Collaborative scaffolding in synchronous environment : congruity and antagonism of tutor/student facilitation acts

This paper focuses on the theoretical framework for investigating facilitation acts of the tutor and the students in problem-solving groups as reciprocally congruent. We propose to broaden the scaffolding debate in collaborative teams towards the areas of students’ shared metacognitive and cognitive grounding acts. Similar tutor-supported and untutored science-related dilemma-solving activities in network-based synchronous mode were categorically analyzed and compared with respect to their scaffolding acts. We asked the question, whether there emerges the collaborative scaffolding situation in teams and how does tutor influence the peer scaffolding. Results indicated the presence of several scaffolding actors in collaborative teams. The nature of activity (tutored or untutored) had an influence on the practice of specific supportive acts by the tutor and the students. The various interrelations between student and tutor scaffolding acts must be considered when preparing the tutor support during problem solving