693AR06GH

Do Internet-thrived Learning Communities Maintain Longer-standing Relationships With Interactive Students and Teachers? For the KAQF portion of the research, I chose “students are not encouraged to take online courses. Face-to-Face is preferred by the program” as my Knowledge. “Allow students in CCT program to take a select amount of courses online” was the action that I was leaning towards. The Query was to “find out about the quality of online courses and the willingness of instructors and students to create an online community”. Lastly, for my Find I chose to “research secondary sources for online communities and ask current web-based course instructors of their experience and suggestions”.

Throughout my research I discovered that students found face-to-face courses to give a better perception of the instructor and a better overall quality of the course. However, online courses aid to individual learning styles, which cater to more students. This in turn, allows the courses and program to be marketed toward a larger audience. When it comes to technology, many students and professors (especially first time users) may find themselves limited in the Internet environment. It takes time to learn the organization of an online course.

Quality interaction is the most important tool to use during an online course. This is what creates an effective learning course. In my research I learned that “interaction in online courses needs to be persistent, and of high quality”. Unfortunately for the research, “defining the qualities of “high quality” interaction is difficult”; therefore there are no measures for understanding what high quality interaction is or how to compare it.

I’m proposing that CCT M.A. students have the option to take 2 out of the 10 courses offered in the CCT program in the online course environment. This will allow for the quality of the overall M.A. program to be sustained. This will also allow for students to participate on and off campus and help the post-graduate community gain one more avenue to recruit new participants.

If I were to continue my research on this scenario, I would speak with current CCT professors to see how adaptable they feel they are toward facilitating an online course. I would also speak with current Web-based course professors for input of what attributes they feel give the highest quality of learning in online courses.

References:

•Johnson, S.D., Aragon, S.R., Shaik, N., Palma-Rivas, N. (2000). Comparative analysis of learner satisfaction and learning outcomes in online and face-to-face learning environments [Electric Version]. //Journal of Interactive Learning Research//, 11, 20-49. From source: http://www.aace.org/dl/files/JILR/JILR11129.pdf

•Roblyer, M.D. & Wiencke, W.R. (2003). Design and use of a rubric to assess and encourage interactive qualities in distance courses [Electronic Version]. //American Journal of Distance Eduacation//, 17, 77-98. From source: http://www.leaonline.com/doi/abs/10.1207/S15389286AJDE1702_2?journalCode=ajde

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