Preparing Adult Learners for Success in Blended Learning through Onboarding: A pilot study

Blended learning offers adult learners unique opportunities for instructional continuity given work and personal commitments. However, learners participating in blended learning may experience a sense of isolation and/or problems with technology. To address the challenges of a blended program, an expanded orientation, called ?onboarding,? was designed to ensure learners feel connected to their program and clearly understand the programmatic requirements. Onboarding spans six months and includes a series of activities to provide learners with technological, interaction, and self-directed learning skills needed to succeed in a blended program. Results from the evaluation survey reveal that learners feel most engaged with the program through one-to-one interactions with their academic advisors and interactions with peers in an online discussion board. In addition, learners primarily found the onboarding process straightforward and mostly expressed a desire for more explicit instructions. The onboarding, catering to adult learner needs, provides a combination of personal interactions and self-paced activities, offers hands-on experience of the technologies that learners will be using in the program, and contextualizes all the technical activities within programmatic requirements. Providing a comprehensive onboarding process can help returning learners in their transition to blended learning

Increase Engaged Student Learning Using Google Docs as a Discussion Platform

Online discussion board activities have traditionally been a primary method of providing student-to-student interaction, especially in asynchronous online classes. This study examines the impact of an alternate online discussion tool on student participation in online discussion assignments. Three identical discussion assignments were examined over the course of two semesters. The first semester utilized the traditional Learning Management System (LMS) threaded discussion board. The second semester incorporated Google Docs as the discussion platform. Overall, students using Google Docs made 68 percent more posts per student than students using the traditional LMS discussion board. Students using Google Docs also demonstrated more engagement by sharing professional experiences and teaching strategies more often than those students using the traditional LMS discussion board. While the data are encouraging, limitations of this study encourage additional research in the areas of discussion platform, discussion group size, and group assignment methods.

The Comparative Effectiveness of Synchronous and Asynchronous Online Bioethics Lecture Delivery on Student Learning in Discussion Board Posts

"Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many courses that were once in person are now online. In our new “physically distanced” world, bioethics faculty has had to adapt quickly. To bridge the gap created by eliminating face-to-face interaction for two cohorts of international bioethics students, we combined them and created five four-week online bioethics mini-courses: “Justice and Pandemic Diseases,” “Reproduction,” “Pediatrics,” “Organ Transplantation,” and “Death and Dying.” Each mini-course involved required readings, weekly lectures, discussion board participation, and a final paper. Our study evaluates the comparative effectiveness of synchronous and asynchronous lecture delivery on student learning as evidenced in online discussion board posts in the mini-courses. Students from both cohorts received the same educational materials but were divided into two groups for alternating synchronous and asynchronous Zoom lectures. We developed a standardized rubric, and raters have been using it to score each student’s initial posts. We hypothesized that, for the same discussion board question, students’ scores on posts following synchronous lectures will on average be higher than those following asynchronous lectures. We will finalize our data analysis at the conclusion of the final mini-course in late March and learn if the data support our hypothesis. There are many challenges in determining the comparative effectiveness of synchronous and asynchronous teaching on overall student learning. Our study addresses a modest yet worthwhile question, whether and to what degree these different lecture modalities impact student learning evidenced in discussion board posts. Our findings will contribute to bioethics pedagogical research during these challenging times. "

Investigation on graduate students’ social presence and social knowledge construction in two online discussion settings

Online discussions have become important educational activities through which collaborative learning and knowledge construction can be facilitated. This study explores the use of two online discussion tools, online discussion board and VoiceThread, for supporting online course discussion activities among a group of graduate students and investigates the differences in the levels of social presence and social knowledge construction in the two discussion settings. Meanwhile, the participants’ posting behaviors and interaction patterns were also examined. Results reveal that the participants contributed more words when using the audio and video features of VoiceThread. Additionally, the graduate students tended to create more contents and demonstrated more social presence behaviors when interacting with others in the VoiceThread discussion platform. However, the participants exhibited fewer social knowledge construction behaviors than they did in the text-based online discussion board.

Virtual Work Meetings During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Good, Bad, and Ugly

This study focuses on the good, the bad and the ugly of using videoconferencing for work-related meetings during the COVID-19 pandemic. Using a text mining process and qualitative content analysis of 549 comments posted to a LinkedIn online discussion board, we identified six key themes; three were tied to camera and microphone issues, two involved eating and meeting management issues, and one dealt with work-from-home issues. These themes are discussed in relationship to media naturalness theory and meeting science. Because widespread use of videoconferencing will likely continue, we provide guidance for workplace policies/practices and suggest directions for future research.

The Most Invisible Maternal Experience? Analysing How Maternal Regret Is Discussed in Finland

In Finland, becoming a mother is often constructed as an individual choice that ultimately leads to personal fulfilment and happiness, despite the occasional ‘negative’ feelings associated with motherhood such as exhaustion, frustration and tiredness. In this cultural atmosphere, maternal regret continues to be a subject that is hidden, forbidden and rarely scrutinised. It is perhaps surprising that in one of the world’s most gender egalitarian countries, which is also perceived to be one of the best countries in which to be a mother, women still testify that motherhood is limited to survival. We argue that, somewhat paradoxically, discussing the negative emotions of motherhood might be particularly difficult in a relatively gender egalitarian society, where family policies are (by international comparison) fairly comprehensive and where becoming a mother is strongly constructed as a ‘free choice’. These discourses often hide the fact that parenthood in Finland is still extremely gendered. Finland’s masculine work culture with long working hours, the tendency for mothers and fathers not to take equal parental leave periods, and the cuts to welfare state services for families all contribute to the gendered division of parenthood. What are rarely discussed in connection with the struggles of mothering are political demands to improve gender equality. This chapter analyses discussion of maternal regret on an anonymous Finnish online discussion board. In comments from regretful mothers, motherhood is constructed as all-consuming, draining work. Hiding regret, especially from children, is seen as essential, as these mothers fear that their lack of ‘correct’ feelings will have adverse effects on their children. In comments responding to these regretful mothers, disbelief is a recurring theme with commenters suggesting that regretful mothers have misrecognised self-inflicted exhaustion or postnatal depression as regret. Such individualising responses depoliticise regret, contributing to the maintenance of taboos around motherhood.

Empowering Women Leaders for Work-Integrated e-Learning: Social Changes and Persistent Challenges

<p>Information technology is increasingly being adopted within various sectors, especially in education. This study examines the effects of a work-integrated e-learning program for women leaders offered by a fully online institution. Data was collected from 61 respondents via an online discussion board forum. The findings showed that integration of technology-enhanced learning into the workplace for purposes of training and development can bring about a variety of social changes at the individual, group, and organizational levels. The findings highlight important insights for the design and delivery of fully online training and development programs that can bring about social change, taking into consideration the persistent challenges faced by women leaders. Further discussion and implications are provided. </p>

Review of Online Discussion Board to Improve Academic Achievement in Pandemic Time Learning

This article analyzed online board discussions' effectiveness as an alternative learning method in response to health protocol policies and compulsory education during Indonesia's pandemic emergency. Since COVID-19 hit in the world, WHO and UNESCO have obliged all countries has been applying technology-assisted distance learning. To get the learning application's effectiveness using the online discussion board method. The researcher analyzed fifteen findings of learning experts during the pandemic, which were published in international journals. The researcher analyzed qualitatively through coding, in-depth interpretation and concluding and ensures that the findings were valid and reliable. The results showed that the online discussion board has become an alternative method during learning during the COVID-19 period, such as podcast applications, ZOOM, Google Classroom. Therefore, the researcher recommends that applying this online discussion as most method was recommended to improve learning and maintain safety during a pandemic. Keywords: Online Discussion Board, Improving Academic Achievement, Learning in Pandemic