Oncology nurses need numerous competencies in order to be able to deal competently with professional challenges: in addition to applying current evidence-based expertise, they should be able to solve complex problems in a communicative way and to help shape inter-professional collaboration in a reflective manner (Bundesministerium für Gesundheit 2017). Challenging requirements of everyday work relate to structural/organizational conditions in the hospital setting, to interaction with patients and their relatives, and to collaborative work in inter-professional teams. The further development of communicative competencies is a relevant aspect when it comes to handling professional requirements. Especially in oncological care, nurses are confronted with particularly stressful situations that need to be solved in a communicative way in their daily work. Studies show that effective communication can improve patient well-being and treatment outcomes (Moore et al 2018). Therefore, the advanced development of communicative competencies is also a central goal of oncological further education. With approaches of computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL), learning successes can be improved and communicative competencies can also be strengthened in group contexts: "(...) students using digital collaborative learning environments might acquire more and better educational benefits (e.g. critical thinking, group skills) and improved learning outcomes compared to traditional teaching" (Männistö et al 2019, 192).  

According to Littleton and Häkkinen (1999), in collaboration, meaning is created through interaction among several individuals. It is also characterized by commitment to a common goal. Such processes support learners' self-responsibility in a group and equally train teamwork such as helping each other (Kuriyama & Sakai 2007).   

Group work, in which complex tasks are worked on collaboratively and results are presented to the plenum, is an integral part of oncological further education. According to Papert, these learning processes can be described as particularly intensive, since a so-called public entity is created through the sharing and discussion of, for example, problem solutions among the learners (Papert 1991).  

To improve complex problem-solving as well as communicative competencies, there is a particular potential in integrating didactically sound approaches of CSCL into further education. Although the current number of studies on CSCL is extensive, CSCL has received rather little attention in the context of nursing (Männistö et al 2019; Männistö et al 2020).  

In the project "CAROplusONKO - Care Reflection Online for oncological further education", the Classroom Learning Interaction System (CLIS) CARO, which was already developed in the previous project, is being advanced developed for the field of oncological further education. CARO is used to design digitally sound interactions based on nursing didactics for classroom teaching. The teaching concepts are based on the “Interactional didactical model” (Darmann-Fink 2010) and are implemented media-didactically according to digital didactial design (Jahnke 2016). In order to integrate computer-supported collaborative learning processes into further education, a tool for the design of group work is currently being developed in the CAROplusONKO project.  The development of the group tool focuses on the following research question:    

Which design elements and didactic methods are necessary to design collaborative learning processes in the context of oncological further education?  

A concept and first design drafts for a group tool in the CARO teaching-learning application have already been developed and evaluated. Currently, a first prototype of the group tool is being programmed, which can be tested in spring 2021 with teachers and learners from oncological further education. 

The methodological approach is based on the design-based research approach (McKenney and Reeves 2012). This approach aims to develop scientifically based innovative solutions to real-world problems and to involve the target group at an early stage. To link the design-based reasearch approach with iterative software development, a so-called four-step release management was developed in the CAROplusONKO project. This allows all development cycles to be planned, adapted and documented in a well-structured way. In the first development cycle, a sample curriculum "Communicative Competence" for oncological further education was developed on the basis of requirements analyses (Darmann-Finck 2020). Based on this, a concept for the group tool was created and design drafts were already developed. For this purpose, focus group discussions were conducted and evaluated with teachers from the oncological further education. Based on these findings, the concept and the design drafts were revised again. In the second development step, a software prototype is currently being programmed, which will be tested for usability and user experience with the target group in spring 2021. In addition, first teaching experiments with lessons developed in the CAROplusONKO project will be conducted. Usability and user experience are parts of the research on human-computer interaction. According to ISO 9241-210(en) user experience is defined as "A person's perceptions and responses that result from the use and/or anticipated use of a product, system or service." Usability is defined by ISO 9241-11(en) as "extent to which a system, product or service can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context of use". In current scientific literature, usability is often described as part of the user experience (Vermeeren et al 2010). The group tool contains complex interactions and is intended to support collaborative learning processes. To achieve this goal, a good user experience is of particular importance. Therefore, extensive user experience testing is performed and evaluated in the second development cycle. In the subsequent third development step (expected at the end of 2021), the group tool will be integrated into the CARO application, tested again and revised accordingly until it can then be published in the fourth development step.

The concept of the group tool was already developed and evaluated in the first development step with the involvement of the target group. Thus, the first development cycle could be completed. In the second development phase, the group tool will be tested in practical use with the target group and in connection with newly developed teaching concepts from the sample curriculum "Communicative Competence". The aim of the user experience tests as well as the teaching experiments is to answer the question to what extent the interactions and didactic methods of the group tool or the CARO application promote collaborative learning processes in oncological further education. The concept of the group tool includes a variety of interaction and communication possibilities: E.g. an audio commentary function, collaborative text editing, mind maps, group chats as well as the joint creation of multimedia presentations. An intuitive usability as well as a good user experience of learners and teachers in group work will be tested and evaluated by means of user experience testing. In addition, teaching concepts that are explicitly adapted to the potential of digital cognitive tools (Jonassen & Carr 1998) are currently being developed and integrated into CARO. Thereby, the differentiated consideration of which cognitive tools are best suited for which work tasks and steps is in the foreground and will be evaluated through teaching experiments. Cognitive tools enable learners to explore content more deeply (Mayes 1992) and are part of the instructional designs developed for the CARO application. The video presentation will show the results of the second development cycle. We will present the prototype of the group tool, the results of user experience testing and first teaching experiments, and visualize first interactions based on our research.

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