other things that are pulling them away, because again, with the phone apps, it is not difficult to get in touch with each other. It’s not at all. Not at all difficult. 

Jeff: I agree. I can almost feel the warmth of your fireplace behind you.

Rukmani: That is my Zoom.

Jeff: Exactly. Rukmani, I want to thank you so much for all the work that you’re leading there at Hill College and just for what you’re doing for your students. I’m envious of your students. I have to say. I wish I was able to spend more time learning from you, being inspired by your work. And Echo360 is very proud to support the work that you’re doing and very excited to see what Phase 2 looks like here moving forward. I also want to thank all of you for tuning in to this episode of EchoCast and you can check this episode out and other episodes and other resources, of course, at Echo360.com.

Announcer: Thanks for tuning in to EchoCast. For more information on these and other inspired learning solutions, visit us at Echo360.com.

Encouraging Collaborative Learning Through Online Activities

Dr. Rukmani Kuppuswami’s success is one of many examples of the ways the Echosystem can work for organizations around the globe. Whether it’s bringing students together to work collaboratively online or keeping a journal of development among a group of students working toward the same goal, Echo360 solutions take your core educational concepts for an online classroom to the next level. Reach out to us for a live demo to find out more.