A synchronous distance discussion procedure with ...assets00.grou.ps/0F2E3C/wysiwyg_files/FilesModule/convergencia/... · A synchronous distance discussion procedure with reinforcement

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Computers & Education 51 (2008) 1538–1552

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A synchronous distance discussion procedure with reinforcementmechanism: Designed for elementary school studentsto achieve the attending and responding stages of theaffective domain teaching goals within a class period

Kuo-An Hwang a, Chia-Hao Yang b,*

a Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering and Graduate Institute of Networking and Communication Engineering,

Chaoyang University of Technology, No. 168, Jifong E. Road, Wufong Township Taichung County 41349, Taiwan, ROCb Graduate Institute of Informatics, Doctoral Program, Chaoyang University of Technology, No. 168, Jifong E. Road,

Wufong Township Taichung County 41349, Taiwan, ROC

Received 31 August 2006; received in revised form 5 February 2008; accepted 11 February 2008

Abstract

Distance education courses must cope with the difficulties imposed by delivering a class at a distance. As most courses onlyemphasize the cognitive aspects of the class and neglect the course’s effect on the students, this gives no help for reaching theaffective domain teaching goals. Especially for younger students, in distance education, when younger students are out of thesight of teachers, they could easily be distracted by the environment around them. This research outlines a synchronous dis-cussion procedure with reinforcement mechanism designed for elementary school students to integrate the affective aspects ofteaching into distance education within a class period. The mechanism allows teachers to understand students’ attitudeswithin the class and provides instant feedback to the teacher. Learners can also get information about their attitudes andhelp to reach the affective domain teaching goals of the courses. This mechanism was implemented and investigated. Com-parative assessments were made by administering interviews and questionnaires to elementary school students. The resultsshow that the procedure can supervise learners and help them reach the response stage of the affective domain teaching goals.� 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Distance education and telelearning; Interactive learning environment; Computer-mediated-communication; Teaching strat-egies

1. Introduction

On-line learning, learning by means of personal computer and computer networks (Harasim, Hiltz, Teles,& Turoff, 1995), is a way largely utilized in distance education. E-mails and discussion forum are often

0360-1315/$ - see front matter � 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2008.02.004

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +886 4 2332 3000x7708; fax: +886 4 2330 4902.E-mail address: [email protected] (C.-H. Yang).

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K.-A. Hwang, C.-H. Yang / Computers & Education 51 (2008) 1538–1552 1539

adopted as the interaction tools (Eisenstadt & Vincent, 1998; Wolfe, 2000). Before delivering a class, the tea-cher must set the teaching objectives. According to Lefrancois (1982), teaching goals could be classified intothree domains: cognitive domain, knowledge; affective domain, attitude; and psychomotor domain, skills.However, most teaching courses merely lay stress on knowledge impartation, namely, cognitive domain,and neglect students’ learning attitudes and the affective domain teaching goals (Keller & Sherman, 1974).The teaching strategies of the affective domain teaching objectives must be administered in ordinary coursesby managing the students’ learning attitudes during class to guide their moral characters and achieve theteaching objectives of affective domain (Goge & Broiler, 1992).

There are also affective domain teaching objectives in the courses of distance education. Learningobjects must be set for achieving the attending and responding learning objects within every class period.However, in distance education, mostly, class discussions and interactions are made merely by means ofdiscussion forum, which is similar to chat room. Provided common discussion forums are taken as theonly interaction mechanism of distance education, then, teachers could neither manage the order of thediscussion process, nor give the students instant and apparent feedback, not to say to urge the studentsto take part in the discussion. Instead of helping the teacher to reach the attending and responding learn-ing objects of the affective domain (Beth & Cathy, 2001), such a discussion education may result in pas-sive learning attitude and distract the attentions of many distance education students. Especially foryounger students, in distance education, when younger students are out of the sight of teachers, theycould easily be distracted by the environment around them. Therefore, mostly, distance education isnot applicable to younger students. Nevertheless, provided the effect of distance could be eliminated byadopting the operant conditioning learning theory to have the teachers of distance education take holdof the learning conditions of students, then, the distance education system suitable for elementary schoolstudents could be developed.

According to the learning theory of operant conditioning, giving students instant reinforcement and feed-back by means of reinforcement through the interaction between teacher and students could help students toachieve the substantial behavior objectives desired in class (Gagne, 1985). Provided reinforcement mechanismis equipped in the discussion course of distance education, it could urge the students to give more attentionsand responses to the class.

The purpose of this research is to explore the interaction mechanism of the discussion course in dis-tance education from the perspective of affective domain teaching objectives. According to the learningtheory of operant conditioning, reinforcement mechanism and procedure are designed to make up thedisadvantage of the discussion course in distance education, and interaction mechanism implementedfor conducting the experiment on discussion course. By investigating the discussion course designed inthis research and its actual effect on achieving the attending and responding stages of the affectivedomain teaching goals, it is hoped that the discussion course of distance education could also give con-sideration to the affective domain teaching goals. This research, based on ‘‘the affective domain related tothe academic course,” is centered on investigating the effect of the teaching mechanism, not involving theactivities the students engage in after class. It neither includes the effect of teaching materials nor thelearning achievement. The affective domain teaching goals aimed to be achieved in this research arefocused on the attending and responding stages, e.g., ‘‘Students are willing to participate in course dis-cussion actively,” and ‘‘Students can hold attending and enjoyable attitudes in participating in the coursediscussion.” It takes longer time and further steps to urge the students to participate in the class. As thisinvolves other factors, for instance, teaching materials and teaching methods, it is not investigated in thisresearch.

Section 2 includes the discussion on the affective domain teaching goal and teaching strategies, and the wayof interaction in most of the current distance education systems. In Section 3, an ‘‘instant reinforcement mech-anism” for synchronous distance education is designed to help teachers to supervise the students in the discus-sion procedure. In Section 4, we evaluate the use of the ‘‘instant reinforcement mechanism” for synchronousdistance education by designing and implementing actual discussion course. In Section 5, discussions on theevaluation results and the actual effects of the mechanism on achieving the attending and responding stage ofaffective domain teaching goal are made. Finally, the last section is the conclusions and suggestions for futureresearches.

1540 K.-A. Hwang, C.-H. Yang / Computers & Education 51 (2008) 1538–1552

2. Literature review

2.1. Affective domain teaching goal

Affective domain teaching objects include desirable/undesirable, attitude, and faith, which could be strat-ified as follows: (A) Receiving or attending: students can be motivated to receive and attend to the course. (B)Responding: turn from passive reaction to active participation. (C) Valuing: internalize the value. (D) Organi-

zation: combine various values into a system. (E) Characterization: have persistent and consistent response tothe related situations or subjects (Krathwohl, Bloom, & Masia, 1964).

Many education scholars emphasize that affective domain teaching objectives could not be neglected inenhancing learning effects and cultivating healthy personality (Gagne, Briggs, & Wager, 1992). From the affec-tive domain teaching goals and the time for achieving the goals of every stage, the following objects could beinduced: the learning objects of every class period for achieving the attending and responding stages; theobjects of every unit course for achieving the valuing and organization stages; the objects of a semester or aca-demic year for achieving the characterization stage (Lefrancois, 1982) (see Fig. 1). The attending and respond-ing stages are the fundamental phases of the affective domain teaching goals. To have students achieve theaffective goals satisfactorily, it must be started from carrying out the attending and responding stages. Themain teaching goals in a class period are set on achieving the attending and responding stages.

Fig. 1. The stages of affective domain teaching goal (Hwang and Yang, 2006).


In teaching strategies, reinforcement could be used for forming the learning behaviors by giving positive ornegative incentives in accordance with the behaviors of the students (Martin and Briggs, 1986). The reinforce-ments proposed in the operant conditioning learning theory are the positive reinforcement and negative rein-forcement. Positive reinforcement is to give the student a positive incentive for conducting a desirablebehavior, while negative reinforcement is to withdraw an undesirable incentive for conducting a desirablebehavior. Positive reinforcement is equal to rewards, while negative reinforcement involves the withdrawalof punishment (Hilgard, 1962).

In general didactic teaching, in an attempt to understand students’ affective attitudes, the teacher wouldoften observe students’ behaviors in class interaction. Only by guiding or correcting the students throughinstant interaction could the students have good learning attitudes and achieve the affective domain learningobjectives. Thus, scholars often suggest using the teaching methods with more teacher–student interactions orinteractions among students. In the interaction teaching of, for instance, discussion teaching, group discus-sion, or problem thinking, since students could enjoy the discussion atmosphere and imitate the discussionattitudes of the teacher or other class members, as long as proper discussion order is maintained by the tea-cher, affective domain teaching objects could be achieved (Woalfolk, 1997).

The adoption of the teaching methods with more interactions and reinforcement teaching strategies is abetter way for achieving affective domain teaching objectives. If such a teaching mechanism could be con-structed in the synchronous distance education course, it could help the teachers to supervise students’ atti-tudes in distance education, and achieve the attending and responding stage of affective domain teachinggoal.

2.2. Research on the interaction mechanism of distance education

Currently, learning by means of personal computer or computer networks is the most common way of dis-tance education (Harasim et al., 1995), and also the focus of many researches on distance education. As e-mailand discussion forum are the most frequently used interaction tools (Eisenstadt and Vincent 1988; Wolfe,2000), many distance education courses take the frequency of interaction discussion as the base of students’participation evaluation to assess the students’ participation in interaction (Pena-Shaff, Martin, & Gay, 2001).However, the number of times is not equal to the quality of discussion content. The statistics of students’ dis-cussion frequencies could not indicate that the students are attentive to the discussions (Mason, 1997). Fur-thermore, as the technology for precisely analyzing the discussion content is not mature yet (Rourke,Anderson, Garrison, & Archer, 2001), the learning attitudes of many discussion courses students in distanceeducation are passive and distracted.

Beth and Cathy (2001) held that applying the functions of common instant discussion forums directly todistant education is still imperfect in some ways. If a user holds a negative attitude towards the system, then,the user may refuse to use the system. By then, factual norm must be used to change the attitude of the user(Saleem, 1994). Jonassen, Peck and Wilson (1999) also mentioned that although the real-time feedback of on-line discussion could allow the students to rethink and absorb the discussion content, definite guidance isneeded to reduce social and digressive discussion contents. Therefore, common instant discussion teachingcould not be taken as the only way to deliver distance education courses (Jonassen, Peck, & Wilson, 1999).

Owing to the lack of real-time reinforcement feedback in distance education, teachers could neither takehold of the learning conditions of the students nor achieve the expected affective domain teaching goals. Thus,in distance courses, the adoption of synchronous interactive discussion teaching with reinforcement mecha-nism is suitable for achieving the basic ‘‘attending” and ‘‘responding” stages of affective domain teaching goal.By means of this, the teacher can supervise the students’ learning process and urge them to participate in theclass by giving feedback in real time and reinforcing the attention and response of the students for reaching theattending and responding stage of the affective goal set for every class.

3. A synchronous distance discussion procedure with reinforcement mechanism

In this research, the affective domain teaching goals aimed to be achieved are mainly focused on the attend-ing and responding stages. ‘‘Students are willing to participate in course discussion actively,” and ‘‘Students


can hold attending and enjoyable attitudes in participating in the course discussion” are set as the affectivedomain teaching goals. It takes longer time and further steps to urge the students to participate in the class.As this involves other factors, for instance, teaching materials and teaching methods, it is not investigated inthis research.

As it is found in the literature review, in a class period, the attending and responding stages of theaffective domain teaching goals should be achievable. Nevertheless, common discussion forums with nomanagement or feedback mechanism are adopted in many discussion courses of distance education. With-out instant reinforcement mechanism, as the teacher cannot take hold of the learning conditions of thestudents, the attending and responding goal of the affective domain could not be achieved as required.In investigating the common disadvantages of the synchronous distance discussion education, improve-ment could be made for better integrating the discussion mechanism of distance education as well asassisting the teachers to manage the discussion order and give students instant feedback reinforcement.The comparison between the common discussion mechanism and improved mechanism is made as follows(see Table 1):

Giving positive or negative incentives according to the students’ participation in the discussion with rein-forcement mechanism can reinforce the learning behaviors of the students. Thus, in this research, reinforce-ment mechanism was proposed in accordance with the learning theory of operant conditioning bydesigning and implementing various instant feedback reinforcement windows, including positive and negativereinforcement, to allow the teacher to give students instant reinforcement feedback in the discussion course.The related functions are as follows (see Table 2 and Fig. 2):

Regarding the design and implementation of the reinforcement functions of all the discussion mechanisms,the operational planning procedure applied in the entire discussion course is as Figs. 3 and 4:

Step 1. Login to education platform, and the name and IP address along with the location and login time ofthe student participating in the course will be shown in the screen.

Step 2. The teacher can set, as necessary, the timeout for ‘‘no discussion participation” to urge the studentto have feedback more intensely. The frequency of discussion participation for receiving positivereinforcement windows will be accumulated, as shown in Fig. 3.

Step 3. The teacher can refer to the students list and require certain student to join the discussion by sendingthe student feedback request message.

Table 1The comparison list of instant discussion mechanisms

Common instant discussion mechanism Mechanism of synchronous reinforcement feedback discussion

When there is an influx of students, numerous messages might beposted in the discussion at the same time

Press the ‘‘raise hand button” for ‘‘the right to speak” givenaccording to time sequence or the permission made by the teacher,same for group discussions

The content posted might not be constructive or serious Accompany with the reinforcement mechanism, after monitoringthe contents posted by the students, the teacher can send windowswarning messages instantly, delete the improper message, and makepoint deduction

The students with poor affective attitudes in class could not berequired to contribute to the discussion

For students who might not be attentive to class, the teacher canrequire them to join the discussion with instant windowsnotification

Students who make good and constant contributions or those whodo not contribute to the discussion for a long time would begiven instant feedback reinforcement

Accompany with the reinforcement mechanism, the teacher cansend positive reinforcement windows feedback to students whohave made constant contributions, and send negative reinforcementwindows feedback to students who have not contributed to thediscussion for a long time. From deducting points or giving extrapoints, as the grade could be shown instantly, this could avoidignoring some of the students

On-line users are allowed to have discussions or send messages inprivate. The messages from the teacher might be mixed up withthose sent by students and neglected

Only the teacher can send extra reinforcement messages to theentire class or a single student. The other users can post messagespublicly, yet not permitted to send messages privately

Table 2Types and timing of instant feedback windows

Types of feedback windows Timing

Notifying messages from the teacher to have certainstudent join the discussion

During the class, when the platform shows that a student seems to be inattentive,the teacher can request the student to answer a question

Warning feedback window for improper messages In course discussion, if a student posts improper messages, the teacher can clickand make a point deduction or warning to the student

Auto warning feedback windows for notparticipating in the discussion for a long time

In course discussion, if a student does not participate in the discussion within thetime set by the teacher, the platform will display the warning windows in threephases

Auto encouragement window for intenseparticipation in the discussion

In course discussion, when a student contributes to the discussion intensely, andreaches the threshold set by the teacher, the platform will display anencouragement window automatically

Instant encouragement or warning feedbackmessages sent manually by the teacher

The teacher can send encouragement or warning feedback messages to the entirestudent or a single student manually

Fig. 2. Feedback message example.


Step 4. A student can press the button for claiming the right to speak, then, the system will allow the studentto join the discussion in accordance with time sequence to maintain the discussion order.

Step 5. After the student ‘‘speaks up” by posting the message, the teacher will monitor the content posted.Extra credit will be given and accumulated for good content.

Step 6. If the number of good posts reaches the threshold set, positive reinforcement feedback window willbe displayed by the system automatically.

Step 7. If the student posts improper content, the teacher can click ‘‘warning” for displaying the warningfeedback window, and keep the record.

Step 8. If no discussion participation time exceeds the timeout limit, the platform will urge the student tojoin the discussion more intensely via an auto-feedback window.

Step 9. The teacher can observe the students’ responses in class from the post record in the database of thesystem.

Step 10. The teacher can send feedback messages to the entire class or individual students manually accord-ing to the conditions of students.

Fig. 3. Mechanism operational flow chart.

Fig. 4. Procedure and interface.



4. Methodology

4.1. Research structure

Research assumption: As the distance discussion course reinforcement mechanism proposed in this researchis used by the teacher, significant difference would be shown in guiding and managing the learning attentionand learning response of students.

� Independent variable: The distance discussion course reinforcement mechanism proposed in the research.� Dependent variable: The students’ learning attention and learning response during the implementation of

the synchronous distance discussion education with the reinforcement mechanism.� Variable control: In an attempt to compare the difference before and after using reinforcement mechanism

effectively, and avoid the effect caused by the difference of course contents, in the two discussion coursesconcerned, the same unit lesson and teaching activity were chosen and instructed by the same teacher.In addition, in order to avoid affecting the emotional attitudes of the students with the incentives of otherexternal factors, for instance, the attitudes of the students during class might be affected by a quarreloccurred in the break time, the courses were given in two continuous classes.

4.2. Surveyed subjects

In this research, 60 sixth grade students were sampled randomly from the elementary school and dividedinto two groups, 30 students in each group. Each group was given two continuous classes.

4.3. Experimental teaching procedure

The entire procedure of the teaching activity is as the followings (see Table 3):The affective domain teaching goals of this experimental teaching course were set as follows: ‘‘Students can

hold attending and enjoyable attitudes in participating in the course discussion,” and ‘‘Students are willing toparticipate in course discussion actively.”

Sixty students were divided into two groups, with 30 students given simulated distance discussion course inthe computer classroom each time. The courses were delivered via computer video and interface. Teacherswere not allowed to contact the students face to face during class. Interaction must be conducted through

Table 3Teaching evaluation process chart

Stage Time Teaching activities Platform functions

StageA

0–5 min To be familiar with platform operation Platform operation practice5–35min

Discussion teaching activity 1 Discussion topic: the advantagesand disadvantages of nuclear power plant

Discussion forum without reinforcementmechanism

35–40min

Filling in the questionnaire scale for the 1st time

BreakStage

B0–5 min To be familiar with the operation of the platform with

reinforcement mechanismPlatform operation practice

5–35min

Discussion teaching activity 2 Discussion topic: The choice ofthe resource use and environmental protection

Discussion forum with auto-feedbackmanagement and reinforcement mechanism

35–40min

Filling in the questionnaire scale for the 2nd time

Afterclass

Interviewing 10 students by random choice


teaching mechanism, and students were required to participate in the course by operating the computerthemselves.

Group A students participated in the stage A course first, then, took the stage B course. Alternatively,group B students took the stage B course first before taking the stage A course to avoid the effect of timesequence.

The affective objectives of these two class periods were set as ‘‘students can be attentive to the discussion,”and ‘‘students can join the discussion actively.” According to the literature review, course affective objects liein achieving the attending and responding stage teaching goals. This research experiment was conductedwithin two class periods. If it is conducted in a longer time duration, the differences between the two surveyedgroups might be the results caused by other variables, for instance, content of teaching material, teachingmethod, and the like/dislike for the teacher.

4.4. Research tool

4.4.1. Attending and responding scale

A user’s questionnaire with 5-point scale was designed according to the attending and responding object ofthe affective domain set for the experimental teaching course. The questions of the scale (see Table 4) includethe ‘‘attending” and ‘‘responding” stage for achieving the affective domain goal.

After completing the discussion course with two-phase teaching mechanism, students were required to fill inthe questionnaire scale for comparing and understanding the results of learning attention and response. Atotal of 10 students were sampled randomly and interviewed with the questions pertaining to the scale asfollows:

� A.1. As the course began, were you more attentive in class to see the teacher’s encouragement feedback?� A.2. Did the teacher’s warning feedback make you more attentive to class?� A.3. Did the auto-encouragement feedback displayed during discussion make you more attentive in class?� A.4. Did the management of the discussion participation order make you more attentive in class?� A.5. Did the auto-instant warning window make you more attentive in class?� B.1. As the class began, did you feel more like discussing with the teacher about the course after seeing the

encouragement feedback?� B.2. Did the teacher’s warning feedback make you feel more like discussing with the teacher about the

course?� B.3. Did the auto-encouragement feedback make you feel more like joining the discussion course?� B.4. Did the management of the discussion participation order make you feel more like joining the discus-

sion course?� B.5. Did the auto-warning window make you feel more like participating in the discussion course?� C. Under what circumstances were you more attentive to class and felt more like joining the course discus-

sion actively?

Table 4Attending and responding scale

Factors Questions

Learning attention 1. I was attentive during class2. The teacher has taken notice of me3. I was not attentive to the lecture of the teacher4. I have switched to other irrelevant screens during class5. The teacher has not taken notice of me

Learning response 6. The teacher has not taken notice of my posted messages7. I have discussed with my classmates actively8. I have asked questions9. The discussion has proceeded in great order10. My classmates have not taken notice of the messages I posted

Table 5Cronbach’s a coefficients

Factor Question no. Cronbach’s a Has it reached the standard?

Learning attention 1,2,3,4,5 0.7981 YesLearning response 6,7,8,9,10 0.8308 Yes


4.5. Reliability test

An additional 30 students were invited for testing the reliability of the questionnaire scale of this research.Pre-test was used to conduct reliability analysis with Cronbach’s a. From the Cronbach’s a acquired from ourpre-test (see Table 5), it is shown that the results have reached satisfactory reliability standard.

4.6. Record of course procedure

Stage A was proceeded without reinforcement mechanism, and the student could discuss with other class-mates through the discussion forum. During the discussion procedure of 30 min, the 1st discussion conflictoccurred in the 1st group of 30 students, and was restrained by the teacher in the 12th minute. However, about12 posted messages involving personal attack were input. During the course procedure, among the two groupsof students surveyed, about 21 students contributed to the discussion. Nevertheless, after monitoring the con-tent, the teacher considered that only the posted contents of 8 students were constructive.

Stage B was proceeded with the mechanism proposed in this research. The teacher could use the reinforce-ment encouragement function of the system manually and set the reinforcement mechanism. For students whodid not join the discussion, warning feedback were delivered in the 3rd, 5th, and 8th minutes. As for studentswho contributed to the discussion continuously for 5 times, they could receive auto-encouragement feedback.In consequence, 37 students received the 1st phase warning feedback; 6 students received the 2nd phase warn-ing feedback; while only 2 students received the 3rd phase warning feedback. In addition, 29 students receivedencouragement feedback, and discussion conflict did not occur. Finally, totalizing 45 students contributed tothe discussion, and the posted contents of 22 students were considered by the teacher to be constructive.

5. Results and discussion

5.1. Attending stage

The learning attending frequency and paired t-test results are as follows (see Tables 6 and 7):In making comparison with question 1 in the questionnaire scale, ‘‘I am attentive during class,” and question

3, ‘‘I am not attentive to the lecture of the teacher,” before using the mechanism proposed by this research, 45%of the students considered that they were not attentive during class, while 37% considered that they were notattentive to the lecture of the teacher. The students were comparatively more attentive when the teacher was lec-turing. After using the mechanism of this research, 10% of the students considered that they were not attentiveduring class, while 5% considered that they were not attentive to the lecture of the teacher. As a result, the lec-turing course with synchronic video function could largely improve the attention of the students during class.

Table 6Table of learning attending frequency

Questionno.

1st Stage 2nd Stage Total

Notconform

Mostly notconform

Partiallyconform

Mostlyconform

Conform Notconfirm

Mostly notconform

Partiallyconform

Mostlyconform

Conform

1 9 18 22 10 1 1 7 23 24 5 602 9 27 18 6 0 0 4 20 32 4 603 0 5 31 20 4 4 35 18 3 0 604 0 9 21 24 6 1 33 24 2 0 605 0 3 20 26 11 0 34 20 6 0 60

Table 7Table of learning attending t-test

Questionno.

1st Stage 2nd Stage t-Value Significance(two-tailed)

Has it reached the significantstandard, 0.05?Mean Standard

deviationMean Standard

deviation

1 2.6000 0.9949 3.4167 0.8693 �6.327 0.00 Yes2 2.3500 0.8601 3.6000 0.7178 �10.82 0.00 Yes3 2.6167 0.7386 3.6667 0.6806 �9.544 0.00 Yes4 2.5500 0.8719 3.5500 0.5945 �9.181 0.00 Yes5 2.2500 0.8156 3.4667 0.6756 �11.15 0.00 Yes


Regarding the interview question A.1, ‘‘As the course began, were you more attentive in class to see theteacher’s encouragement feedback?”, eight out of 10 students considered themselves to be more attentive toclass after receiving the encouragement feedback. As for A.2, ‘‘Did the teacher’s warning feedback makeyou more attentive to class?”, three out of 10 students considered themselves to be quite attentive to class,so, they were not affected by the warning feedback; while five students considered that the warning made themmore attentive to class.

After the discussion course had proceeded 10 min, the students were more distracted than they were in lec-turing course. Regarding interview question A.4, ‘‘Did the management of the discussion participation ordermake you more attentive in class?”, two students considered the management made the discussion participa-tion inconvenient. However, 10 students considered that the management of the discussion participation ordercould avoid the influx of discussion participants at the same time. As this could allow the students to fit betterinto the discussion, this resulted in a significant difference in learning attention. Consequently, proceeding freediscussion without any management mechanism would make the results more worse than the direct lecturingof the teacher. Overall, the mechanism of this research made the students much more attentive during class.

In response to the questionnaire questions 2 and 5, ‘‘The teacher has taken notice of me,” and ‘‘The teacherhas not taken notice of me,” in the 1st stage, 60% of the students considered that the teacher did not takenotice of them, yet after using the mechanism of this research in the 2nd stage, only 3 to 10% of the studentsconsidered that the teacher did not take notice of them.

In response to interview question A.5, ‘‘Did the auto-instant warning window make you more attentive inclass?”, all the 10 students interviewed considered that whenever they were distracted, it seemed that the tea-cher would detect it and display warning windows to them soon. Therefore, they could not be distracted dur-ing class. As the mechanism of this system can have the students feel that the teacher are taking notice of theirlearning, this can urge the students to be more attentive to class.

In response to questionnaire question 4, ‘‘I have switched to other irrelevant screens during class,‘‘ in the 1ststage, about 50% of the students admitted that they had switched to other irrelevant screens during class.However, after using the reinforcement mechanism proposed in this research, less than 4% of the studentswere distracted to do other things. Hence, for the distance education without reinforcement mechanism, thereis no guaranty that the students would not open other screens during class.

Regarding interview question A.3, ‘‘Did the auto encouragement feedback during discussion make you moreattentive in class?”, after having further understanding, it is found that five out of 10 students considered thatthe auto-encouragement of the system could slightly prevent them from being distracted. However, the effectwas not strong enough as three students considered that with the control of computer screens, they might stillbe distracted by other things or books at hand. Even if the monitoring camera could be installed to keep thestudents in their seats, without interaction, there is still no guaranty that they could be attentive during class.

5.2. Responding stage

In the part of learning response, the frequency and t-test results are as follows (see Tables 8 and 9):In response to questionnaire question 7, ‘‘I have discussed with my classmates actively,” and question 8, ‘‘I

have asked questions,” in the 1st stage, 45% of the students did not join the discussion actively, while 60% of


the students were unwilling to ask questions. In the entire discussion procedure, the students were very passive,and unwilling to ask questions. After using the mechanism designed by this research, only 3% of the students didnot join the discussion actively, and 6% of the students were unwilling to ask questions. Overall, the mechanism ofthis research can urge students to participate in the course discussion and achieve the goal of the responding stage.

Regarding interview question B.1, ‘‘As the class began, did you feel more like discussing with the teacherabout the course after seeing the encouragement feedback?”, eight students considered that this made themmore attentive to class; however, five students considered that they did not participate in the discussionactively out of the encouragement of the teacher, and two students considered that it made no difference.Therefore, although the encouragement feedback of the teacher could have a guiding effect on students’ learn-ing attention, it is not likely to have strong effect on learning response.

Regarding interview question B.3, ‘‘Did the auto-encouragement feedback make you feel more like joiningthe discussion course?”, three students reached the threshold for receiving encouragement window from thesystem, and were also glad to receive the encouragement window. This manifests that reinforced encourage-ment could really supervise students’ participation in course. Receiving the encouragement window could beespecially helpful to students’ attitudes in participating in the course. However, all the 10 interviewed studentsconsidered that although the encouragement from the teacher or auto-encouragement window could guidethem and make them more attentive during the course, it is not the main cause of their participation in thediscussion. Therefore, encouragement could only have positive reinforcement effect, not full effect.

Regarding B.2, ‘‘Did the teacher’s warning feedback make you feel more like discussing with the teacherabout the course?”, five students considered that they had joined the discussion because of the warning. Afterhaving in-depth interview on this question, without warning feedback, five students admitted that they wouldnot had joined the discussion. Thus, although students might still complete the prescribed course hours even ifmany distance education courses adopted only positive guidance, there is no significant help to the attitudes inparticipating the course.

From the statistics of questionnaire question 6, ‘‘The teacher has not taken notice of my posted message,”and question 10, ‘‘My classmates have not taken notice of the messages I posted,” in the 1st stage, about 60%of the students considered that neither the teacher nor classmates had taken notice of their posted messages.After proceeding the 2nd stage of the course, only 5% of the students considered that the teacher did not take

Table 8Table of learning response frequency

Questionno.

1st Stage statistics 2nd Stage statistics Total

Notconform

Mostlynotconform

Partiallyconform

Mostlyconform

Conform Notconform

Mostlynotconform

Partiallyconform

Mostlynotconform

Conform

6 10 28 15 7 0 0 4 28 25 3 607 5 21 24 10 0 0 2 27 28 3 608 9 28 17 6 0 0 6 25 28 1 609 4 29 24 3 0 0 4 25 29 2 60

10 0 8 16 31 5 2 31 21 6 0 60

Table 9Table of learning response t-test

Question no. 1st Stage statistics 2nd Stage statistics t-Value Significance(two-tailed)

Has it reached the significantstandard, 0.05?Mean Standard deviation Mean Standard deviation

6 2.3167 0.8924 3.4500 0.6993 �9.379 0.00 Yes7 2.6500 0.8601 3.5333 0.6501 �7.012 0.00 Yes8 2.3333 0.8570 3.4000 0.6938 �9.247 0.00 Yes9 2.4333 0.6979 3.4833 0.6763 �9.071 0.00 Yes

10 2.4500 0.8321 3.4833 0.7247 �9.071 0.00 Yes


notice of their posted messages, and 10% considered that the classmates did not take notice of their postedmessages. Therefore, discussion management and feedback can make the students feel that the teacher andclassmates have taken notice of their posted messages.

Regarding interview question B.5, ‘‘Did the auto-warning window make you feel more like participating inthe discussion course?”, seven out of 10 students admitted that they started joining the discussion only afterreceiving the warning window. Five students received the warning window after joining the discussion once.Two students received improper post warning for their improperly posted messages. Then, this condition didnot occur again. Therefore, the management of discussion order could prevent having social or digressiveposted messages as it is mentioned in literature review.

Regarding questionnaire question 9, ‘‘The discussion has proceeded in great order,” in the 1st stage, 56% ofthe students considered that the discussion did not proceed in good order, while more than 50% of the studentsconsidered that the discussion proceeded in good order after using the mechanism of this research.

Regarding interview question B.4, ‘‘Did the management of the discussion participation order make youfeel more like joining the discussion course?”, 10 students considered that as the discussion proceeded in goodorder, and they were required to join the discussion by the teacher, these made them fit into the discussioncourse more actively, and affect their participation in the discussion. Therefore, as it is mentioned in the lit-erature review, factual norm must be used in the discussion course to change the attitude of the users.

5.3. Overall induction

In inducing the responses to interview question C, ‘‘Under what circumstances were you more attentive toclass and felt more like joining the course discussion actively?”, all the ten interviewed students considered thatinteresting course content and teaching materials could make them more attentive and join the discussionactively. Eight students pointed out that discussion order might affect their attention and attitude in partici-pating in the course. Other affecting conditions included teacher’s guidance, attractive screen presentation, andteacher’s requirement.

In inducing the two factors of learning attention and learning response, according to the t-test results of thequestionnaire survey, from comparing the reinforcement mechanism designed in this research with the regulardiscussion teaching without using the said mechanism, significant difference was shown in the statistic results.According to the frequency filled in the questionnaire by the students, in stage A, with the use of the regulardiscussion forum without management function, the attention and participation of the students were not sat-isfactory, and students did not have attentive learning attitudes. After using the mechanism designed by thisresearch, it did make the students more attentive during class; guided the students to join the discussion activ-ity of the course effectively; and allowed the students to feel the concern from the teacher. From the researchfindings, it could be inferred that the distance discussion education reinforcement mechanism could really helpto achieve the objectives set: ‘‘students can hold attending and enjoyable attitudes in participating in thecourse discussion,” and ‘‘students are willing to participate in course discussion actively.”

It could be induced from the interview results that although the encouragement reinforcement mechanismcould affect the learning attention of the students, it could not prevent some of the students to be distractedduring class. With the use of warning mechanism, it could urge the students to join the course discussion.However, mostly, it could only reach the response stage of having passive response. To have the students makea further step and respond actively, then, the effect of teaching materials, the teaching method of the teacher,and the management of discussion order must also be included. Accordingly, it could be induced that it wouldbe most effective to include the reinforcement mechanism and management into the discussion course contentof distance education. Depending merely on teaching materials or course design, students might still be dis-tracted. Depending merely on reinforcement mechanism, it could only have the effects of reaching the stageof passive response or partial active response.

6. Conclusion

In the course of distance education, it is very difficult to judge the affective attitude of the students. Basi-cally, the instant interaction between the teacher and students is a way for taking hold of students’ attitudes in


class. Only through teacher–students interaction could we infer the affective attitudes of the students. As stu-dents participate in answering the teacher’s questions and having discussions with classmates, this indicatesthat the students have reached the ‘‘responding” stage, the 2nd stage of affective objectives. During the course,the teacher could urge the students to be more attentive in many ways for achieving the affective goal of thecourse. However, these ways might not be easily applied to the common synchronous distance education.

In many synchronous distance courses, without the mechanism for monitoring the attention and responseof students, the students are urged to participate in learning merely by having tests. This might easily lead stu-dents to study only for tests, and not being attentive to regular studies. As students study only for tests, even-tually, only the cognitive domain teaching goal could be achieved. From the findings of this research, it isfound that without using the synchronous distance discussion mechanism designed in this research, not manystudents could be attentive, not to say joining the discussion actively.

Mostly, the affective teaching goal is achieved through the interaction in teaching. With only lively teachingmaterials, if the students could not be attentive and interact with the teacher, then, the teacher cannot instillthe value of the course to the students for achieving the further affective goal. Therefore, it’s not sufficientenough to explore the interaction mechanisms commonly applied in the current distance education fromthe perspective of affective domain teaching goal.

We have improved the mechanism of the synchronous distance discussion course to enhance teacher–stu-dents interactions with the adoption of the encouragement and urging reinforcement mechanism. In compar-ing with the synchronous distance discussion course without using the mechanism proposed in this research,the mechanism of this research could enhance the students’ attention and responses in joining the course moreeffectively, and, thus, urge the students to achieve the attending and responding stage of affective domainteaching goal. According to the findings of this research, the improvement of the mechanism could only makethe students have passive response or partial active response. Therefore, it would be more effective to furtherachieve the affective goal by integrating the teaching materials and course content with the mechanism of thisresearch. Currently, there is still a gap between distance education and the affective domain teaching goal ofschool education. However, aside from the improvement of teaching material and teaching, the exploration ofthe synchronous distance education mechanism in this research has contributed to the overall development ofdistance education. Consequently, the development of the mechanism and distance discussion course hasalready reached the goal set.

From the experience of system design and evaluation, for further researches, it’s suggested to have the com-puter competence of learners put into consideration. The frequency in joining the discussion might be affectedby the learners’ typing speed and their familiarity with the use of computer. For the learners with poor com-puter competence, it is not that they are unwilling to join the discussion, but they are not competent to do so.For coping with this condition, the audio discussion mechanism could be designed in the future researches toreplace the text discussion design of this research so as to reduce the effect caused by the computer typingspeed of students.

In this research, 6th grade elementary school students were taken as the surveyed subjects since they are stillshapeable and the effect of the mechanism on their learning attention and response could be shown manifestly.In the future, an attempt could be made to apply the mechanism to other age groups for evaluating the effectof this mechanism on students of other ages. As for the long-term research, the effect of the variables of teach-ing contents, teaching methods, and teachers must also be included for practical exploration and induction tofurther achieve the affective domain teaching goal of distance education.

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