It is not either or: An initial investigation into combining collaborative and individual learning using an ITS

Research on Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) has provided significant insights into why collaborative learning is effective and how we can effectively provide support for it. Building on this knowledge, we can investigate when collaboration is beneficial to support learning. Specifically, collaborative and individual learning are often combined in the classroom, and it is important for the CSCL community to understand when a combination is beneficial compared to individual or collaborative learning alone. Before investing significant work into discovering these details, an initial investigation is needed to determine if there may be any value in a combination. In this study, we compared a combined condition to individual or collaborative-only learning conditions using an intelligent tutoring system for fractions. The study was conducted with 382 4th and 5th grade students. Students across all three conditions had significant learning gains, but the combined condition had higher learning gains than the other conditions. However, this difference was restricted to the 4th grade students. By analyzing the hints and errors of students over time from process data, we found that students in the combined condition tended to make fewer errors both when working collaboratively and individually, and asked for fewer hints than the students in the other conditions. Students who collaborated (collaborative and combined conditions) also reported having higher situational interest in the activity. By finding support for the effectiveness of combining collaborative and individual learning, this paper opens a broader line of inquiry into how they can effectively be combined to support learning.