Understanding community in synchronous online learning: do perceptions match behaviours?

ABSTRACT

The community of inquiry (CoI) framework is becoming increasingly popular in online learning. The relationships among CoI constructs (cognitive, teaching and social presences) were generally investigated through surveys. However, some methodological challenges were noticed in CoI studies such as the limitations in data diversity or data verification. Hypothesising that learners’ perceptions about CoI constructs may not reflect their actual behaviours, this study matches students’ perceptions and actual behaviours reflecting the CoI constructs in an online learning setting in a synchronous online undergraduate programme. Data from CoI surveys, online discussion records and observations were comparatively discussed. The results indicated that relationships between the behaviours and perceptions about CoI constructs were quite positive and students’ perceptions about CoI constructs almost matches with their actual behaviours. Thus, the study confirmed the power of determining the interactions reflecting CoI constructs in online learning within CoI surveys. It is hoped that the study may shed a light with its contribution in providing some evidence for the question of whether conventional data collection techniques in CoI studies is required to be revisited or not.

KEYWORDS:

• Community of inquiry
• synchronous online learning
• perceptions
• behaviours

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ünal Çakıroğlu

Ünal Çakıroğlu is currently an associate professor at the Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technologies at Trabzon University. His academical qualifications were in Computer Engineering (BSc), in Computer Engineering (MS) and Technology of Education (PhD). He teaches computer programming, multimedia instructional design, and other IT-related courses. His research interests include e-learning applications, social networking in education, technology integration and distance education.

Servet Kılıç

Servet Kılıç is a lecturer in the Computer Technology Department at Ordu University. Also, he is a PhD student in the Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology at the Karadeniz Technical University. He graduated from this department in 2007 and from the same department with a Master’s degree in 2016. His academic interest areas are open and distance learning, robotics training and computational thinking. He teaches computer programming, operation systems and professional foreign language at Ordu University.