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Online Learning News and Research
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Saturday, July 24, 2004
From a Distance: Student Empowerment and Constructing Teacher Identities Online - Ayshe TALAY-ONGAN, TOJDE
It can doubtless be argued that many pedagogically sound teaching and learning experiences have been and will be successfully constructed in the absence of online learning. Many such experiences however, depend on opportunities of teacher-student contact through lectures, tutorials and consultations. These face-to-face interactions over the length of a semester allow a personal sense of knowing to develop among the participants, and help forge a common goal and identity. Distance education students, by contrast, experience significantly less of the benefit of such interpersonal and continuous interactions. As off-campus enrolment may be related to lower academic achievement (Dickson, Fleet & Watt, 2000), the advent of technology compelled us to find ways and means of levelling the field and provide comparable learning experiences and environments to those enjoyed by their on-campus peers on principles of social justice and equity.
Comments:
Having just experienced a UMUC online introductory course, I feel that they took your message too much to heart.
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They placed heavy emphasis on this "personal" relationship building through "conference" requirements. I felt as if I was in a competitive chat-room. In the "real" world of college classes, I listened to lectures. In the last minute of class, the instructor MIGHT ask if there are any questions. One or two might actually get to ask something. Also, in the interest of "social justice and equity," I feel that the lack of visual interfacing is a plus. i.e. judge me not by my appearance, but by my insights. Online Learning News Blog Archives OTEL - Ray's Home Page - Notebook - UIS Online - U of I Online - UIS Home Fair Use |
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