TCC 2003 Presentation

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COMFORT, CONFIDENCE AND CONFIDENTIALITY: THE EXPERIENCE OF TWO
E-LEARNERS

Margaret Freeman
University of Sheffield, UK
Barbara Allan
Hull University Business School, UK

Abstract

This paper is based on the authors’ experiences as e-learners on a MEd in Collaborative Networked Learning during 2000-2002. Although this course was delivered completely online, a strong sense of community developed early and continued as a key theme throughout the two years of the course. Our paper examines how this sense of community was facilitated and maintained, based on narrative analysis of our learning journals and personal recollections.

Introduction

Some of the most exciting developments in e-learning are those which link people with a shared interest and which enable them to interact and learn from each other in formal or informal learning communities (Preece, 1999; McDonald, 2002; Coomey & Stephenson, 2001). There is now a growing body of research which shows that online peer learning and collaborative small group discussion are especially valuable for topics ‘which lend themselves to reflection, tacit understanding and diffuse knowledge domains’ (Mason, 2002: 24). Experienced e-tutors have also emphasised that the success of this type of e-learning requires both careful design and support of the computer system and effective management strategies, to provide support and policies and strategies which guide participants’ interactions and encourage of a sense of shared purpose (Preece, 1999; Harris and Niven, 2002).

We have noted with interest that the majority of reports on e-learning communities are described from the perspective of the e-tutor/moderator (Curry, 2001; Allan et al., 2002). We suggest, however, that accounts of the experience of being a student online (e.g. Mann, 2002) provide additional insights which add to the understanding of the online learning experience.

In this paper, therefore, we reflect on our experiences as e-learners on a post-graduate course and consider how the dynamics of this established and successful online course impacted the total learning experience. While some of our reflections are inevitably subjective, we present this paper as an example of action research which has informed our own practice, and we hope it will provide insights to others who are designing or entering e-learning experiences.

Background: the Course and the Participants

The course

The MEd in Networked Collaborative Learning (now the MEd in e-learning) is a two year part-time, post-graduate course which emphasises ‘the implementation of innovatory on-line practice by creating a supportive and creative online research learning where participants can feel free to experiment and "learn by doing", while constantly holding a critical perspective on their practice and the theory underpinning it.’ (McConnell et al., 2000, p.220). It is of note that our cohort was the first to experience this course entirely on-line, in contrast to previous cohorts who had met together initially for a residential induction.

The participants

Our cohort consisted of 23 students, all of whom are practicing educators working in a variety of settings, predominantly, but not exclusively in the UK. To facilitate the sense of community, our photographs and personal introduction/self-descriptions were mounted on the course site. These showed that our group included people with a wide variety of prior expertise and experience as e-learners and e-tutors. This is exemplified by authors of this paper. While Margaret entered the course as a relative newcomer to e-learning, Barbara had previously been an online tutor for the Open University and was currently engaged in running other online learning events as part of her professional activity. Our reflections, summarised below, therefore reflect very different starting points.

Reflections on the Experience of e-Learning

We have used a case study approach, based predominantly on an analysis of our learning journals. From this data, we have identified three factors which we consider were influential for our learning community (Wenger, 1998); these are:

How personal feelings of comfort and ease impacted the introduction to the course.
The processes which facilitated the growth of confidence, students’ readiness to share, discuss and work collaboratively and to develop a sense of our personal and community identity.
Issues relating to the development and maintenance of trust, sharing and socio-emotional engagement (Lally and Barrett, 1999) in a communal and public forum ( McDonald, 2002; Preece, 1999). This includes issues such as the ownership of the group discussions, ethics and confidentiality.

Theme 1: Personal Comfort and Ease

Our initial responses as e-learners can be considered on at least two levels. At the cognitive level (Hiltz, 1994), we recognised that the design and management of our new learning environment reflected the recommendations for good practice identified in the literature (Duggleby, 2000; Duggan, 2001; Goodyear et al., 2001). For example, the course induction pack included explanations of the course structure and instructions for accessing the WebCT site and obtaining help. Preliminary reading, including publications by the course tutors (Lally & Barrett, 1999; McConnell, 2000), provided insights into the theoretical and philosophical underpinnings of the course. These elements, combined with the tutors’ actions in welcoming each participant and weaving the online discussions (Allan, 2002), served to support and facilitate the first stages of successful e-learning (Salmon, 2000).

Even with all of the support mechanisms in place, as students, we both found that adjusting to the on-line learning environment was challenging at the ‘socio-emotional’ level (Harasim et al., 1995). This began with a sense of isolation, which Mann (2002, p.71) described as a feeling of ‘visibility and invisibility…All I have here are words on a screen and a sense of the world out there with unknown recipients’. We needed time to find our own ‘virtual voice’, in terms of our language and style of expression, especially because we lacked the immediate non-verbal feedback which we usually gain from face-to-face conversation. This led to a yearning for a brief, private face-to-face chat with someone else who had shared the experience, so that we could compare notes about our reactions and get some informal and immediate feedback.

In a similar way, we needed to recognise the voices of the others. Although this was a relatively small group, we found that meeting more than 20 new colleagues and three tutors on-line raised issues about how much one needs to know about another person before one feels comfortable in discussion with them. When this was discussed among the group, it transpired that each of us had adopted strategies, such as printing out the photos and personal introductions or labelling each person with known attributes (for example ‘X is a language teacher, who lives in …’), so that we could recognise and respond effectively to our on-line peers.

It also took time to adjust to the ‘syncopated’ nature of asynchronous communication, with discussions occurring at different levels and in different time frames (McDonald, 2002, p.14). This was compounded by the number of contributions from the whole group of students and the three tutors, produced within a very short space of time. This had a cyclical effect: we needed to keep returning to the site to keep up with the activity, but then we needed to respond - which in turn generated more messages. Our journals reflect initial memory overload, which later developed into a sense of becoming engaged, as we adjusted to the process. We were also aware of the need for time and thinking space as the online activity escalated. Like our peers, we found that thinking about the course was an almost constant background activity at various times throughout the course.

Theme 2: The Development of the Community

The action to encourage ‘socio-emotional communication’ (Harasim et al., 1995; Lally and Barrett, 1999) among the participants was a major factor in the success of our individual and communal learning. This action included:

The tutors’ actions and presence: The tutors’ involvement throughout the course remained a central and vital factor. In addition to their role in formal learning, each of the three tutors acted as facilitators — and in the early stages, role models- through their individual communication styles, modes of interaction, use of humour and readiness to share information. Along with encouraging participation, these interactions supported a form of cognitive apprenticeship (Wang & Bonk, 2001; Bowskill et al., in press) for students as we developed our own niche in the e- learning community.

The use of small group activities: The time spent in whole group learning activities was limited. Most of the formal program was undertaken in subsets which varied for each module, sometimes with participants allocated by the tutors and sometimes organised around topics selected by the students.

The members of each learning group developed close working relationships, so that over the duration of the course a strong bond developed among the whole group. We noted that we also became increasingly self-managed as our sense of personal and group autonomy grew (Salmon, 2000; Davis & Denning, 2000). For some of us, this led to the decision to experiment by working without a tutor for one small module (Allan et al., 2002).

The social space. In our course, this was a virtual pub (The Rover’s Return: named after the hub of activity in the UK soap opera, Coronation Street). At least half of the student group were visible in the pub on a regular basis, sometimes joined by one or two tutors.

As in other virtual social spaces (Lally & Barrett, 1999; Allan, 2002), the apparently inconsequential chat with colleagues encouraged and sustained our sense of engagement, sharing and support. We are aware, however, that the ‘club atmosphere’ in the pub could also be considered divisive for the whole community because some group members did not have a visible presence here. The whole group did not discuss this directly, but we know from our chats with others that some people lurked, while others only joined in occasionally because of time limitations. We are also aware that there may be cultural and social issues around the concept of a pub as a social space, which may have deterred some of our colleagues.

Theme 3: Trust, Confidence and Confidentiality in the On-line Community

We suggest that the growth of our e-learning community was based on a combination of factors which enabled us to balance our individual needs, rights and concerns with the group sense of shared purpose. This included the responsibility of all participants to develop and maintain the group dynamics.

The tutors again played a strong part here. Typically, their input was strong in the early phases of each new group activity, followed by a reduced presence when the students established their own way of working together and more overt input when the tasks neared completion (Lally, 2002). This was generally successful, as it gave the groups opportunities to work with relative independence and thus, the opportunity to experience ‘making the learning public’ and ‘learning by doing’ which were central elements in the course design (McConnell, 2000).

There were occasions, however, when we felt the need for more specific policies to guide our interactions (Preece, 1999; Harris and Niven, 2002). We became aware, for example, that there were few stated guidelines for responding to opinions, personal beliefs, cultural expectations or motivations which challenged our own viewpoints. Although these incidents were surprisingly rare, they raised our awareness that issues which might be resolved by a brief, informal and transient face-to-face chat can assume a different significance in the online environment (McConnell, 2002). We also recognise that we sometimes felt inhibited because all our postings were recorded in the permanent paper trail of the online course (McDonald, 2002). This emphasised the need for clear and explicit policies about the ownership and security of the course discussions (Varvel, 2001; Harris and Niven, 2002). While open access to all areas of the course site encourages the sense of community, course leaders need to be aware that privacy guidelines are essential when students engage in open discussion for their learning.

Within our group of mature, post-graduate students, the sense of responsibility to contribute to and support the development of the community was strong. Because each of us worked at establishing and maintaining communication, we quickly got to know and understand the individual styles and working patterns of each member of the group and established a strong sense of mutual support and trust. We continued to value the tutors’ contributions, especially when we were preparing assessed assignments. This, perhaps, underlines one of the basic issues for students in collaborative on-line learning: the need to complete the course successfully still invokes a degree of personal vulnerability, even when the learning is well-supported and democratic.

Conclusions

For us, being student participants in an on-line learning community was a powerful and positive experience. Our reflections have also demonstrated that the success of this experience came from a complex blend of processes that supported the development of individual and collective autonomy through mutual support and learning (Bowskill et al., in press). We hope that our brief summary here has contributed to the understanding of the impact of some of these processes on student participants and look forward to reading other contributions that provide further insights from the student perspective.