Collaborative Learning and Research Training: Towards a Doctoral Training Environment

Abstract : Doctoral training has not been studied in depth as a learning situation, and no learning environment has been designed to specifically support actors involved in the training of future researchers. The research literature on doctoral education indicates that the knowledge about doctoral training needs to be made explicit and formalized. We claim that several problems brought up in the literature on PhD Training could be reduced or solved by a doctoral training environment designed on the basis of a cognitive analysis. Doctoral training in the sciences consists essentially of research training through immersion in scientific communities and activities. Collaborative learning is built in authentic research situations, where doctoral students discover collaborative research. The model of a ‘Collaboratory' provides the foundations for the practice of collaborative research. Future researchers are expected to be competent in practicing ‘E-science' and knowledgeable about distributed research with remote access to shared instruments. The ability to practice ‘Coexperimentation' is part of the research skills. An authoring environment has been prototyped as well as an instantiation of a PhD program in the field of Cognitive Informatics One Use Case consists of two or three research distributed teams sharing observations and discussions, a research training situation involving immersion and collaborative learning. A series of tests and co-experimentations involving Inquiry Learning Environments as a topic of study in the field of Technology-Enhanced Learning was conducted. An international collaboration happened through Kaleidoscope and the coexperimentations were made possible by an optical network infrastructure providing high quality interactions in terms of sharing and telepresence.