ABSTRACT
Current research and design of integrated electronic collaborative learning environments (IECLEs), which are often referred to as computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) environments, tend to focus on surface level characteristics. There is a myriad of educational researchers and designers who are busy, for example, with determining optimal group size for problem-based education as opposed to project-centred learning. To determine the optimal group size, students’ collaborative efforts and the results of these efforts are compared for groups of varying sizes in the different educational settings. This approach resembles comparative research on the use of different media in education which was strongly, and we had hoped definitively, criticized by Clark (1983). He eloquently argued that researchers tend to focus on the media used and surface characteristics of the education they provide. As a consequence, comparative research tends to be inconclusive and the learning materials developed tend to be at best unreliable and at worst ‘mathemathantic’. This word is derived from the Greek, mathema (learning) plus thanatos (death). This surface level approach disavows the fundamental differences between the real determinants of learning and behaviour in education.
