Expanding educational chronotopes with personal digital devices

Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate the role of personal digital devices for negotiating assignments during collaborative work in school. Using video recordings of the peer-to-peer interactions in two math and Norwegian language projects, an interactional analysis (IA) is used to analyse the meaning making and the role of phones and cameras in social interaction. To enable a better understanding of the spatial and temporal dimensions in the school context, the students' interactions with the digital devices are used as the unit of analysis because these interactions constitute a practice 'in tandem' with the cultural tools and mediational means being deployed. Using two cases, the article demonstrates how personal digital devices can constitute and reconstitute the spatial and temporal dimensions in the educational chronotope. Overall, the findings show the ways in which the specific features of the screen and viewfinder are important in understanding the dialogues and negotiations during collaborative work on assignments where students use personal digital devices.

Social Excursions During the In-between Spaces of Lessons. Students’ Smartphone Use in the Upper Secondary School Classroom

“…Today, digital devices have changed the media ecology of the classroom (Ito et al, 2008) with digital technology reconfiguring the spatial and temporal dimensions of education. Moreover, ubiquitous and continuous connectivity changes the classroom both as a space for learning and a space where social life takes place (Erixon, 2016;Gilje, 2019). This connectivity also makes it possible for young people to expand and develop friendships and interests in participation patterns that Ito et al (2008) describe as "hanging out" (p. 13), "messing around" (p. 20), or "geeking out" (p. 28).…”

“…This connectivity also makes it possible for young people to expand and develop friendships and interests in participation patterns that Ito et al (2008) describe as "hanging out" (p. 13), "messing around" (p. 20), or "geeking out" (p. 28). Further, the smartphone can function as a boundary object, expanding the context of schooling for students (Gilje, 2019). Thus, sociality in classrooms is now grounded in both networked and face-to-face interaction.…”

Building intersubjectivity in blended problem-solving tasks

“…The research studies about intersubjectivity in computer-supported activity confirmed the focus on dialogue and added new features (Bober & Dennen, 2001). In particular, the space-time dimension is perceived in an original way (Gilje, 2019;Pifarré & Staarman, 2011;Ritella, Rajala, & Renshaw, 2020;Wegerif, 2001). This perception is not confined to the digital environment but it also changes the way face-to-face space-time is perceived.…”

Expériences sociomatérielles. Objets, interactions, espaces

“…Le chronotope est défini en termes de configurations spatiotemporelles socialement émergentes, où l'espace et le temps sont considérés comme des constructions sociales interdépendantes . Ce concept permet aux chercheurs d'étudier comment les relations spatiotemporelles virtuelles-sociales-matérielles pourraient fonctionner comme un terrain d'apprentissage dans plusieurs contextes (par exemple, Brown et Renshaw, 2006 ;Gilje, 2019). Cependant, de nombreuses études adoptant le chronotope sont de nature exploratoire et doivent être développées à la fois au niveau théorique et méthodologique (voir Ritella et al, 2021).…”