Designing a Technology Enhanced Collaborative Space for Learning Entity-Relationship Modeling

This paper describes the design and development of a collaborative learning space for addressing the conceptual problems of students when learning to model Entity-Relationship Diagrams (ERDs). The research methodology is a Design Science Research Process, focusing on the initial stages of establishing the specific nature of problems student experience with ERDs. Empirical data on the specific nature of the conceptual problems of students was collected, so that a suitable solution could be designed. Participants in data collection included students studying under-graduate database units and expert database educators. Two data collection instruments are described, a survey and expert interview questions. The paper discusses how the outcomes of this data collection phase were used to inform the System Design, which is a design of an improved learning space, which was then evaluated in a later phase of the research.