Panagiotis Tsiotakis

Beyond students’ perceptions: investigating learning presence in an educational blogging community

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present an integrated framework for designing and investigating students’ engagement patterns and learning presence in educational blogs. The framework was grounded on the ideas of self-directed and reflective learning, and was applied to analyse students’ blogging activities in the context of an undergraduate course. Design/methodology/approach The proposed research framework was organized along three dimensions: content artefacts, blogging processes and community building. With regard to the methodological tools used, this study integrates content analysis of students’ posts using the framework of community of inquiry, the representation of learning mapping and social network analysis methods. Findings The results have revealed important information about the different ways of students’ engagement and learning presence within the blogging groups, the contribution and the influence each student had, as well as the structure and the cohesion of the learning community developed around the blogging project. Research limitations/implications The findings of this study are limited by the blended course features, the specific sample and the context of implementation. Future research needs to consider and analyse students’ lurking or invisible presence in educational blogging communities. Practical implications This study has yielded promising results with regard to the design of educational blogs in higher education that aim to enhance students’ engagement, reflection, collaboration and self-directed learning. Originality/value The originality concerns the proposed conceptual framework which can guide the design, monitoring and analysis of blogging processes in order to reveal students’ learning presence within self-directed communities of blogging.

Students’ Self-Regulated Learning Through Online Academic Writing in a Course Blog

This chapter presents an investigation on students’ self-regulation practices associated with online academic writing and inquiry through blogging, in the context of a blended postgraduate course. The design framework of this particular intervention was determined by the assumption that online writing in course blogs could be a means of increasing students’ academic writing skills. The key aspects of students’ engagement, peer interaction, and reflection were directed by the principles of self-directed and self-regulated learning. Students’ contributions to the course blog were analyzed by using two schemas, i.e., Community of Inquiry and Learning Presence. Descriptive and content analysis revealed important information regarding individual inquiry and performance, peer interaction and reflection, as well as self-regulated learning actions exhibited by the participants within a community of inquiry. The results provided supportive evidence that online academic writing was an effective learning activity and promoted students’ cognitive presence as well as their learning presence. Students’ self- and co-regulated learning appeared to be addressed to the dimensions of monitoring, strategy use, and reflection.

Investigating the Role of Structure in Online Teachers’ Communities of Learning

Online learning communities constitute a dynamically evolving field at both levels, research and development in educational practice. This paper reports on the design and the implementation of two online communities with different organizational–functional characteristics, a self-directed (open) community and a semi-structured community. Using in combination of qualitative and social network analysis methods, this investigation revealed important information regarding critical community indicators, i.e. teachers’ engagement and mutual interaction, as well as collaboration and community evolution. The findings indicated that the semi-structured community was very effective and cohesive, since the majority of the participants were very active and self-organized in groups, and they developed strong interrelations among them. On the other hand, the open community turned out to be very centralized, evolving around the coordinator’s initiatives.

Self-directed Learning in e-Portfolios: Design Issues and Investigation of Students’ Performance

This paper presents an investigation on students’ learning presence in a blended post-graduate course, designed to promote self-directed learning through e-portfolio activities. The theoretical foundations and the key dimensions of e-portfolio learning activities are outlined, i.e. students’ construction, reflection and collaboration. Following are presented the organizational and the analysis framework of students’ self-directed learning and constructive activities within the e-portfolio. Descriptive analysis and Social Network Analysis of the research data revealed important information regarding individual performance, interaction and collaboration among participants as well as the whole e-portfolio community.