Developing effective Web-based information seeking for inquiry-based learning: a meta-cognitive approach

1. 研究性学习越来越被认为是本科和研究生教育的一种重要模式。基于网络的信息搜索是探究式学习的一个重要方面。该项目旨在提高本科生和研究生利用基于网络的信息来支持他们基于探究的研究、项目和论文的有效性。2. 这个项目将设计一系列的策略来帮助人们改进他们在网络上的信息搜索。我们将使用的策略旨在提高人们的“元认知”水平，这将在下文第6段中进行更详细的描述。然后，这些策略的有效性将由180多名本科生和研究生进行统计测试（使用对照组），他们将参与一系列受控搜索。有效性将根据使用策略所产生的变化、网络搜索策略和结果来衡量。结果将根据他们实际找到的信息的相关性进行评估。我们还将评估他们使用的搜索策略的质的差异。3. 这项统计工作将辅以深入的研究，其中我们将跟踪从事本科研究项目的本科生和从事研究论文准备的硕士生的活动。学生们将详细记录他们的信息搜寻活动，生成他们的研究问题和相关信息需求的“思维导图”，并在他们在研究背景下从事信息搜寻的过程中接受长时间的深入采访。有人可能会问，为什么这是必要的，像谷歌这样的搜索引擎显然是如此有效。事实上，许多研究都集中在开发更“智能”的搜索引擎上。智能技术旨在使搜索更有效，甚至对没有太多技能/或元认知水平的人/包括所谓的“最佳匹配”和“布尔”搜索工具，自动“查询扩展”，即根据智能算法分析索引中术语的共现性，向搜索者提供额外的关键字，以及“搜索缩小”功能，例如，允许在先前的搜索结果中进行渐进搜索。然而，搜索引擎的“聪明”能在多大程度上取代人类搜索者对“聪明”的需求，充其量是值得怀疑的。当信息需求变得更加复杂时，这种需求就会真正“发挥作用”。做一个非常具体的简单搜索，谷歌将在快速找到相关信息方面做得很好。但在研究性学习的现实世界中，“信息需求”可能更复杂，更不容易定义/特别是当学生在决定他们的研究性项目或论文的核心实际研究问题，以及决定自己如何和在哪里搜索信息方面发挥越来越大的作用时。这就是“元认知”发挥作用的地方。6. “元认知”是关于人们管理自己的学习和解决问题的能力/基本上，推理和积极管理（监测，评估和改进）自己的思维。这种能力可以用来最大限度地发挥一个人的智力潜力。关于元认知在学习和解决问题中的作用已经有很多研究，最近关于元认知在探究式学习和特别是信息寻求方面的应用的研究越来越多。我们将使用统计和定性研究方法的混合来调查我们可以通过提高人们的元认知知识和技能来帮助他们改善信息搜索的方法。

1. Inquiry-based learning is becoming increasingly recognised as an important mode of education at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Web-based information seeking is a vital aspect of inquiry-based learning. This project aims to improve the effectiveness with which undergraduate and postgraduate students engage in Web-based information seeking to support their inquiry-based research, for projects and dissertations. 2. The project will devise a series of strategies for helping people improve their Web-based information seeking. The strategies we will use are designed to increase people's level of 'meta-cognition', which will be described in more detail in paragraph 6 below. The effectiveness of these strategies will then be statistically tested (using a control group) by more than 180 undergraduate and postgraduate students, who will engage in a series of controlled searches. Effectiveness will be measured in terms of changes, resulting from the use of the strategies, in their Web-searching strategies and outcomes. Outcomes will be assessed in terms of the relevance of the information they actually find. We will also assess qualitative differences in the search strategies they use. 3. This statistical work will be complemented by in-depth research in which we will follow the activities of undergraduate students engaged in their undergraduate research-based project, and Masters students engaged in the preparation of a research-based dissertation. The students will keep detailed diaries of their information seeking activities, generate 'mind maps' of their research problem and related information needs, and be interviewed in depth over a protracted period of time as they engage in information seeking in the context of their research.4. One may wonder why this is necessary, with search engines like Google apparently being so effective. Indeed, much research has focused developing ever 'smarter' search engines. Smart techniques designed to make searching more effective even for people without much skill / or level of meta-cognition / include so-called 'best-match' and 'Boolean' search facilities, automatic 'query expansion' whereby additional keywords are offered to the searcher based on clever algorithms which analyse the co-occurrence of terms in their indexes, and 'search narrowing' facilities allowing, for example, progressive searching within previous search results.5. However, the extent to which the 'smartness' of a search engine can replace the need for 'smartness' on the part of the human searcher is at best questionable. This need really 'kicks in' as information needs get more complex. Do a simple search for something quite specific and Google will do an excellent job at quickly finding relevant information. But in the real world of inquiry-based learning, 'information needs' may be rather more complex and less easy to define / especially when students are taking an ever-greater role in determining the actual research questions at the heart of their inquiry-based projects or dissertations, as well as determining for themselves how and where they search for information. This is where 'meta-cognition' comes into play. 6. 'Meta-cognition' is all about people's ability to manage their own learning and problem-solving / basically, reasoning about and actively managing (monitoring, evaluating and improving) one's own thinking. This ability may be used to maximize one's intellectual potential. There has been a lot of research on the role of meta-cognition in learning and problem-solving, and relatively recently there has been a growing volume of research into the use of meta-cognition in relation to both inquiry-based learning and specifically information seeking. We will use a blend of statistical and qualitative research approaches to investigate ways in which we can help people improve their information seeking by improving their meta-cognitive knowledge and skills.