Student Engagement with Social Issues in a Multimedia-supported Learning Environment

Abstract

This paper explores high school students' responses to a technology-supported, problem-based U.S. history unit. Our investigation focused on how participants used a specially-designed multimedia environment, on what meaning this learning experience had for participants, and on how their responses and culminating understandings compared to students who studied the same topic without using the multimedia resources. We wished to explore whether a multimedia-supported learning environment might mitigate some of the identified learner obstacles to problem-based instruction: (1) lack of deep engagement with the topic; (2) failure to weigh competing perspectives, and (3) lack of domain-specific and metacognitive knowledge. Findings suggest that scaffolded multimedia may provide a more authentic context for learning that raises student interest, confronts students with alternative perspectives, and makes knowledge more available for application to social problems. However, expert guidance by the teacher seems to remain a crucial factor for nurturing the disciplined inquiry necessary for addressing social problems critically.

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