Cues and Mechanisms for Improving the Social Nature of Online Learning

On Friday, June 29th at 11:35 AM, Jim Laffey will present a paper on the cues and mechanisms for improving the social nature of online learning.

ABSTRACT: Online learning is becoming a pervasive part of higher education. However, while online learning plays a powerful role in broadening access within and beyond campus sites, there is a growing concern that it may diminish the social nature of teaching and learning by forcing instructors and learners to view courses through the narrow pedagogical lens afforded by contemporary software systems. This paper identifies and briefly explicates 3 cues of sociality: presence, co-presence and social navigation. Next the paper describes a framework and mechanism for infusing these cues into online learning through a context-aware activity notification system (CANS) being developed as an open source application for integration with course management systems.

Laffey, J., & Amelung, C. (June, 2007). Cues and Mechanisms for Improving the Social Nature of Online Learning. ED-MEDIA 2007. Vancouver, BC, Canada.

ARTIFACT: Paper