Promoting Online Learning Community with Identity Transparency

This book chapter is a synthesis of several empirical user studies of online learners enrolled in degree-earning educational programs. Our findings are drawn from interviews with both online students and instructors, regarding their perceptions and strategies of fostering an online community of learners. In contrast to traditional formal education that takes place in a residential campus, or informal learning communities that are often light-weight and transient, we have been studying the nature and role of community within the growing arena of online education. In this chapter, we present and discuss our findings from multiple standpoints, offering design implications that might help designers of information systems to support socially mediated learning experiences, especially with regards to online students’ identity cues.

[1]  Jennifer Marlow,et al.  Designing interventions to reduce psychological distance in globally distributed teams , 2012, CSCW.

[2]  Michael S. Bernstein,et al.  Talkabout: Making Distance Matter with Small Groups in Massive Classes , 2015, CSCW.

[3]  Ismail Sahin,et al.  Considering Students' Perceptions: The Distance Education Student Satisfaction Model , 2008, J. Educ. Technol. Soc..

[4]  Vincent Tinto.  Dropout from Higher Education: A Theoretical Synthesis of Recent Research , 1975 .

[5]  GuzdialMark,et al.  When Life and Learning Do Not Fit , 2012 .

[6]  Alcides Velasquez,et al.  Motivations to participate in online communities , 2010, CHI.

[7]  Alfred P. Rovai,et al.  The Classroom and School Community Inventory: Development, refinement, and validation of a self-report measure for educational research , 2004, Internet High. Educ..

[8]  Mary Beth Rosson,et al.  Where is Community Among Online Learners?: Identity, Efficacy and Personal Ties , 2018, CHI.

[9]  Jocelyn Armarego,et al.  The Teaching--Research--Industry--Learning Nexus in Information and Communications Technology , 2012, TOCE.

[10]  Sarah Carr.  As Distance Education Comes of Age, the Challenge Is Keeping the Students. , 2000 .

[11]  Mark Guzdial,et al.  When Life and Learning Do Not Fit: Challenges of Workload and Communication in Introductory Computer Science Online , 2012, TOCE.

[12]  Laura A. Dabbish,et al.  Social transparency in networked information exchange: a theoretical framework , 2012, CSCW.

[13]  E. Erdfelder,et al.  Statistical power analyses using G*Power 3.1: Tests for correlation and regression analyses , 2009, Behavior research methods.

[14]  M. Kara.  Distance education: a systems view of online learning , 2020 .

[15]  Ruth E. Brown.  THE PROCESS OF COMMUNITY-BUILDING IN DISTANCE LEARNING CLASSES , 2019, Online Learning.

[16]  David J. Brown,et al.  Designing location-based learning experiences for people with intellectual disabilities and additional sensory impairments , 2011, Comput. Educ..

[17]  Felix B. Tan,et al.  Students' Uses and Gratifications for Using Computer-Mediated Communication Media in Learning Contexts , 2010, Commun. Assoc. Inf. Syst..

[18]  Noah Liebman,et al.  It's (Not) Simply a Matter of Time: The Relationship Between CMC Cues and Interpersonal Affinity , 2016, CSCW.

[19]  C. Haythornthwaite.  Online Personal Networks , 2000 .

[20]  Eni Mustafaraj,et al.  The Visible and Invisible in a MOOC Discussion Forum , 2015, L@S.

[21]  Kate McDowell,et al.  Pedagogical Strategies for Building Community in Graduate Level Distance Education Courses , 2008 .

[22]  Anselm L. Strauss,et al.  Basics of qualitative research : techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory , 1998 .

[23]  L. Vygotsky.  Mind in Society: The Development of Higher Psychological Processes: Harvard University Press , 1978 .

[24]  Janette R. Hill,et al.  Strategies for Instructors on How to Improve Online Groupwork , 2010 .

[25]  Janyce Wiebe,et al.  A machine learning approach to assessing knowledge sharing during collaborative learning activities , 2002, CSCL.

[26]  V. Braun,et al.  Using thematic analysis in psychology , 2006 .

[27]  N. Peterson,et al.  Validation of a Brief Sense of Community Scale: Confirmation of the Principal Theory of Sense of Community. , 2008 .

[28]  Sherif Halawa,et al.  Attrition and Achievement Gaps in Online Learning , 2015, L@S.

[29]  L. Hallberg.  The “core category” of grounded theory: Making constant comparisons , 2006 .

[30]  D. Gašević,et al.  “Choose Your Classmates, Your GPA Is at Stake!” , 2013 .

[31]  Duncan Rowland,et al.  PEER Support In MOOCs: The Role Of Social Presence , 2016, L@S.

[32]  Carolyn Penstein Rosé,et al.  Fostering Discussion across Communication Media in Massive Open Online Courses , 2015, CSCL.

[33]  Joseph B. Walther,et al.  Time effects in computer-mediated groups: Past, present, and future. , 2002 .

[34]  Björn Hartmann,et al.  Chatrooms in MOOCs: all talk and no action , 2014, L@S.

[35]  Caroline Haythornthwaite,et al.  Community Development Among Distance Learners: Temporal and Technological Dimensions , 2006, J. Comput. Mediat. Commun..

[36]  Mary Beth Rosson,et al.  Finding the Community in Online Education: It's in the Instructors' Eyes , 2017, CSCL.

[37]  S. Merriam.  Qualitative research in practice : examples for discussion and analysis , 2002 .

[38]  Mary Beth Rosson,et al.  How Do Distance Learners Connect? , 2019, CHI.

[39]  Xiang Cao,et al.  Understanding family communication across time zones , 2010, CSCW '10.

[40]  Hanna Ashar,et al.  Can Tinto's Student Departure Model Be Applied To Nontraditional Students? , 1993 .

[41]  Sean P. Goggins,et al.  Completely online group formation and development: small groups as socio-technical systems , 2011, Inf. Technol. People.

[42]  Sean P. Goggins,et al.  Modeling Performance in Asynchronous CSCL: An Exploration of Social Ability, Collective Efficacy and Social Interaction , 2015, CSCL.

[43]  Mary Beth Rosson,et al.  Augmenting classroom participation through public digital backchannels , 2012, GROUP.

[44]  Betsy Anne Williams,et al.  Peers in MOOCs: Lessons Based on the Education Production Function, Collective Action, and an Experiment , 2015, L@S.

[45]  Y. Neumann,et al.  Differences Between Traditional and Distance Education Academic Performances: A Meta-Analytic Approach , 2003 .

[46]  Gerry Stahl,et al.  Theories of Cognition in CSCW , 2011, ECSCW.

[47]  Jan-Willem Strijbos,et al.  Developing the role concept for computer-supported collaborative learning: An explorative synthesis , 2010, Comput. Hum. Behav..