Online dependence-Tutoring in an online course

Tuulikki Viitala & Pirjo-Liisa Lehtelä

Concepts

An online environment

Tutoring in an online environment

4 dimensions of tutoring (Wang 2008)

- Pedagogical, social, managerial and technical

The course studied: Organization and developing competencies

Blackboard learning environmentThe links on the course homepage:curriculum, learning materials, tasks,

summary and printing, links and literature, discussions, E-mail, calender.

Assignments

Active participation in discussion on two given topics.

The size of a discussion group is 10-12.

Two written tasks

The course lasts for about one and a half months.

The aim of this study

Describe the students´experiences of studies and especially tutoring in the course.

Research implementation

The student feedback that forms the research data was collected by a questionnaire including openended questions. Students also wrote freeform feedback.

40 random pieces of feedback were included in the analyses.

Analysis

The responses to the questionnaire were analysed based on the themes using the cross-case analysis.

Research results

PEDAGOGICALGives information (D, A)Gives constructive feedback (D)Summarises (D)

MANAGERIALDirects discussion (D)Gives instructions and rules (D, A, M)

SOCIALStrengthens atmosphere (D)Considers /approves (D)

TECHNICAL

D=tutoring of online discussions A=tutoring of learning tasks M=tutoring of online materials

Discussion

Future:

In the future the research could be expanded to an analysis of online discussions. In the course studied here, it is possible, for instance, to compare the simultaneous discussions of two groups on the same topic.

For one of the groups, the tutoring would be more intensive, while in the other the discussion would proceed more spontaneously led by the group.