Using Wikis To Enhance Communications in a Collaborative Environment

Research Practitioner Paper

Lejla Rovcanin / Martin O Hanlon / Kevin O FarrellElectronics and Communications Engineering / Electrical Engineering Systems

Dublin Institute of Technology

Abstract Collaborative Engineering is a developing paradigm where engineers from diverse disciplines cooperate to specify, design and manufacture a product. It covers not only the technical aspects of building a product but also the planning and scheduling. Within an academic environment collaborative engineering projects can be used to develop group skills and encourage deep learning. Since February 2007 in the Faculty of Engineering of the Dublin Institute of Technology we have run a number of collaborative projects. The aim of this work is to develop a transferable learning and teaching model that enables under-graduates to develop interdisciplinary teamwork skills. This paper outlines a number of issues encountered in implementing these projects and our decision to use a wiki as a tool for collaboration to alleviate the difficulties.

Keywords: Cross-disciplinary project, engineering education, interdisciplinary teamwork skills, communication tools, wiki

1. Introduction

The aim of Collaborative Engineering is to provide concepts and technologies to allow products to be developed by disperse groups. Emerging Internet technologies are facilitating groups to cooperate from remote sites resulting in savings on travel and shortening design cycles. It also assists the integration of knowledge across disciplines. During the last two years a number of collaborative projects have been run or are currently running in the Engineering faculty of the Dublin Institute of Technology as part of research into the learning and development of interdisciplinary team skills. The projects runs across programmes and endeavour to introduce some of the elements of collaborative engineering that would be encountered in industry. In organising these applied educational experiments it is important that the learning and assessment environment is preserved. An example of a collaborative project run in September 2008 involved students from three separate programmes, taking modules in Computer Programming, Industrial Automation and Project Management working in teams to produce a Programmable Logic Unit and Graphical User Interface to measure heart rate. Students worked in groups of three, one from each programme. The individual members bring a different range of skills to the group, which promotes both peer and independent learning.

Working within groups will better prepare the student for work in the real world where cross-functional teams and group decision making is common. Group work should improve their ability to use, Katzenbach's (1997) "four C's" of effective teamwork: communication, collaboration, cooperation and compromise. Indeed it is the interpersonal skills developed during the course of the project that may be the most important for future career success.

The aim of this research is to develop a transferable learning and teaching method that enables engineering under-graduate students to develop interdisciplinary teamwork skills. A number of inhibiting issues were identified during three one-semester long iterations involving two or three classes of students. Some of the issues identified are typical for cross-disciplinary collaboration and can be used as a checklist for any future cross-discipline (cross-module) collaborative activity.

2. Project Inhibitors

The students understood the concept of developing interdisciplinary team skills and initially engaged with enthusiasm. Groups were incentivized through a cash prize for the best work in the first iteration (800 Euro for the best project overall). The students were motivated by the prize and saw it as a bonus on top of their project mark. The initial enthusiasm waned as students realized the burden of work that the collaborative projects entailed.

The participating modules in the projects are from different disciplines offered by different Schools. The probability of having equal size class groups is low. In previous pilots, due to the size mismatch, it wasn’t possible to have all students participating in the collaborative exercise. Those that could not be accommodated were given a standard project from their individual discipline. This was regarded by the students as “the easy option” because of the perceived difficulties in collaborating.

A serious problem highlighted was one of timetabling. A collaborative group consisted of students from separate programmes, each with a different timetable. It was not possible to schedule all members to be free at the same time. Individuals in the group had to organise meetings outside class times. This was problematic especially during the difficult start-up phase. In addition group members generally worked in different areas of the college. In an attempt to reduce the need for face to face meeting students communicated in three ways: using mobile phone short message services (sms), email and through the DIT’s webcourses (the DIT’s virtual learning environment).These attempts met with only moderate success

Our initial idea of involving first year students, proved to be difficult to implement. A delay in registering and organizing first year students is a common experience at the beginning of each academic year. This delay created a high degree of uncertainty. For this reason the involvement of first-years in their first semester is to be avoided.

The collaborative environment requires that supervisors provide considerably more continuous guidance and formative feedback than in standard single module ones. It is essential that all participating staff understand the time commitment involved. This may introduce a significant overhead when dealing with a large number of groups.

The collaborative projects need to be fully integrated with the learning outcomes and assessments of each participating module. The pilot’s project assessment was not fully aligned with the module assessment this resulted in de-motivating students. Assessment drives learning.

3. Wikis as a Communication Tool

In an attempt to solve some of the problems identified above we will run a trial using a wiki primarily as a vehicle for collaboration and communication. Most people in the educational field are familiar with the use of wikis as a collaborative publishing tool that allows anyone granted permission to create new web pages or edit the content of existing pages. Wikis along with Facebook, MySpace and YouTube can be seen as part of a web enabled development where users participate in the personalised construction and organisation of their own knowledge ( Jonassen et all,1999). Typically wikis provide a range of features beyond page editing that allow for the recorded history of changes to be viewed and rolled back as well as the posting of comments on each web page. There is also evidence according to Jacobs (2003) as sited in Wheller (2008:987) “that user-created content software in particular encourages deeper engagement with learning through the act of authoring, simply because the awareness of an audience, no matter how virtual or tentative, encourages more thoughtful construction of writing”. Klobas (2006) described wikis as social information spaces that are modelled on shared ownership and investment in a community of shared goals and aspirations.

The wiki we choose was Pbwiki This is free for educational use. It is externally hosted and therefore requires no additional software to be installed on a users computer and can be accessed from any web browser. It should not be necessary for the supervisor to create the wiki. A new user, even a non technical one, can typically set up the wiki and create a number of accounts for his group in less than an hour. An extensive help facility and tutorial is available online. No extensive guidelines were given to students on how to use the wiki apart from instructing them to use it to hold documents and files and as a method for organising meetings and improving communications.

Wikis also have the potential to provide for formative assessment through feedback from peers and tutors. For all students formative assessment is vital, but it is especially important, as identified above, in the early stages of project work where students are often unsure of where they should be heading and there are many problems to be overcome. Hatzipanagos and Warburton (2009:45) state that “Feedback is a key factor in formative assessment and learners can benefit from the deployment of emerging technologies and the opportunities for participation and dialogue afforded by social software” and also that wikis “ allow for formative assessment practices to be re-invented or at the very least facilitated by essentially participative and student focused interventions”. Feedback from other members of the group should be inherent in the way the wikis are used in our collaborative projects, as the main point of their use is to communicate to group members on the work currently being undertaken and how it may be progressed. The history facility of the wiki details the date and time changes were made to a wiki page and the changes that were made. Supervisors can use this to gain an understanding, at any point in time, of what work has taken place and ensure that all members are contributing. Tutors can then make informed comments and providing direction and encouragement to the groups.

4. Conclusion

The aim of this research is to develop a workable learning and teaching technique that enables engineering under-graduate students to develop interdisciplinary teamwork skills. A multi-cycle research development plan was undertaken. This process commenced in February 2007. The modus operandi is to resolve issues at the lowest possible level while maximizing the utilization of existing structures and resources. The aim is to create a model that could be easily applied across the Dublin Institute of Technology’s Engineering programmes. The first two cycles are complete and a third cycle is underway. During the current iteration groups will utilise a wiki as an information technology tool to mitigate the communication deficiencies and also to enable the supervisor to monitor and enable progress. This paper outlines the reasons behind this decision and the proposed next course of action. The full results of these wiki utilisation educational experiments will be reported at a future date.

5. References

Hatzipanagos, S. Warburton, S (2009) Feedback as dialogue: exploring the links between formative assessment and social software in distance learning. Learning, Media and Technology, Vol 34, No1, March 2009, 45-59

Jonassen, D. H., Peck, K, L. & Wilson, B. G (1999) Learning with Technology: a constructivist perspective. Upper Saddle River, NJ:Merrill

Katzenbach, Jon (1997) The myth of top management teams. Harvard Business Review 75(6): p82-92

Klobas, J. (2006). Wikis:Tools for information work and collaboration. Oxford: Chandos

Wheeler,S , Yeomans,P & Wheeler, D (2008). The good, the bad and the wiki: Evaluating student-generated content for collaborative learning. British Journal of Educational Technology, Vol39, No6, 208, pp987-995