Exploring the Interactions of Social, Cognitive, and Teaching Presences in Student Learning Experiences in an Online Undergraduate Course

摘要

According to the Community of Inquiry model, the optimal student learning experience occurs at the intersection of three interdependently functioning presences: social presence (how students present themselves and connect with one another), cognitive presence (how meaning is constructed and confirmed), and teaching presence (how the course is designed and discussions facilitated). In this study, the manifestation and interactions of these three presences in an undergraduate online educational technology course were explored through a validated perception-eliciting survey and open-ended reflections of learning experiences prior to taking the course, related to collaborative course activities, and upon course completion. The dynamics of the online course were documented given the context. This study examined the content of various student reflections, determining how they mirror the aspects formulated in the Community of Inquiry framework. Interviews, discussion observations, and email communications were used to triangulate findings from the quantitative and qualitative data analysis. This study resulted in the development of a codebook for analyzing student reflections of learning experiences. Interpretations of what the elements of an optimal learning experience are, and how they interact, are presented in the form of a chronological representation of element interactions at the thematic level, and a five-gear representation of the elements at the categorical level.