Categories: Research Methods, Technology, Communication Design
Summary:
Swan produced this literature review to explore the research on learning effectiveness in asynchronous online environments. She compiled a collection of significant research projects that indicated there is no significant difference (or positive differences) between online and traditional learning. Her review references over 355 reports, summaries, and papers to that effect. She also found some instances where studies reported significantly worse results in online courses. These were in the minority.
To address the differences in the studies and results, Swan examined and critiqued the current research from Rourke, Anderson, Garrison, & Archer's 'Community of Inquiry' model for online learning. Her three tables comparing research findings and implications for practice in the appendix may help online education practitioners to quickly understand the implications of her research.
Citation-worthy:
"LEARNING EFFECTIVENESS means that learners who complete an online program receive educations that represent the distinctive quality of the institution. The goal is that online learning is at least equivalent to learning through the institution’s other delivery modes, in particular through its traditional face-to-face, classroom-based instruction.. . . Interaction is key (Sloan Consortium Elements of Quality: The Sloan-C Framework. Needham, MA: Sloan Center for OnLine Education, 2002" (Swan, 2003, p. 1).
"Central to the concepts of both learning and computer mediation is the notion of interaction. Interaction refers to reciprocal events involving at least two actors and/or objects and at least two actions in which the actors, objects, and events mutually influence each other [27]. No matter what learning theories we hold -- behaviorist, constructivist, cognitivist, or social -- reciprocal events and mutual response in some form must be integral to our notions of how we learn" (Swan, 2003, p. 4).
Researchers concerned with
computer-based education have identified three kinds of interactivity that affect learning: interaction with
content, interaction with instructors, and interaction among peers. Interaction with content refers
both to learners' interactions with the course materials and to their interaction with the concepts and
ideas they present. Interaction with instructors includes the myriadways in which instructors teach,
guide, correct, and support their students. Interaction among peers refers to
interactions among learners which also can take many forms -- debate,
collaboration, discussion, peer review, as well as informal and incidental
learning among classmates. Each of these modes of interaction support learning
and each can be uniquely enacted in online learning Environments. Of course, none of the three modes
of interaction function independently in practice. Interaction amongstudents, for example, is supported
by instructor facilitation and support, and, because it centers on
content, can be seen as a variety of that type
of interaction. Thus, a useful way of thinking about the three forms of interaction is provided by
Rourke, Anderson, Garrison & Archer’s 'community of inquiry' model of
online learning. If one equates cognitive presence in this model with
interaction with content, teaching presence with interaction with instructors,
and social presence with interaction among students, it gives a good
representation of how all three work together to support learning online. At the same time it should be remembered that both teachers and
students have social presence, that in many online courses, both teachers and
students teach, and that learning is always learning of content" (Swan, 2003, p. 4).
Interaction with content section:
"Janick & Liegle have synthesized the work of a range of instructional design experts in these areas to develop a list of ten concepts that support the effective design of web-based instruction. These are:
• Instructors acting as facilitators
• Use of a variety of presentation styles
• Multiple exercises
• Hands-on problems
• Learner control of pacing
• Frequent testing
• Clear feedback
• Consistent layout
• Clear navigation
• Available help screens" (Swan, 2003, p. 5).
"Chickering and Gamson’s 'Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education,' updated for online learning, are based on research and practice in traditional undergraduate education. These include:
• Contacts between students and faculty
• Reciprocity and cooperation among students
• Active learning techniques
• Prompt feedback
• An emphasis on time on task
• Communication of high expectations
• Respect for diverse talents and ways of learning" (Swan, 2003, p. 6).
Keeton, Scheckley and Griggs have adapted and revised the seven principles according to
a survey of twenty years of teaching practices, basing their eight principles on the practices they find to have had the greatest impact on learning gains in higher education:
• Make learning goals and one or more paths to them clear
• Use deliberate practice and provide prompt constructive feedback
• Provide an optimal balance of challenge and support that is tailored to the individual students’ readiness and potential
• Broaden the learners’ experience of the subject matter
• Elicit active and critical reflection by learners on their growing experience base
• Link inquiries to genuine problems or issues of high interest to the learners to enhance motivation and accelerate their learning
• Develop learners’ effectiveness as learners early in their education
• Create an institutional environment that supports and encourages inquiry" (Swan, 2003, p. 6).
"These sets of organizing concepts seem to have in common, then, is that they suggest online developers and instructors provide:
• Clear goals and expectations for learners,
• Multiple representations of course content,
• Frequent opportunities for active learning,
• Frequent and constructive feedback,
• Flexibility and choice in satisfying course objectives, and
• Instructor guidance and support" (Swan, 2003, p. 6).
"Carol Twigg [26] gathered together a group of innovative online faculty and administrators in a Pew sponsored symposium to discuss paradigm changes in online learning, their overall conclusion was that individualization was the key to innovation in distance
education. Better quality learning, they agreed, would result from the greater personalization of learning experiences for all students. Symposium participants identified five key features of pacesetting programs that support personalization of learning:
• An initial assessment of each student's knowledge, skills, and preferred learning style
• An array of high-quality, interactive learning materials and activities
• Individualized study plans
• Built-in, continuous assessment to provide instantaneous feedback
• Appropriate, varied kinds of human interaction when needed" (Swan, 2003, p. 7).
Interaction with instructors quotations:
"Research on learning through interactions with instructors, however, has yet to clearly document relationships between online teaching behaviors and student learning. Research to date is preliminary but intriguing. It has mostly been correlational and based on interview and survey data and faculty and student perceptions, but these do hint at important relationships between instructor activity and student learning. Initial investigations of instructor roles in online environments also seem quite promising.
Nonetheless, much work still needs to be done in this area" (Swan, 2003, p. 10).
"Several researchers have attempted to categorize the roles online instructors perform to reflect the ways in which they project their presence. Berge, for example, maintains that moderators of online discussions must fulfill four major functions -- managerial, social, pedagogical and technical. Paulson reduces these to three sets of functions -- organizational, social, and intellectual. Rossman provides empirical support for similar categories through the analysis of over three thousand student course evaluations. He found that student comments and complaints concerning their online instructors clustered into three major categories -- teacher responsibility, facilitating discussions, and course requirements (Swan, 2003, p. 12).
Interaction with classmates quotations:
"Socio-cognitive theories of learning maintain that all learning is social in nature and that knowledge is constructed through social interactions. Online education seems particularly well constructed to support such social learning because of the unique nature of asynchronous course discussions. To begin with, all students have a voice and no student can dominate the conversation. The asynchronous nature of the discussion makes it impossible for even an instructor to control. Whereas discussion in traditional classrooms is, for the most part, transacted through and mediated by the instructor, online discussion evolves among participants. Accordingly, many researchers have found that students perceive online discussion as more equitable and more democratic than traditional classroom discourse. In addition, because it is asynchronous, online discussion affords participants the opportunity to reflect on their classmates’ contributions while creating their own, and on their own writing before posting it. This tends to create a certain mindfulness and a culture of reflection in online courses. However, as Eastmond reminds us, computer-mediated communication is not inherently interactive, but depends on the frequency, timeliness, and nature of the messages posted. Ruberg, Moore and Taylor found that computer-mediated communication encouraged experimentation, sharing of ideas,
increased and more distributed participation, and collaborative thinking, but also found that for online discussion to be successful, it required a social environment that encouraged peer interaction facilitated by instructor structuring and support" (Swan, 2003, p. 13).
"Some communication researchers argue that differing media have differing capacities to transmit the non-verbal and vocal cues that produce feelings of immediacy in face-to-face communication. Short, Williams & Christie refer to these capacities as “social presence,” or the “quality of a medium to project the salience of others in interpersonal communication.” They contend that low bandwidth media, such as text-based computer-mediated communication, have less social presence, and by extension promote less learning, than media with greater communication potential. Media richness theory reaches a similar conclusion, as does Picard's more recent notion of "affective channel capacity". Researchers experienced with online teaching and learning, however, contest this view. Participants in computer-media communications, they argue, create social presence by projecting their identities into their communications. Walther, for example, argued that participants in strictly text-based electronic conferences adapt their language to make missing non-verbal and vocal cues explicit and so develop relationships that are marked by affective exchanges. What is important, these researchers contend, is not media capabilities, but rather personal perceptions of presence" (Swan, 2003, pp. 14-15).
"The concept of social presence leads to that of virtual learning communities. Virtual learning communities have been variously defined by differing authors, and variations
on the term, such as 'virtual classrooms', 'computer-supported knowledge-building communities', or "communities of inquiry' confuse the issue even further. Most conceptualizations, however, seem to center on one of two foci relating to research on learning communities in general. Some researchers focus on learning, more specifically, they focus on Scardemalia and Bereiter's notion of learning as collaborative knowledge building. ... Other researchers base their work on Lave and Wenger's groundbreaking
research on learning communities and on the social relationships that support them" (Swan, 2003, p. 17).
"What does the research tell us about learning effectiveness in asynchronous online environments? On the one hand, it tells us that online environments support learning outcomes that are generally equivalent to those resulting from traditional, face-to-face instruction. On the other hand, the research suggests that unique characteristics of the medium may afford and constrain particular kinds of learning. Such affordances and constraints, in turn, suggest certain strategies and approaches that might enhance the learning effectiveness of online instruction. These are summarized in Tables 1 through 3
which connect what we know, or think we know, about learning in asynchronous online environments with suggestions for practice that might either capitalize on unique their affordances or ameliorate their unique constraints (Swan, 2003, pp. 22-23).
