Elba Gutiérrez-Santiuste

Online distributed leadership: a content analysis of interaction and teacher reflections on computer-supported learning

This study performs a content analysis of the communication that develops in online educational situations. It focuses on two aspects of communication in a context in which we observe instructional leadership: how leadership is seen in the virtual classroom and how teachers view their role. The study attempts to answer the question of how teachers lead this methodological change, that is, instructional leadership at the service of distributed leadership. The study analyses the online interaction and teachers’ reflections on the communication between teachers and students in the process of virtual teaching, specifically in post-compulsory secondary education in Spain.

Analizar el liderazgo distribuido en entornos virtuales de formación.

We propose a coding scheme for the analysis of distributed leadership in virtual learning environments. The tool is designed for the analysis of synchronous and asynchronous textual communications. The tool is built by a process based on previous literature and the content analysis of the researchers. We obtain realibility of coding scheme through the intraclass correlation coefficient reaches a value of .878. We conclude that the proposed coding scheme can be used for coding virtual communication through chats, forums and emails to obtain reliable results that facilitate understanding of distributed leadership in teaching and learning in virtual environments.

School Technology Leadership in a Spanish Secondary School: The TEI Model.

This study analyzes the perception that teachers and management team members in secondary school education have of technology-based educational innovation (TEI). Two questionnaires and in-depth interviews permit us to analyze leaders’ perspective of planning, development, and evaluation. The school leaders’ view diverges from that of the regional/national education policy makers and is closer to the view developed in pedagogy for leading the process of introducing technology in classrooms and influencing innovation in teachers’ practice. Based on reflection on the leadership–technology–innovation relationship, we derive a top-down model for use by teachers, schools, the community, and education authorities.

Type and degree of co-occurrence of the educational communication in a community of inquiry*

ABSTRACT The study analyzes the type and quantity of co-occurrence of social, cognitive, and teaching presence in a Community of Inquiry (CoI). Content analysis of the virtual educational communication shows units of analysis that must be assigned to more than one category. By crossing the categories of the CoI model, we observe that Social Presence is involved in all of the crossings and that graphic, linguistic, and paralinguistic elements change the meaning of the communication in the social, cognitive, and teaching interaction. We demonstrate the communicative richness of the educational encounters in which Social Presence interacts with the other elements and draw conclusions about the importance of support for communication in virtual communication. We stress the need to analyze co-occurrences to achieve a full analysis of computer-mediated communication.

Tipos de comunicación en una comunidad colaborativa virtual de futuros docentes

Communication is studied in a virtual collaborative community of future teachers. The participants collaborate in a virtual learning environment in higher education. The main theme of this article is computer-mediated communication and the analysis of the three most used communication tools (chats, forums and emails). The different types of communication (social presence, cognitive presence, teaching presence) and the perception of the future teacher on them are exposed in the article. The results show differences in the elements analyzed for the communication tool which is used. The analysis of communication in virtual collaborative environments is a promising line of research to contribute improving the initial training of teachers and therefore improving education.