Preservice Teachers' Collaborative Information Behavior while Developing Curriculum in Cooperative Learning Contexts

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the collaborative information behavior (CIB) and experiences of preservice teachers while developing curriculum in small groups. A survey was conducted with 70 students from three courses in a teacher preparation program in Taiwan, and followed up with 14 voluntary interviews among survey participants. The three courses that participants were taking share the same learning goal—promoting preservice teachers’ ability to develop curriculum through teamwork. Results show that specific CIBs, such as co-browse and co-search, only occurred prior to labor-distribution stage. In the process of curriculum development, preservice teachers who exhibited CIB more frequently typically came from teamwork/labor-distribution balanced groups, and tended to use a wider variety of online tools; compared to their low-frequency CIB counterparts, high-frequency CIB students also held more positive attitudes towards their perceived project outcome. Suggestions for facilitating cooperative learning, for future teacher education, as well as for future research, are provided based on the findings of the present study. (Article content in Chinese with English extended abstract)

Keywords

• information behavior
• collaborative information behavior
• cooperative learning
• curriculum development
• teacher education