Tuesday, March 21st, 2006.
Possibly the single greatest problem facing elearning, distance learning and educational software in general is that of motivation and drop-out rates. The cause is long known: lack of face-to-face interaction as in a real classroom. Yet expensive elearning tools continually fail to implement online learning communities and report drop-out rates of up to 80%.
Both the problem and its solution are no great secret. Academic literature on elearning has long since reported on the issue. Implementation is the problem, and the way in which communities are implemented is critical to their impact on the success of the learning process.
When selecting an online learning community mechanism, some of the issues which must be considered are these:
- Linguistic interaction
- Non-linguistic interaction
- Privacy issues
- Synchronicity versus asynchronicity
Linguistic interaction.
To what extent should linguistic interaction ("chatting" or "messaging") be allowed in online learning communities, and what controls can be put in place, taking into consideration resources such as budgets and staff availability?
- Safety and trust. Linguistic communication is "open" in that the content of the messages transmitted is very difficult to control. There is a tendency for language-based web communities to disintegrate into silliness (at best), obscenity (in the middle) and exploitation (at the worst). The solutions to this are (time-intensive) supervision and leadership on the one hand, and inculcating a sense of responsibility in all community members on the other hand.
- Feelings. A learning environment is one where a learner's feelings as well as their cognition are vulnerable. When language is conveyed just as a series of typed words, tone of voice and accompanying body language are lacking. Comments made by teachers or peer learners can be misinterpreted as unduly harsh in such a situation. Online linguistic interaction therefore requires an especial attention to effects on learners' feelings. Learners cannot be thrown into environments where they may be attacked or scorned.
Non-linguistic interaction.
- Score-chasing. The simplest form of community-building is simple score-chasing ("halls-of-fame", ladders). The technological simplicity of this concept does not mean that it is not also the best - simple may mean good. Take the example of a tennis or golf club: very simple community building methods are used - usually score-chasing competitions combined with social events. Yet they work. One of the world's most popular sports involves nothing more complicated than trying to kick a ball into a net more often than the other guys. Whether or not successful communities emerge from these simple structures depends on how these simple ideas are implemented.
- Cause-and-effect. Research in computer gaming has identified decision-making as one of the key motivational factors. Future choices are affected by past decisions (single player) or other people's decisions (multiplayer). One can extend "decisions" to "actions" in general. Do past actions or other people's actions affect the current choices available? Cause-and-effect relatedness does not necessarily require synchronicity (simultaneous interaction of different learners). Email chess is the classic example of a non-synchronous causally related online gaming community. Current gaming technology can and does make this kind of causal interaction many times more complicated - but complexity does not of itself necessarily entail greater motivation.
Privacy issues.
Online communities must perform a balancing act between openness and privacy. The very idea of community is one of openness and acceptance, yet openness and acceptance can easily be abused to destroy a community.
- Data protection. Any online community requires data submission. If any of this data can be used to personally identify individuals, data protection and privacy law is an immediate issue, and rightly so, because all sorts of dangers are present.
- Membership. Any protective mechanisms introduced immediately raise the questions of who will be allowed to join, and how they will be chosen.
Synchronicity and asynchronicity.
Should an online learning community be synchronous or asynchronous?
Synchronous communities allow real-time interaction between members. The content and results of those interactions exist only temporarily. Asynchronous communities are built up out of submissions posted and received at different times. Typically the emphasis is on collecting such submissions and building a structure out of them. A forum is an example of a simple asynchronous online community.
- Long-term commitment versus high motivation. The equation between synchronous and asynchronous interaction is simple: synchronous interaction is strong on motivation but short on long-term commitment. Asynchronous interaction is the reverse, attaining lower peaks of motivation, but maintaining it over longer periods of time. This logically suggests that online interaction that is more game-like should tend towards synchronous interaction, while online interaction that emphasises learning goals over game-quality should tend towards asynchronous interaction.
- Participation levels. A synchronously interacting online learning community required either a high number of participants or strong coordination of timing. If both of these factors are absent, the community can quickly become a lonely place. Asynchronous interaction makes the best of lower participation levels.
Conclusions.
The Qedoc Learning Solution is constantly under our scrutiny as regards the best way to implement online learning communities. The current path is to prefer non-linguistic asynchronous interaction of the simplest kinds and allow users to select between two privacy options. We intend to develop this in response to experiences and user feedback.
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