The Impact of the Learning Network
A Qualitative Case Study on Learning
with Lotus LearningSpace
Sha Li
(2001, Oklahoma State University)
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
The new technology per se is not a revolution---the revolution is the difference that technology makes in how we organize, structure, and empower our lives (Gregorian et al., 1992, p.7).
Today’s society has entered the Information Age. Information Technology (IT) impacts our life profoundly. Technology has been incorporated into school curriculum-based instruction, and students are learning how to use computers to learn (Heinich et al., 1996). The computer provides teachers with a tool to engage the students powerfully in the learning process, for it has the amazing ability to meet the students’ increasing advanced needs (Villamil & Molina, 1997). The fast development of the Internet is moving distance education to a new era. The educational network is growing exponentially (Linda et al., 1995; Harasim, Hills, 1997; Mason, 1998; Muirhead, 1999). President Clinton proclaimed that by the year 2000, all American classrooms should be wired to the Internet, and all students should be provided with help to become technologically literate. He submitted a proposal of a $1.77 trillion budget to prepare digital facilities in the nation’s classrooms (Clousing, 1999).
The quality of distance education is becoming a critical issue for educators, and interaction has become the core of the quality of distance education (Muirhead, 1999). The rapid development of Intranet products has been most beneficial to distance education, providing various tools for facilitating learning interaction in distance learning settings. Educators and learners are faced with a new challenge in how to take advantage of the new network technology effectively (Davison, 1999; Muirhead, 1999).
The array of media formats and quality materials available through Intranet is increasing dramatically. Teachers and students are making an effort to explore the ultimate potential to maximize academic communication and enhance learning outcomes by using network systems (Liu, 1996; Hills, 1997; Hinrichs, 1997; Greer, 1998; Muirhead, 1999;). With rapid development of network technology and improved manipulation of it, the telecommunication opportunities have revolutionized education and are reshaping and enriching the way learning occurs.
The emerging Intranet groupware is one format of an asynchronous distance learning communication network (Criscito, 1999). Some of its software products have been integrated with synchronized features recently, such as video-conference and telephone communication. The key characteristic of the Intranet is the capacity of its learners to be a part of a community, collaborating and sharing ideas asynchronously or synchronously to achieve a common goal. Lotus LearningSpace (LearningSpace) is a learner-centered Intranet groupware. It has been newly developed by Lotus Company and has attracted much attention. Increasing interests have emerged from educators and learners concerning the effectiveness of learner-centered groupware products, but many are still unsure about the effectiveness of the learner-centered groupware LearningSpace and how to best use it to reach their educational goals. A research study of LearningSpace can contribute to a better understanding of the product and help users to better utilize the product to achieve their academic goals.
Statement of the Problem
Most of the Intranet, such as Lotus Notes, Novell Groupwise, and Microsoft Exchange, are now used for businesses, organizations, and administrative systems. There are a few cases in which Intranet groupware like Lotus Notes are used for educational purposes. Educators are expecting the emergence of such groupware to meet their immediate educational needs and are revamping interactivity in a virtual learning environment. Lotus LearningSpace is among the first of the new groupware products being used for educational purposes. It is at the starting stage. People need to have an understanding about it, learn how to use it to its full extent, and be aware of its effectiveness and limitations.
People need continuous exploration in the domain of interactivity in distance learning (Moore, 1990; Muirhead, 1999). This study on Lotus LearningSpace can contribute to a better understanding of its interactive components in a college distance learning course delivered by a large university in the Midwest.
Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this research is to provide an in-depth qualitative case study of the students and teachers’ attitudes toward the effective use of Lotus LearningSpace Groupware in a college course in a large university in the Midwest. This study adopts qualitative research methodologies to explore insights.
Research Questions
The focus of this study is (1) How effective is Lotus LearningSpace in assisting distance learning class HES 3002? (2) What are the critical factors that affect learning in the class HES 3002 in the Lotus LearningSpace-networked environment?
The following subquestions cluster around the main questions:
For
Students:
1. What is it like to use Lotus LearningSpace to learn?
2. Is Lotus LearningSpace perceived as an enhancement to distance learning?
3. What are the advantages and barriers in learning in the class HES 3002?
4. What are the relationships among the factors that could either enhance or confuse distance learning?
5. What are the perceived strengths and weaknesses of LearningSpace?
For Teachers:
1. What is it like to use Lotus LearningSpace to teach?
2. Is Lotus LearningSpace perceived as an enhancement to distance learning?
3. What are the advantages and barriers in teaching in the class HES 3002?
4. What are the relationships among the factors that could either enhance or confuse distance learning?
5. What are the perceived strengths and weaknesses of LearningSpace?
Research Assumptions
It is assumed that the technological capabilities of a groupware are the basic structure for the interaction in a distance learning environment. They defines the strategy of instruction and the format of interaction throughout learning activities. It is assumed that the teacher’s guidance to the network-assisted learning and his/her adaptation of network technology to instruction and learning collaboration are important to learning outcomes and learners’ motivation of involvement. It is assumed that students’ active involvement in the networked interaction is related to the factors of the groupware capabilities, teacher’s enthusiasm and modeling, and students’ learning styles, motivation, acclimation to the new learning culture, and discipline enforcement.
Rationale for the Research Design
Most qualitative researches reflect some sort of phenomenological perspective (Glesne, 1999). They are conducive to describing or answering questions about particular events or contexts and the perspectives of a participant group toward events, beliefs, or practices. It is useful for explorations and understandings of the group or a phenomenon and these understandings often result in new findings or insights (Gay & Airasian, 1996).
A phenomenological approach considers human beings the center and determinants of world events. Studies solely depending on numbers may be unreliable in interpreting human feelings, emotions, perceptions, and attitudes, and these studies may not be fully representative of the participants involved.
Qualitative research emphasizes the interaction of human participants. It is a more humanistic approach to deal with data and its outcomes can more accurately reflect the human construct, perspectives and attitudes. Qualitative researchers argue that
Meaning is situated in a particular perspective or context, and, since different people and groups often have different perspectives and contexts, there are many different meanings in the world, none of which is necessarily more valid or true than the other (Gay & Airasian, 1996, p. 9).
Morgan highly praises the use of the qualitative methodologies: “…Research and evaluation studies which have adopted qualitative methodologies generate rich descriptions of learning in specific contexts” (Morgan, 1984, p. 265). The researcher in this study wants to probe into Lotus LearningSpace users’ perspectives to gain more humanistic insights. Even though many research studies on network-assisted learning are based on quantitative methodology, the researcher in this study hopes that this research can tap into an understanding of human perceptions and behaviors in the distance learning arena through a qualitative paradigm.
An exploratory case study was chosen for this research. Case studies,
especially qualitative case studies, are prevalent throughout the field of
education (Merriam, 1998). A case study is an investigation defined by an
interest in a specific phenomenon within its real-life context. Morgan calls
the case study “illuminative evaluations” (Morgan, 1991, p. 6) because they
examine particular incidents or events and the complex meanings related to
these events (Stall-Meadows, 1998). Merriam emphasizes, “A qualitative case
study is an intensive, holistic description and analysis of a single instance,
phenomenon, or social unit” (Merriam, 1998, p. 27) and “…can be characterized
as being particularistic, descriptive, and heuristic” (Merriam, 1998, p. 29).
Erickson indicates that qualitative questioning strategies possess the
potential to illuminate the invisible world of everyday life, that is, to
explore more fundamental details of events of our daily life and make the
familiar strange and, in the end, make the strange more familiar and clear
(Erickson, 1990). The use of LearningSpace in this
study is considered a case, or a single entity in a “bounded system” (Merriam,
1998, p. 27). This study attempts to anatomize the case of the HES 3002
distance learning class and analyze it qualitatively.
This research is an exploratory case study on the users’ attitude towards using Lotus LearningSpace in an educational setting. The main approaches that are adopted to gather data in this research are semi-structured interview, observation, and open-ended survey. These approaches are most commonly used in the qualitative research (Anderson, 1998; Reinard, 1998). The researcher in this study attempts to explore the meaning of events and processes through interactive understanding and naturalistic observation (Bogdan & Biklen, 1992), gain entry into the conceptual world of the participants who are using LearningSpace to learn, and make an understanding of human perceptions and behaviors in this case.
Participants of the study
The participants in this study were students in the HES 3002 class
(Contemporary Issues in Human Environment Science) in the Department of Human
Environment Science taught by Dr. Rona. Dr. Rona was recommended by Rilly, the school network administrator in charge of Lotus LearningSpace at this university. Dr. Rona has rich
experience in integrating LearningSpace into
instructional communication. Her class has a diversified student population
with different backgrounds and perspectives, which can help enrich the data
resources of this study. There were fifty student participants, one teacher
participant from this course, and three LearningSpace-related
network administrators from the Office of Computer Information Services (CIS)
for this study. There are 20 interviewees from the 50 students in class, one
faculty interviewee, and three interviewees from the LearningSpace-related
network administrators. The interviewees from the students were selected from
the “focused group” (Morgan, 1997, p. 7) or “targeted population,” that is,
“the interviewees should represent the range of points of view” (Rubin &
Rubin, 1995, p. 66). The student interviewees were chosen according to their
level of their representation in the area of cultural background, technology
background, experience background, and their interest in the LearningSpace
assisted educational format. Since there were only two male interviewees among
this research, and the other student interviewees were female students, the
gender difference was not unique in this research. Therefore, in the later data
presentation, the interviewees' gender will not be considered. There were
twenty interviewees from the student group, and the teacher of this course and
all three network administrators were interviewed. So there were twenty-four
interviews altogether. There were four follow-up interviews with the students
and one with the instructor.
Context of the study
This study was conducted in a large land grant university in the Midwestern of the United States. This university is located in a small city. It has 22,000 students. This university offers degrees at the bachelor, master and doctoral levels which represent a rich blend of disciplines and varied professional experiences. The university is heavily supported with technology and began distance education in the early 1980s. The research and practices performed here have added to the literature of distance education since then (Moore, 1990). The university computing system provides e-mail and digital communication services for all faculty, staff, and students. Lotus Notes was installed as a collaborative network for the faculty and staff in 1996. Lotus LearningSpace has been incorporated into the Lotus Notes for the sake of providing a networked collaboration of students and teachers in different courses since 1998. In the fall semester of 2000, there were 30 courses at this university using LearningSpace as a course collaborative tool.
Significance of the Study
This research will contribute to the literature of networked distance education. The research on the users’ attitude towards using Lotus LearningSpace will provide the designers, administrators, instructors, and learners a better understanding of the effectiveness of Lotus LearningSpace and how to effectively use this tool to improve the quality of distance learning through networked learning interactivity and the new format of the instructional tools. It will serve as feedback to the producers and help them make better decisions on developing, administrating and manipulating internal networks like Lotus LearningSpace for educational purposes, and a feedback to the educators to better understand the LearningSpace-assisted class, and improve their instructional design and methodology for the networked distance class. The findings which this research yield may engender further study of Intranet-based learning under similar conditions and enrich the social learning implications. In addition, it could precipitate reforming networked technology and technology-based pedagogy.
Definition
of Terms
The following terms are defined in this study: qualitative case study, distance learning, World Wide Web (WWW), TCP/IP, LearningSpace, collaborative software, Internet, cooperative learning, video-conferencing, and risk period.
Qualitative case study is an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident (Yin, 1994, p. 13). Stake defines (1994, 1995) a case study as an intensive, holistic description and analysis of a single instance, phenomenon, or social unit (Merriam, 1998, p. 27).
Distance learning is defined as the “linking of a teacher and students in several geographic locations via technology that allows for interaction” (The U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment, 1989). It is also defined as “any instructional situation in which the learner is separated in time or space from the point of origination, characterized by limited access to the teacher and other learners” (Heinich, et al., 1996, p.408).
World Wide Web (WWW) is a graphical environment on computer networks that allows users to access, view, and maintain documents that can include text, data, graphics, sound, and video (Heinich, et al., 1996, p. 417).
TCP/IP is the abbreviation of Transfer Control Protocol/Internet Protocol, a group of protocols for network communications routing and data transfer developed for the precursor to the Internet. It is the accepted standard for UNIX-based operating systems and for the Internet (Kleinedler et al., 1998).
Network is a computer
system linking two or more computers (Heinich et al.,
1996, p. 413).
LearningSpace is a newly developed groupware that facilitates learners and instructors to communicate, collaborate, and disseminate information to achieve common learning objectives.
Collaborative software is Intranet software packages or groupware
such as Lotus Notes, Microsoft Exchange, or LearningSpace
that enhance communication and dissemination of information within or between
companies or classes.
Internet is a matrix of networks that interconnects millions of supercomputers, mainframes, workstations, personal computers, and laptops. The networks use a standard set of communications protocols, thus allowing computers with distinctive software and hardware to communicate. Some of the most popular features of the Internet are e-mail, file transfer, and remote login (Kleinedler, et al., 1998, p. 140).
Cooperative learning refers to an instructional technique whereby students work together in heterogeneous groups on a structured task to help each other learn rather than competing as individuals. (Slavin, 1989; Strother, 1990; Gamson, 1994; Cooper, 1995; Heinich et al., 1996). In this study, the terms cooperative learning and collaborative learning were used interchangeably.
Video-conferencing is teleconferencing in which video images are
transmitted among the various geographically separated participants in a
meeting (Computer Dictionary, 1999).
Risk Period is a period of the first few weeks of a semester during which the new distance-class takers usually have so much technical and format adjustment frustration that they could develop a negative attitude toward the distance class or may even drop the class. It needs special attention and effort from both the teacher and the students to cope with the difficulties in order to complete a first distance class.
Summary
In this chapter, the overall concepts of the research design were discussed. As it is a qualitative exploratory case study, the researcher in this study will immerse himself into the new technology-assisted learning environment to perform careful data collection and thoughtful analysis to reach insight.
In education, there is a large gap between research findings and their applications in day-to-day practice (U.S. Congress, 1995, p. 6).
This study is intended to gear the educational research to practical issues
through the qualitative paradigm, use the powerful qualitative data to discuss
and evaluate the networked learning environment, and then inform action,
enhance decision making, and apply new findings to solve human and societal
problems (Patton, 1990). The research will also combine the theory of learning
in the process of the analysis of the data.
CHAPTER
TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
When we talk about online learning, we generally discuss network-based learning activities. Since the network came into being, it has displayed its vital potential to convey information and support interaction, leading people to try to develop versatile tools and explore its full use in order to make it work most effectively and efficiently (Harasim et al., 1995).
Communication over computer networks appeared as early as the 1960s with electronic mail on time-sharing mainframe computers (Hills, 1997; Harasim et al., 1995). In 1969, Advanced Research Projects Agency Network was developed as a U.S. government experiment in multi-site packet switching to link researchers with remote computer sites for the sharing of hardware and software resources and databases. Users realized the advantage of this network in sending each other messages about the progress of their shared projects (LaQuey, 1993; Quarterman, 1993). By the 1970s, the e-mail function had been integrated into the network to support group work and team collaboration. In the early 1980s, the network developed into a more multiple connected web-work that constituted the basic format of today’s Internet (Harasim et al., 1995). In its early stages, the network was used mainly in military, government and business organizations. Academics and educators had limited access to computer networks. The USENET (User’s Network) and UUCP (a UNIX communication network) were launched in the 1970s to serve university communities and later for commercial organizations. BITNET (Because It’s Time Network) and CSNET (Computer Science Network) appeared in the early 1980s to provide nationwide networking services to academic and research communities (Harasim et al., 1995). In the mid-1980s, the American NSFNet (National Science Foundation Network) was created to link researchers and academics across the United States with five supercomputer centers. It later developed into today’s global network, the Internet (Hills, 1997; Harasim et al., 1995). The development of the network, and later the Internet, enabled the development of Intranet, or groupware.
Groupware Enhanced Learning
What is an Intranet?
An Intranet is a private computer network that uses Internet standards and protocols to enable members of an organization to communicate and collaborate more efficiently with one another, thereby increasing productivity (Greer, 1998, p. 2)
What is Intranet Groupware?
According to Hills, an Intranet is “a private Internet inside an organization,” and “an internal network that is based on the Internet’s TCP/IP protocol. It uses World Wide Web (WWW or Web) tools such as HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) to give you all the features of the Internet on your own private network” (1997, p. 4). An Intranet is built to enable business organizations to share information so the employees can make better decisions about serving their customers. As Hills observes, an Intranet is considered groupware which allows a business organization or community members to communicate; thus groupware is also called Intranet groupware (Hills, 1997). Groupware, actually a kind of network software package based on interactive information technologies, was used for business collaboration and coordination within or between companies, and enabled teams of people to work together efficiently (Bikson, 1996; Chaffey, 1998). Lotus Notes, Novell Groupwise, and Microsoft Exchange are examples of groupware. With networked synchronous and asynchronous technologies, Groupware capacitates teamwork by allowing communication asynchronously or synchronously at a global level when the team members are separated by time and space. Because employees can continue to communicate and collaborate on joint projects when face-to-face contact is impossible, groupware is also called worldwide collaborative software (Ciborra, 1996).
Intranet emerges as a groupware to facilitate communication and deliver information within a group of people, a business organization, a school, or a group of organizations (Hills, 1997). The network-based learning environment differs from the traditional classroom. In this new learning environment, the roles of the teacher and the learners are changing, teaching styles and learning styles are challenged, and new needs have to be met (Moore, 1990; Mason, 1998).
What Can Groupware Do?
Hills explains
that groupware consists of hardware and
software on a network. It does many of the following things:
· Helps two or more people work together
· Lets them share knowledge and expertise
· Automates their activities
· Bridges geography and time
Groupware generally serves three purposes:
1. Communication. Helps people share information.
2. Coordination. Helps people coordinate their individual roles with each other.
3. Collaboration. Helps people work together (Hills, 1997, p. 47).
Hills abbreviates the function of groupware as “share, discuss, and present”(Hills, 1997, p. 49). Chaffey defines the function of the groupware as
· Group discussions (threaded text-based conferences)
· Document-sharing for joint authoring of reports
· Electronic meetings software, such as video-conferencing
· Group decision support
· Group-coordination software for time management and scheduling (Chaffey, 1998, p. 4).
The informational tools incorporated into groupware include e-mail, calendaring and scheduling tools, voice conferencing, videoconferencing, electronic meeting systems, whiteboards or data conferencing, chat rooms, etc. They can be categorized as
1. Discussion and conferencing tools that allow participants to have conversations and share ideas and knowledge in close-to-real time or at vastly different times, such as e-mail, newsgroups, forums, threaded discussions, and discussion databases;
2. Knowledge repository tools, which include public folders, document management systems, and internal webs, all of which allow participants to place documents, demos, and reports in a location where others can access them when they wish to;
3. Group writing or shared document-editing tools, which allow two or more contributors to collaborate by individually working on a document whenever it is convenient for them; these tools may even help resolve discrepancies where there are simultaneous changes to the same passages, and they enhance individual productivity by turning it into interpersonal productivity;
4. Workflow tools, which allow participants to work with a form or application, do part of the process, and forward it to the next person who should continue working with it. Workflow applications incorporate e-mail messaging or document management databases (Hills, 1997, P. 52).
These tools of groupware can provide a convenient environment for brainstorming, joint venture, and collaboration among the coworkers or learners who are separated by time and geography.
The Current Application of Groupware
Intranet groupware is designed mainly for business organizations and for organizational administrations as an internal communication tool (Lloyd, 1994; Ciborra, 1996; Hills, 1997; Chaffey, 1998). It is considered a new class of information technology known variously as groupware, Intranet groupware, coordination technologies, software for teamwork, etc. “The intent with groupware is to provide support for coordination and collaboration through shared access to technological capabilities such as common repositories, discussion forums, and communication facilities” (Orlikowski, 1996, p. 23).
To sustain competition in today’s world, people need to understand how to harness the collective genius of the people in their organization, thereby not only empowering workers to carry out their respective jobs, but also facilitating their access to knowledge, which should, in turn, allow integrative thinking and creativity to permeate the organizations (Senge, 1990). The ability for organizational learning could be regarded as the only means of maintaining a competitive advantage and is a fundamental requirement for sustaining existence in the face of market competition (Mason, 1994). The Intranet groupware has been referred to as a wisdom bank that can empower the employees at the front line to understand core business processes. In Johnson and Paper’s study of eight business organizations, they found that the organizations utilized collaborative groupware such as Lotus Notes to empower employees to solve business problems. The groupware provided for multiple, simultaneous, and anonymous inputs from meeting participants. Anonymity neutralizes the effects of personality, positions, classes, and ranks, which might otherwise intimidate those who do not feel comfortable openly criticizing the ideas of authority or dominant figures (Johnson & Paper, 1998).
A number of nationally known companies incorporate groupware applications; among these is the Siemens Company, which uses Intranet groupware to pool ideas in business innovation and motivate employees to think about aspects of the innovation process that might have been previously unfamiliar to them. Effective teamwork was realized by increasing motivation, communication, and cooperation with the aid of Intranet groupware (Schepers et al., 1999).
Issues of time-effectiveness are prominent reasons for utilizing Intranet groupware. The Supply Chain Value Assessment Framework, a global customized software based on Lotus Notes, is an effective supply-chain management solution to tough tasks, enabling the diagnostic process to be cut from months to less than four weeks (Anonymous, 1999). To achieve organizational excellence, Goh advocates a practice of learning organization (Goh, 1998). A learning organization is an organization skilled at creating, acquiring, and transferring knowledge and at modifying its behavior to reflect new knowledge and insight (Garvin, 1993). Lotus Notes was a recommendation for sharing best practices as an intervention to improve knowledge transfer in a learning organization (Goh, 1998).
In Atlanta, ICG Communications is another corporation using Intranet groupware. Its Human Resource Department employs the Intranet system to assess and screen job candidates in order to make better decisions about hiring competitive technicians and administrative personnel for the company (Morgan, 1999).
A third organization, Philips Petroleum Company, established an internal network system as a remote computing environment to ease the tension and hardship faced by audit staff during travel. This company has subcompanies all over America, England, Norway, Asia, and Africa; its auditing staff members spend approximately 35% of their time traveling to other sites. The company determined that a remote computing environment would best suit the needs of the staff. The computing environment is based on the company’s Intranet; staff use computers or laptops at home to communicate with different sites for the effect of maximizing remote productivity while minimizing overall complexity and expense (Crowell, 1997).
Rangaswamy and Lilien (1997) indicate that groupware has played a role in the development of new products. Companies are embracing new concepts and technologies to support changes in the new product development process. Group software tools are used for developing new products, generating creative ideas, designing products, and evaluating new products. Groupware falls into two categories in these companies: packages for managing workflow between project members, such as Group Works, and packages for coordinating communication between members, maintaining a record of activities, and analyzing and evaluating project progress, such as Lotus Notes. The employment of these packages helps the organizations meet such process goals as speeding to market, reducing the costs of development, improving the quality of the product, and minimizing rework (Rangaswamy & Lilien, 1997). The ABA Bank compliance and regulatory information are now housed in the bank internal Intranet databases. The ABA Bank uses the Intranet database to mediate financial operation within its banking system or between banks and takes advantage of the full multimedia training options to train their tellers. The Intranet works effectively and flexibly; its only real limitations are budget and bandwidth, which are closely associated with the issues of speed and technological updates (Bedsole, 1999).
What is Lotus LearningSpace?
Lotus LearningSpace is an advanced educational
groupware that facilitates group learning online. It is learner-centered and
has been adopted by schools and businesses (Syrett,
1998). Lotus LearningSpace is a product of the Lotus
Development Corporation (Technology Notes, 1999; Penalosa,
1998). It provides an integrated learning environment using computing and
online network technology and is attached to the Notes database. Lotus LearningSpace consists of five interactive learning modules
that support team-based, instructor-facilitated learning. These modules are
schedule, media center, course room, profile, and assessment manager. LearningSpace uses the web browser to facilitate learning
communication and collaboration, and it provides capabilities and possibilities
for network-based interactive learning.
The Current Application of LearningSpace
Unlike other groupware products such as Lotus Notes and Microsoft Exchange, LearningSpace is still in its infancy (Kurch, 1998). With the rapid development of distance education, an urgent need and a large marketplace for LearningSpace has risen. People are trying to understand and are learning to explore how to achieve their educational goals through collaborative software products such as LearningSpace (Gardner & Scannell, 1998; Blumenstyk, 1999; Kursh, 1998; Masie, 1999). In some cases, LearningSpace is used in school settings as well as in professional workplace training.
The Risk and Insurance Management Society adapted two training courses to a distance learning format. These courses were taught through LearningSpace. This educational experience reflected a flexible, cost-effective way to augment employees’ professional skills without taking time from work. The trainees were intimidated by the new Learning software package at first, but after they got into the program, they found LearningSpace is a helpful tool for keeping pace with the class schedule, assignments, teamwork, and discussions with both peers and instructors (Anonymous, 1998). In Atlanta, MCI’s Systemhouse developed a virtual learning environment by using the LearningSpace groupware package. This program was aimed at quickly educating people about new company policies, sales programs, and products through the company’s outsourcing, development, and management programs. This virtual-learning effort resulted in a windfall for an increase of value-added training engagement (Torode, 1999). Meanwhile, IBM is currently linking sixty of its managers on a Pan-European MBA course through distance learning. Both the company and its employees are trying to avoid having personnel take a break from employment while taking a course. This distance learning system adopted LearningSpace as a communication tool, giving students greater control over their learning preferences. Students benefit from this software by making imaginative links between different topics and also by being able to have regular access to fellow students through discussion databases. If this proves a success, IBM will make a big leap forward by expanding its inservice training online (Syrett, 1998).
Fisher conducted an action research project on a staff training program by using LearningSpace (Version 2.50) as a communication media in her technology literacy course at Marquette University to train inservice high school faculty. Her study indicates that LearningSpace built a cohesive student-centered collaborative environment that maximized cooperative learning while adapting to the different learning styles of the learners. The students’ active participation in LearningSpace-assisted interaction demonstrated an ability to generate a greater diversity of ideas, more reflective thinking, and an increased creativity in learning to adopt new technology in classroom instruction (Fisher, 1998). Thus far, there has been no research conducted on the perceived effectiveness of LearningSpace used for the college student distance learning courses.
Learning Theories in the
Networked Context
The learning network provides an environment that can foster learners’ academic intellectual growth. The pioneers who contributed to the wealth of learning theories also benefited the electronic networked learning paradigm. Skinner’s behaviorism has led to the drill-and-practice training software that helped students learn with the earlier educational computer programs (Heinich, et al., 1996). With the development of these new technologies, the network appeared and more advanced learning network products created a flexible, adaptable, and convenient environment which is conducive to constructivist learning (Hinrichs, 1997; Greer, 1998; Baker, 1997). Piaget (1977) claims that what is more important is that educational programs should give rise to the active manipulation and discovery by the young learners themselves. Furthermore, he emphasizes that “basic operational structures of intelligence are not acquired through instruction but must be invented by the child” (Spencer, 1988, p. 153). His assertion leads to the active method, discovery learning, and constructivism in today’s education that most apply to electronic networked distance education. Piagetians claim that by taking active roles, the learners construct their own understanding predominantly by discovering, in a sense of a creative learning module, while teachers no longer act as information providers, but as guides to educational experiences by encouraging cooperative learning activities (Spencer, 1988).
Vygotsky, a Soviet educational psychologist, contributes to the constructivist theory from another viewpoint. According to Vygotsky (1962), children’s early thoughts and language are independent of each other. The vehicle to gear thought with language is a “socially situated interaction” (Lucia, 1976, p. 52). Social learning is the foundation of the mental development of the human being (Vygotsky, 1962; Bandura, 1977; Slavin, 1990). This concept applies to interactive learning on the network (such as Internet, Intranet, or groupware, and Extranet) (Spencer, 1988). The advocates of social learning take the position that cooperative learning is both more effective and more socially beneficial (Vygotsky, 1962; Bandura, 1977; Slavin, 1990). Vygotsky’s social transaction theory tells us that a child can learn more from an activity or experience if an adult is present or if a more experienced playmate is in the learning process with him. The “Zone of Proximal Development” (Vygotsky, 1962) is the range where a child can learn to complete tasks with the help from others who are more mature and experienced with the task. This social influence can raise the students’ ability to a level two to four years senior of their potential (Spencer, 1988). The Neo-Vygotskian Pontecorvo and Zucchermaglio (1990) have shown that even peers with similar knowledge or ability cause reorganization of concepts as students argue and negotiate their solutions to various problems. Yet, in the socialized learning; concept conflict does create a higher-order thinking process (Pressley et al., 1995). The current online discussion groups, threaded discussions, e-mail, listservs, chatrooms, and video-conferencing are stages where mediated class discussions and debates stimulate and spark higher order thinking and train the students to be more mature mentally. This fact refutes the claim of Heinich and his colleagues that educational technology currently only supports lower-level knowledge and comprehension (Heinich et al., 1996).
Other studies have explored technology-supported learning, including Paivio's dual coding (Paivio, 1986; Clark & Paivio, 1991) and Salomon’s theory of media and symbolic system (Salomon, 1994), both of which discuss the relationship between the imagery system and cognitive functioning. These studies have theoretically added to the wealth of cognitive theories in the format of technology-and-multimedia-assisted learning.
In the recently developed technology-assisted learning context, interactivity has been considered essential to distance learning in terms of the emphasis on socialized learning activities (Moore, 1990; Muirhead, 1999). It captures the attention and challenges the educators in the new learning context of the Information Age. Moore's perspective on interaction is based on the learner-centered pedagogy, and his three types of interaction are: learner-content, learner-instructor, and learner-learner (Moore, 1989); Muirhead (1999) defines interaction using three components: communication, participation, and feedback. He affirms that students hope to communicate consistently with their instructors, but the level of interactivity varies between students and their instructor. He indicates that the instructor plays a vital role in promoting class interaction, yet students must develop their self-directed learning skills and adapt their communication habits to be effectively involved in the online learning environment.
The Social Dimension of Group
Learning
The social dimension of group learning has been emphasized by Lave and Wenger in terms of legitimate peripheral participation in communities of practice. They mention that learning is an integral and inseparable aspect of social practice. The learners, such as apprentices, must first get sponsored before they can gain legitimate access to participation in the community's productive activities: learners move from legitimate peripheral participation to centrality (Lave & Wenger, 1991). Tuckman indicates the importance of developmental sequence in small group learning. His sequence falls into four stages: stage one---orientation to the task; stage two---intragroup conflict; stage three---development of group cohesion; stage four---functional role-relatedness. The interpersonal relationship is referred to as a group structure in conducting group learning activities (Tuckman, 1965). Wegerif's research on asynchronous learning network finds that there is a "threshold" before the learners when they try to get into the networked learning community. The threshold is the first barrier for the learners to gain membership into the community. Learners need to cross this barrier to be effective to learn in a new learning milieu (Wegerif, 1998).
Constructivist learning is utilized in technology-assisted education, which is based on students' active participation in problem-solving and critical thinking regarding a learning activity which they find relevant and engaging. They are "constructing" their own knowledge by testing ideas and approaches based on their prior knowledge and experience, applying these to a new situation, and integrating the new knowledge gained with pre-existing intellectual constructs (Bednar et. al., 1992). In constructivist learning approach, the teacher’s role has changed to a facilitator or a coach. The teacher guides the student, stimulating and provoking the student's critical thinking, analysis and synthesis throughout the learning process. The teacher is also a co-learner (Bull, 1997).
Constructivist learning is a social learning approach which requires the scaffolding from mature tutors whose knowledge is higher than the tutee so that the learning could increase to a level across the “zone of proximal development” with the help or tutoring (Vygotsky, 1978). In the networked environment, constructivist learning requires the learner to possess the ability to manipulate the network technology, and interact with the class participants across time and space (Muirhead, 1999).
Issues Leading to the Study
Groupware, as a tool to enhance online interaction, has become a big industry, and its market is increasing. Campbell, Director of Collaborative Technologies at International Data Corporation (IDC), describes how IDC's Collaborative Computing Market Review and Forecast shows that the installed base of collaborative software users increased 33% for 1995, reaching almost 54 million users. The number would grow 39% each year in each year for the next two years, to almost 75 million users in 1996 and 104 million users in 1997. By the year 2000, the anticipated number of users will reach 241 million, representing a compound annual growth rate of 35 % (Campbell, 1997).
As the distance learning format increases exponentially (Hartzell, 1998), educators need more and more effective groupware. There is an increasing interest in the network-assisted learning format. It is necessary to understand the impact of the network software like LearningSpace being used in academic institutions. In May of 1997, the University of Nebraska hosted a LearnShop program to train regional university faculty representatives of GP/IDEA (Iowa State University, Kansas State University, University of Nebraska, North Dakota State University, Oklahoma State University, and Texas Tech University) to be prepared for the instructional design of Web-based instruction. LearningSpace was part of the training content. Faculty members learned to use distance education technology with strong pedagogy and to explore the transfer of a class-seating learning format to a constructivist learning format by using online network tools. Faculty who attended the LearnShop all positively evaluated this program for its contribution to the development of distance learning (Draper et al., 1999). After that, Oklahoma State University adopted LearningSpace as a learner-centered groupware for the communication of online instruction. By the fall semester of 2000, 30 courses used LearningSpace as online interactive tools for the facilitation of instruction. Until now, however, very little research has been conducted on the impact of LearningSpace used in school settings. The scope of this study is to promote a better understanding of how LearningSpace is used in the distance education context and what factors could affect the LearningSpace-assisted class so as to fill up the gap in this area.
Summary
Some studies argue that Lotus LearningSpace was intended to succeed in corporate training programs rather than in teaching (Besser & Bronn, 1996). Yet, the challenge is that technology is changing the format of how people are working and also changing the format of how people are learning (Rhinesmith, 1994). This study, on behalf of millions of learners, expects that Lotus LearningSpace can not only succeed in training in the context of business organizations, but can also succeed in the area of distance learning in educational institutions. The door of LearningSpace is opening to new applications, such as online distance learning; thus, we need to understand the format of learning with new perceptions, reengineer the new cutting-edge technology to our day-to-day practice, and reconceptualize teaching and learning in an electronic setting. Can what succeeds in corporate training also succeed in school learning?
CHAPTER THREE
METHODOLOGY
Rationale for the Qualitative Study
Basically, there are two major research paradigms, quantitative and qualitative (Creswell, 1994; Gay & Airasian, 1996). The quantitative research paradigm, which has often been referred to as “traditional” or “scientific,” (Kim, 1989, p. 1) is based on numbers to interpret a phenomenon under study. It rests its evidence on the logic of mathematics, the principle of numbers, and the methods of statistical analysis and resorts to the statistical variables for interpretation (Meyer, 1988), whereas, the qualitative paradigm tries to preserve the form and essence of human behavior and to analyze its qualities, rather than subject it to mathematical or other transformations (Lindlof, 1995). Anderson and Meyer (1988) also note, “Qualitative research methods are distinguished from quantitative methods in that they do not rest their evidence on the logic of mathematics, the principle of numbers, or the methods of statistical analysis” (Anderson & Meyer, 1988, p. 247). Many quantitative research perspectives hold that there is a single, objective reality--the world out there--that we can observe and know, which is measurable through deductive procedures (Merriam, 1988), while qualitative research is based on the assumption that the world is not an objective one, but exists in multiple realities or multiple facets. The world is a highly subjective phenomenon in need of interpretation rather than mathematical measurement. It exists as a result of human interaction and perceptions which can only be explored and discovered through meaningful description and interpretation. The research is achieved through exploratory, inductive procedures and emphasizes processes instead of ends (Merriam, 1988).
The quantitative approach has been criticized for its lack of focus or meaning, its lack of context, and the lack of interaction between researchers and subjects. When Eisner argues for the use of artistic and other qualitative modes in research, he indicates that no concepts can be formed without internal or external stimulation (Eisner, 1981), and, “the forms concepts take are as diverse as our sensory capacities and the abilities we have developed to use them”(Eisner, 1981, p. 49). Qualitative research is based on the information gained through watching, listening, touching, feeling, smelling, tasting and interacting. “The sources of knowledge are at least as diverse as the range of information provided by the senses. Each of the senses provides a unique content that is not replicable by other sense modalities” (Eisner, 1979, p. 14).
To explore learning under the impact of Lotus LearningSpace
would entail many students’ perspectives, their social behaviors, and events in
the specific class setting. Qualitative research uses a naturalistic approach
to explore the data, which can better serve the needs of this research with
IT-based learning psychology and educational pedagogy than quantitative
research, which emphasizes using numbers and statistical data. Eisner describes
the process of the qualitative research as “casting a net into the sea” (1979,
p. 14). By exploring the qualitative aspect of the learners’ experience with
the new informational tool, LearningSpace, it is
expected that the researcher not only casts the net into the sea and catches
the fish out of water, but also plunges himself along with the net into the sea
so that he may know what environment the fish live in, what the fish’s life is
like under water, how the fish behave, what socialization and culture the fish
share, and how they interact with each other to survive in their environment.
Stake states, "Truth in the fields of human affairs is better approximated
by statements that are rich with the sense of human encounter: to speak not of
underlying attributes, objective observables, and universal forces, but of
perceptions and understanding that come from immersion in and holistic regard
for the phenomena” (Stake, 1978, p. 6).
Case
Study
A qualitative case study is particularistic because it focuses on a particular, specific situation, event, or phenomenon. A case study is descriptive and provides insight into the phenomenon under study (Merriam, 1988). Guba and Lincoln state that the purpose of a case study is “to reveal the properties of the class to which the instance being studied belongs” (Guba & Lincoln, 1981, p. 371). Shaw describe the case study as “interpretation in context” (1978, p. 13). Cozby argue, “Case studies are valuable in informing us of conditions that are rare or unusual and thus not easily studied in any other manner. Insights gained through the case study may also lead to the development of hypotheses that can be tested using other methods” (Cozby, 1989, p. 119). Becker defines the purpose of a case study as twofold: “to arrive at a comprehensive understanding of the groups under study” and “to develop general theoretical statements about regularities in social structure and process” (1968, p. 233). Merriam states that “one selects a case study approach because of an interest in understanding the phenomenon in a holistic manner”(1988, p. 153). LearningSpace assisted learning is a new phenomenon in the distance education arena. People need to know about it, understand it and explore its capabilities. A case study is appropriate for this research.
Yin states that case studies fall into three categories: explanatory, descriptive, and exploratory (1989). The exploratory case study is usually used to find the phenomenon that is blank in the research literature. As Lotus LearningSpace is a new product for group learning, it has its special context, community culture, technological base and people’s perspectives and attitudes. It has not been researched thus far, and there is no existing study or theory generated regarding this area. This study on learning with Lotus LearningSpace is of the exploratory nature.
Even though meanings drawn from this case study are limited to this specific context, they could help “alert researchers to themes or events which might be common to similar phenomena under different conditions” (LeCompte & Preissle, 1993, p. 119).
Approaches
for Data Collection
Interview
The interview is a most commonly used approach for data collection in qualitative research. A qualitative interview is an interaction between the researcher and the interviewees through conversation, which is a basic mode of human interaction. When people talk to each other, they interact, get to know each other, and understand each other’s experiences, feelings, expectations, and the world they live in (Kvale, 1996). Through interviews, the researcher can enter into other people’s perspectives and understand how people make sense of their world and experiences (Restine, 1999). Interviewing is a metaphor of hearing data and sharing experiences. Through it, the researcher can extend his or her intellectual and emotional reach across time, class, race, gender, and geographical divisions (Rubin & Rubin, 1995). The words of the interviewees can give a picture of life changing experiences similar to real world events and demonstrate how the interviewees make sense of their learning experiences via Lotus LearningSpace.
Interviews constituted a major part of data collection in this research. The interviews conducted in this study were designed as semi-structured interviews. In the semi-structured interview, the interviewer asks predefined questions but also tries to leave more freedom for the interviewee to talk. The lived experience and insights of the interviewees are released through the interview, and the interviewer tries to gain access to the world of the subject and his/her perspective (Rubin & Rubin, 1995; Kvale, 1996). In this case, the participants had varied experiences and attitudes toward using LearningSpace, and the researcher wanted these detailed depictions of their experiences. A semi-structured interview, rather than a structured interview, was considered best for this research.
Another type of interview is telephone interview (Liu, 1996). Telephone interviewing uses telephone communication to conduct interviews. As there were so many interviews in this research, telephone interviewing could save time and cost, and ensure convenient and flexibly-timed appointments for the interviewees.
Interviewee
Selection
The participants in this study were students in the course HES 3002 (Contemporary Issues in Human Environment Science) in the Department of Human Environment Science, taught by Dr. Rona. Dr. Rona was recommended by Rilly, the school network administrator in charge of Lotus LearningSpace at the research site university. Dr. Rona had a rich experience in integrating LearningSpace into distant instruction. Her class has a diversified student population with different backgrounds and perspectives, which helped enrich the data resources of this study. In Dr. Rona’s distance HES 3002 class, there were fifty students enrolled, and in the school network system, there were three network system administrators who are related to the service of the LearningSpace network. So there were fifty student participants, one teacher participant from this class, and three LearningSpace-related network administrator participants in this study. There were 20 student interviewees, one faculty interviewee, Dr. Rona, and three interviewees from the LearningSpace network administration. The interviewees from the students were chosen from the “focused group” (Morgan, 1997, p. 7) or “targeted population,” that is, “the interviewees should represent the range of points of view” (Rubin & Rubin, 1995, p. 66). The student interviewees are chosen according to their level of representation in the areas of cultural background, technology background, experience background, and their interest in the LearningSpace assisted educational format.
Participant and Non-Participant Observation
Reinard points out that in the research settings, qualitative researchers often become “active participants” (Reinard, 1998, p. 192). Researchers immerse themselves the research setting and gain membership and a close relationship with their participants and obtain insight from within the participant groups (Wax, 1986; Gay & Airasian, 1996).
Non-participant observation, on the other hand, tries to avoid intruding on the settings and having a relationship with the subjects. These researchers are less emotionally involved with the participants and try to gain an understanding of the process and events through the eye of an outsider. The less the researcher’s physical participation, the less likely the “observer effect” (Gay & Airasian, 1996, p. 224). Non-participant observation is convenient in researching on the network-based learning activities as most of these activities were observable through an online database and the World Wide Web. The researcher could also sit at different distance learning sites to observe how tasks in LearningSpace were related to the instruction through Internet. These details of experiences will be recorded and analyzed systematically for meaningful explanation and analysis. Non-participant observation will constitute an important part of this research.
In this research, all the names of the participants are presented as pseudonyms in the data analysis in order to protect their identity.
Document Review
Mason (1996) points out that the analysis of documentary resources is a favored method in qualitative research. It is considered meaningful and appropriate in terms of research strategy. Visual data, the other form of documents, is equally important in qualitative research. Documents are mainly text-based archives, while visual data are graphics, photos, film, videos, television programs, graphic presentations, sculptures, drawings and artifacts. As this research performed some observations of online document data and downloaded data, documents and visual data constituted part of data in this research.
Open-Ended Survey
An open-ended survey can save time and focus the questions on the research topic. It is also the most commonly used descriptive method in educational research (Garcia, 1989; Cohen & Manion, 1994; Kvale, 1996). An open-ended survey is a self-report measurement technique to gather data about people’s attitudes, perspectives, behaviors, personality, and demographics. An open-ended survey is an empirical study that uses questionnaires to discover descriptive characteristics of phenomenon (Garcia, 1989; Reinard, 1998). The open-ended survey is “most useful when the researcher needs to know what people are thinking and how they naturally understand their world” (Cozby et al, 1989). The researcher in this study holds the belief that an online open-ended survey is an effective method in this research since it is time-effective and applicable for the college students in this study to express their viewpoints.
Validity Issues
Validity is of primary importance in research (Merriam, 1998; Glesne, 1999). The internal validity is attended to throughout this research. The Internal validity refers to the fact that the research findings are congruent with reality and reflect what they are intended to evaluate (Merriam, 1998). Merriam argues that “one of the assumptions underlying qualitative research is that reality is holistic, multidimensional, and ever-changing; it is not a single, fixed, objective phenomenon waiting to be discovered, observed, and measured as in quantitative research” (Merriam, 1998, p. 202). Qualitative researchers must try to protect the research integrity, use words, or pictures faithfully, and interpret what really happened objectively to the readers to overcome bias. To ensure the internal validity the following techniques were used:
1. Cross Case Analysis. Cross case analysis (Multiple site analysis) involves collecting and analyzing data from several sites. Multiple case analysis can “lead to categories, themes, or typologies that conceptualize the data from all the cases; or it can result in building substantive theory offering an integrated framework covering multiple cases”(Merriam, 1998, p. 195). In this study, students at two sites were selected for data collection. Collecting data from participants at two different sites increased the trustworthiness of common themes.
2. Multiple Session Interviews. Conducting interviews in more than one
session can reduce the threat to the accuracy of the participants’ testimonies,
allow interviewees enough time to think more deeply about their own feelings,
reactions, and beliefs, and help develop rapport between the researcher and
interviewees so as to increase validity of the interviews (Glesne,
1999). In this research, some of the participants will be interviewed on
different occasions to ensure trustworthiness.
3. Member Checking. Taking the data and the tentative interpretation back to the
informants ensures that the data collected are objective and represent them and
their ideas accurately (Glesne, 1999). In this research, the interview transcripts
were emailed back to each interviewees for their feed back.
4. Peer Viewing and Debriefing. Two doctoral students in the same
department as the researcher were invited to review and verify the data and
interpretation of the notes to ensure a realistic record of the data in the
process of treatment of data materials (Glesne,
1999).
5. Thick Description. Thick description is the detailed description of the research data so that the readers are allowed to enter the research context (Glesne, 1999). This constituted a large part of the data analysis in this research.
Subjectivity of the Study
In qualitative research, the researcher himself/herself is an instrument (Glesne, 1999). I, the researcher in this study, am a doctoral student majoring in educational technology. I am from China, with a different educational background and culture. The information technology-assisted learning is my interest. I have taken one course which used Lotus LearningSpace as an online group communication vehicle. The experience helped me to reflect on the potential of the future of the Intranet groupware in enhancing distance learning. LearningSpace is among the first few of the learner-centered groupware and is still in its infancy. This is the incentive that motivated me to conduct this study. A study on LearningSpace could provide people with a better understanding of this groupware and what the class is like in a LearningSpace-assisted class.
Since I am from China, my research could give a view on LearningSpace from a different cultural perspective. This could enrich the meaning and implication of this study. On the other hand, as English is my second language, I may have difficulty in interviewing as well as in understanding and analyzing the data. That could jeopardize the validity of this research. To minimize this, I tried to implement the techniques designed to increase validity mentioned in the Validity Issues.
Summary
This chapter gives a view of methodology that is to be adopted in this research. The reasoning and analysis of the qualitative case study have been presented for the sake of an understanding of qualitative research methodology and its relevance in this study. Issues such as qualitative methodology, defining of the case, selecting of participants, validity, and definition of terms are delineated. This chapter serves as a methodological guideline to the whole study.
CHAPTER FOUR
ANALYSIS OF THE DATA
Introduction
In the following chapter, I present an analysis of this qualitative research case study, which attempts to answer the two original research questions: (1) How effective is Lotus LearningSpace in assisting the distance learning class, HES 3002? and (2) What are the critical factors that affect learning in the HES 3002 class in the Lotus LearningSpace environment? As the research progressed, two themes emerged from the data: the technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma.
In order to help readers understand what it is like to be engaged in the HES 3002 distance course in LearningSpace, I begin this discussion with the two themes: the technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma, which can serve as a guideline to direct all descriptions of the data. Next, I describe the environment of the Lotus LearningSpace, the learning context in which students participated in HES 3002. Third, I present data, starting by reviewing the students' objectives and original motivation for participating in this class. Finally, I present my analysis of the data, including the detailed discussions of the two themes, technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma. The whole process explores how the students and the teacher are challenged by the problems of the technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma, and how they struggle to fix the problems in order to succeed. And the remaining problems are also discussed. At the end of the chapter, I offer discussion and summarize the chapter. The presented data may have some minor editing when it is necessary, and all the interviewees are presented as pseudonyms in the data analysis in order to protect their identity.
About the
Two Themes
The two themes are the technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma. The first theme, the technical accommodation means that the students in HES 3002 class struggled with a period of technical hardship, and this period is a test for them to struggle out of the technical frustration. Students who are successful in this period are smoothly connected to the class learning activities and are able to continue learning activities; while those who were unsuccessful in getting over this period usually had a bad experience to learn in this class in a technical sense. That is, they were technically intimidated and frustrated in this class, which caused them a lot of problems in learning, or they might be scared to drop this class. The second theme, format shift dilemma means that the students, especially the first time distance-class takers, had a hard to time in adjusting to the format of the distance learning. They needed to make the effort to mediate all those frustrating problems and progress from being uncomfortable to comfortable in learning. Their difficulty level varied from person to person. Some students could adapt to this new learning environment earlier, but some of the students had some resistance to the format change, underwent uncomfortable experiences in this class, and fostered a negative attitude toward this distance learning format.
The Learning Environment of LearningSpace
LearningSpace, a virtual learning network, is an Intranet software that is attached to Lotus Notes, and distributed on the World Wide Web (WWW). The current software used in this research is LearningSpace, Version 2.5.
LearningSpace (Version 2.5) is a program designed by the IBM Notes Company to enable distance learners to communicate asynchronously and access the instructional databases online. It provides a virtual learning community that allows distance learners to participate in a class whenever and wherever they prefer.
The LearningSpace homepage interface for the HES 3002 course is graphically appealing. In the upper left corner of the homepage is the LearningSpace logo. In the upper right corner of this homepage is the course title of this research: HES 3002 - Contemporary Issues in Human Environmental Sciences. Below the course title is a greeting addressing users individually once they open the LearningSpace course web site with phrases such as "Good Morning, Mike," and "Good Evening, Charlie." It makes users feel they are attended to, and cared about once they get into this community. In the middle of the screen are four large square icons that look like four doors, decorated with an attractive yellow shade as its base color. From the right to the left, the four doors are marked as Schedule, MediaCenter, CourseRoom and Profiles. The Schedule icon is a picture with a clock, a time table, and a pen in it, which remind people that Schedule is related to the class schedule and syllabus. The next door is MediaCenter, which depicts a CD and several pieces of paper with graphics, implying that opening this door opens a wealth of multimedia files and tasks. To the right of the MediaCenter door is CourseRoom, the main content-related course work and activities and team-based collaborative work will take place here (see Fig. 1).
Fig. 1. LearningSpace Homepage for Tutorial.
The last door, Profiles, shows some personal ID cards, denoting that this door contains the information of each individual student, for distance learners have little or no opportunity to know each other face-to-face. Profile fills up this void by allowing students the opportunity to exchange personal information and establish learning relationship.
On each individual door is another small, round icon, each of which represents its related large, square door. They appear as hyperlinked buttons within the LearningSpace databases so that users can click on them to surf freely from one database to any other.
This LearningSpace-assisted learning community is password protected. Only the students who enrolled for this class have access to this class.
The first database, Schedule, serves as a road map to the course, guiding students through their tasks and the materials they need to complete their course work according to the class schedule and assignments. Clicking on the Schedule icon opens its door and brings up five sub-databases: <Start Here> and four Modules. <Start Here> is a hyper-linked text to a course orientation database. It opens the course syllabus, schedule, technical orientation, teamwork assignment, and, finally, an orientation quiz to check if the new user of the LearningSpace has enough knowledge about this class format and the LearningSpace network to start the class. So the <Start Here> is actually a warm up phase for the class. When students start the class, they first have to learn some information about the class and its format, before they can successfully accomplish the course work for the semester. The content of <Start Here> introduces the seven topics: 1) The Syllabus and Schedule; 2) Plugins and Viewers; 3) Discussions; 4) Netscape Setup; 5) The Rules; 6) Using the OSU Library On-Line; and 7) Quiz.
The Syllabus and Schedule is an introduction to the course content and the course syllabus; the Plugins and Viewers gives students information on how to install a Power Point viewer into their hard drive to view the PowerPoint presentations. Discussion mentions that the discussion is a "graded portion of this class" and states the requirements for discussion participation, emphasizing, "It is important that you keep going back to a particular discussion and responding to what has been written by your classmates…. Never going back to see the responses of others is not acceptable." It also mentions that each student may be assigned to a small discussion team, indicating that discussion is considered highly important to this online distance course. Netscape Setup gives an illustration of how to install the PowerPoint viewer by using the Netscape browser. The title of the RULES is a set of basic rules and regulations for the participants while they use this LearningSpace to interact with each other. It specifies: 1) all students are expected to contribute to discussions in their small groups and in the After CourseRoom discussion board; 2) no flaming (using rude obnoxious language); 3) be careful with teasing and joking; 4) using polite message to let classmates know when you are joking; 5) no one liners (which means to avoid using only simple words, such as "I agree," to respond people's discussions); 6) limiting comments; 7) being patient with classmates; and 8) using spell-check before submitting work. After students get some online orientation to this LearningSpace-assisted class, they finally take a quiz in <Start Here> to check if they understand the basic rules and technical features enough to start this class.
In Schedule, after <Start Here>, the other four topics are four modules which contain the class activities for the main course content:
Module 1 - The History of HES (Human Environment Science)
Module 2 - Leadership and Teamwork
Module 3 - Ethics and Professionalism
Module 4 - Cultural Diversity and Population Trends
These four modules include course work, assignments, reading assignments, writing assignments, discussion assignments for teams, and tests and quizzes. The main learning activities are included in these four modules with different content emphases.
The next door is MediaCenter, which is a shared resource center that stores and manages information and reference materials relevant to the course, such as assignments, articles, links to the web sites, video files, graphic files, and multimedia presentations. In the HES 3002 course, MediaCenter contains mainly the PowerPoint presentation files made by the teacher and the guest. On the very left door of this course in LearningSpace is Profile, a place where learning participants' personal information is presented to the class so that students and the instructor can know about each other. It contains a student's name, photo, etc.
Clicking on the hyper-linked student's name brings up the student's personal information, such as the home address, email, work information, educational background, hobbies, personal homepage, etc. It also has a Portfolio, which keeps a record of each student's assignments and assessments that have been graded or returned.
The most active database in this course in LearningSpace is CourseRoom. CourseRoom includes a Discussion Board and the Assignment, an important part of the online interactive class where students could post their discussions, share information, and complete projects and assignments. Students can also work in assigned teams in CourseRoom, submitting postings publicly or privately among participants. The discussion board is a topic-headed, multiple-level discussion database, so it is also called "threaded discussion." The threaded discussion makes it easier for participants to read various discussions, identify sophisticated tasks, respond to any discussion under any topic thread, and generate new ideas corresponding to the topic (see Fig. 4).
The trickiest part of a discussion board
is that there may be some small, blue triangles on the left side of each
discussion topic. When a discussion topic has no blue triangle on the left
side, it means that topic has had no response made to it. When a topic has a
small, blue triangle on the left side of a discussion topic that
points to the discussion topic, it means that topic has a response or
responses to it. Clicking on the small, blue triangle causes the triangle to
point down, expanding on all the response(s) under that topic.
The Start of the Class
The fall semester of 2000 started on the 21st of August. As usual, students all came back to the school for the new semester. The quiet campus became busy and noisy again. But the HES 3002 class seemed quiet at this point. As a virtual class, it had no classroom; no students came to campus to take this course. Most students had already enrolled online at separate locations for this class; few of them enrolled on the main campus during summer vacation. Students could take this class at home, in their work places, or even while travelling. They could schedule their own time for this class, which means that they could work on this class at any time and anywhere they preferred. Because of this convenience and flexibility, many students were attracted to this online class to fulfill it as part of their academic goals.
The title of the HES 3002 course is "Contemporary Issues in Human Environmental Sciences." It is a theory-based, undergraduate, junior-level class, counting two credit hours. The two textbooks for this class are Management Challenges for the 21st Century, written by Peter Ferdinand Drucker, and The Ethics of Excellence, written by Price Pritchett. The main theoretical focus of this class is on professionalism and professional ethics. The instructor of this class is Dr. Rona, and the graduate assistant who works with Dr. Rona is a Ph.D. student, Nancy. They cooperated to work on this online class in the previous summer. The fall of 2000 was the second semester for them to cooperate on this class. Dr. Rona had taught online distance learning classes for three consecutive semesters, and she is regarded as experienced among the few of the teachers who teach the totally online class in her college, the College of Human Environmental Science. Dr. Rona also teaches another HES 3002 class in the traditional classroom, in addition to her teaching this online HES 3002 class in a distance format. Meanwhile, Dr. Rona is an Assistant Director of her College, which requires her to handle many administrative duties while teaching the two classes.
At the start of the semester, Dr. Rona began the HES 3002 by opening her class database in the school Lotus Notes network, where LearningSpace is part of its components, and checked on the student roster in the Notes computer database for this class. She contacted the fifty students enrolled in the class by email, then input all the students' names into LearningSpace HES 3002 class database and set up each student’s user name and password so that students could access the LearningSpace course web site. She mailed each of her new students packages containing class instructions and technical orientations, which gave the students important instructions on how to start taking this class, how to access the class web site by using their user names and passwords, how to take the class according to the syllabus, how to do their course work and online learning activities, and how to get technical support if they had technical problems in using LearningSpace on the web site. She also provided the email addresses, phone numbers, and web site addresses of the Computer Information Services (CIS) at the university for students so they could contact CIS for help and resources to resolve possible technical problems as they arose.
All the students in this class were first-time distance learners, utterly new to this learning format. Dr. Rona tried to give them as much technical support as possible. For example, in Tulsa, a large city seventy miles away from the main campus, twenty-three students were enrolled. Dr. Rona emailed the Tulsa students to schedule a time to give them the technical orientation at the Tulsa Branch Campus of the University on the Tuesday of the second week after class started. This gave the Tulsa students an opportunity to consult their teacher face-to-face concerning some technical issues and confusing problems on how to take this class.
HES 3002 is a theory-based course; its objectives are to:
1. Develop a comprehensive knowledge of the history and evolution of human environmental sciences.
2. Learn and practice leadership and teamwork skills in the contexts of class, university, professional and social communities.
3. Explore issues in ethics and professionalism that impact the disciplines within HES (Human Environmental Science) and identify potential ethical and professional Responsibilities and challenges.
4. Identify diversity and population trends and study their present and future impact on the various disciplines of HES.
To fit the course into the particular distance learning format, the course requirement for grading distribution is formulated as:
1. Discussion--10 points
2. Writing Assignments (3 at 15 points)--45 points
3. Critical Thinking Exercises--5 points
4. On-Line Quizzes (4 at 5 points)--20 points
5. Midterm Exam (of the short essay variety)--10 points
6. Final Exam (of the short essay variety)--10 points
All these learning activities take place on the LearningSpace course web site. In the syllabus, the participation in online discussion is highly emphasized. The course requires that each student post a minimum of four original thoughts/questions (original topics) during the semester, and respond to the original thoughts/questions a minimum of one time per week. This means that each student in this class is required to post four original discussion topics and sixteen responses to other people's discussion topics; that amounts to a minimum of twenty postings per semester. Interaction is essential to distance learning, and the social dimension of learning plays an important role in a successful online course (Moore, 1989; Muirhead, 1999). According to the syllabus, HES 3002 is intended to implement an increased online interaction to keep up the learners’ involvement and the quality of learning.
Virtual
Learning
This study is mainly based on observation and interview, with limited surveys. The discussion board is a place where most learning activities and participants' perspectives can be reflected. It is a window to the interior of the cultural world and individual needs, so we first focus our observational lens on the discussion board to see what is happening to student learning, how they communicate, and their attitudes and perspectives toward the format of this class when the class proceeds. This research also combine the interview and survey data to make sense of their world. As the HES 3002 course is totally online, the students undergo a brand new virtual learning experience. Their cognitive growth is coupled with conflicts, struggles, and habit and attitude changes.
Knowing
about the Learners
When students come to a class, they bring their personal culture, beliefs, and experiences with them, thus influencing the learning atmosphere of the class. In the first week, on the 24th of August, to learn about the students and raise discussion, Dr. Rona posted a starting question on the discussion board to elicit responses and find what factors have motivated students to choose this online class. The question was "Why did you choose to take this course online and what do you think will be your biggest challenge?" This question was intended to elicit students' personal perspectives and the motivational factors that made them take this online class, to expose their concerns about taking this class, and to start to produce a share-and-care atmosphere while students learned to develop a habit of online interaction. After Dr. Rona's first posting, the students' responses appeared one after another. They displayed their viewpoints, perspectives, and personal experiences. The feedback to this question helped the instructor know about her students and to design appropriate strategies to teach according to her audience. As she expected, this question became a hot topic. In the threaded discussion board, the responses following this question made this topic the longest thread on the discussion board. The reasons for the students to take this class varied from person to person. Many students' responses showed their excitement and curiosity about this new class. Many responded that their main motivation to take this class was the fact that this course was a requirement for their major. Since technology-assisted distance learning was utterly new to them, taking this class could bring them many new beneficial experiences. A number of the students indicated that their motivation to take the class was based on the advantages of the distance learning class. This online class was new, convenient, flexible, and interesting, and it could be taken anytime and anywhere, which helped balance students' conflicts with tight schedules and heavy course loads, jobs, and family responsibilities. This course was time-effective.
Learning online as a way to gain technological experience was regarded as an added windfall of this semester, as we can see in the following postings on the discussion board: (there is little minor editing in the quoted postings)
I chose this class because first it is required for my major, which is Interior Design. I have never taken an Internet class before and I thought it would be interesting. I'm also hoping to learn something new about the Internet. And so far I am. (Online Data, 29/08/00)
…I heard about it from lots of people in my major and just girls in my sorority that had to take it also…I also have never taken an Internet course. So I thought it would be fun and interesting for me…it helps me with my computer skills also which will come at an advantage later in the real world when I get a job…I am very excited about this class already… (Online Data, 28/08/00)
Probably the main reason (to take it online) is because I am a senior with a tight schedule. I thought it would be easier and time-wise if I took it online instead of going to a classroom two or three times a week. Another reason I am taking this course online is because I have waited to the last minute to take it. And once again, I thought it would be more time effective than a traditional class. (Online Data 28/08/00)
The degree requirement, students' personal interest, and curiosity were among the first of the incentives for them to take this online class. The students' interest in the advantages and flexibility of a new format of learning gave them a positive image of the HES 3002 class: "This allows me to attend school full-time, but be home when my child is home" (Canyon); "I prefer study at my own pace" (Jim); “I like the openness of online learning" (Brenda); "I prefer to study at home and at my own convenient schedule" (Delia); and "…to balance my full load of work and study" (Tam). Any new products, when coming out, bring a certain amount of advantages and benefits. Many people see those advantages and benefits as their main incentive to accept the new. HES 3002 is the same. The enrollment of fifty students in a distance class is a large number. That promises a good potential for HES 3002 in the distance format.
In the research to develop a comprehensive theoretical model of participation for university distance education, Courtney (1992) provides a decision-making model which focuses on environmental conditions, in which the origin of the students' learning needs is highlighted. The students' needs and objectives for taking this HES 3002 course were associated with their motivation to learn. Motivational influences can come from within or outside the individual. Moore (1998) mentioned that motivation falls into two main categories: intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation; Intrinsic motivation relates to a person's primary motive, such as personal needs, attitudes, interests, curiosity, and self-esteem. The intrinsic motivation is "…what learners bring to the learning environment, that is, their internal attributes: attitudes, values, needs, and personality factors" (Moore, 1998, p. 233). Extrinsic motivation is from the outside of the individual related to external and environmental factors that help shape the learner's behavior. Requirements, rewards, punishment, and attractions are regarded as the extrinsic motivational factors (Bull & Stansberry, 1997). External and internal motivations can transfer into each other; for example, a course requirement for a degree is external motivation. A person's desire to complete a degree makes him or her feel a strong personal desire to fulfill the course requirement. In this way, the external motivation has changed into internal motivation. This kind of change is beneficial, as the external momentum has changed to internal, helping students make the decision to learn online and persevere in class tasks.
The first question posted by Dr. Rona was a very strategic elicitation that helped engage the students to participate with an emphasis on their experiences, attitudes, needs, beliefs and concerns about this class. It was a good start to this class. As all the students were distance learners who would not meet each other while learning, they could start knowing each other from their perspectives, values, beliefs, and personal goals, getting familiar with discussion and warming up for the class. And on the discussion board, students' motivational factors and demotivational concerns began to appear, which facilitated the instructor in analyzing the students' objectives to learn and their participation, and help her design the online learning activities and evaluate the students' learning.
Students'
Concerns
Students not only expressed positive attitudes towards the HES 3002 distance class, but they also showed concern about taking this class. Their technical skills, lack of experience online, and uncertainty regarding this new format of learning caused some panic and worries among some of the students. When they answered Dr. Rona's question regarding this course, they posted their concern and worries in their responses, too. Some of the remarks are:
I see my biggest challenge as getting acclimated to the computer program and feeling comfortable with it. All in all, I'm excited about this new form of technology. (Online Data 28/08/00)
…being a student at Tulsa, the Internet (class) is the only option. The greatest challenge for me will be completing the assignments using the computer. While I am not exactly afraid of the computer, I am far from confident! (Online Data, 25/08/00)
…I think my most challenging obstacle in this class will be making sure I am staying caught up and knowing what is required of me when is comes to where I need to find info and where I need to discuss my thoughts. (Online Data 27/08/00)
These postings reveal that students began to realize the challenge of the new online class. They felt excitement, anxiety, and panic. Because a distance class is considered an open class due to its network transmitted format, students needed to work on their own and depended on themselves for the most of the part. They could not contact their teacher or classmates as they could in a traditional class setting, but they had to learn to use a new format to communicate in a networked environment. Students in distance learning need to make connections to their teacher and classmates through the LearningSpace online communication tools; thus, effort is needed to tackle all possible problems. Students’ awareness of the possible barrier in a new learning format was helpful in arousing their attention to starting something new. They needed confidence to turn their anxiety into power to be successful in this class.
Lewin's conception of the "force-field" notion analyzes the individual learner in terms of equilibrium. The adult learners are directed to work in pursuit of their learning goals in certain patterns by a force that originates within and outside the individual learners (Lewin, 1952). The learners in the HES 3002 class also struggled with difficulties and resorted to a new way of learning to balance their conflict between time and space when they pursued their learning goals. As people already stepped in the Information Age, the ability to learn with informational technology has become a need. The learners in HES 3002 had to struggle in the process of developing their competency in order to keep pace with today's trend.
The following data indicated two main concerns: the technical issue and the format shift issue, which developed into our two themes of the study. The following sections delineate the two themes of the study.
Theme I: Technical Accommodation
Introduction to Theme I
The HES 3002 class in this study was a total distance learning class. It is situated in the learning network of the LearningSpace environment. It changed the traditional physical learning environment into a virtual learning environment. The LearningSpace's own facilities and features were important factors that affected learning in this environment effectively or ineffectively. And the user's technical background, capability, and flexibility in using technology were other important factors that determine the effectiveness of learning in LearningSpace. In the following section, I will discuss the data with a view toward technical problems that occurred in the HES 3002 class and how the teachers and students coped with these problems to accomplish their goals.
The
"Threshold" to the New Users
The CourseRoom was a place where most learning activities occurred. The discussion board in the CourseRoom was a place that provided a communicational and informational flea market to the class members. Through it, the teacher communicated with the students, and students communicated with their teacher and among themselves. Students posted discussions to share information about the class among colleagues. The period of the first few weeks was the important time in becoming familiar with the LearningSpace network and building relationships through the discussion board. Students got into the process of understanding the class and learning about their classmates and teachers. Students were exploring "how-tos" and "what-tos." Even though most of the students claimed that they already had basic skills in computers, their main technical problems still related to the use of the course network, LearningSpace. The discussion board became noisy and revealed the students' confused situation. Many postings brought complaints and questions into the discussion board.
In the beginning, students were not familiar with the use of the discussion board to "chat" about technical issues. They lacked the skills to successfully use LearningSpace. Many students came to a LearningSpace-assisted class with zest. But when they were challenged by the technical problems in LearningSpace, they fell into frustration and confusion. The discussion board became a place filled with technical complaints, questions, and fidgets. Students, intimidated by technical problems and dissatisfied with the use of LearningSpace, were under the pressure of a new study format. Many students took over 16 credit hours this semester, and were annoyed that this class only counted for two credit hours but it was so hard to take due to the technical and format shift problems. They were confronted with technical problems, and expressed irritation, and a lack of patience. Several postings were complaints about frustrations and technical hardship, such as
I hated it all. The class is dumb, everything is dumb. I almost got to the point where I wanted to throw my computer out the window. (Online Survey Data, 11/06/00)
Technology was a base for the networked learning. Even though students claimed that they already had enough technology to learn in this class, this survey response showed that their technology didn’t help them at this point. It may indicated that some of the students lacked appropriate ability to explore and learn the new things, and their technology skills cannot be transferred to a new technology-rich environment. The students were faced with a new challenge. The challenge the new learning network had brought with it was that it required efforts and persistence to acclimate to the LearningSpace-assisted class setting. Instead of exerting the effort to acclimate to this class, some students appeared unused to this environment and had limited patience with mediating technology problems, which per se became a barrier to the new users in this class. The period of the first few weeks looked like a test to them. For some students, once they were placed in a distance class, they felt that they lost all the advantages of face-to-face interaction that had been providing all kinds of stimulation of their interests and motivations to learn. This situation was especially obvious for the new distance-class takers during the first few weeks of the semester. Other students have the similar feelings about this class.
I feel (an) extreme amount of frustration due to the confusion I experienced. I am also somewhat intimidated. I really have to stay on top of things to keep up. (Online Data, 11/12/00)
…I have a lot of trouble finding and accessing articles posted on LearningSpace. I don't know if this is the problem with LearningSpace or instructor. (Online Data, 11/015/00)
Many students who felt frustrated and negative toward this class had done very well in the traditional classroom. When they entered this distance class, they didn't expect so many difficulties and were not prepared for these unexpected obstacles or this level of frustration. Technology was a good tool, but also a source of confusion and hardship for students unable to harness it.
Due to many questions I received about the students' technical problems, I went to the school LearningSpace network manager, Mr. Yellin, who said,
LearningSpace is complicated. It has many features and many functions but not arranged in a logically clear way on its interface. It's not user-friendly for new users. You must kind of be professional to use it. If you are new to it, it would help you get into confusion. When I started to learn to use LearningSpace, though with my own technical experiences, I spent two whole days to learn about LearningSpace, I still had many things confusing (Interview with Yellin).
The interface design was a problem that caused the students in the HES 3002 class to run into many barriers. Interface here meant the user interface on a computer monitor, where texts, graphics, and menus are displayed to enable the user to interact with the computer, access information, and issue commands. The Dictionary of Computer Words defines the user interface of a computer as
the way in which a user enters commands in a given program. There
are three main types of interface. In the command-driven interface, the user types commands from the keyboard. In a menu-driven interface, either the keyboard or a mouse is used to select an option from a menu displayed on the screen. In a graphical user interface, the user selects and activates functions by manipulating icons and pop-up window on the screen. While the menu-driven and graphical user interfaces are generally easier to learn and use, many expert users still prefer the command line interface because of its speed and efficiency (Kleinedler, et al., 1998, p. 282).
LearningSpace mainly has a graphic user interface that is not very user-friendly. It takes time to become familiar with its functions and features. Ninety-four percent of the students in the online survey in this study claimed that their computer capability was above the level of "enough for this class," but it seemed that this didn't help them very much in tackling the technical problems in LearningSpace. For example, although many students stated in the survey that they had computer experience with Microsoft Word, desktop publishing, Excel, and the Internet, they still felt uncomfortable using LearningSpace once they started the this class on the Internet. They needed to become aware of and knowledgeable about many things before they could successfully use LearningSpace. LearningSpace has its own specific technical structures that every student must learn about them in order to be successful. Several common problems were posted in discussion:
I posted a discussion. But why I cannot see it? Where can I find it? If anybody knows, please help me. Thanks. Sandy (Online Data 01/09/00)
I have a lot of trouble finding and accessing articles posted on LearningSpace. I don't know if this is a problem with LearningSpace or my instructor. Holly (Online data, 11/06/00)
It is very confusing and I feel we are somewhat left in the dark. Also, I feel we should have more interaction with the instructor. Danniel (Online data, 11/06/00)
Could someone possibly tell me how to attach something from a file. I wrote my entire assignment in WORD, then printed it out and then re-typed it into the box so I could submit it for a grade. I would just really like to know how to make this easier and just be able to attach it. Kay (Online data, 23/09/00)
Many students got trapped in the pitfalls of LearningSpace while working on their tasks. They found this network's numerous buttons and graphics, and multiple pages confusing. Navigating LearningSpace was like navigating a labyrinth: students found it hard to access things they needed. When students clicked on buttons in an effort to browse page by page, they were easily lost. Once lost, they first expected help from their teacher. They hoped to see their teacher and her involvement. But where was the teacher? The distance format didn't allow students to contact their teacher in the way they were used to. They had to wait and make an effort to look for help on the discussion board. Since one hundred percent of the students were first-time distance learners, their technical problems and confusion constituted a large part of the barrier in the class. They were new to this format, they were new to the LearningSpace database, and they had difficulties accessing information they needed for their coursework. Many students said that they were under the high pressure of school and work; they didn't have enough time to learn so many features in LearningSpace. They often wanted to get in quickly, check on coursework and assignments in a hurry, and finish their work as soon as possible, due in part to the fact that many undergraduate students commonly took four to seven classes a semester.
But LearningSpace needed users to spend time on learning about its features and functions before they could be successful learners with it. Students said they didn't have enough time to explore so many features in LearningSpace. The lack of time and exploration led to technical problems becoming the main topic of their comments on the discussion board. The discussion board was noisy with the posting of technical problems, complaints, and requests for technical support. As Jim said, there are many function features in LearningSpace, which is a good aspect. But too many features are arranged in a user-unfriendly manner that can confuse students.
Is anyone else a little bit lost or am I the only one? I'm OK with being the only one who doesn't have a clue, and I'm sure it's going to get better. Just curious. Brenda (Online Data 08/23/01)
OK, I sent a comment but I am not sure if it was sent. I have no clue as to what is going on. Where is the quiz that we are supposed to take? If someone knows what is going on, please let me know. Thanks. Ted (Online Data 08/23/00)
I am needing help getting around this computer, finding assignments, responding to assignments, what to read in the books and by when. I've already missed one quiz because I didn't have this information or was unable to find (it). Please help. Thank you. Wilson (Online Data 09/04/00)
Because of the interface confusion problem, study was affected from completing assignments to downloading texts, and uploading responses to participating in discussion homework. Missing something and failing to fulfill some requirement were common among the students in this class, as were procrastination and missed quizzes. Students were afraid that their grades would be affected, which exacerbated the intimidation and panic they felt while studying in this class.
The LearningSpace's interface was not designed carefully enough in minor ways. For example, some small graphics and signs functioned as hyper-linked buttons. Because they were not labeled with textual explanations to help users understand their functions, people without LearningSpace experience found it hard to understand how to use them. The program contained no prompts to tell people what to do when they got lost; there were no textual or graphic reminders or prompts to give warnings or guidance while students were doing assignments or other work. Quite often, if a student did one thing wrong, say in uploading an assignment, he or she might not know that an error occurred or why it occurred or why an assignment could not be uploaded to the right place. This type of failure was a hidden problem that often gave users trouble later. For example, if an assignment file was uploaded to a wrong place in LearningSpace, the teacher or students might not be able to find it; thus, the assignment was neither read by the teacher for grading, nor read by the classmates for comments or responses, which was an important part of the class activities. This problem affected the quality of the class.
The technical problem often annoyed the students, depletng patience and interest in learning, and making it difficult for students to adjust to this distance-class format. Student Alice showed her frustration with the technical problem of submitting assignment files to the LearningSpace; although she said that she submitted four assignment files to LearningSpace, both her classmates and teacher could not find her assignments there. That caused her to be accused of procrastinating on assignments. She reported to Dr. Rona, who assigned her GA (Graduate Assistant) Nancy to look for the assignment files. After two days, two of the assignments were found in another section instead of in the assignment section. When I asked Alice why, she said that somebody told her that she clicked on a wrong assignment title, so the files were published in the wrong place. But her other two files were still missing. She was worried about the other two assignments.
If LearningSpace had had incorporated a feature of prompting Alice when she had done something wrong, such as at the point when she submitted the file the wrong way, she could have avoided this confusion. But LearingSpace didn't have this function. Mr. Yellin told me that it was possible that many students could click on wrong assignment titles and submit files to a wrong place. When choosing an assignment title for an assignment, students had to click on the assignment menu bar. The menu dropped down and displayed a number of titles for assignments and teamwork projects. Students had to select the exact assignment titles that fit their assignments to ensure the assignments appeared in the right section of the assignment page. If they didn’t, problems could happen, confusing the students and creating additional difficulties for them and for teachers.
Mr. Yellin told me of another problem that he found with using LearningSpace. Currently, some Internet companies tend to automatically disconnect the users from the server if the companies find that computers have stopped using the Internet for a certain period of time. Because LearningSpace doesn't give students a warning about the disconnection of the Internet, they sometimes continued submitting their files to the LearningSpace online database. Their files actually were not submitted to the LearningSpace server, but to their own computer cache. The cache is a fold in the computer that contained saved Internet pages the computer owner used before. The cache fold saves those used pages so that when the user wants to turn to the same pages again, those saved pages will pop out from the cache fold in order to save the computer's downloading time from the Internet. When the Internet connection is cut off, the cache page is still in the computer. If LearningSpace doesn't prompt the user with a warning saying that the Internet connection would be or had been cut off, the users would not know, thinking that their assignment files had uploaded to LearningSpace the right way. That's why many students complained that their assignments were not found in LearningSpace, even though they had submitted them.
Mr. Yellin attributed the technical problem to three possible causes: 1) the LearningSpace interface design had many features arranged in too scattered a way; new users found it hard to understand and learn; 2) the students didn't learn enough about LearningSpace; once they opened LearningSpace to work on it, they just hurried through to fulfill the basic requirements of their assignments, then left; and 3) the students didn't want to invest time in exploring new things, like checking whether a posting or file was submitted or not. Actually, after submitting, students could check their work by opening the assignment page and clicking on RELOAD or REFRESH on the browser to see whether their work had been displayed in the right place. But many students only complained, not spending time to think about it and explore. With their experience being primarily on the Internet, they could not easily transfer their skills in Internet use to the use of LearningSpace. The transfer of knowledge is an ability to move the knowledge learned in one occasion to another (Pressley, 1995). Unable to transfer Internet skills and knowledge to the use of LearningSpace in the HES 3002 class indicated that the students' ability to transfer their knowledge of information technology was weak. This ability needed reinforcement through more specific training by the teacher, and more practice and experience of using information technology. Actually, the HES 3002 class was an opportunity for students to gain this ability.
The
"Black Box"--The Issue of “User-Friendly”
The reason why students complained about technical frustration is that LearningSpace is not designed user-friendly. The term "user-friendly" here means that LearningSpace should be designed to support an easy-to-use human-computer interaction interface, in which the computer is "designed to be easy for those without much experience to learn and use. User-friendly systems include such features as menu-driven or graphical user interfaces, online help, and a logical function organization that conforms to established standards" (Kleinedler et. al., 1998, p. 282). As computerized information sources increase, people place a high value on computer speed, ease of use, accuracy, and resourceful databases. As distance education is a new format of learning, its classroom is filled with a majority of inexperienced users who expect a computerized educational information system to be easy to use. "User-friendly" needs to fulfill three requirements:
1. The system is cooperative--it provides active assistance during the task and makes its actions clear and obvious.
2. The system is preventive--it acknowledges that people make mistakes by preventing those mistakes to the extent possible and by providing backout and recovery procedures.
3. The system is conducive--it is reliable, predictable, and assists rather that controls the user. (Borgman, 1987, p. 29)
The personal computer was the main context of the HES 3002 learning environment, and the HES 3002 course was situated in the LearningSpace interface. The quality of the LearningSpace interface determined accessibility and usability and, in turn, affected the effectiveness of learning and student satisfaction with the class. LearningSpace is not a “bad” software; it is pretty mature and is an extension of the Lotus Notes network, which has been used for years in business, corporations, and institutes. Because Lotus Notes is mainly designed for corporate internal communication, many of its features and functions were transferred to LearningSpace, which meant that LearningSpace contained many useful features and functional facilities.
But the features and facilities need to be designed in a clear, logical manner in order to help provide good information stimulation and guidance, leading users to comprehensible information so that they find it easy to process the information the program provides. A corporate employee generally has the luxury of time and the help of experience in learning Lotus Notes, and often the company arranges time and experts to teach and train novice workers using Lotus Notes. But for the students in the HES 3002 class, it was different. They were first-time distance-class takers with heavy course loads and other responsibilities, and with only one semester and one distance class during which to learn LearningSpace. Because they received no in-class training, they were different than the workers who have enough opportunity to learn or be trained to use a network system in a company over a long period of time. For the students, the time and effort they could invest in learning LearningSpace during one course was limited. And, when LearningSpace was designed in a scattered, ambiguous, or confusing manner, students grew frustrated, intimidated, and lost their patience and motivation to learn.
LearningSpace's many features and functions make it powerful enough to assist communication and provide access to curriculum content matter, such as in the case of the HES 3002 class the syllabus, the course schedule, the discussion, assignments, teamwork assignments, personal profiles, tests, quizzes, automated evaluations, and links to external web sites or databases. But having many features can not guarantee user-friendliness. Emily Gallup Fayen, a librarian at University of Pennsylvania, defines a few well-known characteristics pertaining to user-friendliness:
· Users cannot get "lost" in the system. The system always lets the user know what is being done and offers suggestions about what to do next. There are no surprises. The system does not, at the touch of a finger, go off and perform some action that is totally incomprehensible to the user.
· Users cannot enter illegal commands. The system prompts for certain user actions. If the anticipated choice is not made, the system does nothing or prompts again for the expected data, perhaps at the same time suggesting an appropriate choice.
· Users can choose among several different simple modes of data entry. One keystroke or perhaps pressing the Enter key is all that is required of the user. Some systems that are equipped with a mouse or other pointing devices allow users to enter data using the device or using the keyboard.
· Users are in control. The user is given enough information about the system to understand how it works and how to make it do what the user wants. The user has a mental model of the system. (Fayen, 1987, p. 54)
The students in HES 3002, the majority of whom were new users, easily got lost, thrown into the dark, or confused. They needed a user-friendly network that could help and guide the users to fulfill their tasks instead of confusing them while they were working with it.
"In-action help" is needed in LearningSpace. "In-action help" here means that while students are using LearningSpace, they get prompts or reminders. He/she could be intelligently guided away from an incorrect route by the computer program to a correct paths, or be provided with options as to fulfilling their tasks. Since there are no prompts to stop users from inputting incorrect keystrokes or making wrong choices, users of LearningSpace don't know what will happen or what has happened after an operational action. And finally, contrary to what Fayen suggest, is necessary, users are not given enough information about the LearningSpace system; they find it hard to understand how LearningSpace works and how to make it do what they want it to do. Based on Fayen's four main characteristics about user-friendliness, LearningSpace's design does not meet the specifications for being a user-friendly system. Because of this, the teacher and the students need to put more effort into learning how to use LearningSpace, and the producers need to invest more effort into researching and testing their products, researching their clients, and updating their products to meet the users' needs and follow the current trends to hold their marketplace and the trust of clients.
The
Risk Period
For the first time distance-class takers, the period of the first four to five weeks of the semester was a period during which students had a hard time with the use of LearningSpace and the new learning environment. They were confused, frustrated, and intimidated by the new learning environment, struggling to learn and to adjust to the class. Both teachers and students spent much time and effort on the technical problems and adjusting to the new environment. Because this period is usually the time for students to try a new class and make their decisions whether to keep or drop the class, this is a critical phase to help the learners accommodate to the distance class, to foster positive attitudes toward a networked class, and to prevent them from dropping out. I define this period as a risk period. In the HES 3002 class, ten out of fifty students, or 20% of the class enrollment, dropped out during this period. Their experience with and attitude toward this class was really negative. And many of them expressed that they would never take a distance class again. No distance-learning students means no distance classes. So how to support distance students during the risk period is a critical issue to the distance-class instructor.
What were the problems the students faced that made them feel so negative toward this class and drop it at the expense of their tuition and time? I conducted telephone interviews with two students who dropped this class. They revealed their stories. First I interviewed Tiffany, a student in Tulsa, who never came to the main campus after she enrolled in this class. She told me,
At the beginning, I could not get my password…. It took me three weeks to get my password. And some other problems [as to the] setting up. And once they get my password [to] set up, my facing [logon] couldn't work. And once I got started trying to sign on to the class, I couldn't figure out what's going on. I didn't have any paperwork [about technical tutorial]. I didn't have anything for a week in the mail. Since I didn't get a visual or a printed piece of paper, they just told me what my password was. I didn't know the separation of the character they are going to be [to logon]. So I called back to the professor, "Hey, why can't [I] get my password?" She had to call the technician people to go round and round. I've been down here since the beginning. And it took another two weeks to get things to go. And [for] three weeks I just felt barely getting started. We already had five reading assignments, a written synopsis about ourselves, a whole bunch of stuff. I was far behind. So I mean it was just crazy.… (Interview with Tiffany)
Tiffany also felt frustration when downloading PowerPoint presentation files, as did many other students. She said that it was strange that she could not download the PowerPoint presentation files from the LearningSpace course web site, even though she had Microsoft PowerPoint installed in her computer. The HES 3002 syllabus asked students to download a PowerPoint viewer from www.PowerPoint.com before they could download and view the PowerPoint presentation files on their own machine. Tiffany went to the web site and finally downloaded the viewer, but it took her a long time. This technical shortcoming added to the students’ frustration with using LearningSpace.
Moreover, it seemed that Tiffany didn't get enough technical support during her frustration period. When she had problems, she struggled alone and felt helpless. This exacerbated her frustration and anxiety. Technical support was really an important component to the students' perception about technology-assisted learning and of their motivation to be actively involved in a technology-assisted class (Lacky, 2000). The first few weeks were a risk period for new distance-class students; Tiffany failed to grow with the class, first technically, and then academically, which reduced her to a dropout student status. We can see the impact on her in her following statement about the class:
I didn't like it [this class] at all. I didn't find it helpful. I did not find it any different than [if] I went to the library [to] check out a book…even have a lecture that has been put on the board…. It is not efficient for me. I got nothing out of it for the time period…and for that particular class. It requires more work than some of my other (regular) three-hour classes.
Because of the technical problems that Tiffany experienced, she had to drop the class. Learning in the HES 3002 class was not efficient for her, and she became extremely negative about the problems she had in this class. Tiffany has three kids at home and a job responsibility. She took four classes at this university, one of them being the distance class. The time she had and effort she could devote to the exploration of LearningSpace was limited. So for the students like Tiffany, if LearningSpace had been "friendly" to them, they might not have had so much trouble using it and could have stayed with the class. But because LearningSpace was “unfriendly," students had to spend too much time and effort trying to find technical support or explore the program, which they could not afford. At the end of the interview, Tiffany said, disappointedly, "It was a waste of my time and money. Unfortunately, I have to take the class again next semester."
The second dropout student, Jane, also told me about her perception of and experience in this class. She said,
It seems that they didn't let us know what's going on very well, just letting us know where we were looking for things. And actually we tried to post some questions on the web board…. I thought we had midterm due, and I got work. We don't have the idea that we even had the midterm. If we don't know that ahead of time, then we wouldn't have to do that. It's fairly confusing I thought…. I didn't think that it was user friendly at all, [but] I think maybe in the future it will be helpful…. One time I did a quiz, she [teacher] said [she] just can't find it…. [I think] that even before the course started, to have a session with the professor like about the school, like a meeting, like a kind of going through everything. It's really easy to miss things. (Interview with Jane)
Jane insisted on the fact that technical confusion was her main problem; she didn't know what was going on in class, and she could not find things. The teacher couldn't find her quiz, and missed her midterm test. All these things made Jane uncomfortable with learning in this environment. She wanted a pre-session with her teacher prior to the class in which the professor could give students some orientation to the class and address technical issues so that the learners would find it easier to learn in this virtual field. The problem was that Dr. Rona only gave one technical orientation to the students at the Tulsa site, but Jane was at the main campus. She didn't get the orientation. With all her technical frustration, Jane was really unsure whether she could succeed in this class. She added:
I mean, I am pretty much an A student. I can make an A in a [regular] class…I can easily make an A in [a classroom] class. I have to keep certain GPA point for my scholarship. So I don't feel like worth risking my GPA on [taking] this class. (Interview with Jane)
Because Jane had a scholarship, which financially supported her education, she had to maintain a certain grade point average to retain her scholarship. Jane was an A student in traditional classes, but in this HES 3002 class, her experience turned out to be quite different. The intimidation and technical anxiety overcame her to the point that she thought she would fail, or at least be unable to learn well enough to keep a competitive GPA and sustain her scholarship. She felt that she had to drop the class. Jane's experience showed that this risk period screened out some of the students who were weak in technology and lacked the learning confidence necessary to take a technology-assisted class. Self-image and self-confidence are two factors that affect the learner's learning success (Mouly, 1982). In the traditional classroom, the learner's emotion and attitude are easier to identify. But in the distance class, they are not easy to feel out. Jane's example indicates that it is important to identify the learner's psychological needs and provide appropriate support. Because of the "distance" in the class, this task is even harder to realize. For a distance teacher, the ability to teach and the ability to identify the student's emotional or psychological needs are of equal importance.
Community
Support as a Solution
LearningSpace has a discussion board (also called communication board) where students post their discussion messages about course content, technical issues, and other topics. The teacher tried to make the full use of this board to create an academic community, where knowledge of any issue was initiated, reproduced, augmented, accumulated and refined. The knowledge generated could be shared by community members, and they themselves could structure a scaffold for their own development of understanding and creative use of what they had learned, technically and academically. Research shows that the learning process or activity relies heavily on interpersonal communication, as Vygotsky described in constructivist social learning (Vygotsky, 1981). In HES 3002, community support led to constructivist learning. Constructivist learning is based on students' active participation in problem-solving and critical thinking regarding a specific learning activity which the learners find relevant to their lives and engaging (Bull, et al., 1997). They "construct" their own knowledge by probing ideas and approaches based on their prior knowledge and background experience, applying these to a new situation, and integrating the new knowledge gained with pre-existing intellectual constructs (Vygotsky, 1978).
Vygostky's constructivism advocates
cooperative learning and scaffolding (Bull, et al., 1997). Dr. Rona supported,
activated, and solicited student participation in the open discussion and
exposed the students to heterogeneous discussions and arguments. The discussion
board was structured in such a way that technical information--ranging from a
specific level to a holistic level--could tie the individuals into a mutually
supporting whole. Anybody could initialize, reproduce (such as respond), reuse,
contribute to, and refine the messages to share the pains and gains in learning,
and alleviate the bitterness and tension caused by the technology of LearningSpace. A mutual understanding and common concepts
were cultivated under Dr. Rona's facilitation. Dr. Rona said that she tried to
scaffold on one hand, and establish student involvement in communication on the
other, until the students were capable enough to self-support and self-reliant
enough to cope with the risk period of the first few weeks. And students found
it beneficial to participate in online interaction and support each other.
Brenda said that most of her technical problems were solved by her reading the
classmates' postings about technical issues. She really enjoyed the community
and the ideas on the discussion board.
Teacher's
Scaffolding
Since the tough threshold in this class was the technical issue, new distance learners had an even harder time crossing it. The teacher of this class, Dr. Rona, took on the role of technical support and mediated the frustration and cultural change conflicts. The bridge that mostly connected students with students and students with the teacher was the discussion board. Dr. Roan made it a "flea market" for the participants to “trade” their messages, information, and ideas on any topics of the class. Many students were learning to use the threaded discussion to post and respond to each other on the problems they encountered. Once the students internalized the discussion culture, they began to take a role in discussion as part of their learning process, posting and responding to the discussions regarding their learning needs. Dr. Rona told me that she tried to use Constructivist approach to facilitate learning in this class. According to constructivist learning, the teacher's role is one of facilitator and supporter. Dr. Rona took on her role of guiding students out of the mysterious maze and starting them on the right track of learning as early as possible. Dr. Rona's technical support was more active during the first few weeks because this period was the hardest for the students to familiarize with the LearningSpace. Without certain time and effort on it, students could not learn how to use this network for study. After certain weeks, Dr. Rona’s support was mainly on the technically hard problems, or on the tricky questions, leaving the questions that had already been answered on the discussion board or that were easy to resolve by the students themselves, so that they could be motivated to be actively involved within the "zone of proximal development" of the HES 3002 class. Pressley and his colleague explained Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development:
The "zone" is defined as behaviors beyond a child's level of autonomous functioning, but within reach with assistance and as such reflect behaviors that are developing. Children learn how to perform tasks within their zone by interacting with more competent and responsive others who provide hints, prompts, and assistance to the child on an as-needed basis. These hints and prompts encourage the child to process the task appropriately, with such processing eventually internalized by the child---that is, the child ultimately performs the task without assistance, a development stimulated by the supportive interactions with others before autonomous functioning is possible (Pressley, et al., 1995, p. 230).
In summary, the zone of proximal development is the discrepancy between a learner's current knowledge level and the level of knowledge that he could acquire through help or facilitation from other people. This help was scaffolding (Vygotsky, 1981). Through scaffolding, the teacher provides information by helping the learners build a structure into which they put new information based on old information, and by helping the learners comprehend the new knowledge through situated experiences and by providing appropriate, just-in-time support for the learners. One example of this mutual support appeared in Ken's question and Dr. Rona's response to it:
Discussion Topic: I have a question about the assignments.
Created by Ken
We are to discuss everything that we read on this web site in a discussion room (discussion board) after we read it. It is to tell what we thought of the material. I think I might be lost on where to find information and what to do with it. If anyone has insight, please help! Ken (Online Data 27/08/00)
Reply to "I have a question about the assignments."
Created by Dr. Rona
Hi, Ken. All of the reading assignments, PowerPoints and materials that you are to read can be found in the Schedule under the appropriate module. For instance, go to the schedule, find module one, you'll see a blue twister (blue triangle) beside the title "Module One". Click on the twister, you'll see a document called Introduction, a document called Reading Assignment, a document called "The History of …" Dr. Rona (Online Data 31/08/00)
It had been mentioned in the LearningSpace tutorial that when a discussion topic had received a response, a small blue triangle (also called a blue "twister") would appear by the left side of the topic. Clicking on the small, blue triangle would reveal the titles of all the responses. This was how the threaded discussion presented the content of the responses to its readers. But not every student knew about this. The problem was that the blue triangle was so small, it looked like a small graphic dot instead of a hyper-linked triangle button. If a student overlooked the triangle on the discussion board and never clicked on it, the content of the response posting would not pop out. Then the student would miss the content of the discussion. This is one of the trickiest parts of the LearningSpace discussion board. Because of this, many students missed important information that could have had an impact on the effectiveness of learning in this class. Dr. Rona wanted to emphasize the small triangle in her responses to students. On the other hand, Dr. Rona helped Ken resolve this problem and also taught her how to use this tool. This was actually a help-and-teach approach that scaffolded the students out of the technical shadows.
As a teacher of a distance class, Dr. Rona found that providing technical support to the students had become a critical part of her responsibility in her instructional process. At the beginning of every semester, she paid special attention to common technical questions. When she responded to the students' questions, she usually mentioned the technical aspects that might occur to any new users, such as the blue twister, the PowerPoint viewer, and how to find assignments in the CourseRoom. If the question was posted on the discussion board, her response to that question would appear on the public discussion board and be viewed by all students in the class.
New users in LearningSpace could easily go astray due to the overwhelming number of links, graphics, and buttons connecting to many different "meta pages" (pages that can generate pages). How easy it was to get lost and how difficult it was to find what one wanted were the main problems for new users; LearningSpace appeared to require its users to take time and to be experienced before using it. At that time, many of the distance-class students were not experienced enough with the use of the difficult Internet groupware. Their first experience with LearningSpace was like a stranger driving into a new city. Without proper road signs and a mental model of the street layout, the new-comer could easily get lost and be unable to find his way to either the destination or home again. The students’ use of LearningSpace often conflicted with the LearningSpace design, which provided many features but no clear route or road map for users. The teacher, Dr. Rona, had to spend much time and effort on the discussion board to help out the confused students. The following is an example:
Discussion Topic: Confused
Created by Manning
How do I check my grades on quizzes and such [in LearningSpace database]? I am also confused on how many times per week I have to comment and what do I comment on. Do I only comment on what you send us to comment on? Manning (Online Data 11/09/00)
Reply to "Confused"
Created by Dr. Rona
Manning, your quiz grades and assignment grades can be checked from your profile. Go to your profile and click on portfolio. Only you can see your [own] grades from here. About your discussion, the syllabus indicates that you should participate an average of 2 times per week and that you should post a minimum of four original questions. Discussion includes your responses to the questions that I post and to the questions that your classmates post…. Dr. Rona (Online Data 13/09/00)
A distance-class teacher with a confusing network like LearningSpace needs special patience with students. Even though this point concerning grades had been mentioned in the tutorial section in LearningSpace, Manning still didn't know about it. After Dr. Rona's individualized facilitating, Manning's problem was solved. Scaffolding online is time consuming and requires patience, and the need for it suggests that not every student reads the syllabus carefully and remembers it in detail. Extra effort from the teacher is always expected.
Another example from the discussion board reveals how students’ impatience with technology grew into dissatisfaction, and even developed into anger. Student Canny was confused about submitting her quizzes. She posted a question in the discussion section for Dr. Rona, who responded to her question:
Discussion Topic: Quizzes
Created by Canny
I am a small bit worried about my quizzes and assignments reaching Dr. Rona. If you have a suggestion or answers, how can I be sure that my assignments are reaching the teacher? I just finished a quiz and am not positive that it got sent. I think I followed the correct steps, but how can I know for sure? (Online Data 28/08/00)
Reply to "Quizzes"
Created by Dr. Rona
You should receive automatic notification that the quiz was received if you marked your profile to enable mail notification. As for your assignments, after you submit them in the CourseRoom under Assignments, you should be able to go back later if your entry is there. You will also receive mail notification (if enabled) when I submit your grade for a writing assignment. You can also check your grades through the portfolio section of the profile. Dr. Rona (Online Data 31/08/00)
Dr. Rona replied to the student within three days to explain the technical features on how to find different things in the CourseRoom and grades in the Portfolio in LearningSpace. This was the common situation happening among the students: because LearningSpace provided so many sections of databases, students were easily overwhelmed by attempting to sort out the function of each database, or by becoming lost in one section and unable to find another section. These problems with the databases meant that the teacher would spend a significant amount of time trying to assist students with the technology; Canny's one question alone indicated that she needed help to understand three databases--CourseRoom, Profile, and Portfolio--each of which has a different function. The teacher's special attention was needed to help each individual student who was at a lower level of technology experience.
Dr. Rona commented in an interview that many students considered the teacher as the main source of technical support, as indicated by their content-area questions. If they had technical problems, students often asked the teacher for help, or blamed th teacher. She said, "I spend a lot of time on email for the first few weeks. I refer students to the school CIS Help Desk for the technical problems. But they always first come to me. They rarely go to the CIS Help Desk for support. I have to take the responsibility to help them, no matter whether it is individually or in groups."
Dr. Rona also replied quite often to many private phone calls from students requesting technical support. She spent time trying to reply to all of them, until her students were satisfied. Some of the students even came to her office to talk to her face-to-face; at these meetings, she always gave them support and explanations until the students felt their problems had been solved. But when “some of the students came to my office and I was not there, they were unhappy. They didn't like that," said Dr. Rona. Students viewed the instructor as the highest authority of the class. No matter what freedom the teacher allowed the students, the teacher was the final authority: she was the resource of the technical support, she determined the curriculum, the class procedure, and methodology, and she administered the assessment. In the eyes of the students, the teacher was also the reliable source of technical support and class information. That was the reason why the teacher's role was highly valued by the students, even in this distance-formatted class.
Because the HES class was a distance-learning format, learning happened any time and anywhere. Thus, Dr. Rona had to take the responsibility to communicating with her students any time and anywhere. When she attended a conference out of state, she took her laptop computer to the hotel, using the hotel's Internet jack and her AOL (America Online) account to communicate with her students via email and on the discussion board. The only thing Dr. Rona could not do was manipulate the LearningSpace course database from Lotus Notes, because she could only access Lotus Notes from the campus' internal Intranet. But that limitation didn't affect her communication with the class during her travels.
Jenny was one student who really appreciated being able to email Dr. Rona and receive an immediate reply. Each time she sent Dr. Rona private email, Jenny received a reply from her, leaving her feeling satisfied with the technical support from Dr. Rona. But Alice complained that on one occasion she sent an email to Dr. Rona to ask about technical problems, and, contrary to her expectation, Dr. Rona didn't reply to her. Alice waited for several days, and still did not receive any response from Dr. Rona. Alice said, "I sent an email to Dr. Rona about the missing grades. She didn't reply to me. I don't know why." Alice felt really uncomfortable and disappointed about that, and never sent private email to Dr. Rona again. When I asked Alice in an interview what the status of this problem was at a later point, she told me she found that somebody had posted the same question on the discussion board and it had received a reply from one of her classmates. Alice found her answer in that response, so her problem had been solved. But as to the fact that the instructor didn't reply to her student, Alice still felt uncomfortable. I asked Dr. Rona why she sometimes didn't reply to a student's email. She told me that if she saw that the student's question had been answered by someone on the discussion board, she might not answer that particular email. She wanted students to put effort into the class and learn how to take advantage of technology to learn.
As the instructor was considered as the highest authority of the class, when a student didn't get a reply to his/her email from the instructor, a misunderstanding could occur. Because the teacher didn't tell students that the unanswered email meant that the question asked had been answered on the discussion board by somebody else, the students might not know why the teacher didn't reply to some questions. This lack of mutual understanding could leave students feeling disappointed, helpless, and uncomfortable; their feelings could be hurt, their self-esteem undermined, or their trust in the teacher eroded, which could be detrimental to the relationship between the teacher and the students. This, in turn, could affect the atmosphere of the learning community: this kind of misunderstanding, or disconnection in the learning relationship, could be a hidden trauma in the development process of the online class.
The teacher's role as a technical supporter was especially important during the risk period. Dr. Rona said that she was fairly busy interacting with students and answering various technical questions at that point. Because LearningSpace was not very straightforward, students were confused and frustrated with its use at the beginning. Their ability to handle problems was limited. The teacher not only had to handle the technical problems, but also mediate the complaints, confusions, and misunderstandings to keep students emotionally motivated to participate in this class. Once students passed the risk period, and some of them even grew more mature with using LearningSpace, cooperative support grew more active among them. When this cooperative support happened, students felt more free to talk about technical issues, requesting support from their peers. Students were not restricted to any topics and felt free to extend discussions in any direction they liked. Dr. Rona indicated that she would like to participate less after the first few weeks of technical struggles. She found that any conclusions she drew on a topic killed the student discussion, because students considered her comments as final. Thus she tried to avoid talking too much on the discussion board, instead just reading what students communicated about; this further generated the approach of scaffolding and observing, letting the students go or by themselves. The sharing of information among students through the discussion board led to a cooperative learning atmosphere. Students consciously or unconsciously cooperating and brainstorming on some specific technical and academic issues out of their learning needs positively affected the students' achievement, self-esteem, and attitude toward this class and their peers.
Students’ Scaffolding
In the pedagogy of constructivism, learning is tied to the social milieu. The process of learning is situated and social-cultural. Language is the main tool for social interaction (Bull, et al., 1997). Dr. Rona placed high value on Socrates' didactic action in teaching and learning. Socrates valued learning by discovery through a dialogical manner (Main & Riise, 1995). Learning cannot be separated from social action. One of the most important parts of constructivism in HES 3002 was cooperative learning, which became a main vehicle for tackling technical barriers. Cooperative learning was embedded in the technical support among the students. Meanings were shared within the class group. Students became known to each other and survived learning through a co-construction of technical knowledge on the discussion board. Pressley and his colleagues indicate essential benefits of cooperative learning:
· It increases intrinsic motivation. Learning is more fun. Learning seems more personally meaningful.
· There are high expectations for success among cooperative learning participants.
· The mutual benefits of cooperation increase incentives to learn.
· There is high epistemic motivation, that is, high interest in the topic being studied, interest that extends beyond the small group. Cooperative learning might promote the long-term commitment to learning required to keep students in school, largely by improving students' attitudes about school.
· There
is high task persistence. (Pressley, et al., 1995, p. 118)
As the cooperative learning in this class was socially contextual on the discussion board, the discussion board worked as a web hub that connected everyone in this class. But when students first came to the discussion board, it looked unfamiliar, boring, and irrelevant to them. Students didn't know what it was like to be involved in the discussion. "When I wanted to discuss, I didn't know how to use this discussion board, and what I should do on it. It scared me," Delia said. But after a time, the students gradually learned how to discuss; more and more postings appeared on the discussion board. The students' posting or participation was rewarded with responses, support, and information feedback. Students began to realize that the discussion board was rewarding and relevant to them, and that reading discussions was beneficial. Their understanding of and attitude toward the discussion board changed, and it became a dependable place to communicate with classmates. Cooperative learning is most effective if the cooperation can provide both group rewards and accountability (Slavin, 1985). When the students' experience with LearningSpace accumulated, their learning relationships and interdependency were established progressively. Alice said:
When I have technical questions, I will turn on the computer to see discussions and look for the familiar names who often post technical solutions. (Interview with Alice)
The experience told the students that LearningSpace tools such as the discussion board were meaningful, dependable, and relevant to them. With time passing, the freedom to use the discussion board developed gradually. Every step forward was a step toward a new format of learning in the Information Age. Students like Jenny benefited from sharing thoughts and communicating on the discussion board. They engaged in discussing how and what to do, and activated their potential to communicate as well as students in a regular classroom can. There were some threads of postings discussing technical issues that showed how students tried to use the discussion board to talk as freely as any daily communication in a traditional classroom:
Discussion Topic: Assignment
Created by Kim
Could someone possibly tell me how to attach a file (to discussion)? I wrote my entire assignment in word and then printed it out and then retyped it into the box so I could submit it for grading. I would just really like to know how to make this easier and be able to attach it. Thanks. Kim (Online Data 09/23/00)
Response to "Assignment"
Created by Leonard
Kim, when you finish your document, save it onto your disk or Drive C. Secondly, you hit the "Browser" button below, go into the drive where you saved the document and then open the document (file)…(W)hen you hit the open button, it will put the file into the File Attachment slot. Then just (click on) "Save & Close." You can check it by clicking on the (attachment) icon in your assignment document (usually below the file attachment section) to see if you can pull it back up. Hope this helps! Leonard (Online Data 09/23/00)
Kim wrote a posting on the topic of "Assignment," but it was actually a call for technical support to the whole class. Anyone in this class could see and respond to it. Leonard read it, and posted a response to help Kim on the same day. Kim received Leonard's response from the discussion board, and her problem was solved with this interactive peer support. Another thread of posting started by Clarky also evidences the use of the students' mutual support to conquer the technology problems.
Discussion Topic: Attachment
Created by Clarky
I am also, as another individual stated, having problems sending attachments. If anyone can help me out and tell me how this is done, I would appreciate it. Thanks. Clarky. (Online Data, 09/24/00)
Response to "Attachment"
Created by Allen
When you click on the "Begin Your Assignment" at the bottom of the page of the screen, it comes up where it should be a thing that says "File Attachment." Click "Browse." Find you file in there. You may have to click the arrow at the bottom of the window and select "All Files" to be able to locate your files. Select you file and click "Open." Your file is uploaded and its file name should show up next to the File Attachment in the Assignment Window. Then you are done. Allen (Online Data, 09/24/00)
Students offering variety of support in discussion board increased each others' confidence in learning with technology. The online mutual support is actually a seen, felt, and rewarding outcome of the interaction. Once a student's problem had been posted and answered by others, they all grew more sure of the effectiveness of accessing other people in the class, and they were more willing to participate in the interaction in order to learn. The more familiar they became with the discussion board, the freer chats they placed there. Because the students were separated by distance but linked by technology, their capability to manipulate technology grew as the class activities evolved. The deadly, sterile discussion board became lively. The more students used it, the more lively the discussion became. When Bloom discusses learning interaction, he indicates that the interaction is “the major factor in accounting for the cognitive learning of the students, their interest in school subjects and school learning, and their confidence in their own learning capabilities" (Bloom, 1981, p. 86). The increase of the discussion quality and frequency marked the increase of the effectiveness of the HES 3002 class.
Another thread of discussion reads like a free chat among friends, although it pertains to technical problems. We can see how the students posed the question, expanded the topic, and drew the solution:
Discussion Topic: Save & Close
Created by Larry
For Everyone
I seem to be having a problem getting my discussions to "save". Each time I attempt a discussion, I am unable to find it later. Is anyone else having this problem? Larry (Online Data 31/08/00)
Response to "Save & Close"
Created by Delia
I, too, am having a little problem writing part of my assignment then save that to add to (my discussion) later. Any suggestions? Delia (Online Data 03/09/00)
Response to "Save & Close"
Created by Van
I had the same problem while use Netscape but when I switched over to Internet Explorer, it worked just fine. Van (Online Data 31/08/00)
Response to "Save & Close"
Created by Larry
Van, how did you switch to Internet Explorer? I think that is what I use anyway. Larry (Online Data 01/09/00)
Response to "Save & Close"
Created by Van
On my computer, I have the option to use Internet Explorer or Netscape. I just click on the one I want. If you don't have one of them, you can probably download it. Just try searching for it. Van (Online Data 06/09/00)
There were five discussions in this topic thread. The discussion started from the question of how to "Save & Close." As the discussion progressed, the topic expanded to how to use Internet Explorer for this class to achieve a better effect. This spontaneous peer support was most effective among students when they collaborated on the specific tasks that they encountered during learning (Johnson & Johnson, 1975). "Up with each other" instead of "competing with each other" characterized the expectations of the students of this class. An online, effective open discussion of the problems generated "just-in-time help" (Bull, 1997) that made students feel closer to each other and minimized the "transactional distance" (Moore, 1993). The concept of the "transactional distance," proposed by Moore, means a distance of understandings and perceptions that may lead to a communication gap or a psychological distance between participants in the teaching-learning situation. He indicates that the transactional distance must be overcome by the distance-learning participants if effective learning is to occur. In HES 3002, the communication gap and the psychological distance were filled by increased participation and understanding. The motivation to interact increased as the students' needs could be met in the discussion in terms of their particular interests. During interaction, students developed their interdependence, interpersonal skills, and individual accountability to foster intellectual growth, while adopting collective wisdom to solve technical problems during study.
Tam was a student who worked in a police department as a 911 operator in Tulsa. She has two children. Her family and job responsibility made her choose this distance class so that she could take care of her children while working in Tulsa and studying at home in a distance class. Her problem with LearningSpace was "confusion" and not knowing “how to use a computer that well." LearningSpace was not "friendly" to her. But her difficult experience with this was minimized by the support of her classmates, which made this "old student" step out of the risk period. She said:
I get more support from classmates than from the teacher…(A)t the beginning of the class, I was confused. I didn't know what to do. I could not logon (to LearningSpace), and I could not find things in LearningSpace. My files could not be submitted (uploaded) to the LearningSpace. I have difficulty to find assignment and grades. When I have problems, I post them. I get technical support from my classmates. Sometimes I open the discussion board to see other people's discussion about technical issues. Then I got the answer. That's the way I usually solve my problems. (Interview with Tam)
When students felt that they were freer to talk and to request support from among themselves, they felt that they became capable distance learners. This released the teacher from a heavy supporting work load, and allowed her to perform a scaffold-and-let-go situation to allow students to explore by themselves. When technical barriers were alleviated, students began to put on more content-related postings in the areas of professionalism, ethics, and information management. Effective learning took place.
CIS Technical
Support
When Dr. Rona was bombarded with technical questions, she also referred the students to another source of technical support, the school Computer Information Services (CIS) Office, where they cold get information on how to use LearningSpace. The CIS crew were experts regarding computers and network. The CIS played the role of technical support at the school level and maintained a stable server system. Dr. Rona noted during the semester, "Most of the time, I can resolve the problems students ask me about. But sometimes, I refer them to the CIS Help Desk. They are experts. I give students the CIS phone number and their email address. They can contact them, especially for those problems that I cannot solve, such as those relating to hardware and software." But in the HES 3002 class, few of the students resorted to the CIS Help Desk for technical support. When students developed technical problems at the beginning of the semester, they first contacted Dr. Rona for support, by phone or email, because the first authority of this class they were aware of was the teacher.
The CIS Help Desk manager Rilly, who was in charge of the LearningSpace network for the university, explained in an interview how CIS supports distance courses:
We have to make sure we have a solid infrastructure for the server. We want to make sure the students and faculty will have uninterrupted service as far as the server uptime goes. So we just try to make sure the system works as stable as possible and the students and faculty can access their course (online) all the time. Even if there is any type of down time to the server or the Internet activity, we try to put up an announcement on the web site to announce any kind of down time in advance. And also we have lots of online (technical) tutorials and resources both for the faculty and for the students, and provide enough training for the faculty. At the beginning of the semester, we try to keep track of all the students (who enrolled for LearningSpace class) get their logon ID and password correct so that they can logon to the system.
Students reported very few complaints about the CIS service, because most of the problems were handled within the class with their instructor and among students themselves. Even though CIS received few requests for technical support, some minor problems did happen. For instance, due to late enrollment, some of the students didn't find the right channel to get their passwords and logon IDs. When Rilly received a report from Dr. Rona about logging-on problems, she immediately helped Dr. Rona set up the connection for her students in the network.
The server operation was another concern in regards to keeping LearningSpace running. Student Jim said, "I don't have any problem using LearningSpace to learn. The only thing I am concerned with could be the server goes down." CIS tried to maintain a good operation of the network system to keep the server running appropriately. Rilly indicated that LearningSpace "has its own dedicated server. It's been a non-stop for the entire semester. We rarely rarely have any outages."
Several students reported that there were occasions when they could not log on to LearningSpace, which probably meant that the server was down, Rilly said. The CIS network system had a few cases when they had scheduled server maintenance, which lasted no more than thirty minutes at a time. When this happened, Rilly emailed all the instructors and students in advance about the upcoming maintenance.
Another possible problem was that One-Net Internet, the service provider, went down. Rilly explained that posibility:
One-Net is the Internet connectivity system, which is the backbone of the school Internet server system. It comes from Oklahoma City through a fiber-optical network. Sometimes One-Net could be down for a very short period of time; that could interrupt our school Internet service. But it is not our school's system problem, nor a problem of Lotus Notes and LearningSpace. This problem is unpredictable. But it rarely happens, and only lasts for a few minutes if happens.
Rilly said that she cooperated well with Dr. Rona's class. Because of this cooperation, very few problems happened that related to the school network service, and students had their problems solved if they contacted her or the CIS Help Desk. Rilly also remarked that the school computing network service office was expecting some new products from the Notes Company to come out. The school wants to upgrade the Internet system to a higher level of quality once the new products come into play, which would help make the network service easier for administrators to manipulate and more convenient for the students to use.
Positive
and Negative Attitudes Toward the Class
After the risk period, students began to see the advantages of this class and LearningSpace. During interviews, many students demonstrated their satisfaction with Dr. Rona's technical support during the risk period, which enabled them to connect to the LearningSpace database to access the course materials when they were most frustrated. Jim said, "I think Dr. Rona has done a good job…. I enjoyed the professor." Jane said, "When I emailed her (Dr. Rona) with questions, she was very quick to respond to my email." Maggie also told me about her attitude toward LearningSpace and Dr. Rona's online class in a telephone interview:
It's pretty organized. It's kind of all in an outline. Explaining everything what's going to happen and when. Just like distributing discussion sometimes…any time I had question like with my essay, I couldn't get to extend, I emailed [to Dr. Rona] and she was pretty responsible to that. She seems pretty caring. (Interview with Maggie)
The teacher's effort on behalf of the students and the class interaction was valued and rewarded in the students' response. It was this factor that produced a cohesive bond that held the students to the class. No matter what happened, this factor was true in class.
Maggie was one of the few students who lived close to campus. She had the opportunity to visit Dr. Rona in person. In an interview, Maggie talked about her contact with Dr. Rona when she was seeking instructions on how to use LearningSpace and how to do the assignment in modules:
|
Question: |
Do you think the teacher's attitude toward students is OK? |
|
Answer : |
I think it's pretty well. Any time I had question, like with my essay, I couldn't get to extend, I emailed to her, and she was pretty responsible to that. She seems pretty caring…. She is really nice, I think…. I only saw her [Dr. Rona] once. I came into her office about [uploading] midterm [into the LearningSpace]…. I didn't understand how I was doing wrong. And she had actually sat on a chair, showing what I was doing on computer, [and] what I was doing wrong. (Interview with Maggie) |
The teacher's and students' efforts to collaborate with each other in HES 3002 helped build rapport among them and freed students from technical intimidation, anxiety, and frustration. This collaboration contributed to a firm connection among the learners, between the learners and the teacher, and between the learners and the curriculum content matter, so that effective distance learning could occur. To some students, such as Jim, Brenda, Mike and Maggie, LearningSpace was user-friendly. Jim liked using LearningSpace; he said, "LearningSpace is easy to learn, very convenient to use. It has many features for you to choose from…. I have no problem using LearningSpace."
Mike also had a good opinion of using LearningSpace. He said, "I have no problems using LearningSpace. The setup of LearningSpace is nice." He added, "I like the threaded discussion board. It helps us discuss and respond conveniently. And it is easy to open and see all the responses from people." Jenny used to be intimidated by using LearningSpace, but she changed her attitude after a period of time: "It (LearningSpace) was difficult in the first few weeks to get used to it. But it is fairly easy for me now." Brenda also expressed the same opinion about using LearningSpace: "At first, it was really hard because I am not very computer literate. I called the Help Desk, and asked her if I could get help with it. Now it's really pretty easy. It's not hard any more. It's user-friendly, I think."
As they became free of technical confusion, students felt a sense of
community in this online class. They felt that they were cared about or could
be cared about any time if they accessed the discussions board, which
indicated a positive impact from LearningSpace to
this class.
After almost one semester's study, many students grew accustomed to using LearningSpace. They passed the risk period and changed their attitude toward this LearningSpace-assisted class. But there were still some students who felt uncomfortable with the technical features of LearningSpace. Dr. Rona said that many of the students could not adjust to the new technical situation. Their patience and dedication to the class were limited, and their learning was technically baffled and disconnected. For example, Tiffany procrastinated on her assignments due to being unable to download PowerPoint presentation files, which, in turn, jeopardized her grades in the final assessment and extinguished her motivation and enthusiasm for this class.
Many problems resulted from LearningSpace itself. Jane's description about her experience with LearningSpace was negative:
It (LearningSpace) seems that everything was so scattered. That it didn't help you go and find what you want, such as syllabus and assignment. They are on different pages. And also the discussion board. It doesn't look like very organized that you can just go to one place and find out what you need to do. I found myself like taking a lot of time to look for everything. I didn't really have time to do that. You know what I am saying. So it's really frustrating people. (Interview with Jane)
Jane and Tiffany dropped the class because of their intimidation by and discomfort with the technical problems of LeaningSpace. Their experience with the HES 3002 course was bitter. "I wasted three hundred dollars and time. I have to take it again next semester in a traditional class. I'm really unhappy about this class," Jane said.
Another example of unclear or confusing features was that the hyper-linked icons did not show sufficient clues to the users. For instance, at the bottom of every discussion page were seven icons. The first two of them are to turn to the previous or the next page to see the previous or the following 50 discussion postings; the next two buttons were to expand the threaded discussion or collapse the threaded discussion. These icons were very convenient for the users to view discussions, but they were placed at the bottom of each discussion page without function descriptions on them. Students didn't know what functions they had unless they rolled the mouse over them, causing the text explanations to appear. And, because these icons look like some decorative graphics at the bottom of the page, they did not call much attention to themselves and were easily overlooked. Many students didn't know how to use the graphic icons even by the end of the semester, which caused them to lose many opportunities to take advantage of these features. But if those icons were placed more effectively, by location or by animation, with some easier-to-see explanations on them, students would more easily utilize them to assist learning earlier in the semester. Even though LearningSpace is a versatile network, its shortcomings had limited its broad acceptance by some learners. On the other hand, the learner's self-discipline and self-motivation were also critical factors affecting the effective use of a distance-learning tool.
Summary to Theme I
Theme I presented the data of the LearningSpace-assisted HES 3002 class concerning the issue of technical accommodation. The students' experiences and their attitude toward using LearningSpace were demonstrated and analyzed. HES 3002 was a class burdened by struggles with technical barriers. LearningSpace was a backbone network for this distance class. It provided many features that could facilitate connections in learning. Its discussion board had a generally positive impact on students in this class, but the interface design of LearningSpace was not sufficiently user-friendly. When the new users used it, it caused confusion and frustration, and exacerbated their intimidation to take this class among the students during the first few weeks--the risk period.
Technology could connect learners to learning and could also disconnect learners from learning. Students who had extensive computer experience and those who had the ability to explore and learn new things quickly could adjust earlier to the use of LearningSpace, their learning was “turned on,” so they were technically, cognitively, affectively, and emotionally connected to this class. Those whose computer skills were low, or who had some computer skills but were unable to explore enough, or who were not diligent enough, could not effectively find appropriate technical information and resolve the problems they encountered, and could not adjust quickly to the use of LearningSpace. They had more difficulties learning with LearningSpace. They were frustrated and intimidated, resulting in low participation, less enthusiasm, procrastination, and negative attitudes toward this class, and even, for ten of them, resulting in dropping this class and having to take this course again the next semester in a traditional format. Their time and money were wasted. Jane and Tiffany were the two of the ten students who dropped the class simply because they were not comfortable or successful in learning with LearningSpace. Their learning was “turned off;” they were technically, cognitively, affectively, and emotionally disconnected from this class.
Theme
II:
Format
Shift Dilemma
Introduction
to Theme II
Theme II presents the data regarding the change of learning format and their related problems. The progress of the HES 3002 class was affected by format shift problems. Theme II also includes the strengths of this learning format, learning habit changes, learning style adjustments, and the misunderstanding and conflicts between the teacher and the students. Although technical problems were the main topic in Theme I, they were also part of the factors that affected the learning format shift, and so they are also discussed in Theme II. When we delineate the points in Theme II, we find that some of the content may overlap with those in Theme I, including the technical issues. But it will give us a new understanding of how students struggle to learn with format shift problems.
The New
Learning Format
The e-learning class is a different format than the traditional class. In this class, HES 3002, students used technology to learn, and the class didn't have a specifically scheduled meeting period; instead, the class takes place asynchronously any time and anywhere. Students schedule their own time to access the class for their own learning. One negative side of this format was that the distance class (HES 3002) lost the immediacy of interaction and the effect of face-to-face communication (Moore, 1989).
The HES 3002 distance class attracted 50 students for the fall semester of 2000. Students enrolled in this class out of their intrinsic motivation, their personal interest and curiosity, with the purpose of gaining distance-learning experience, balancing heavy study or work load with family commitment, and so on. Many of the students thought that learning in a distance class would be the same as in a traditional class, or even easier than in a traditional class. Some students said in surveys, “I choose to take this class because I want to get easy grades.” and “I just felt interested in taking an online class.” Other student said, "I thought this class would be easier, but it turned out to be the opposite." To learn how to learn through a distance class is a challenge and an experience-based growth process. Students encountered problems, fixed problems, struggled between distresses and expectations, and fought against the interference of disconnecting factors to persist in their studies. As one hundred percent of the students in this class were novices to distance learning, the issue of the uncomfortable format shift became another major topic in the learning process. What challenges arose from this new format of learning? What were the students' attitudes toward the new learning issues? And how did the participants cope with the challenges and problems when they learned with LearningSpace? These questions are explored and discussed in this chapter.
A Powerful
Tool
"This is a totally different class," many students commented. Students need time to adjust to technology-assisted learning to be effective learners. Studies of traditional classrooms have shown a connection between classroom interaction and students' attitude toward learning (McHenry & Bozik, 1995). With learning on the network, the interaction format has changed, as has the learning format. Online interaction is a powerful instructional strategy that results in positive learning outcomes (Daly, et al., 1990). Online communication is different from classroom communication. Each has its own strengths. Brenda, a social worker who used to be a counselor and had ample experience interacting face-to-face with people, said about the learning interaction in LearningSpace in an interview,
This class is interesting, and related to myself…. In LearningSpace communication, you get more real answers, more honest answers and more opinion-related answers than you would in face-to-face, because people are rather afraid to talk face-to-face…. I think the reason (why) that's better than a traditional class is because you are not face to face with people. A lot of people have problems talking in front of people for fear of being looked at. They don't want to speak in a classroom full of people….like for being told what you are talking about is wrong, what's not supposed to talk about like that, by professors or by students. People don't like to be wrong, and don't like to be looked at, embarrassed, stupid or so…. You are more apt to have the discussion and speak out mind even if it is different from anybody else's, because you are not telling somebody face-to-face, you are telling the computer basically. So you are not so afraid…. The human-to-human contact can make it difficult sometimes… (Interview with Brenda)
Brenda's comments reveal benefits of the online course that counter expectations that traditional classroom interaction generates more ease of expression. The asynchronous network can avoid the potential for embarrassment and intimidation that can happen in face-to-face conversation. This benefit actually had attracted many people who preferred a communication style of asynchronous interaction so as to avoid possible frustration and discomfort. According to Wegerif (1998), "The asynchronous network communication empowers the learning interaction in a social dimension" (p. 98). In this sense, text-based communication in the network is sociable, because LearningSpace had a discussion board which held the conversation in a public space so that the participants in the class could access it as they like and talk to as many people as the people like to "listen."
Some people regard the drawback of the asynchronous network as the absence of indirect cues, such as facial expressions, voice, vocal tone and body language. Classroom teaching is always associated with the teacher's skills in face-to-face communication. The impact of the facial expression is vitally important in conveying messages of instruction. Flanders and his colleagues have defined two categories of classroom interaction components: direct influence and indirect influence. With indirect influence, the feelings, tones, facial expressions, and even pauses are cues that can bring meaning to face-to-face communication; lecturing, giving facts or opinions about content or procedures, expressing ideas, asking rhetorical questions, giving directions, and criticizing or justifying authority are considered direct influence (Flanders, et al., 1985). In LearningSpace-distributed learning, only direct influences were utilized: the course content and the curriculum. Typical indirect influence was lost, including such indirect cues as feelings, tones, facial expressions, pauses, etc. This loss had a significant impact on students, especially those in a distance class for the first time. Switching away from a learning format that they had depended on since childhood to a totally new format, which itself had some shortcomings and deficiencies--like using a non-user-friendly, confusing network, and talking to someone without immediate feedback--led many students to feeling frustrated and in the dark once they entered LearningSpace. And this loss was hard to completely compensate for in a totally asynchronously interactive classroom. Students had to adjust their learning styles and habits to fit the existing tools to which they had access.
The school network manager, Mr. Jack, told me another story in an interview about his friend who took this class:
One of my friends was a student in this LearningSpace-assisted distance class. She told me that the participants (in that class) never met. But after the class, she emailed me that she really appreciated this class. It was the first time she ever felt so free to express herself. And the first time she ever felt she had been accepted. She commented that she was a large and overweighted woman. She felt nobody listened to her because of her size. She was fragile [sic] to express herself because of that. However, studying online, nobody would do that. All people knew was what she was saying and what she was thinking. Distance learning overcomes this cultural difference and bias…. We live in a world full of all kinds of prejudice, you know? …If I see your face, I am going to ascribe certain stereotypical beliefs to you. If I don't see your face, all I see is your ideas. Then I have to react to you simply on the strength of your ideas…. So I think she is much more honest, much more open, and a lot better (in a class of this format). (Interview with Jack)
Mr. Jack's remarks revealed one of the strengths of the asynchronous learning that motivated students to come to this class. His friend had been intimidated by the physical presence of her classmates while taking a course in the traditional classroom. The focus on language and ideas in the distance class resolved her intimidation and provided her with one more choice for learning.
Sue was an African American student whose opinion added to the diverse perspectives of this class. With her, interaction online was as easy as face-to-face communication. She values the advantages of online asynchronous interaction highly, noting that online communication
is the same as (face-to-face) communication with them
(students at
Sue's remarks added a minority group member's views to Brenda's and Mr. Jack's opinions about asynchronous learning. The asynchronous networked interaction avoided unnecessary emotional frustration. People who feel intimidated or uncomfortable talking to people in a face-to-face situation might feel more comfortable choosing an asynchronous distance-learning class where people didn't see each other in the learning process.
But to many students in HES 3002, a shift to the new format of class was challenging. Once they made the choice of this learning format, their accommodation to a totally online distance-learning class was an arduous process. They needed to change the learning habits that had been rooted in their life from childhood. It took a period of difficulty to adjust to this format. They gained some advantages in this class, but lost something also. They had to make an effort to change their personal learning style to fit this format in order learn. The successful adjuster is a successful distance learner. Those who adapted to this format well could survive this class, so fitting into this learning format was a threshold that every student had to cross to be successful.
Issues
of Student Discomfort
The complaints about this class were filled in the interviews. Students relieved their discomfort about this learning format. Jim talked about the drawbacks and annoyances of this class:
This class is a fairly sterile environment. I don't feel I participated enough to get a sense of community in this class. The human touch as we do to enhance the online learning would never be the same as the energy you get when someone (is) sitting there (in the classroom)… This may be the only downside of this class. (Interview with Jim)
But according to online observations made for this study and to what Jim said during the interview, he posted very few discussions on the discussion board; nor did he look at the discussion board very often. This could account for part of the reason why Jim felt isolated during this class, because the discussion board was the place for students to communicate and gain membership of the class (Moore, 1989). Non-participation in the discussion meant a loss of the most important opportunity to be part of the community and to receive support and share the thoughts of the class. A feeling of isolation did occur in a distance class, but the dynamics to overcome the isolation needed joint efforts towards participation to create an effective community (Wegerif, 1998).
Kim, an Asian American student, reported her attitude towards using computers to learn. She expressed her resistance to adjusting to this distance class. She said:
I just don't like it very much. It's some kind of…[not like] I really just take the class…[I] don't like LearningSpace. It don't feel like to get on the computers. Like I kind of forget sometimes that I have class on my computer. I really want to just go to class every day. (Interview with Kim)
When the class started, 24% of the surveyed students expressed that their purpose in taking this class was the desire for getting "easy credit hours." But after they took it for a while, students found they were wrong. One student said in the online survey, "I though it would be easier than the on-campus class, but it is exactly the opposite" (Online Data, 11/06/00).
Brenda observed that once the students moved into a distance class, they found that they had lost something. Even though she advocated the use of asynchronous interactive learning, she revealed that a nostalgic feeling for the face-to-face classroom crept in:
(In the traditional classroom) They not only communicate verbally, they also communicate to see the face to communicate nonverbally. Because sometimes you can read people by communicating, just face to face, not actual talking. And you can tell how people really feel about it…. You can sit down face-to-face questioning it and (realize) how passionate they are when they are talking about it. (Interview with Brenda)
The habit of communicating face to face in the classroom was deeply ingrained in students. Once they left the classroom, they were not accustomed to this isolated, asynchronous and text-based learning environment. When students in HES 3002 first began to learn online, they often felt that they missed assignments, forgot the schedule, lost quizzes, etc. For example, when the students had trouble finding schedules, assignments, tests, or grades in LearningSpace, they could miss class tasks or procrastinate on assignments. When they were busy taking classes in the regular classroom and doing other projects, they could forget that they even had a class online because it didn't have any scheduled class meeting time and no sense of a physical classroom with the presence of a teacher: students were not required to meet in class at a specific time or location to see their teacher. In an interview, Canyon remarked:
It's not hard to check, but I still don't really feel as if I know what to do and when to do it. I missed several discussions I posted. I don't know if I'm doing what I ought to do, if I only talk to my (discussion) group and if I get (involved) in other discussion (groups) too? (Interview with Canyon)
When students felt uncomfortable taking a distance class, it might have been due to the fact that they felt they had lost face-to-face human interaction, personal feeling, and expressive facial cues, or been disconnected from the most effective ways to contact their teacher and their classmates for class information. This isolated feeling crept in many new learners and psychologically affected students’ motivation and enthusiasm in this class. So there was no authoritarian watch and push, plus the technical problems and the uncomfortable format, students felt like that with this course, the class was loose and not convenient to access, the technical environment was confusing, the curriculum and tasks were missing, and the people were unseen. This kind of autonomous learning made students feel like nothing to do or uneasy to do.
Resistance in Class
The students in this class were taking a distance course for the first time. Their learning styles were still rooted in the habits developed in traditional classrooms. LearningSpace provided an environment that supported an asynchronous learning format, which conflicted with traditional learning habits. Thus technological experience was not the sole factor in being successful in this course. Adjusting learning habits was also an essential factor to success. A successful learner was one who could flexibly adjust to the networked environment and be active in participating in the learning process. An asynchronous network allowed more time for reflection, but the learner forfeited the interactive immediacy. When students felt uncomfortable in a distance class, they often compared its disadvantages to the advantages of the traditional classes. The following is how students in HES 3002 thought of the traditional class in comparison to their experiences in the distance class:
I would say I just like classroom better as actual (learning) period. So I feel very negative toward this class. It seems essentially there's really nothing more I believe that can give you the knowledge you need to know. But you don't have that one on one interaction…. One-on-one just like lectures in the classroom. (Interview with Jenny)
Sometimes I have problems thinking of the topics, thinking of discussion to start (with). I think it easier to sit in the class and talk to somebody else face-to-face, and listen to their comments, and comment on their comments, and then give your own sort of discussion. (Interview with Lan)
(In the future) I would not choose to take a distance class unless there is no traditional class. I think I learn much more in the traditional class, because I listen to the lecture, I take notes from the lecture, and I have more interaction with classmates in a traditional class setting. That's the way I learn from elementary to high school and college. (Interview with Glen)
The first distance class was a test for those students. It seemed that the concepts of the traditional format of learning had become a strong temptation, luring students away from the distance class. Jenny thought of dropping the class at the beginning. She had trouble logging on to LearningSpace because the LearningSpace logon user name was longer, case sensitive, and had spaces in it. "Even I didn't start to use LearningSpace, I got stuck to open the LearningSpace with my login name and password," said Jenny; "I like opening my mouth to talk, I don't like to open a 'lock' first and then start to talk." It took a while for Jenny to get used to the LearningSpace user name and password. After that, Jenny felt comfortable in using her password and user name, and changed her attitude about this class. She didn't drop the class. Kay's frustration, on the other hand, was that she didn't like to type conversation back and forth. She liked face-to-face oral conversation, which is natural and easy. To switch to the computer-based typing conversation in the distance class seemed boring and tedious to her. She said:
It seems like it's a lot of extra work to get on the computer and have discussions. I have to type discussion and the kind of things to talk about. I think it is easier for us in a face-to-face class, and have conversation. The conversational discussion is better than just typing to answer somebody else's questions…. I think (even with my good computer experiences) it is easier to jump into a conversation with somebody when you are face-to-face rather than reading what they have to say and writing back later. (Interview with Kay)
It was common for many students to complain that they felt uncomfortable using technology to learn. They complained that the advantageous side of technology didn't motivate them, but its disadvantageous side was annoying to them and interfered with their normal learning habits. Their attention and effort had often been lessened by so many interfering factors.
Besides the format shift interference, students found that this class' course load was heavier than that of a normal undergraduate junior level class, because the technology was added to their learning setting. I asked Dr. Rona about it. Dr. Rona explained that she designed this theory-based class to emulate a graduate-level class. Students needed to understand the theories taught in this course. They had to write two APA-style papers, search for articles from Internet and library, review the readings provided by the resource of the Powerpoint presentations, submit three written assignments describing their opinion of theories related to professionalism, ethics, and cultural diversity, submit a paper about the code of ethics or related topics, and read the two textbooks. Finally, students also had to take the quizzes, a midterm, and a final exam, and they were required to participate in discussions, posting at least 20 discussion postings about the course content on the discussion board. Dr. Rona didn't expect that the technical problems would become a burden to this distance class.
Dr. Rona had two HES 3002 classes, one in the distance format, the other in the traditional format. She said that these two classes had the same content and the same requirements. The only difference was that the distance class used two textbooks, while the traditional class only had one textbook, The Ethics of Excellence. Although she also taught the content of the other textbook, Management Challenges for the 21st Century, in the traditional class, the students didn't know where the content came from. The two classes both complained that their course load was too heavy for a two-credit class. The traditional class' students argued that their course load was heavier than the distance HES 3002 class, while the distance-class students complained that their class was boring, uninteresting, and too much work even for a three-hour traditional class. Although there were some students, like Brenda, Jim, and Mike, who considered this class a comfortable way to learn, there were some complaints from students about this format. Kim said in the discussion board,
Discussion Topic: Discussion topic for Sept. 11
Created by Kim
I just wanted to comment on how I thought this class was completely pointless. After reading some of the material(s) and putting deep thought into all of the stuff we have to do, it is a pretty interesting class that definitely makes you think. But, I definitely think that it would have been easier in a normal class setting. This computer stuff just isn't for me… (Online data 09/11/00)
Kim's discussion posting was responded to by Canyon, who agreed with Kim's opinion about this class:
Response to: Discussion Topic for Sept. 11
Created by: Canyon
I agree that the computer thing is tough. It took me some time to get the team work part of my profiles to show up to see what group I was in. It's not hard to check, but I still don't really feel as if I know what to do and when to do it. Do I only talk to my group or do I get in other discussion(s) too? (Online Data 09/13/00)
Canyon's talk showed that she really felt bewildered about how to learn in this online class. She felt like a stranger strolling into an unfamiliar community, and didn't know where to find the building of her destination, what direction it was, or how to choose a route to reach the destination. Students like Canyon had a desire to know about the class' requirements in order to study the right way, which was set up by the instructor. But the rules in the virtual class looked so abstract that a student needed time to experience it.
Another concern the new participants usually had is that the LearningSpace discussion board was a public bulletin board and discussion tribune; most of the submitted discussions and assignments in LearningSpace were public instead of private work in HES 3002. Students were afraid that the work they posted in the LearningSpace would make a poor impression on the teacher and classmates, so for the first few weeks, discussion postings were few, and the content of the discussions was limited to technical problems, how to do the basic assignments, and what requirements were set for this class. Participation was limited until the midterm.
The Mis-Connection between Teacher and Students
The online distance class, like a traditional class, needs collaboration between the teacher and the students. Since HES 3002 was a class in which the students and the teacher were separated by time and space, communication and understanding on both sides were even more important. A mis-connection on both sides would result in disastrous consequences. When Bourdeau and Bates (1997) indicated the most important components in a distance class, they mentioned that the learners not only need to understand the course content and curriculum, but also need to understand the instructor's procedure, strategy, requirements, and evaluation so that both the learners and the instructor can cooperate in the teaching and learning process. Dr. Rona put the class syllabus online, and put the assignments in each module. In the discussion, she also prompted the students concerning ongoing learning activities and procedures such as readings, papers, guest speaker presentations, and tests. But some of the students still had difficulty following the class, and they often felt it was difficult to determine the correct way to do the assignments, tests, writings, and readings. This difficulty increased because it was not easy for them to contact the instructor for guidance about how to conduct discussions to meet the discussion requirements, what content had to be covered in the discussion, what length of comments was required for discussions, what the initial topic was, and what comprised a response as specified in the syllabus. Some students had either to redo assignments, which cost them extra time, or received low grades for some of their work. Requests for a class orientation were heard again and again.
Due to the students' requests at the beginning of the semester, Dr. Rona offered to give an orientation class to the students in the Tulsa area on the Tuesday of the second week of the semester, but out of a group of 24 students in Tulsa, only 6 students attended the orientation. The other students didn't show up and offered no reasons. They did not seem to realize the significance of the format difference in an online class, and were unaware of the importance of the orientation for easing the possible difficulties involved in this class. Consequently, the Tulsa students posted numerous complaints about the difficulties on the discussion board. Tulsa student Tiffany dropped the class because she was not comfortable in this class, and didn't know information that was mostly covered in the orientation she missed. Students like Tiffany wanted to take a distance class, but didn't want to invest enough effort to understand the new technology and the new format, which resulted in problems for them and for the class.
From
Supervised Learning to Self-Directed Learning
The first challenge to students in a distance class was that the learning format had changed from directly supervised learning to self-disciplined learning. In the regular classroom, students are directly confronted with the teacher's academic authority and supervision. Under direct supervision, students are under the control and guidance of the instructor. The learning activities all follow the teacher's instruction. Even though this could be regarded as passive learning, it is traditional, and students feel comfortable with participating. In contrast to the classroom, the HES 3002 online class is a constructivist class. Dr. Rona set this class as low control, or pedagogy of choice (Bull, 1998). In a low-control class, knowledge is assumed to be socially constructed. The typical learning experience is collaborative and cooperative, so that social interaction can take place. Students have their own control of the learning process, such as with time, space, content, and resources.
HES 3002 was a class based on the LearningSpace network. The social interaction was under the learner's own control, and was self-directed, expert-facilitated, and time/space independent. Students worked on their own based on the specifics of the procedures and processes set by the teacher. Because the learning was socially situated, both cooperative learning and just-in-time learning occurred, which were helpful to the students for interaction based on content matter and directed toward common goals. But this learning was self-directed and needed strong self-discipline and self-motivation to achieve. Students had to work on their own to complete the tasks and assignments without the teacher's intervention and reinforcement. Because the teacher was out of sight, the learning tasks might have been out of mind: students might have forgottn to open LearningSpace to check on the syllabus in order to finish assignments on time, resulting in missed or delayed assignments and quizzes, and low or missing grades. Brenda indicated:
One of the girls told me that she didn't like it because she didn't have access to the computer. So she missed a lot of things. She got really busy and forgot. I understand that because I have been busy with homecoming that week. And I have missed a couple of things so I have to go back. So that's kind of difficult when you don't have that class (in classroom), your instructor doesn't tell you face-to-face "This is due" with them.. You (have to) take on the whole new responsibility of finding (things) when your assignment (is) due or not, but which is good. And it was a learning experience. It provides you a bunch of responsibility. It is a good thing. But it is hard we have everything in our own care. (Interview with Brenda)
The learning-format change was a difficult experience for most of the students, who had to drop the traditional habit of learning with which they were familiar and adapt to the new format. Once they survived this hardest period, they found this learning format more comfortable than they had initially. Brenda continued her statement about her attitude change concerning this learning format:
I think it's better for me (if we could have some online prompts to us), because I am busy. But that's no excuse. Sometimes, if I am not in the classroom, I have to take the appointment myself. Sometimes I don't take that initiative to find out (information), which is my fault. I think it's easier if I can go to a class and find it out. But this (class) is so much better for some people. That you know, (you) have to be at home, but cannot come to class. (So) it's really good. But I think I had my choice, interacting with the class at home…. I like it now. But at first it was real difficult. But now it's OK. (Interview with Brenda)
With the growth of her experience
in HES 3002, Brenda's learning habit changed gradually. She felt less and less
of the frustration and intimidation from falling behind the class than she initially
experienced. She grew more comfortable using self-discipline in learning and
consciously mediated the frustration that she had had at the start of the
course.
A Sense of an
Online Class
The next concern created by the shift in
learning format was that students often did not think about having a class
online. They neglected to regularly open LearningSpace
in the Internet and check up the class schedule, assignments, and any updated
information, like the due dates of assignments, the progress of the teamwork,
and announcements regarding take-home quizzes and tests. They expected to be
"caught up" on their assignments and class progress. They were on the
border between an unconscious and passive participation (forced and required
participation) and a conscious, motivated, and active participation in the
class.
Many students were in the habit of depending on the teacher's and the students' physical presence to prompt and remind them about ongoing course work and assignments. Any questions and problems are raised and solved in the classroom through physical presence and interaction between teachers and students. Generally, when students have any questions, they would automatically think, "I'll ask about it in class." Once they are absent from the classroom and physical human contact, they don't feel that they have a class. For HES 3002, there was no longer any physical reminder of their learning tasks from the teacher, graduate assistant, or classmates about the assignments, readings, writings, papers, projects, quizzes, exams, or discussions. The only reminders were the announcements on the discussion board. because learning activities were changed to an asynchronous format, if students were not self-disciplined enough, not skillful enough to utilize the network LearningSpace to search for information on learning, unable to abide by the schedule and rules of the class, or incapable of following the teacher's arrangements, they were likely to get lost and lag far behind. The physical presence of the teacher is a power and authority that disciplines and forces students to conduct learning in certain ways. And the physical presence of classmates is another form of motivation that prompts students to keep pace with the class.
Student Ire complained that she didn't know what was going on in class or how to jump in to start a discussion. She didn't like to open the LearningSpace discussion board to see other people's discussions. Not seeing means not learning from others and not participating, which can leave a student behind. Brenda said that for a week, she was too busy preparing for homecoming activities. She didn't miss any classes that she took in the classroom, but she delayed assignments, readings, and discussions in this online class, due, perhaps, to the "out of sight, out of mind" phenomenon. The "virtual class" means the "abstract class." The learner can choose to look or not to look. If the learner wants to look, and makes an effort to open the network, he/she will get connected to the class and be involved in learning activities, and then, probably succeed; otherwise, he/she will not get connected to the class, and failure could occur. This basic effort calls for the constructs of self-discipline and self-motivation. Plus, the technical frustration associated with the LearningSpace itself can cause novices to stumble over the format shift problems. They might even fail cue simply to a format adjustment problem instead of from any inability to cope with the content matter of the class.
Learning Style
Adjustment
Many students in the HES 3002 class seemed to be in the habit of relying on the teacher's authority and supervision. They were unused to autonomous learning. Without sufficient authority and control, students felt uncertain as to whether they were on the right track. They didn't know what to do or how to do it well, and they felt the lack of models in the class. They worried that they didn't understand requirements and criteria for this class, such as how to learn the content, how to discuss in order to meet the discussion requirements, how to finish their papers and readings, and what the APA style was required. They had numerous questions to ask, but not enough resources available for them to learn the answers and solve their puzzles. Tam showed her concern about how to learn in this class: "I don't know what is the right way to learn in this class. I never see this kind of class before. We need to know the requirement and the way to get an A." Jenny commented:
A class orientation is necessary at the beginning of the class. We don't know how to use this network and what rules there are. It has too much to learn. We don't know the criteria to assess our learning. If someone can show us how to do, it definitely saves us a lot of time. (Interview with Jenny)
Being unable to know enough about class requirements and the right track for learning well constituted an invisible barrier that frustrated students as to how to effectively learn in this class. Students felt there was a lack of models, but the model only came out gradually when these new users started the assignments and began reading each other's discussion postings. For example, students could open other students' assignments to learn how to do assignments, and students could see what other people discussed about the projects or anything relating to class work, which was an advantage in the networked format, but was commonly not accessible in a traditional class. The problem was how they made use of the advantages of the class’ tools, and how they found and created the models in this online class.
Some students revealed their reading preferences. Jenny said in an interview that she preferred reading on paper instead of on computers because it was more effective for her. When she read the articles on the computer, she liked to print them out. But after one semester of study in HES 3002, she adjusted her reading preference from on paper to on computer screen. Because there were numerous readings in HES 3002, such as the syllabus, the class schedule, PowerPoint presentations, research articles, and threaded discussions, she really couldn't afford to print out all the online materials. "You find it difficult to print out every page to read. You have to adapt to reading on the computer," Jenny observed. "Habits can be changed. Learning in a distance class is also an opportunity to learn to acclimate to a new environment." Once reading styles were adjusted, reading was accelerated and became easier on computers.
The “Netiquette Effect”
"Netiquette," a term used to describe the etiquette of networked social communication, is “a set of unofficial rules that define good behavior and politeness on any network, especially in the Internet" (Kleinedler et. al., 1998, p. 182). Consideration for others is netiquette's premise. Even though netiquette is not required officially, it is desirable. Some impolite behaviors on the net should be avoided, such as shouting (the overuse of capital letters), flaming (email attacks on others), and spamming (posting the same email message to many newsgroups). The instructor mentioned netiquette in this online class, but many students were so cautious and careful in conversing with each other in discussion that they avoided any unhappy conflicts. This caused the tendency to diminish the necessary academic conflicts. Because discussion was an important part of learning in this class, it included posting not only technical questions and answers on the discussion board, but also academic-related debates, arguments, and criticisms to reach a common solution to controversial issues. Academic conflicts can generate higher-order thinking and reasoning, which is helpful to cognitive development (Pressley, et al., 1995). But the students in HES 3002 were concerned that they would stir unhappy dispute and break their rapport and friendly relationship with their classmates. Jenny said that she always tried to avoid saying things like "I don't like it," "I disagree with you," and "You are wrong." She always liked to post supportive responses to other people. If she felt a need to express disagreement, she tried to avoid direct disagreement in order not to hurt people, because online communication is a written interaction, and a written interaction is a formal style of talking. On the discussion board, few of the discussions aroused debates and arguments over some academic issues, which is a scenario often designed by the teacher in classroom discussions. It might be a shortcoming that HES 3002, because of the “netiquette effect,” produced few academic conflicts to spark higher-order thinking and creativities in discussions.
Misunderstandings
This study found that much class information--like how to find the schedule, how to post messages, how to download PowerPoint files, and when to do the quizzes--were posted in the LearningSpace technical tutorial and on the discussion board many times by both the teacher and the students. But there were still students who didn't know about it, who continued posting questions about the same problem again and again on the discussion board. Some students liked to post any questions they had without checking whether the topic had already been answered on the discussion board. This was because the students didn't know enough about how to learn in this class format, and their learning habits were not adjusted yet. They just pose a question as soon as they had it (as in the traditional classroom discussion). They didn't realize there was a difference between the face-to-face instructional prompt and asynchronous networked learning messaging, which resulted in different ways of receiving information and learning. Once this point was neglected, learning was affected and became disconnected. For example, an explanation of how to use the "blue triangle" had been posted four times on the discussion board by both the teacher and the students. It had also been announced in the LearningSpace technical tutorial. In interviews, one student and three dropout students stated that they still didn't know what the "small blue triangle" meant in the threaded discussion. If the students didn't know about function of the small blue triangle, how could they use the discussion database to successfully discuss and transform information? If the students resisted adopting an "online-diligent habit," the appropriate habit of using network to acquire information would not grow, and they would not be able to see information even though it was there. Strangely, although there were 518 postings on the discussion board from both the teacher and the students over the course of the semester, there was not a single posting telling people how to develop a habit of opening LearningSpace regularly and checking on information and postings frequently, or checking back to some areas for possibly updated information. This absence may have added to the failure of many students who have overlooked the necessity of developing a learning habit that would fit this kind of class. The online survey garnered 21 responses to the survey question "How often, on average, do you log on to LearningSpace to use it this semester?" The responses are as follows:
|
Questions: How often, on average, do you log on to LearningSpace to
use it this semester? |
|
|
once/week |
19% |
|
twice/week |
33% |
|
three times or more/week |
43% |
|
few than ten times/semester |
5% |
|
never/semester |
0% |
|
|
|
These results were not bad, but some of the students didn't tell me the truth in the interview. When I conducted a telephone interview with the student Ire, her answer to " How often, on average, did you log on to LearningSpace to use it this semester?" was "three times per week." But when I asked her a question that was posted just the previous week, she was completely unaware of it. When she realized that I knew she was being less than honest, she just ended the interview by saying that she had an appointment and could not continue the interview with me, then hung up. This suggests, to some extent, that students wanted to learn, but didn't pay attention to the importance of the learning-format shift. They wanted to take advantage of the convenience of informational technology, but they didn't want to invest the greater effort that was needed in an asynchronous learning setting. Ire, after the midterm test, became one of the dropouts from the HES 3002 distance class.
A Forced
Connection to Learning Efficiency
The format difference not only affected the students who had technical or learning problems, but also affected the students who were high achievers. The preliminary procedure Dr. Rona used to enhance interaction was to set up a minimum requirement for participating in discussion, which was tracked and scored. Some students thought that they were pretty much "A" students in the traditional class. If they studied content well, participating in discussions did not seem so significant, as was often the case in traditional classes. Student Jenny strongly disliked posting discussions. As she said, she liked to read the postings of other people, because they helped her to "learn skills, solve technical problems, comprehend subject matter, and support other students." She didn't like to post discussions, because her mind tended to be "decoding rather than encoding." But she didn't realize that her grades would be affected if she continued to simply look on, without posting. When she was told that participation was graded, she was surprised and nervous. "I need to post more discussions next week, or I will get lost," Jenny said; "The grade is a motivation to me."
In an interview, Dr. Rona commented on the students who didn't realize the importance of online discussion participation:
…they are going to be surprised (if they don't contribute to discussion). Ten percent of the grades are tied up to the participation (of discussions). I have told them (that) active participation in this class is required. They must meet the minimum requirement of participation. They should post a minimum of four initial discussion topics, and sixteen responses to other people's discussion for this semester. If they choose to ignore, choose to read only, they'll be surprised (when they get their grades). (Interview with Dr. Rona)
Dr. Rona indicated that if students could not meet their basic discussion requirements, they would face the unpleasant reality of having their grades reduced by their lack of participation. Dr. Rona considered her grading methods as an incentive to motivate student participation; they actually worked effectively. “Punishment” is one strategy to motivate participation. In the regular classroom, some students are always inclined to simply listen to others and benefit from other people's discussion rather than contribute to the discussion's collective wisdom. They are ready to take in, but not give out. That may not make a difference in their grades in the regular classroom, as many teachers don't set up a grading “punishment” just for quitting class discussion. But if many students in the online class did the same, they could undermine the quality of the online class, affect learning, collaboration, and cooperation, lose the benefits of shared minds, thereby, jeopardize collective achievement. Students who were new to the distance-learning format might not recognize the characteristics of an online class, but they needed time to learn about the class, to adjust to the distance class and acclimate to the networked environment, format, rules, and regulations, and even to adjust their learning styles to fit the new class culture. No matter whether it was a forced, passive participation or a voluntary, active participation, students had to undergo a format-change period, a transitional period. When students went through the transition of the format change, they inevitably experienced the hardship of transitioning from an uncomfortable interaction to a comfortable interaction. Adjustment was hard for a while, but was beneficial in the long run. The students who survived this class had the potential of surviving the kind of learning that is typical in the Information Age. In this sense, a success in the HES 3002 class marked a milestone in the student's lifetime.
In discussion postings, the choice to participate or to ignore became a divider between the ones who would earn the ten percent of the grade and the ones who would lose the ten percent of the grade, according to Dr. Rona's requirement in the syllabus. Most of them chose to participate, willingly or unwillingly; some chose to ignore. For a class of 50 students, only 31 students participated in the discussions; the other 19 students (including those who dropped the course) never showed up. Dr. Rona talked about the dilemma of involving students’ participation in discussions:
It is a big class. I have to track them. Some of them are doing well. And they have been notified. Well, if they are not participating, they are not sending in their assignment, they are not doing their work. They'll be notified by my email…when I see some team of students not participating, I also post prompts in the discussion, "Hi, Team 2, what are you doing? Haven't seen you for a while. Please participate." (Interview with Dr. Rona)
Dr. Rona spent time prompting and prodding the students to participate. This reinforcement was like a push to the students that reminded them of the situation they were in and the way they needed to behave in order to fulfill their course tasks. After the midterm, discussion participation gradually increased, moving from questions about technical support and assignment information to content-area discussions. The statistics of the participation in discussion appear in Table 1:
|
Total Postings |
518 |
|
Teacher |
54 |
|
Students |
464 |
|
|
|
|
Total Initial Topics |
168 |
|
Teacher |
18 |
|
Students |
150 |
|
|
|
|
Total Responses |
350 |
|
Teacher |
36 |
|
Students |
314 |
|
Table 1. Statistics of the Participation in Discussion in HES 3002 |
|
Meanwhile, Dr. Rona was also concerned about the students' participation in different areas. Some students did their projects, and handed in their assignments, papers, and tests, but did not show up in discussions; others neither finished their work nor participated in discussions. She was not satisfied with those who were sluggish:
If they don't drop, they don't participate in this class, they are not going to pass. In another word, participating is more than just discussing. They (some of them) are not submitting their assignments, papers and the middle term, they are not done the quizzes. You know, all the things in class they get grades for. It's not a surprise to them (if they loose their grades). They know I am not receiving the stuff. (Interview with Dr. Rona)
Dr. Rona was serious about class participation, which was tied to the overall grade, the final assessment of the students' work. Many students seemed not to realize it. But when they were "surprised" with their grades at the end of the semester, it was too late. Certainly students really needed a period of time and experience to know about this "class culture," but Dr. Rona told me that she gave students enough time to experience this class and know the rules before she implemented the punishment.
The rule that required students' participation in discussion was difficult to enforce. Tam's story of her experience with this required participation was an interesting one. For the first few weeks, she didn't like to participate in the discussion at all. She just kept looking on and reading others' comments. When Dr. Rona reinforced the rigorous requirement for the least participation, Tam began to post discussions. Her attitude changed gradually toward participating in discussions with her increased experience. "I enjoyed discussion very much," said Tam in the interview. She continued:
At first, I was totally in dark about how to take part in this class. When Dr. Rona mentioned the class requirement of participation, I began to post discussions. I finally found that the discussion (board) is a place that I can get hold of people. I freed myself when I saw a lot of classmates talking about technical problems and exchange ideas about the course content…. I like to see people address my name and respond to my ideas. I am so happy that I can put an impact in class through discussion, and help others understand a little bit more. I am out of intimidation now. (Interview with Tam)
A successful adjuster is a
successful learner. Those who can adapt to this format well, were those who can
survive this class. The reinforced rules requiring participation played a role
in mobilizing students to participate in learning when they were still
lingering, unable to decide whether to participate or not. Once they got
involved, they gained the experience. But on the other hand, looking on at the
beginning can serve as a kind of vicarious learning (Pressley, et al., 1995)
that can help students gain knowledge from watching other people. The social
learning perspective indicates that much human behavior is acquired via
observing other people's learning experiences (Bandura,
1986). When the first members of the distance class had little or no
comprehension of what to do in a distance class, LearningSpace
provided a bank of others' models and portfolios in different modules for the
novice learners to watch and observe how other people worked, which could guide
them onto the right track in this class when they fumbled. Many students had
experiences similar to Tam’s.
The New Format Challenge to the Teacher
In this class, the students' expectation of communicating with their teacher was high. Students regarded the distance-class teacher as the same high authority in knowledge resources and class decisions as in a traditional class. The curriculum was set up by the teacher; the process of learning and activities were defined by the teacher; and the evaluation was administered by the teacher. Every student looked forward to the teacher’s feedback as a guideline to the class and a judgement of their study. They expected the teacher's teaching in the same way they did when receiving instruction in a traditional class. This reflected the reality that traditional-learning formats and habits were rooted in the learners’ behavior. But the HES 3002 class was a networked distance class. When the teacher’s instructional method did not meet the expectations of the learners, students felt disappointed or helpless. Dr. Rona used online instruction plus a constructivist learning approach to teach this class. But students could not always understand the constructivist learning, and tried to obtain what they were familiar with in terms of receiving instruction in a classroom. For example, students liked to be prompted face-to-face, to be reminded to keep pace with the class, or they would forget they even had assignments, readings, and discussions to work with online, forget to check on the information, or be unable to find the resources to finish their work, such as finding the resource on how to use APA style in research writing. They had conflicts with this class format when their expectations were not met, or they felt that there was nothing to rely upon to receive instruction. That caused some conflict and misunderstanding. This was a format shift dilemma both in distance learning and with the constructivist approach. Some of the students expressed their frustration and dissatisfaction with the teacher's instruction:
|
Question: |
How do you think the teacher's attitude toward students and the teacher's role in this class? |
|
Kim: |
I don't think she does anything. She doesn't really teach very much…like I think (that) students support each other more than teacher helps the students. (Interview with Kim) |
The constructivist learning approach Dr. Rona set up for this class was not understood by the students like Kim. The constructivist learning approach needs to build up a student-centered learning environment. In this format, students work for their own learning and can understand more than the teacher teaches them (Vygotsky, 1981). But Kim was not used to this kind of learning, and she didn’t regarded this class as a formal learning experience like that in a "normal" class in which the teacher taught “more” than Dr. Rona did in this class. Thus rapport and cooperation were not established appropriately. The effectiveness of constructivist learning is disconnected at this point.
Jenny indicated a reaction similar to Kim's in the following excerpt from her interview:
|
Question: |
In this class, how does the teacher teach? |
|
Answer: |
I don't think she does. The way I got her teachings (was) just posting questions for us. But that's the only kind of teaching I have. |
|
Question: |
Does teacher answer your question? |
|
Answer: |
Huh--uh. |
|
Question: |
Have you posted your question in discussion (board) to teacher? |
|
Answer: |
I have posted questions before but she has not responded to. |
|
Question: |
How many questions do you post? |
|
Answer: |
Probably…she is not interested (in my questions). One or two she has not Responded to. The rest she has. |
|
Question: |
Were your questions technical questions or relating to class content? |
|
Answer: |
Basically not real question or something. I posted the questions about the Assignment. |
|
Question: |
She didn't reply to you? |
|
Answer: |
Frankly, one of the students replied. |
|
Question: |
When the student replied to you, did it solve your problem? |
|
Answer: |
En hen. |
|
Question: |
How long did the student reply to you? |
|
Answer: |
A day or after. |
|
Question: |
After the student answered your question, did you need the teacher to reply to you any more? |
|
Answer: |
No. …… |
|
Question: |
Besides answering your questions, did the teacher do something else? |
|
Answer: |
She grades paper for us. I guess, I would assume. |
|
Question: |
Does she give you some resources about content matter, such as from Internet and library to comprehend the theories of the class? |
|
Answer: |
Well, I believe she directed us to the articles in the library. On one module, she did direct us to web sites (where) we can go to for more distance information. I really don't get a feeling of her teaching and teaching materials…I like the class to be interesting. (Interview with Jenny) |
Jenny expressed her discomfort with the online instruction in the above conversation. Her resistance to instruction through discussion is apparent. Jenny didn't believe that Dr. Rona's questioning was a kind of online teaching that engendered students' participation and involvement in the learning activities. This was a format different from Jenny's concept of teaching based on her experience in traditional classes, and she regarded this teaching as being unable to meet her needs. She expected a form of instruction more like those in the classroom, which provided more stimulation. Jenny also complained that the teacher had not responded to her email. Several other students reported the same opinion of failing to receive the teacher's response to their emails and questions on the discussion board. But Jenny's question had already been replied to by one of her classmates on the discussion board, so actually Jenny received an answer by browsing through the discussion board. Her need was met by a different kind of information resource than the teacher, but she still complained because she expected the teacher’s response and was not satisfied: her needs were met, but not her expectations. She expected the teacher's response because she considered the teacher as the highest authority of the class and the most reliable resource and judgment. So even though her question had been answered, her negative reaction continued.
With questions about this situation, I went to Dr. Rona and asked her about it. She told me,
I want the students to put effort in it. If the students ask me a question which I find has been answered (in the discussion board), I would not reply. I want them to look for resolution in the discussion themselves. I want students to work hard. Some of the students are a little unhappy that I expect them to work." (Interview with Dr. Rona)
Students and their teacher were having a misunderstanding. Students could not understand the teacher's constructivist learning approach, and, like Jenny, expected "more" of the teacher’s direction and teaching. Students felt entitled to "regular" teaching in this online class, but the teacher tried to push students to work hard on their own or to learn by looking for mutual support from this community. From the statements by the students and the teacher, we can see that the students' expectations and the teacher's expectations conflicted on the issue of how to learn; thus, the anticipated learning outcome was difficult for some students to achieve.
If there had been an orientation about this learning format and approach, like the orientation about technical problems, this conflict could have been mediated more smoothly. Unfortunately, this point had been neglected. Because the students of this class were new to this format, they needed to be guided or trained to learn effectively in this new format. Their needs had not been recognized in this sense. Dr. Rona treated this class like a graduate class, but the students didn't react with that level of sophistication, in part because the teacher didn’t sufficiently consider the impact of the difficult shift of formats, especially as compared to the traditional HES 3002 class. The insufficient consideration of the format shift factor in the online class created barriers to learning that upset some students to the point that their willingness to learn closed off. A successful online class would require more consideration of various factors than thinking about offering the same course content as the traditional class.
An Episode in
Class
Because there was a missing connection necessary for a mutual understanding between the teacher and the students, the intended class instructional method and the plan of the class were difficult to implement. It made the constructivist instruction hard to arouse the expected cooperation from the students. Students were stuck at the stage of format shifting while the class procedure progressed. The teacher expected the students to learn enough content to meet the goals of the instructional plan and felt that the students were difficult to be motivated into taking the necessary painstaking effort to learn in this online class. Students expected more of the teacher's support and interaction to help them solve their individual problems because they faced many difficulties and encountered many new problems they had never come up against before, which automatically increased the course load of this class. “I thought this class would be easier (than an on-campus class), but it turned out exactly the opposite,” one student responded in his survey.
Since the teacher's effort and the students' work didn't mesh very well, and the teacher’s understanding of the course load and the students’ experience and attitudes towards the class differed, some problems not only went unsolved, but even accumulated. They grew to feel that it was not worth investing so much time and effort for a two-credit online class. Jane said in her interview,
Frisky (another student) also dropped this course. She had the same problem like me. She just couldn't find anything (in LearningSpace). She said she was very frustrated with it. We all are interior design major. Because we are HES major, we have to have that course for our major degree. For me, it [this class] was too much work for a two-credit course… as interior design major anyway, we have a lot of outside work, like project of that. We just don't have a lot of free time to do it. (Interview with Jane)
Dr. Rona responded to my question about the course load in an interview by commenting that her design of this class was intended to develop students' ability to study independently and work hard. They had to work hard to do every assigned task and learn to rely on themselves. Because this course was theory-oriented, there were more higher-order skills than in a common undergraduate course. But Dr. Rona said,
I teach this class like a graduate course. This is a theory-based course. Students must read a lot and write papers. And each student must participate in discussion for a certain number of times…
Some of the students are a little unhappy with the fact that I expect them to work hard. I didn't hand them the (text)book, and I didn't hand them a package of materials that they can read these messages…and, instead, I made them to get their books online. I made them go and get the readings I want them to read. I did not provide a package. I started the discussions and showed them up basically the way I want things done. And I expect them to do it themselves. But I don't think it has (anything) special to do with the course content as the fact that I expect them to put effort on it. (Interview with Dr. Rona)
Because of this class’ design, students spent considerable time searching for articles and research papers in the library and on the Internet. They were challenged by both the distance-learning format and the theoretical work like the graduate level course content as they were still undergraduate students. But it is overlooked that the students’ experience and knowledge of professionalism were not yet as mature as the graduate students’. And their ability and habit of learning independently in a virtual class is not as mature as the graduate students Dr. Rona taught before, probably.
Students not only complained about the course load, but also showed a great deal of concern about the grades they might receive. Jenny said that grades were her motivation in this class. Several other students reported that they expected good grades in order to maintain their scholarships. Some students expressed their desire to have good grades in order to move into graduate programs after they finished their undergraduate degrees. They needed high GPA to apply for admission and financial aid. Grades became another focus of this class in the students' eye. The grading policy in the syllabus read:
|
Your final grade will be based on the number of points you have accumulated at the end of the semester as follows: |
|
90 - 100 = A 80 - 89 = B 70 - 79 = C 60 - 69 = D Below 60% = F |
|
No
extra credit will be offered to any student independently of the course
assignments. (Online Syllabus HES
3002) |
For each quiz, students could earn points. For example, 12/15 meant the student earned 12 points out of a total of 15 points on a quiz. About the test design of HES 3002 distance class, Dr. Rona told me,
Well, the only thing that is different from the residence class (traditional class) is the way they take the exams. The papers are the same and everything… I am doing the kind of you and I would do through a graduate level take-home exam. And the reason I do that is because this summer, I decided to know (if) there are things that I can do. They can go to test center here on campus. I can make arrangement for them to take an exam on a specific date in a physical location. I thought that fit the purpose on the Internet course. If they are off campus, I could have done the same thing, you know. I can say, "OK, will you make arrangements in your local library? To see if your library allows me to mail you the text and show proctored exam?" A lot of people do that. I am more interested. (Interview with Dr. Rona)
Dr. Rona tried to innovate instructional evaluation by offering take-home tests and local-library proctored exams, expecting that might add to the effectiveness of this distance class. As she told, the locally proctored exams were referred to the local libraries near the students’ homes for them to take under the proctor of the librarians, making the tests almost the same as those in the regular classes to avoid plagiarism.
Dr. Rona believed that the two HES 3002 classes she taught had the same content, only different in format: one in the traditional class, and one online. With her rich teaching experience, she would have no problem in teaching the students well in both classes. But, here was misunderstanding and unperceived disconnection between the teacher and students. The teacher and the students in the distance learning class had different views about the course load and the evaluation. This grew into dissatisfaction on both sides, and then finally became an explosion of conflict. On November 16th, almost toward the end of the semester, student Kim posted a discussion on the discussion board:
Discussion Topic: This Class
Created by Kim
OK, this may be really mean to say, but does anyone feel like they are working their butt off in this class and still making crappy grades? I have worked my butt off on every single assignment and have made 13/15 or 9/10 on my assignments. I have an 88% (grade). I'm sorry, but I'm not going to make a B in this class because I worked my butt off. Don't get me wrong or anything. I like this class, but some of this stuff is absolutely ridiculous. I write my essays the best that I can, I make discussions, and I respond to them probably as much as you who are reading this do. I do my fair share of work and put in all the effort but I don't feel like getting a B in this class. Is it justifiable for the amount of work that we have to do for 2 credit hours? Does anyone else agree? (Online Data, 11/16/00)
Kim calculated her grade percent at 88%, less than 90%. According to the rules, she could only receive a B. She was really unhappy about this. But Kim, the Asian American student, was an active discussion participant in this class, posting numerous discussions and serving as a topic leader on many topics. Many students, like Jenny, liked to follow Kim's discussion to expand discussion issues on the subject matter. Kim was definitely an influencing figure in class. Her argument about grades aroused a “T-Storm” in class. Suddenly, this virtual class was no longer abstract. The students and the teacher were all shocked by this posting, physically involved into it. Seven responses followed Kim’s initial topic, supporting her argument and venting anger against the teacher's grading. The following are some excerpts from the students' responses to "This Class":
Response #1
Respond to: This Class
Created by: Cukoo
I
totally agree with you all about this class. I absolutely don't know what's
happening. I received a zero for the professional org. writing assignment. I
did mine over a company called ARAMARK which I work for and I don't (know) why
I did not even get partial credit for doing so…Now the quizzes are another
problem because the web site will not allow me to take them. I think that I
have made a huge mistake by doing this over the Internet and actually it's
pointless to do this class because it is no way going to help me in the future.
What I all need to know about ethics and professionalism I already am aware of, since I work for a huge corporation in the
The grading system is also pathetic. Something has to be done and if anyone has seen the final, I think that it's way too lengthy…she [the teacher] should have given some objective questions as well as subjective because not everyone is great at writing long answers. (Online Data 12/11/00)
Response
#2
Respond to: This Class
Created by: Jenny
I totally agree! I probably have not participated in discussion as much as I should, but I have turned all assignments in on time and probably only received one perfect grade. I work hard for my grades and will be very upset if I receive a B in this 2 credit hour course. (Online Data 12/03/00)
Response #3
Respond to: This Class
Created by: Kennie
I am right there with you! The assignments are pointless and they are only busy work. I wrote my last paper on my sorority, and received a zero. She said that was only a social sorority and not a professional organization---I beg to differ. We run just like a business. We make money and spend money. What else does a business do? This class really needs help!!! (Online Data 11/20/00)
Response #4
Respond to: This Class
Created by: Whitman
I absolutely agree with you. I feel that most of these assignments are pointless and that the grading system is awful. I have no idea what to write about, and when I do, it is wrong. I wish there was more feedback and a little more help on the teacher's part. (Online Data 11/20/00)
These postings were also like a
volcanoes erupting out after a dormant period; a voluntary, spontaneous e-demonstration
formed on the class discussion board. It might stem from feelings of antagonism
arising from a sense of unfair treatment of the HES 3002 students, but it might
be an evaluation from the students’ side about their teacher and the class. But
it did serve as a challenge to the role of the teacher and the relationship, or
connectivity, between the teacher and the students. Many other students had the
same feeling as Kim, even though they didn’t post responses to support Kim.
Kim’s posting might have violated the class rules about netiquette specified in the syllabus, and be regarded as rude to the instructor. But because, in this networked environment, Kim didn’t see her teacher face-to-face, her feelings were overwhelmed by her uncontrolled antagonism, with an Asian American girl’s strong-willed characteristics, bursting out an opinion that had been concealed from the network class for a long time but shared by many students. From the interview with Dr. Rona, I know that Kim was an active participating student in this class. She did excellent job of her assignments; she was a motivated discussion topic leader who posted discussion questions and responded many discussions on the discussion board around curriculum and technical issues; actually, her grades were among the highest. She was never late for assignments and tests. But she behaved as a rebel head in this class conflict. Even though this conflict created some negative effect on the class, it left us some helpful implications. This conflict can serve as an indicator of what a class with a changed format needed, and neglecting these needs might result in problems and affect learning significantly.
I talked to Dr. Rona about this conflict; she said, “Sometimes some student’s postings really upset me. I can talk to them privately if they have any problems about grades and assignments. But they choose to put their problems on the discussion board instead of talking to me.”
Dr. Rona said she was uncomfortable with this conflict for a little while, but she didn’t “retaliate” against her students. She talked privately to several students like Kim and explained her policy and the way she taught and evaluated this class. Dr. Rona also responded to the students’ concern on the discussion board after four days, subduing her feelings and trying to solve this conflict:
Discussion Topic: Grades
Created by: Dr. Rona
Some of you are expressing concern and dissatisfaction with your grades. If you would like to talk to me about your grades, call for an appointment or email me. I’m always happy to talk to you about your grades. There also appears to be two rumors going around about this class. First is that the resident section thinks that you can complete the Internet version in one weekend, and second that the resident class is an “easy A”. Let me assure you that neither is true. Both classes have the same assignments. (Online Data 11/20/00)
After Dr. Rona’s posting and some private talk to some individual students, the class conflict seemed to calm down. But the affective conflict on the students’ side and the teacher’s side was still there. Till now, in the above response, Dr. Rona still stuck to the notion that the two classes had the "same assignments," or course work. The format change problem was not in her consideration. The negative experience and attitude still existed within the class participants. After Dr. Rona’s posting, Canyon continued to comment on this class format:
Respond to: This Class
Created by: Canyon
I feel this class does require a lot of effort to get a good grade. I feel I have worked hard on all of my assignments and work, (which) does not have much to show from it…(I) can not do much (more) about it, (you) know. But feel that the work is not exactly paying off. Guess that’s what we get for taking it over the Internet. (Online Data 11/20/00)
Canyon’s posting not only addressed her dissatisfaction with grades, but also mentioned the online format problem. It implies that there was a difference between the Internet class and the traditional HES 3002 course, that there were definitely special difficulties in the Internet class. Otherwise, why would so many students who are usually A students be involved in this conflict? Were they lazy or intellectually inept? The answer could be that the students’ potential was not tapped out enough because of the new format and they lacked enough support to learn to mediate this format shift problems.
HES 3002--A
Mirage or A Virtual Class
Since conflict exploded around the issues of grading and the course load, Dr. Rona tried to fix the problem by posting an explanation and attempting to contact the students individually to privately solve the problems. However, this solved only a part of the problem. There were other problems not tackled appropriately. The first, the online constructivist learning approach was not comprehended by the students; only the teacher knew it was her instructional design guideline. Just setting up the requirement for participation, even though it was reinforced again and again, was not enough. It needed to be accompanied with enough appropriate scaffolding to help the students (Pressley, et al., 1995) to step out of the tension of both technical and format shift problems. The teacher chose a constructivist approach, but overlooked the students’ need for a period of time to mature enough to succeed. She assumed her position of looking on the side too early, before telling students how to cooperate with people in accordance with the constructivist approach. Even some students’ emails to the teacher for support received no response, and they were not informed that this was part of a constructivist learning approach.
With these misconnections, the students’ difficulties with the class increased to a level higher than that of a traditional HES 3002 class. Their needs were not met, and the course load was unexpectedly higher. This made the students feel unhappy and embarrassed, thereby causing misunderstandings and frustration, and leading to conflict. It emotionally affected the students’ attitude and motivation to participate in learning. In addition, the teacher reinforced the grading requirement without the students’ full understanding of the policy and the special behaviors required in this newly-formatted class. The teacher didn’t seem to understand the students enough who were at a distance. And the students were not psychologically prepared for this class format; on the contrary, they thought this class would be easier, and they could easily earn high grades in this distance class. But when things turned out opposite to their expectations, they didn’t receive enough support or explanations about how to be successful.
Cooperative learning among the students was realized, but not enough and not effectively, especially during the first part of the semester, because at that time, students were not capable enough to support each other effectively. Letting them work alone too early increased the students’ frustration and hardship, while the teacher appeared to be oblivious. The problems finally accumulated until an explosion occurred.
Because the students were not informed about the necessary measures to take to learn in a distance class, they were not prepared enough to handle the format shift problems. For example, the teacher could have given some guidelines or handouts to the students about how to learn well in a distance class, what the common problems were that might happen to the new distance-class takers, what new learning habits students needed to develop, and what habit conflicts could happen once the students got into this class. Additionally, it would have been very helpful to explain how often a student needed to open LearningSpace to check on updated information or announcements on the discussion board, and in what areas some assignments and test messages could be found. If students had been clearly informed about these problems, they might have paid more attention and stayed aware of the class, searching for information and cooperating with the teacher and classmates. And they could also have matured earlier in this class and been capable of supporting each other and learning in a healthy, constructivist manner.
In short, if the students could not appropriately handle the format shift problems, they could not learn well enough, so the HES 3002 class meant nothing to them, wasting their time and money. But if the students could successfully get over the risk period with a successful treatment of the new format problems, they could enjoy all the benefits the network brings and learn successfully. It makes a difference to recognize or not recognize this reality.
Beyond the Rainbow
The two themes found in this research could help us to understand more in-depth the distance-learning paradigm. These two themes work as two foundations that hold a rainbow which presents us a vision of what it can be like in a distance class like HES 3002. Nevertheless, we can extend our vision beyond the rainbow. Using the two themes, we need to turn on the light and see how the critical factors were regretfully neglected. We conclude that actually the format shift problem relates to one big issue: the ability of a successful distance learner. This issue elicits a hierarchical concept about the learner's ability to use technology and interact with the learning network.
There are three levels of abilities that make online learning effective. The first is at the technical level: the ability to use technology for class. This means the learner's ability to use computers, the Internet, two-way television, other digital media tools, and learning networks like LearningSpace, etc. Those who don't have enough technology literacy and who are unable to perform networked interaction are examples of people who lack this ability. The second is at the intellectual level: the ability to learn with technology. This means the ability to learn with computers, Internet, learning network, television, and other digital media tools, and the ability to explore new technology and look for the extensive knowledge. Those who can only read on paper, but can not read on the computer are examples of people who lack this technical ability; and those who can not use technology to learn technology or use technology to explore and learn extensive knowledge are also examples of people who lack this ability. The third is at the social level: the ability to e-socialize learning. This means the ability to conduct socialization, communication, cooperation, and collaboration on the technology-supported media for learning purposes. Those who never participate in e-communication, or those who can only read others' class discussion postings but are unable to express themselves and unable to contribute anything to the discussion board are examples of people who lack this ability. So the three levels of ability are the basic constructs to be a successful distance learner. They are presented in the table below:
|
Level No. |
Level Category |
Explanation |
|
Level I |
Technical level |
Be able to use technology:
computers, learning network like LearningSpace, and
Blackboard, etc., the Internet, television, and other digital media tools. |
|
Level II |
Intellectual Level |
Be able to learn with
computers, Internet, learning network, television, and other digital media
tools, and be able to explore new technology and look for extensive
knowledge. |
|
Level III |
Social Level |
Be able to e-socialize
learning: conduct socialization, communication, scaffolding, cooperation and
collaboration on the network or the technology-supported media for the
learning purpose |
|
Table 2. Three Levels of the Basic Abilities of a Successful Distance Learner. |
||
This table can briefly tell the basic abilities of a distance learner. It is expected that at the beginning of the semester, the teacher inform students of these basic abilities so that they could be more prepared for the oncoming format shift challenges. And the teacher needs to realize the learning needs of the students at different phases, and try to intentionally guide the students to develop their ability to fit the new learning format.
Summary
Theme II focuses on the format shift dilemma. The data about the students’ frustration with and intimidation by the format shift issue are presented and analyzed. The distance learning format brought the learners a convenient environment; it connected the learners and the teacher across time and space. But the traditional habit of learning frequently interfered with the HES 3002 class, which was disconnecting learners from a successful learning interaction. Students fell into turmoil when they came across format shift problems or when some critical factors were not mediated appropriately. The students were not prepared enough to tackle difficulties in this new situation.
On the other hand, it seemed that the teacher didn’t realize the depth of the format shift problems and didn’t provide adequate guidance and direction. A disconnection situation happened. The students and the teacher misunderstood each other in the areas of instructional methodology, design, procedures, and evaluation, and made assumptions regarding the roles the teacher and the students should play. The scaffolding was not provided appropriately, and the rapport and cooperation between the teacher and students were not established as well as expected, until finally, a conflict burst out. This conflict seemingly focused around the topic of grades and the course load, but it implied many hidden factors, such as the issues of format shift problems, scaffolding, learning habit changes, and immature technological ability. Those were all factors that possibly were not fully attended to. Distance education needs more time, more effort, and more understanding, because the learners and the instructor are separated by distance. As a good distance education teacher, the instructor needs to put even more effort into the class; be even more considerate (care for the unseen learners), versatile (able to use variety of multimedia and technologies to teach), and hardworking (put more time and effort into the class, working any time and anywhere) in order to teach effectively. Understanding, a friendly relationship, rapport, mutual support, directions and guidance are all significant aspects in facilitating the process of learning. The distance class needs a cohesive bond to hold the students to the online class in order for them to conduct effective learning, so the teacher's role is still important. It entails effort on the parts of both the teacher and the learners.
Summary of Chapter IV
Chapter IV answers the research questions (1) How effective is Lotus LearningSpace in assisting the distance-learning class HES 3002? and (2) What are the critical factors that affect learning in the HES 3002 class in the Lotus LearningSpace environment? Chapter IV presents the data of this research in terms of Theme I: Technical Accommodation and Theme II: The Format Shift Dilemma. In Theme I, the issue of the technical features of the LearningSpace network and the students’ problems with using LearningSpace are described. This section emphasizes the aspect of how students overcame the technical difficulties with the help of the teacher, classmates, and the CIS Help Desk when using LearningSpace, and how they conquered their frustration and intimidation by means of mutual support and cooperative learning.
In Theme II, the issue of the format shift problems is described. When the students entered the distance-learning class, they underwent a series of learning format shifts and habit-change problems. The instructor in the HES 3002 class used the constructivist approach in this class to helped students establish an interactive relationship in order to mediate their frustration and discuss their difficulties in changing their habits to adjust to effective learning in this class setting. The missing connections were indicated; they treated some problems, such as misunderstanding, frustration, and conflict, which disconnected the learning to some extent. The causes that resulted in these problems lies in the situation of the teacher and students not understanding each other enough and in the constructivist instructional approach and information in this class not being relayed well to the students by the teacher and was not supported very well by the students.
The two themes of the research contribute to an explanation of the academic phenomenon of the HES 3002 class. Due to the technical problems and format shift difficulties, learning in the HES 3002 risked being disconnected. In this sense, the students were frustrated and intimidated by both technical barriers with LearningSpace and the learning format shift or habit change problems occurring while the teacher and students were trying to connect to learning. When these barriers were not mediated or resolved appropriately, they resulted in emotional and intellectual discomfort, misunderstanding, and negative attitudes toward this class. Most students tried to overcome the difficulties, to pass the risk period and step out of the technical pressure, continuing to finish this semester. They were finally successfully connected to this class.
But some students could not successfully stay with the class and dropped out. They were the disconnected group. Others were marginalized, passively staying in the class, but not participating or contributing actively enough. They were the jeopardized group. Both the disconnected group and the jeopardized group were marginalized students who developed negative attitudes toward the distance class due to their bitter experience in this LearningSpace-assisted class. They will avoid taking distance classes in the future if they can. The remedy for the marginalized group would be to manipulate a more effective scaffolding approach to support them through the help from their teacher and peers, aiding them in develop an independent learning style and the ability to meet the needs of the distance-learning class. The suggested three levels of abilities that a successful distance learner should possess are listed in a table; they are the ability at the technical level, ability at the intellectual level, and ability at the social level. The teacher needs to teach the students to develop these abilities and recognize the significance of the format shift phase.
CHAPTER V:
DISCUSSION, IMPLICATION FOR
PRACTICE, LIMITATIONS, AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH
Introduction
This research is a qualitative case study on the effectiveness of learning with Lotus LearningSpace. It assumes a phenomenogical perspective on exploring the reality. Few qualitative researches are conducted on investigating how students and teachers make sense of their daily lives in using educational technology (Kerr, 1996). This research concentrates on the empirical phenomenon in an undergraduate, junior-level class in human environmental science at a large land-grant university in the American Midwest. Two research questions guided this study: (1) How effective is Lotus LearningSpace in assisting the HES 3002 distance learning class? and (2) What are the critical factors that affect learning in the HES 3002 class in the Lotus LearningSpace environment?
The research utilizes the approaches of interviews and observation to collect data. The data were from an online discussion board, online surveys, and interviews. They presented the perspectives, attitudes, and experiences of the LearningSpace users. Chapter V discusses the findings and the implication for practice, then delineates limitations and makes suggestions for future researches. The two themes found in this research are the technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma. They describe how students survived learning in the LearningSpace-assisted HES 3002 class, and reveal some implications about the effectiveness of learning in networked environments like LearningSpace.
Discussion
With the development of the study, two themes emerge from the data. They are technical accommodation and format shift dilemma, which help explain how the students of the HES 3002 class struggled and survived their first distance class.
Theme I is technical accommodation, which describes how the learners in the HES 3002 class made efforts to adapt to the new technical environment of the LearningSpace-assisted course, and what struggles they had with the use of LearningSpace. The powerful features of LearningSpace could facilitate learning interaction and provide efficient access to information resources and the class database. But the LearningSpace interface design problems caused students much confusion and frustration, because the students in HES 3002 were all new distance-class takers. On the other hand, the students’ capacity for learning in a networked class needed improvement. As a distance learner, to be technically capable is a must. That means that a learner in the Information Age will inevitably pick up the technology tools to fulfill his/her personal learning goals. A student entering the technology-assisted class need to be happy to face the challenge to learn new things, instead of planning to take advantage of the technology to avoid hard working and to earn easy grades. Technology helps those who understand it, but can embarrass those who are afraid of it. Taking a first distance class is an important learning experience. Even if the students encountered many difficulties in their first distance class, it would help them to alleviate their technical tension in the distance classes, benefiting them in the long run.
As the teacher, to help the students get out of the initial technical shadow, Dr. Rona provided much support to the students and also referred them to the CIS Help Desk to solve complicated problems. But the most effective way to solve the technical problems was through the use of the constructivist learning approach: cooperative learning. Cooperative learning creates better learning efficiency, higher participation, and positive attitude toward class and peers (Bull, 1997). With this approach, students were required to participate in interactions on the discussion board, share technical experiences, and scaffold each other to mediate confusion and frustration among themselves. Students felt more free and comfortable with contacting each other to solve their own problems with the help of the LearningSpace communication tools. They were more willing to participate if they felt that their dialogue was more meaningful to their personal needs (Slavin, 1989).
The challenge to the constructivist learning was how much scaffolding had to be provided when the new distance-learning students felt confusion. When the teacher creates scaffolding in the constructivist learning approach, he/she must have a clear awareness of the students' needs so as to adjust to their level of scaffolding and help students out of difficulties. Dr. Rona wanted the students to put more effort into learning on their own. When she reduced her responses to the students after noting that the technical questions the students asked were already answered on the discussion board, students expressed their dissatisfaction with the teacher’s limited support. The teacher’s intention and the students’ expectations were unable to reconcile, and misunderstanding occurred. But when the students underwent a period of difficult experience in learning and adjusting to the new technical environment, their capability also grew. Even though there were some difficulties in implementing constructivist learning, the final effective approach to help students step out of the technical barriers in HES 3002 was still through constructivist learning. The technical support from the teacher and from peers provided the backbone of the constructivist scaffolding to lead the new distance learners out of the technical shadow.
LearningSpace needs more renovation and improvement to make it powerful and competitive in the market. If a learning network fails to be user-friendly and requires too much technology competency and exploration, it will not be welcomed by distance learners and will lose its market. Blackboard is generally welcomed because its interface is more user-friendly than LearningSpace. Blackboard’s interface buttons show clearer meanings and the user can understand what content or categories are related to that button. The routes of the buttons are clear and meaningful, so it is easy for the users to find what they need just by an easy click. The same type of jobs, such as checking assignments, looking at the schedule, finding grades, and participating in discussions are easier in Blackboard as compared to LearningSpace. As network product designers, Notes company should put the users' needs as the highest objective to ensure usability, acceptability, and user-friendliness. This study recommends that classes like HES 3002, where many learners are first-time distance-class takers, not use complicated networks like LearningSpace. A network like Blackboard is a better choice, because Blackboard is generally considered more user-friendly, intuitive, and easy to learn than LearningSpace. If using LearningSpace, the instructor should incorporate teaching students to use LearningSpace in instructional design and instructional strategy, assign specific time and place to train the students to ensure that students get comfortable with their class network.
Theme II, the format shift dilemma, reveals a fundamental problem of the distance-learning paradigm: it could be a long-range issue regarding how to effectively implement distance learning among new distance-class takers.
Format shift problems are associated with the learning habit change in the networked environment. Students in HES 3002 were challenged by the format shift problems, which could often affect the effectiveness of learning. The HES 3002 students complained that they often forgot that they even had a class online when they were busy working with their other traditional classes. They were not in the habit of opening the LearningSpace online database regularly to check on the schedule, announcements, updated class information, and discussions. They found their ability to explore the new facilities of the network and to learn to use the LearningSpace tools very weak. They experienced a series of problems that related to acculturation and personal habit adaptation. Students were intimidated by the discomforts and hardships they encountered while adjusting to the new learning format. At this point, most students’ ability to cope with the networked environment and learn the new skills was vulnerable. Once feeling uncomfortable, everything became affected. This situation is most visible during the risk period. But after the risk period, the students’ experience and ability to learn in the new environment grew, and active participation in class communication and cooperation increased, resulting in positive dialogue concerning the hindrances they were coping with, and leading the students ultimately to resolving the format shift problems on their own.
On the teacher’s side, it seemed that she didn’t realize the students’ barriers with format shift enough. Dr. Rona emphasized again and again that the two classes had the same content and tests. The only difference was with the textbooks. However, the two classes were not the same classes; even though their content was the same, their difficulty level was not the same based on the different formats of the class. Using the same scale to evaluate two classes in two different formats, requiring the same assignment models, and incorporating the same content matter at the same pace—without considering the barriers facing the online class—led to significant problems. This grew into a misconnection which resulted in misunderstandings and problems, and even a conflict toward the end of the semester when some students argued about their grades and complained about their course load, causing a turmoil in the class. But it helped expose the differences that existed between the two formats of the classes and help identify different ways to deal with the difficulties these differences caused.
The format shift period is taxing, but once many students, like Mike, Jim, and Brenda, made it through this trying time and gained experience, they had fewer problems learning in the networked class. Those students who were firmly connected to the distance class learned successfully with the distance-learning format and fostered positive attitudes toward the class. But if students are conquered at the beginning by the difficulties, if they become frustrated, intimidated and scared, their learning could be disconnected from the class, resulting in their dropping the class and becoming rooted in a negative attitude toward their experience in the online class. So, as Lacky indicated, timely technical support and scaffolding was necessary for new distance-class takers to get comfortable with a technology-assisted environment (Lacky, 2000). A good scaffolding, no matter whether it comes from the teacher or from peers, in a constructivist learning environment, could can help the “at-risk” students survive the format shift period. But it is important to understand that in a constructivist learning setting like the HES 3002 class, there needs to build up a collaboration between the teacher and the students. The guidelines for this learning approach should be clear to all participants. And, the teacher still plays an important and influential role of teaching, guiding, facilitating, and directing, especially when the learners are at an immature format shifting stage. This finding supports Muirhead's research that students hope to consistently communicate more with their instructors, and the instructor still plays a vital role in promoting class interaction. Yet students must develop their self-directed learning skills and adapt their communication habits to be effectively involved in the online learning environment (Muirhead, 1999). This study conflicts with other researches which indicate that in the constructivist online class, a teacher's role has changed from teaching to facilitating (Moore, 1990; Spencer, 1988; Mason, 1998; Pressley, 1995).
In the distance learning class, a teacher needs to avoid leaving the students unattended and letting them “play” by themselves, which is a hidden problem in the concept of the constructivist distance class. A distance class teacher needs to be able and skillful in: (1) predicting the learners’ needs in distance; (2) designing strategies to help learners mediate their format shift problems; (3) prompting the learners regarding the ongoing events; (4) eliciting or probing the learners’ responses or feedback via network; (5) providing feedback as immediately as possible; (6) cultivating the learners’ ability to cope with all possible problems that could occur in the learning process; (7) flexibly adjusting the instructional strategies; (8) using technology tools (such as multimedia, etc.) to enhance instruction efficiency; (9) creating and providing the learning models, and (10) fairly and appropriately evaluating the learning outcomes. Even in a distance class, the teacher still needs to be “visible,” “hearable,” reachable, dependable, and reliable in the eye of the students.
A distance class teacher also needs to be a skillful constructivist, able to cognitively hold the distant students, scaffold them to fulfill objectives, and give them the room and freedom to learn and develop on their own.
The Implication for Practice
This study examined the two aspects of the distance learning, technical accommodation and the format shift dilemma. The findings of this study could help distance educators be aware of the current critical issues relating to how to increase the quality and effectiveness of distance learning in the LearningSpace-assisted learning environment, and help the LearningSpace designers beome aware of the perspectives and experiences of the users.
This study gives the educators some hints and reminders about the aspects that can affect the quality of distance learning and are easily overlooked. It reminds the educators of some of the crucial factors, such as the interface user-friendliness, the format shift dilemma, and the constructivist learning approach that could help teachers with their instructional design and methodology development in the distance education paradigm. The format shift problem is a problem that can be easily neglected by both the teacher and the students. That is why many students' interest and motivation drops sharply when they encounter the unanticipated barriers associated with their learning habits and cultures. An awareness of this problem may elicit attention from the instructors on designing instructions as well as designing strategies for students to resolve their format shift problems and help them.
Also, this study offers the experiences and perspectives of the users to LearningSpace’s producers so that they will have an understanding of the effectiveness of their product. This information may enable them to make decisions to renovate their products in order to better meet the needs of distance education.
Limitations of the Study
This study has several limitations that may affect its transferability. The study was limited to one class in the human environmental science field. The class population was only 50, and interviewees included only 20 students, one teacher, and 3 school network administrators. Their experiences and attitudes cannot represent all distance learners, teachers, and network administrators. Additionally, qualitative research is subjective; when the researcher conducted this study, he may not have addressed the issue of subjectivity and inter-subjectivity as extensively as possible, resulting in a potential pollution of the data, which, in turn, might result in research bias. The research site is located at a large land-grant university in the American Midwest, and, thus, may not represent the conditions and students in other sites.
With the development of IT instruction, the network facilities and the experiences of teachers and learners are changing. Today’s research might not explain the phenomenon of tomorrow’s situation very well, so this research can only explain the phenomenon in this specific case, at this particular time and place. When future researchers use these research results, they need be aware of all these factors to maintain the objectivity of their studies. In addition, the researcher is an Asian doctoral student, whose cultural background and English proficiency may affect the integrity of the research validity in terms of data collection and presentation.
Suggestions for Future
Research
This research highlights a perspective of the networked distance-learning reality. A more fully realistic view of the networked class needs a more expanded effort for exploration and understanding: one qualitative study cannot explain all phenomena, as there is little research exploring the reality of the format shift in an IT-assisted class. Few researches explore the effects of the format conflict existing in the e-learning class. This study suggests that future researchers explore more deeply and widely on the influence of IT on the learning styles, learning habit changes, instructional design, and the quality of online communication. Research is needed to uncover the impact of the human factors, which plays a critical role in the revolution of IT-assisted education.
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