Using relevant resources to help the group move forward

Manal Raoui  |  manalraoui.com

When group progress stops, this strategy helps a student identify the obstacle and the specific need, find a relevant resource, and contribute to using it. The resource might be a classmate's knowledge, an earlier explanation, an instruction, a previous example, or an available tool. The learner checks whether using it has enabled the work to resume. If available resources are insufficient, they identify what is still missing before seeking outside assistance.

This is our proposed classroom formulation. The cited studies did not test it in this form under this name. It draws on research on transactive memory systems and socially shared regulation of learning. A group's accessible knowledge includes what members know about others' expertise and how to access it when needed. Noroozi and colleagues (2013) show how recognizing and coordinating distributed expertise can turn it into a resource for joint work.

Why the strategy matters

Working in a group expands the resources a learner can use: classmates' knowledge and experience, information gathered together, products of the activity, and records of previous attempts.

One member may recall a method others have overlooked, explain a difficult point, or have recorded a result everyone needs. What the group can use therefore depends on recognizing and accessing its resources as well as possessing them.

Noroozi and colleagues (2013) describe a transactive memory system in terms of knowing who knows what, accessing knowledge held by different members, and coordinating its use. Individuals need not hold all the knowledge themselves, but they need ways to find it when required.

Their study involved 60 university students working in multidisciplinary pairs. A structured script helped supported pairs recognize a partner's expertise, retrieve distributed knowledge, and coordinate its use. Their joint problem-solving plans were significantly better than those of pairs without this support. Specialization and knowledge coordination mediated the script's effect on the quality of the group product.

The authors explain that knowing who knows what matters because it allows members to retrieve knowledge from an appropriate source and integrate complementary expertise.

The study took place with university students in a structured digital environment. It does not establish that asking school students what classmates know would reproduce those effects. It supports the principle that a group can possess useful resources without recognizing or retrieving them at the right moment.

For the learner, the strategy expands what can support learning beyond personal recall. For the group, it reduces the likelihood of remaining stuck at a difficulty that existing resources could help resolve.

Identifying the need before looking for a resource

The strategy begins with identifying what prevents progress. “We don't understand” or “We don't know how to continue” announces a difficulty without specifying the need.

Instructions may be unclear, information may be missing, a procedure may be unknown, or a result may need interpretation. The student moves toward a more precise question: “What exactly are we missing that would allow us to continue?”

Sobocinski and colleagues (2022) explain how metacognitive monitoring helps identify situations requiring changes in learning. Detecting a difficulty may prompt changes to a strategy, plan, task understanding, or monitoring standards.

Monitoring is not the target strategy here. It reveals that progress has stopped. Resource use begins when the student uses that information to determine what the group needs and what could help now.

Matching a resource to the need

The learner searches among relevant resources: a member's knowledge, something already established, instructions or documents, an earlier example, or a procedure used in a similar situation.

The aim is to match a resource to the obstacle. Returning to instructions may help clarify a requirement. A member's information may fill a knowledge gap. An earlier example may help with a procedural difficulty.

The student contributes to using the resource and checks its effect: Has it removed the obstacle? Can the group resume thinking or producing the work?

The process involves recognizing what prevents progress, specifying the need, finding a related resource, contributing to its use, and checking whether the group can continue.

An insufficient resource does not necessarily mean the strategy failed. It may reveal that the group lacks something it needs. Moving to an outside source can then become a justified, specific decision.

Using expertise without handing over the learning

A group may know which member can solve a problem and ask that person to do the difficult part. The product advances while others remain at the same point in their learning.

The intended resource use makes a member's expertise available as information, explanation, or a procedure that others can use. A student may explain an idea, demonstrate a step, or provide an example, allowing everyone to continue from it.

Noroozi and colleagues (2013) describe identifying distributed expertise, retrieving relevant knowledge, and coordinating and integrating contributions. This involves more than locating the strongest member and delegating the problem to them.

The strategy also differs from reallocating work. Its question is “Which resource can help with this particular difficulty?”, rather than “Who should do each part?”

Nor must the group try every possible resource before requesting assistance. The aim is to avoid irrelevant searches and prolonged difficulty. The necessary knowledge or clarification may be unavailable, making outside help an appropriate regulatory decision.

Karabenick and Dembo (2011) describe adaptive help seeking as assessing the need, selecting the type and source of assistance, and using it to develop understanding rather than simply obtain an answer. When a needed resource is unavailable, a student can approach the teacher knowing what is required, instead of making a general request such as “We don't understand.”

Why students may need support

Members may recognize that they are stuck, discuss the problem, and repeat the same attempt. They may reread the question even when instructions are not the difficulty, or call the teacher without noticing that someone has the relevant knowledge. Recognizing stalled progress differs from specifying the need and mobilizing a suitable resource.

Sobocinski and colleagues (2022) illustrate the distinction. They followed four secondary school physics groups and identified 815 monitoring events across 18 sessions, compared with 82 traces of adaptation under their strict operational definition. Not every monitoring event needed to produce a change. The findings nevertheless distinguish noticing something about the work from changing what learners do.

Many observed adaptations involved returning from execution to examining task understanding. A difficulty does not always require another procedure; the group may need information that helps reconstruct its understanding of the activity.

Malmberg and colleagues (2015) offer a complementary finding. They followed 103 teacher education students working in groups during a two-month course, using tools that prompted identification of challenges and strategies. Higher-performing groups reported greater variation over time in challenges and regulatory strategies than lower-performing groups.

The finding does not prescribe a fixed resource list. It supports selecting responses that fit the difficulty and adjusting the work accordingly.

Our intended learning is the move from “We have a problem” or an automatic familiar response toward “What exactly is stopping us, and which resource fits this need?”

What teachers can do

Supplying an explanation may be faster, but identifying the obstacle, selecting a resource, and using it on the group's behalf every time leaves the regulation with the teacher.

Begin by making the difficulty specific: “What is preventing you from continuing now?” If students say they do not understand, help distinguish “Is it the requirement, the information, or how to use it?”

Then draw attention to available resources:

• “What do you already have that could help?”
• “Has anyone found something related to this problem?”
• “Is there an example, result, or instruction you could consult?”

After the resource is used, ask, “Can you continue now, or is something specific still missing?”

This fits principles discussed by Järvelä and colleagues (2015): increasing awareness of one's own and others' learning, making relevant information visible and available for exchange, and prompting regulatory processes when needed. They emphasize support for planning, monitoring, evaluating, and adjusting group work.

Every question need not be asked each time. If a student knows the relevant resource, there is little value in turning the strategy into a formality. With experience, external reminders can decrease as learners become more able to identify needs and retrieve resources independently.

The strategy in practice

Four students are working on an explanation of experimental results. They have completed a table of measurements but stop when turning the data into a graph. One says, “I don't know how to choose the scale.” Another suggests asking the teacher. A third rereads the question, while the fourth has made a similar graph before.

A student using the strategy first specifies the need: “We know what to plot and what the axes are. We need a scale that accommodates all the values.”

They then look for a resource: “We made a similar graph before. Does anyone have the example?” Or they ask the classmate who remembers the method, “How did you choose the scale last time?”

That classmate need not draw the graph for everyone. They may explain that they identified the smallest and largest values, then chose a scale covering the range.

The group applies this to its current data and checks, “Can we now plot all the values clearly?” If the scale works, the knowledge one member shared helps the group move forward.

If a difficulty remains, the request to the teacher can be precise: “We've identified the smallest and largest values, but we don't know how to choose the intervals so the graph uses the available space. Could you clarify that?”

Outside help is now sought with a clear understanding of the remaining need.

“What do we have that can help us continue?” helps a group that is stuck pause before asking for help and check its own resources through four questions: Where are we stuck? What does each of us know? What resources can we return to? What can we try now?

The aid makes visible resources in members' knowledge, instructions, previous attempts and products, and available tools. It neither supplies a solution nor determines the resource in advance. Students identify what seems relevant, try using it, and judge whether it enables progress.

The strategy lies in the student's decisions: specifying the need, matching a resource to it, contributing to its use, judging its effect, and deciding whether another resource or outside assistance is required.

The central idea

A group may already have what it needs to move forward. One member might have the information, earlier work might offer an example, or the instructions might contain a clarification. Those resources help only when members see how they apply and use them.

Regulation develops as learners move from announcing a difficulty to specifying what is needed, locating a related resource, helping use it, and checking whether progress resumes.

When available resources are insufficient, identifying a need for an outside source is also part of regulation. Independence includes knowing when the group can use its own resources, when it needs another source, and precisely what it needs from that source.

Students need not know everything. They can learn how to find what helps themselves and their group continue learning.

References

Järvelä, S., Kirschner, P. A., Panadero, E., Malmberg, J., Phielix, C., Jaspers, J., Koivuniemi, M., & Järvenoja, H. (2015). Enhancing socially shared regulation in collaborative learning groups: Designing for CSCL regulation tools. Educational Technology Research and Development, 63, 125–142. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-014-9358-1

Karabenick, S. A., & Dembo, M. H. (2011). Understanding and facilitating self-regulated help seeking. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 2011(126), 33–43. https://doi.org/10.1002/tl.442

Malmberg, J., Järvelä, S., Järvenoja, H., & Panadero, E. (2015). Promoting socially shared regulation of learning in CSCL: Progress of socially shared regulation among high- and low-performing groups. Computers in Human Behavior, 52, 562–572. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.03.082

Noroozi, O., Biemans, H. J. A., Weinberger, A., Mulder, M., & Chizari, M. (2013). Scripting for construction of a transactive memory system in multidisciplinary CSCL environments. Learning and Instruction, 25, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.learninstruc.2012.10.002

Sobocinski, M., Malmberg, J., & Järvelä, S. (2022). Exploring adaptation in socially-shared regulation of learning using video and heart rate data. Technology, Knowledge and Learning, 27, 385–404. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10758-021-09526-1

See it in a classroom situation: When a group stops at the first difficulty