Realizing the potential of digital libraries through the development of a self-regulated learning intervention aimed to foster conceptual understanding in science and history

University Of North Carolina At Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill NC

Investigators

Abstract

This Targeted Research project is working to develop, refine, and test technical and pedagogical interventions to support students' Self Regulated Learning (SRL) learning processes in digital library settings, including the use of tools built into the library as well as pedagogical scaffolds that educators implement. Students must possess self-regulatory knowledge and skills, including selecting, incorporating, and evaluating resources, to take full advantage of the powerful affordances of digital libraries. Indeed, well-developed, individual knowledge and skill in student SRL are key to the efficacy of digital libraries in promoting learning. Moreover, there is good empirical evidence that SRL ability can be taught and that doing so leads to improved conceptual understanding. Based on these core propositions, this project is synthesizing knowledge from the fields of educational psychology, education, and SRL research to teach SRL specifically aimed at an NSDL Pathways collection and an analogous humanities-focused portal. The project team is identifying the key SRL processes associated with learning, followed by developing interventions that foster these processes to help educators and students realize the potential of two digital libraries. The two content domains selected are computational science ("CSERD") and history ("DocSouth"). The analysis is beginning with developing SRL mechanisms for the NSDL CSERD Pathway in both classroom and laboratory settings. This is being done at the level of skill expected of successful high school and college students. The findings from this stage are then being used to test the efficacy of these SRL tools in student use of DocSouth library (history projects). This project is investigating how and why students learn with digital libraries rather than simply whether they show gains from pre-test to post-test.