This design-based research study examines the ways in which the knowledge community collaborative learning approach can be enacted in undergraduate large lecture courses through a scaffolded, complex curricular design that utilizes active, inquiry-based learning. This study involves the re-design of a course that covers basic business concepts for undergraduate media students. By combining a lecture in a traditional setting with smaller breakout tutorials, the study involves adopting and adapting the Fostering Communities of Learners (FCL) pedagogical model (Brown & Campione, 1996) by blending its methodology with digital components of both Knowledge Building (KB; Scardamalia & Bereiter, 2006) and Knowledge Community and & Inquiry (KCI; Slotta & Najafi, 2010), most prominently with the addition of a digital collaborative knowledge base . One of the primary goals of this research is to identify digital tools that will facilitate and enhance deep inquiry within a knowledge community and thereby expand upon the FCL pedagogical model. By appropriating design elements from KCI and KB, a Collaborative Knowledge Base (CKB) was introduced as a major research element in the curricular design. The CKB is intended to be a permanent online hub of ideas that would be impossible for one student to amass if working independently. It will become a research library that all students and student groups can contribute to and benefit from, as well as serving as a resource for completion of the consequential task.

Published in: London International Conference on Education (LICE-2016)

• Date of Conference: 14-17 November 2016
• DOI: 10.2053/LICE.2016.0066
• ISBN: 978-1-908320-76-6
• Conference Location: Heathrow Windsor Marriott Hotel, UK