Students' Perception on E-learning in Context of Social Presence

Author(s):

Rita Birzina(presenting / submitting)Jelena Janevica(presenting)Alla Anohina-Naumeca

Conference:

ECER 2012

Network:

11. Educational Effectiveness and Quality Assurance

Format:

Paper

Session Information

11 SES 05 A, Alternative Innovations to Improve Education

Parallel Paper Session

Time:

2012-09-19

11:00-12:30

Room:

FCT - Aula 1

Chair:

Andra Fernate

Contribution

The rapidly changing economic, financial and social conditions require new knowledge and competences in order to be able to understand them, adapt to the new requirements and remain competitive and successful in the globalized social environment. Widening the access to lifelong learning is a means of how this could be achieved. A special role in this process has to be plaid by higher education whose major challenge is to adapt to the “ensuing opportunities of globalisation and accelerated technological developments with new providers, new learners and new types of learning” (Leuven Communique, 2009). In this context new types of learning include the use of new technologies, e-learning which is becoming more and more significant to provide accessibility to lifelong learning to everyone.
While human interaction (learner-to-learner and learner-to-instructor) is often stated as a desired instructional goal within distance education, social interaction in and of itself is not a guarantee of cognitive engagement or of meaningful learning (Garrison & Cleveland-Innes, 2005). Randy Garrison and others (Garrison et al., 2000) elaborated the teaching and learning transaction model in a text-based communication medium. The model assumes that in e-community, learning occurs through the interaction of three core components: cognitive presence, teaching presence, and social presence (Garrison et al., 2000). Social presence is defined as the ability of participants in the Community of Inquiry (CoI) to project themselves socially and emotionally, as ''real'' people (i.e., their full personality), through the medium of communication being used. Social presence is now a central concept in online learning (Lowenthal & Dunlap, 2010). It is so essential breaking the social barriers between students, educators and tutors by creating social interaction and communication.
The evidence based explorative research was conducted during the implementation of study process in previous and current study year (2011/2012) at the University of Latvia to explore the students’ perception of e-learning in promoting their studies.
The aim of the present research was to explore good patterns of social presence in e-learning as a mediating factor to facilitate learning in national and transnational contexts.
The research question was to find out how social presence facilitated students’ e-learning.

Method

The research has got the design of mixed explorative concurrent quantitative and qualitative methods (Tashakkori, Teddlie, 2003; Taylor, 1973; Dockrell & Hamilton 1983; Mayring, Huber, Gürtler, 2007) which comprises the following stages: data collection, primary and secondary data processing and finally the analysis and interpretation of findings. The priority has been given to the quantitative aspect of the research. The questionnaire has two parts: general and specific. The general part consists of items related to the description of the students and their perceptions of e-learning. It was based on theoretical background of e-learning, theories of learning and explorative experience of the researchers of the University of Latvia (Birzina et al. 2010, 2009; Fernate et al. 2010, 2009). The specific part consists of criteria and indicators designed by Randy Garrison et al (2000, 2001) for the Community of Inquiry model, which is an instructional design model for e-learning.

Expected Outcomes

The main emphasis of the community of inquiry is to create an effective learning community that promotes effectiveness of the students’ studies in e-environment. The present research has explored how good the patterns of social presence in e-learning as a mediating factor to facilitate learning are. Based on the theoretical findings and the obtained data, the following conclusions can be drawn: social Presence is a critical factor in building the community of learners facilitating the achievement of cognitive aspects of learning. There are three categories of Social Presence: affective expression, open communication, and group cohesion. The data of the present research show that students underestimate the affective expression which supports a sense of belonging to the course and is important for social interaction. Open communication and group cohesion as key elements for students’ interaction in e-environment have been more supported, thus demonstrating a tendency to recognise the role of open communication in e-learning. However, as the research data show, the virtual communication cannot replace real communication and conversations.

References

Birzina R., Kalnina D., Janevica J., Cernova E. (2010) The impact of interactive e-learning organization on quality assurance in European interuniversity master’s studies. Samuel Gento Palacios (ed.) How to Progress on Educational Quality Assurance, Madrid:UNED. CDformat. ISBN978-84-614-2567-9 Birzina, R., Kalnina D., Janevica J. & Cernova, E. (2009) Effectiveness of interactive e-learning organization and quality assurance in European interuniversity master studies. http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/186734.pdf Dockrell, W.B., & Hamilton, D. (1983) Nuevas Reflexiones sobre la Investigación Educativa. Madrid Editorial Narcea.18. Fernate A., Surikova S., Kalnina D., Sanchez R. C. (2009) Research-Based Academic Studies: Promotion of the Quality of Learning Outcomes in Higher Education? British Education Index Data Base. ID187885 http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/187885.pdf Fernate A., Surikova S., Kalnina D., Sanchez R. C. (2010) Promotion of the Quality of Learning Outcomes in Research-Based Academic Studies by Widening of Opportunities. Samuel Gento Palacios (ed.) How to Progress on Educational Quality Assurance, Madrid:UNED. CDformat. ISBN978-84-614-2567-9 Garrison, D. R., & Cleveland-Innes, M. (2005) Facilitating Cognitive Presence in Online Learning: Interaction is Not Enough. American Journal of Distance Education, 19(3), 133. Garrison, D.R., Anderson, T., Archer, W. (2000) Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education, The Internet and Higher Education, 2 (2-3), 87-105. Leuven Communique (2009) The Bologna Process 2020 – The European Higher Education Area in the new decade http://www.ond.vlaanderen.be/hogeronderwijs/bologna/conference /documents/Leuven_Louvain-la-Neuve_Communiqu%C3%A9_April_2009.pdf Lowenthal, P. R., & Dunlap, J. (2010). From pixel on a screen to real person in your students’ lives: Establishing social presence using digital storytelling. The Internet and Higher Education http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S109675160900061X Mayring, P., Huber, G.L. and Gurtler, L. (Eds) (2007) Mixed Methodology in Psychological Research. Sense Publishers. Tashakkori, A., Teddlie, C. (Eds.) (2003) Handbook of mixed methods in social and behavioural research. Thousand Oaks, CA:Sage. Taylor, W. (eds.) (1973) Research perspectives in Education. London:Routledge&Kegan Paul, 217

Author Information

Rita Birzina (presenting / submitting)

University of Latvia

Institute og Pedagogical Sciences

Riga

Jelena Janevica (presenting)

University of Latvia

Faculty of Education, Psychology and Art

Daugavpils

Alla Anohina-Naumeca

Riga Technical University

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