Distance students' readiness for and interest in collaboration and social media [r-libre/853]

Poellhuber, Bruno; Anderson, Terry; Racette, Nicole, & Upton, Lorne (2013). Distance students' readiness for and interest in collaboration and social media. Paper published in Interactive Technology and Smart Education, 10 (1), 63-78. https://doi.org/10.1108/17415651311326455

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Item Type:	Papers in Conference Proceedings
Refereed:	Yes
Status:	Published
Abstract:	Social media and social networking tools offer new educational affordances and avenues for students to interact, that may alleviate the drop-out rate problem faced by distance education institutions (Rovai, 2003). However, we know little about distance students’ expertise with social media or their interest in using them to learn individually or to collaborate with peers. To investigate these issues, an online questionnaire was distributed to students from four large Canadian distance education institutions. A systematic sampling procedure lead to 3462 completed questionnaires. The results show that students have diverse views and experiences, but they also show strong and significant age and gender differences in a variety of measures, as well as an important institution effect for interest in collaboration. Males and younger students score higher on almost all indicators, including cooperative preferences. In this article we review quantitative results from the survey from earlier work (authors, 2011) and present an analysis of the qualitative data gathered from open-ended questions in the survey. Answers to open-ended questions regarding the expectation and interest in using social software in their courses, show that students have positive expectations about interactions and course quality, but also concerns about technical, time, and efficiency issues The limits of the study and future developments and research questions are outlined.
Depositor:	Racette, Nicole
Owner / Manager:	Nicole Racette
Deposited:	25 May 2016 14:10
Last Modified:	25 May 2016 14:10

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