Editorial Board

Owner

Prof. Dr. Şafak Ertan ÇOMAKLI (Anadolu University Rector)

Editor-in-Chief

Dr. T. Volkan YUZER (Anadolu University)

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Dr. Gulsun KURUBACAK (Anadolu University)

Dr. Nilgun OZDAMAR (Anadolu University)

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Dr. Ilknur KECIK (Anadolu University)

Dr. Ipek KURU GONEN (Anadolu University)

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Dr. Ali MERC (Anadolu University)

Dr. Ozgur YILDIRIM (Anadolu University)

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Dr. Alan TAIT (United Kingdom)

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Dr. Zeki KAYA (Turkey)

Dr. Zdena LUSTIGOVA (Czech Republic)

Dr. Zhang WEI-YUAN (Hong Kong)

Honorary Editorial Board of TOJDE

Prof. Dr. Ugur DEMIRAY - Founder Editor of Turkish Online Journal of Distance

Education - TOJDE

Prof. Dr. Cevat ALKAN - The pioneer of educational technology in DE in Turkey

(Turkey)

Prof. Dr. Engin ATAC - Former Rector of Anadolu University for 1999-2006 period

(Turkey)

Prof. Dr. John BAATH - The well-known Swedish distance educator (Sweden)

Prof. Dr. Tony BATES - Father of DE in Canada (Canada)

Prof. Dr. Yılmaz BUYUKERSEN - The founder of DE in Turkey (Turkey)

Prof. Dr. Chris CURRAN - The founder director of National DE Centre in Ireland

(Ireland)

Prof. Dr. Chere Campbell GIBSON - She studied for DE all her life. Emeritus Professor

(USA)

Prof. Dr. Börje HOLMBERG - He studied for DE. Emeritus Professor (Sweden)

Prof. Dr. James MARAJ - The pioneer of the open university movement (Australia)

Prof. Dr. Charles A. WEDEMEYER - The pioneer of DE in the world (USA)

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Table of Contents

From The Editor Welcome to the Volume 21, Number 1 of TOJDE

Fatih TANRIKULU The Effect of L2 Listening Texts Adapted to the Digital Story on the Listening Lesson

1 – 18

Abdelrahman Mohamed AHMED & Mohamed Eltahir OSMAN The Effectiveness of Using Wiziq Interaction Platform on Students’ Achievement, Motivation and Attitudes

19 – 30

Nuh YAVUZALP & Eralp BAHCIVAN The Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale: Its Adaptation into Turkish and Interpretation According to Various Variables

31 – 44

SUGILAR The Role of Service Quality Management in Students’ Re-Enrollment 45 – 56

Jesus TRESPALACIOS & Lida J. URIBE-FLOREZ Developing Online Sense of Community: Graduate Students’ Experiences and Perceptions

57 – 72

Yousef Ahmad ALJARAIDEH The Impact of Digital Storytelling on Academic Achievement of Sixth Grade Students in English Language and Their Motivation towards it in Jordan

73 – 82

Duysal DEMIRBAS & Sebnem TIMUR OGUT Re-Designing the Design Brief as a Digital Learning Tool with Participatory Design Approach

83 – 100

Ayse BAGRIACIK YILMAZ & Phil BANYARD Engagement in Distance Education Settings: A Trend Analysis

101 – 120

Betul KAN KILINC, Berna YAZICI, Bulent GUNSOY & Guler GUNSOY Perceptions and Opinions of Graduates about the Effects of Open and Distance Learning in Turkey

121 – 132

Chrysoula ZIOGA & Konstantinos BIKOS Collaborative Writing Using Google Docs in Primary Education: Development of Argumentative Discourse

133 – 142

Hatice Gokce BILGIC & Hakan TUZUN Issues and Challenges with Web-Based Distance Education Programs in Turkish Higher Education Institutes

143 – 164

Nazli AZODI & Ahmadreza LOTFI E-Collaborative Tasks and the Enhancement of Writing Performance among Iranian University-Level EFL Learners

165 – 180

Nahid YARAHMADZEHI & Mostafa GOODARZI Investigating the Role of Formative Mobıile Based Assessment in Vocabulary Learning of Pre-Intermediate EFL Learners in Comparison with Paper Based Assessment

181 – 196

Reviewed By Eda ATASOY REVIEW: Against the Tide: Critics of Digitalisation; Warners, Sceptics, Scaremongers, Apocalypticists, 20 Portraits

197 – 199

Reviewed By Murat ARTSIN REVIEW: Macro-Level Learning through Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): Strategies and Predictıions for the Future

200 – 202

Dear TOJDE Readers

Welcome to Volume 21 Number 1 of TOJDE,

There are 13 articles and 2 book reviews in January 2020 issue. 25 authors write the articles and reviews from 8 different countries. These countries are Greece, Indonesia, Iran, Jordan, Oman, Turkey, UK and USA.

THE EFFECT OF L2 LISTENING TEXTS ADAPTED TO THE DIGITAL STORY ON THE LISTENING LESSON is the 1st article. The author of this article is Fatih TANRIKULU. This study is conducted as the action research model aimed to identify the effect of use of new story form, digital storytelling (DST) as a product input in listening lessons on listening lessons. As a result of the research, it is seen that digital storytelling has a positive effect on the development of listening skills, positively affects learning and is more effective compared to listening lessons taught with voice recordings and increases student motivation.

The title of the 2nd article is THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING WIZIQ INTERACTION PLATFORM ON STUDENTS’ ACHIEVEMENT, MOTIVATION AND ATTITUDES. Abdelrahman Mohamed AHMED and Mohamed Eltahir OSMAN are the authors. The purpose of this study is to assess the effects of using WiziQ platform as a virtual classroom on students’ achievement, motivation and attitudes. The results of the study show that there is a significant difference in the mean scores of the post-test between the control group and experimental group in favor of experimental group.

The 3rd article is written by Nuh YAVUZALP and Eralp BAHCIVAN. The title of the article is THE ONLINE LEARNING SELF-EFFICACY SCALE: ITS ADAPTATION INTO TURKISH AND INTERPRETATION ACCORDING TO VARIOUS VARIABLES. The aim of this study is to adapt the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale (OLSES), developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016) to determine university students’ self-efficacy perceptions in online learning environments, into Turkish, and to analyze the validity and reliability of the results of the scale. The results indicate that no statistically significant difference is found between groups regarding either gender or type of school.

THE ROLE OF SERVICE QUALITY MANAGEMENT IN STUDENTS’ RE-ENROLLMENT is the title of 4th article, and the author is SUGILAR. The main concern of this article is that there are many interrelated variables affecting students’ re-enrollment. Those variables mainly included service quality management of higher distance education, student characteristics, student academic success, and accessibility to student learning support services. The results revealed that the students’ re-enrollment is affected by the level of service quality management modulated factors: (1) the student personal characteristics, (2) the level of success in previous semesters, and (3) the participation in the learning support services.

Jesus TRESPALACIOS and Lida J. URIBE-FLOREZ are the authors of the 5th article. DEVELOPING ONLINE SENSE OF COMMUNITY: GRADUATE STUDENTS’ EXPERIENCES AND PERCEPTIONS is the title of this article. The purpose of this research study is to explore perceptions of graduate students on sense of community and learning after using different collaborative activities with diverse forms of interaction (text, audio, and video) in an online educational research course. Findings indicate that multimodal and scaffolding interactive activities help to support connectedness and learning, and therefore foster online graduate students’ sense of community.

The title of the 6th article is THE IMPACT OF DIGITAL STORYTELLING ON ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF SIXTH GRADE STUDENTS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND THEIR MOTIVATION TOWARDS IT IN JORDAN. Yousef Ahmad ALJARAIDEH is the author. This study aims to identify the impact of digital storytelling on academic achievement of sixth grade students in English language and their motivation towards it in Jordan. According to results, some recommendations are set like integrating digital storytelling in the teaching and learning English language.

RE-DESIGNING THE DESIGN BRIEF AS A DIGITAL LEARNING TOOL WITH PARTICIPATORY DESIGN APPROACH is the 7th article. Duysal DEMIRBAS and Sebnem TIMUR OGUT are the authors. The aim of this study is to determine the design criteria of a new learning tool in line with the needs and expectations of the new generation industrial design students with a student-oriented approach. All suggestions are found to indicate a more interactive structure depending on the variable and cyclical structure of the design.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1

The authors of the 8th article are Ayse BAGRIACIK YILMAZ and Phil BANYARD. The title is ENGAGEMENT IN DISTANCE EDUCATION SETTINGS: A TREND ANALYSIS. This study examines studies focusing on student engagement in distance education using a trend analysis technique. The findings offer support for Chickering and Gamson’s Seven Principles of Good Practice as important in promoting student engagement in distance education.

Betul KAN KILINC, Berna YAZICI, Bulent GUNSOY and Guler GUNSOY are the authors of the 9th article. The title of this article is PERCEPTIONS AND OPINIONS OF GRADUATES ABOUT THE EFFECTS OF OPEN AND DISTANCE LEARNING IN TURKEY. The purpose of this study is to analyze the role of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University, which has helped Turkish higher education by means of increasing economic and social welfare. The results indicate that the Open and Distance Learning System in question has been effective with regard to their employment status (before and after education), income levels and their social-economic welfare positions.

The 10th article is titled COLLABORATIVE WRITING USING GOOGLE DOCS IN PRIMARY EDUCATION: DEVELOPMENT OF ARGUMENTATIVE DISCOURSE. The authors are Chrysoula ZIOGA and Konstantinos BIKOS. The aim of the study is to determine the effect of a collaborative writing program through the Google Docs writing tool on the production of argumentative discourse within the framework of Modern Greek Language teaching. The results of the paired-sample t-tests show a statistically significant difference between pre- and post-tests in the majority of the criteria and the total scores of the rubric.

ISSUES AND CHALLENGES IN WEB-BASED DISTANCE EDUCATION PROGRAMS IN TURKISH HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTES is the 11th article. Hatice Gokce BILGIC and Hakan TUZUN are the authors. This study aims to examine the core issues and challenges with web-based distance education programs in Turkish higher education institutes. The study results in 9 core issues related to (1) program launching process, (2) legislation, (3) program structure, (4) instructional design, (5) assessment and evaluation, (6) communication and interaction, (7) support, (8) technical issues, and (9) program evaluation.

The 12th article is written by Nazli AZODI and Ahmadreza LOTFI. The title is E-COLLABORATIVE TASKS AND THE ENHANCEMENT OF WRITING PERFORMANCE AMONG IRANIAN UNIVERSITY-LEVEL EFL LEARNERS. This study investigates the benefits of collaborative and e-collaborative tasks on writing performance of the students in a process-oriented approach. The results show that there is no significant change in the fluency of the written texts produced by the students.

Nahid YARAHMADZEHI and Mostafa GOODARZI are the authors of the 13th article. INVESTIGATING THE ROLE OF FORMATIVE MOBILE BASED ASSESSMENT IN VOCABULARY LEARNING OF PRE-INTERMEDIATE EFL LEARNERS IN COMPARISON WITH PAPER BASED ASSESSMENT is the title of this study. Throughout this study technology and especially mobile phones was utilized in EFL classrooms in order to see whether it can influence the process of vocabulary formative assessment and consequently improve vocabulary learning of Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners or not. The results highlight the positive attitude for mobile learning.

There are two book reviews in this issue. AGAINST THE TIDE: CRITICS OF DIGITALISATION; WARNERS, SCEPTICS, SCAREMONGERS, APOCALYPTICISTS, 20 PORTRAITS is the title of the 1st book. The writer of this book is Otto PETERS. The reviewer is Eda ATASOY.

The 2nd book’s title is MACRO-LEVEL LEARNING THROUGH MASSIVE OPEN ONLINE COURSES (MOOCS): STRATEGIES AND PREDICTIONS FOR THE FUTURE. The editors of this book are Elspeth McKAY and John LENARCIC. Murat ARTSIN is the reviewer.

I wish a happy new year for all of you. Hope to meet again in the next issue of TOJDE.Cordially,

Dr. T. Volkan YUZEREditor-in-Chief

1

THE EFFECT OF L2 LISTENING TEXTS ADAPTED TO THE DIGITAL STORY ON THE LISTENING LESSON

Dr. Fatih TANRIKULUORCID: 0000-0002-6730-0353

Faculty of Education Kahramanmaras Sutcu Imam University

Kahramanmaras, TURKEY

Received: 20/12/2018 Accepted: 05/08/2019

ABSTRACTThe study conducted as the action research model aimed to identify the effect of use of new story form, digital storytelling (DST) as a product input in listening lessons on listening lessons. Working group of the research consists of higher education undergraduate foreign students mostly financed by UN (N:49). The two-step procedure covers a twelve-week-process of six weeks each. The first step was applied on students studying at C1 level and the second step was applied on students studying at B1 level. During the procedure, 40 texts in DST format were used for listening lesson. Researcher diary, student diary and focus group discussions were used as data collection tools. The data obtained were analyzed with Nvivo 11 qualitative data analysis program. Themes were created by coding and categorizing the data. As a result of the research, it is seen that digital storytelling has a positive effect on the development of listening skills, positively affects learning and is more effective compared to listening lessons taught with voice recordings and increases student motivation.

Keywords: Digital storytelling, listening skill, action research.

INTRODUCTIONListening is a significant skill both in daily life and in education life (Cigerci & Gultekin, 2017). Different techniques, materials and tools are utilized in order to improve this important skill. One of these tools is tales and stories, the most used old narration types (Barclay, 2012). However, changes in technology brought about different needs along with it (Lotherington & Ronda, 2014). Technology, by affecting the role of story as one of traditional types in education environment, created its new form DST (Bozdogan, 2012). This new type, as the technological face of story, is one of the multimedia technologies which provides the possibility to share a story in digital media (Yussof, Abas & Paris, 2012). It is known that DST, one of multimedia technologies and similar technologies help development of listening skills (Barclay, 2012). In this regard, DST can be used as an alternative application in listening education (Ramirez Verdugo, & Alonso Belmonte, 2007; Morris, 2011). A new option can be presented to language teachers in order to develop listening skills in educational environment (Abdollahpour & Maleki, 2012).

Tale, Story and Listening EducationTales and stories can be effective listening tools to develop both mother tongue and the second langue learning skills. As the communication between narrator and listener is based on listening skill, stories help focusing (Abdollahpour & Maleki, 2012). Thanks to its attention-grabbing character due to its dynamic nature (Hull, & Katz, 2006), narrator directs the listener to a world full of visions and voices by linking reality of real life to the imagination of the listener (Foley, 2013). At the same time, story, which is based on speaking and listening, can also have a significant contribution to language education. By its very nature, it provides the opportunity to listen and speak the target language more frequently enabling more chances to apply the target language (Dollar & Tolu, 2015). Storytelling can be seen as a practical and strong language teaching tool especially for language learning (Yussof, Abas & Paris, (2012). It provides the opportunity to apply the four skills; reading, writing, listening and speaking for the students (Dollar & Tolu, 2015).

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 1

2

Tradional Story And Digital StoryThe changing technology and the different communication skills require change and development to meet the needs of web 2.0 environments (Lotherington & Ronda, 2014). Development and change in technology created new forms of telling and listening stories which are a part of tradition (Bauman, 1986). DST as one of these forms is one of the multimedia technologies to be used for storytelling (Yussof, Abas & Paris, 2012). DST constitutes innovative opportunities and areas for students by expanding storytelling opportunities (Morris, 2011). It prepares the way for broadcasting thoughts and stories in a place where other people can listen, see and hear online (Fasi, 2011). DST, described as a narrator communicating between narrator and audience with its multimedia structure (Yuksel-Arslan, 2013), makes the storytelling enjoyable and delightful with its colorful, graphic, vocal, video and interactive narrations (Yussof, Abas & Paris, 2012). DST can be seen as the combination of traditional storytelling and technology (Normann, 2011; Nguyen, 2011). This multimedia-based application created with the inspiration from traditional story consists of both elements of story and multimedia. It is based on tradition and different from story in some aspects (Dorner, Grimm & Abawi 2002; Morris, 2011). In DST, the audience can affect and shape the story as they are active participants (Dorner, Grimm & Abawi, 2002; Miller, 2014). While traditional story is being presented to live audience by a narrator in the same physical environment, DST narration is presented via multimedia and narrator plays both the role of the author and the listener (Morris, 2011; Foley, 2013 DST helps developing stories through technology (Dorner, Grimm & Abawi, 2002). It provides the possibility for students to reach out to other people in digital environment. DST gives the chance to broadcast thoughts and stories online where other people can listen, see and hear (Fasi, 2011). It is seen that technological dimension adds a significant potential to traditional storytelling (McLellan, 2006). Story, as a useful tool both in traditional and digital aspects (Fokides, 2016), is used as a functional application to develop listening skills.

Effect of DST to ListeningMobile technology and multimedia provide the opportunity to develop materials for listening education in various forms now (Hsu, Hwang, Chang, & Chang, 2013). These opportunities can be used in developing listening skills and can enrich language education (Meskill, 1996). DST as one of the new opportunities of multimedia is an effective tool to develop students’ listening skills (Ramirez Verdugo & Alonso Belmonte, 2007). This educational application can be an alternative for developing listening skills (Morris, 2011) and can make the listening activities easier in education environment (Ramirez Verdugo, & Alonso Belmonte, 2007). It gives the opportunity to practice listening skills (Wang & Zhan, 2010) by meeting communicational needs such as telling and listening (Simsek 2012). Thus, it can be used as a rich learning-teaching technique in acquiring listening skills (Kurudayioglu & Bal, 2014). At the editing scenario text and presentation stage of DST creation, both DST creators and the audience actively uses listening (Banazevsky, 2002; Van & Gills, 2005; Yamac & Ulusoy, 2006; Bran, 2009; Miller 2009; Slvyester & Greenedge, 2009; Gubrium, 2010; Wang & Zhan, 2010; Gordon, 2011; Nguyen 2011; Simsek 2012; Yang & Wu, 2012; Bozdogan 2012; Bumgarner, 2012; Hull & Katz, 2006; Ozkoz & Elola 2016; Fokides 2016). At the process of DST creation, voice is recorded, and records are listened, and these records are edited according to feedbacks (Bumgarner, 2012; Castañeda, 2013; Ozkoz & Elola, 2016). These activities in the process positively affects development of listening skills (Tsou, Wang & Tzeng, 2006; Ramirez Verdugo, & Alonso Belmonte, 2007; Ohler, 2006; Davis & McGrail, 2009; Wang & Zhan, 2010; Robin, Mcneil & Yuksel, 2011; Robin, & McNeil, 2012; Yussof, Abas & Paris, 2012; Pardo, 2014; Kurudayioglu & Bal, 2014; Ozkoz & Elola, 2016). After the process, well-chosen DST’ can be useful in developing listening skills (Abdollahpour & Maleki, 2012).

Using DST in a Foreing LanguageMultimedia applications are important tools (Brett, 1995) to develop listening as a significant skill area in foreign language teaching (Long, 1989; Vandergrift, 2007). Multimedia in various forms can enrich language education (Meskill, 1996) by presenting listening materials (Hsu, Hwang, Chang, & Chang, 2013). Multimedia tools can develop listening skills by creating an environment in a foreign language ((Meskill,

3

1996; Jones & Plass, 2002). As one of these multimedia tools DST’ supporting foreign language development (Abidin, Pour-Mohammadi, Souriyavongsa, Tiang, & Kim, 2011) is reflected to the studies carried out (Ramirez Verdugo, & Alonso Belmonte, 2007; Normann, 2011; Robin, McNeil, & Yuksel, 2011; Castañeda 2013; Pardo, 2014; Yoon, 2016; Diaz, 2016). During the process of DST creation, second language learning is supported while the records are edited (Normann, 2011). Therefore, in the foreign language classes where DST is used, development of student skills can be expected (Yoon, 2012; Kurudayioglu, 2014), motivation provider side of video can be an advantage for language education (Meskill, 1996). Stories, by developing child’s listening and focusing skills, can motivate students, make lessons enjoyable and can help having a positive attitude towards foreign languages (Loukia, 2006; Abdollahpour & Maleki, 2012). Use of DST, as the technological state of story, in their activities can be effective on listening skills (Tatli & Arzugul Aksoy, 2017). It is known that chosen DST’ develop student’s listening skills (Ramirez Verdugo, & Alonso Belmonte, 2007). However, the studies examining the effects of DST on listening are concentrated more on its effect during the process. There are very few studies on DST’ effect on listening as an output (Ramirez-Verdugo & Belmonte, 2007; (Abidin, Pour-Mohammadi, Souriyavongsa, Tiang, & Kim, 2011; Cigerci & Gultekin 2017). In listening lessons in line with content of the lesson, there are no studies on DST use. This study aims to examine the effects of DST’, specifically created with reference to texts for listening lesson, on listening lesson and skill. In service of this goal, answers to the following questions have been sought:

1. What are the effects of the use of DST on L2 listening education on students?2. How is the use of digital story reflected in the learning environment in L2 listening lesson?

METHODThis study is designed in action research model among qualitative research patterns. Action research is intended to improve a current situation or fix a bad situation. It aims to improve education by changing educational environment and acting according to results of change (Kemmis, 1992:25).

Determining a Focal AreaThe researcher, who previously carried out research on DST, saw that DST’ multimedia feature has a significant place in language teaching. He thought that the listening training would be more effective by supporting with multimedia as it is only based on voice and addresses to one sensory organ. The researcher shared his opinion with technology-language experts as well. Furthermore, he discussed whether this study would be useful by sharing it with other instructors working at the center. The author, who got positive feedbacks, considering researches on DST’ language learning, listening education foreign language education as second language, decided to use DST in listening lessons.

Research ParticipantsThe study, by the nature of action research, has been conducted with more than one participant. Researcher, experts, validity committee, course teacher, participant students and focus group students constituted the working group of this research. The researcher is the one who developed the application and is in the role of participant observer. Experts are three instructors from the faculty of education. Experts are instructors who have studies on education area as well as being experienced on qualitative research. Members of the validity committee comprises of three instructors who are working in TOMER with the researcher and have at least one-year experience in teaching Turkish to foreigners. Committee members, making regular meetings, gave opinion and made recommendations on the course of the research. There are course teachers among these instructors. Course teacher is the teacher who gives the listening lesson in the center. During the first and the second phases, different teachers were used. It has been put into practice in a class taught by one of the experienced teachers on a voluntary basis. Students are foreign students studying at university (N: 23+ 26=49). These students are mostly the Syrian refugees financed by the UN. The students, after learning Turkish in the language teaching center, continue their education in their own departments. Students of the first phase comprises of 23 people who are learning C1 level language in the class number 5 during 2016-

4

2017 school year, second phase student group consists of 26 people who are learning B1 level language in the class number 7 during 2017-2018 school year. The information on the countries and genders of the students are given in the graphs. Focus group students comprises of students chosen among students in the application class on voluntary basis. Focus group discussions were made with 6 students including 4 males and 2 females in the first phase while the number of students was 6 including 1 female and 5 males in the second phase.

73%

27%

1st Phase Gender

Male Female

57%43%

2nd Phase Gender

Male Female

Figure 1. Gender

4%

96%

1ST PHASE COUNTRYChina Syria

100%

2ND PHASE COUNTRYSyria

Figure 2. Country Literature ReviewAccording to the literature review on DST, it is seen that DST has a significant place in language teaching and there are many researchers in this field. By DST’ nature, it is noted that most of the studies were made on writing skills. It is notable that there are less studies on listening skill compared to other language skills. Furthermore, the studies were on the effect of DST creation process on language. It is seen that there are very few studies on the effect of DST output product on listening. It is found that there are no studies specifically on DST’ listening education. From the literature review, the thought that DST’ multimedia feature maybe successful on listening skill has been effective on conducting this study. Literature review started before the research continued during the research process.

5

Defining an Action PlanThe action research should be planned thoroughly in order to be successful. It has been focused on why and how the application can be developed (Taylor, Wilkie & Baser, 2006). This can only be achieved through a very good planning. While preparing an action plan, the aims are clearly introduced and goals are listed. The types of data to be gathered and data gathering process were taken into consideration (Koshy, 2005). Considering these matters, plan of the action research is defined as in Figure 4.

Expert Opinions

Preparation of Action Plan

Taking Notes of Observations and evaluation of the current situation

Literature Review

Defining Focal Area

Application Process

Focus Discussions

Transfering the Texts into

data and Evaluation

Taking Expert Opinions

Validity Committee

Conclusion and Discussion

Findings and Reviews

Codification of Data and Arrangement of Themes

Figure 3. Action research plan

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Data CollectionData collection process of the research is given in detail in Table 1.

Table 1. Data collection process of the research

1. P

hase

Before Application Literature Review

Before Application May 2017 Preparation of Action Plan

Before Application May 2017 Observations made before the research

Before Application May 2017 Taking expert opinions

Before Application May 2017 Determining the participants, creating the committee, preparation of action plan

Before Application May 2017 Preparation of digital stories to be used in listening

Before Application 06 June 2017 Focus Group Discussion

1. Week 13 June 2017 Practice lesson, writing the 1st student diaries

2. Week 20 June 2017 Practice lesson, writing the 2nd student diaries

2. Week 22 June 2017 1. validity committee meeting, having the in- class records watched, reading the diaries

3. Week 27 June 2017 Practice lesson

4. Week 04 July 2017 Practice lesson, writing the 3rd student diaries

4. Week 6 July 2017 2. validity committee meeting, having the in- class records watched, reading the diaries

5. Week 11 July 2017 Practice lesson

5. Week 12 July 2017 Focus Group Discussion

6. Week 18 July 2017 Practice lesson, writing the 4th student diaries

2. P

hase

Before Application February 2018 Revision of the 1st phase

Before Application February 2018 Determining the participants, creating the committee, preparation of action plan

Before Application January-February 2018

Preparation of digital stories to be used in listening

Before Application Focus Group Discussion

1. Week 26 February 2018 First practice lesson

2. Week 02 March 2018 Practice lesson, writing the 1st student diaries

2. Week 05 March 2018 Validity committee meeting, having the class records watched, reading the diaries

3. Week 09 March 2018 Practice lesson, writing the 2nd student diaries

12 March 2018 Focus group discussion

4. Week 16 March 2018 Practice lesson, writing the 3rd student diaries

4. Week 19 March 2018 Validity committee meeting, having the in- class records watched, reading the diaries

5. Week 23 March 2018 Practice lesson

6. Week 30 March 2018 Practice lesson, writing the 4th student diaries

6. Week Focus Group Discussion

1st Phase

The researcher first identified the problem status. Before the research, he made observations on listening lesson. As he previously took place in these lessons, the researcher reflected his experiences to his observations. Observation and area notes were shared with the experts. At the same time they were shared with teachers giving lessons in the language center. After deciding the research, literature review was conducted. An action plan was prepared in line with the literature review, observations and expert opinions. Action plan was shared with the experts and committee and arranged according to the feedbacks and put into final form. As a result

7

of the observations, area notes and discussions with the teachers, the class in which the research would take place was decided. The DST’ to be used in the next phase were prepared. There are 20 listening texts in total for each phase. The listening texts into DST by using Movie Maker program. Texts turned into DST were rearranged by taking opinions of experts and committee. Before practice, there had been discussions with focus group students. The first practice lesson was made on June 13, 2017. At the end of the three-hour-lesson, the students were asked to write a diary. During six-week-practice, 4 diaries were written. Following the two-week practice, after diaries, there had been a committee meeting. Diaries and short video records were shared with the committee. Practices and meetings continued in this way. One week before the end of the practice, focus discussion was conducted.

2nd Phase

Data of the 1st phase were revised, and deficiencies identified. Considering the opinion that it should be applied on students in low levels mentioned in phase 1, it is decided that the practice would be made with B1 level language learning students. In the 1st phase, negativities like fast speaking, some of the DST photos’ being incompatible, students’ preferring to look at the book more for fill-in-the-blank texts in listening activities were considered and deficiencies were tried to be fixed. During the 2nd phase practice, students were told that they can listen DST from voice while studying texts in fill-in-the-blank activities. Again, determination of participants and creation of the committee were made as in the 1st phase at this stage. In the 1st phase, the incompatibility of photos is tried to be fixed. Students of education faculty helped in DST conversion. DST’ were presented to expert and arrangements were made. Before practice, focus discussion was made. The first practice was made on February 26, 2018. After the second week practice, diaries were kept and then the committee meeting was held. Short videos taken from the lessons were shared with the committee. The points indicated in the plan were made in the same way with the procedure in plan of the 1st phase and data collection.

Data Collection ToolsData was collected from the diaries, focus discussions, participant observations, video records, documents and literature (Stringer, 2007: 68).

Student DiariesParticipant students kept diaries during learning process (Kemmis & McTaggart, 1992: 50). During the practice of each 6 weeks, each student kept 4 diaries. The diaries were kept after the practice lesson. Each diary was recorded as a separate word file. In first phase 46, in second phase 65, in total 111 diaries were included in codification.

Researcher DiaryResearcher diary is not only used for collection and analysis of data, but also used for following up the research process (Altrichter, Posch, Somekh & Feldman, 2005). Diaries regularly kept after each lesson in order to reflect the research process and researcher observations were included in codification.

Focus InterviewFocus group discussions were made before the practice and during the practice process. Two discussions in the 1st phase of the research, 3 discussions in the 2nd phase of the research were made. The discussions made before the practice were not included in the codification. 1 focus discussion in 1st phase, 2 focus discussion s in 2nd phase was included in the codification. Six students, including 4 males and 2 females in the first phase and 6 students including 1 female and 5 males in the second phase were interviewed.

8

Data Analysis and CodificationFor data analysis, content analysis method was used. Nvivo 11 qualitative data analysis program was used for the analysis. During codification, words, word groups and sentences were selected as baseline. Names of the codes created based on students’ expressions. In codification, for clearer reflection of student opinions, codes were given names which were very close to students’ expressions. Although visuals and picture words were used in the same meaning, they were given different cryptonyms in order to reflect student’s opinion much clearer. While the code in the same meaning was visual in the first phase, it was picture in the second phase. The first phase data were analyzed, codes and themes were created. These codes and themes were checked by two different expert academicians during qualitative data research and codes were put into final form after being arranged according to these feedbacks. Common views on the code list created in first phase were directly used in second phase. Unexampled codes were codified with a different name. These codes were categorized and gathered under a different theme (Stringer, 2007; Ekiz, 2009).

EthicsAfter determining the practice class, the practice was discussed with the teacher who would apply it. Then, the practice was discussed with the students. How the application would continue, how it would end and how the data would be used were explained in details to the students. The students were assured that they would be able to give up at any phase of the application (Taylor, Wilkie & Baser, 2006). A written consent was taken from the students stating that they had volunteered and allowed the use of the data obtained from the research.

Reliability and ValidityData was collected from multiple sources in order to ensure reliability and precision of qualitative data (Naughton & Hughes, 2009). In the research, 53 codes in the first phase, 74 codes in the second phase were codified from 127 different sources of researcher and student diaries and focus discussions. By getting 400 code frequencies from 126 different sources, triangulation was provided. In order to sustain reliability, codes and themes were verified by two expert instructors. In line with their views, the necessary amendments were made.

FINDINGSIn this section, the findings of the research are given. In this section, codes of 5 themes from data analysis and their ratios are given. Subtitles are determined in line with the theme obtained. In each theme, a graph showing the theme’s ratio to all codes is given. Then, graphs of common codes and unexampled codes are given and they are explained.

Theme of Its Effect to Learning

38,17% 54,28% 49,00%

0,00%

100,00%

1

Its Effect on Learning Theme Graph

1st Phase 2nd Phase Average

Figure 4. Its effect on learning theme graph

9

196 codes were obtained under its effect on learning theme. 50 of these codes belong to the 1st phase, 146 of them belongs to the 2nd phase. The effect of this theme to the 1st phase is 38.17% and the effect to the 2nd phase is 54.28%, and the total effect on two phases is 49.00%. This ratio corresponds to the half of the findings obtained from the research.

7,63

%

5,34

%

5,34

% 6,11

%

9,16

%

1,53

%

1,53

%

10,4

1%

7,43

%

4,46

%

3,35

%

1,49

%

2,97

%

0,37

%

9,50

%

6,75

%

4,75

%

4,25

%

4,00

%

2,50

%

0,75

%

0,00%

2,00%

4,00%

6,00%

8,00%

10,00%

12,00%

Pictures’ Facilitating

Understanding

DH’s Facilitating Understanding

Facilitating theLesson

Visuals’ Facilitating

Understanding

Videos’ Facilitating

Understanding

Provision ofPermanent

Learning

Watching’s Facilitating

Understanding

Common Code Graph on Its Effect on Learning

1st Phase Coding Rate 2nd Phase Coding Rate Average

Figure 5. Common code graph on its effect on learning

Common codes in this theme generally comprise of views on DST’ multimedia feature. Pictures’ facilitating understanding is the second which effects the total most among all codes with a ratio of 9.50%. This code’s ratio to total codes in 1st phase is 7.63%, and 10.41% in second phase. DST’ facilitating understanding code is among the ones with highest effect with 6.75%. its ratio to total codes in 1st phase is 5.34% while it is 7.43% in 2nd phase. Facilitating the lesson code, with its 4.75% ratio, is one of the most effective ones on the average of all codes. Its ratio to total codes in 1st phase is 5.34% while its ratio to total codes in the 2nd phase is 4.46%. Visuals’ facilitating understanding is among most effective ones on the average of all codes with a ratio of 4.25%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 6.11%, while it is 3.35% in the second phase. Video’s facilitating understanding is among most effective ones on the average of all codes with a ratio of 4.00%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 9.16% while it is 1.49% in second phase. Provision of Permanent Learning code has the ratio of 2.50%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 1.53%, while it is 2.97% in second phase. Watching’s facilitating understanding code has a ratio of 0.75%. Its ratio to code total is 1.53% in 1st phase, while its ratio to code total is 0.37% in 2nd phase.

10

5,95

%

2,60

%

1,86

%

1,86

%

1,86

%

1,86

%

1,49

%

1,49

%

0,76

%

0,76

%

0,74

%

0,74

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

4,00

%

1,75

%

1,25

%

1,25

%

1,25

%

1,25

%

1,00

%

1,00

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,50

%

0,50

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

Faci

litat

ing

unde

rsta

ndin

g w

ords

Visu

als’

dis

trac

ting

atte

ntio

n

Its h

elpi

ng th

e on

es w

ith w

eak

–low

le

vel-

lang

uage

ski

llsVi

sual

s’ fa

cilit

atin

g le

arni

ng

Gue

ssin

g th

e w

ords

from

vis

uals

Visu

als’

faci

litat

ing

unde

rsta

ndin

g te

xts

Diff

icul

ty o

f fill

ing

the

blan

ks

Att

entio

ns’ m

ovin

g to

pho

tos

rath

er

than

list

enin

gFi

lling

bla

nk’s

bei

ng m

uch

easi

er

Unk

now

n w

ords

’ com

plic

atin

g un

ders

tand

ing

Its d

istr

actin

g th

e at

tent

ion

of th

e on

esw

ith s

tron

g la

ngua

ge s

kills

It is

get

ting

easi

er to

ans

wer

text

ques

tions

Nec

essi

ty to

see

the

spea

ker

Hav

ing

diff

icul

ty in

und

erst

andi

ng th

ew

ords

Its b

eing

und

erst

anda

ble

Its b

eing

a re

med

y fo

r und

erst

andi

ng

Und

erst

andi

ng v

ery

wel

l

Und

erst

andi

ng to

o m

uch

Its h

elpi

ng in

gue

ssin

g th

e pa

rts

not

unde

rsto

od

Pict

ures

’ bei

ng e

xpla

nato

ry

Visu

als’

mak

ing

the

wor

ds fo

rgot

ten

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

1stPhs

1stPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

2ndPhs

Uncommon Codes in DH's Effect on Learning Theme

Effect of the theme Effect of the totaly

Figure 6. Uncommon codes in DST’ effect on learning theme

The codes given in Graph 6 comprise of uncommon codes in 1st and 2nd phase in DST’s Effect on Learning theme. 1st columns show the effect on code number in the phase it belonged to, 2nd columns shows its effect to total. Words’ facilitating understanding is a code only in 2nd phase. This code is among the ones with high ratio to total code number. Its ratio to 2nd phase code number is 5.95, its effect to total code ratio is 4.00. Visuals’ distracting attention is a code which can be regarded as negative in this theme. Its ratio to the number of codes in 2nd phase is 2.60%, its ratio to number of total codes is %1.75. It is seen that uncommon codes graph comprises of codes reflecting multimedia feature of DST.

Comparison Theme

26,72%39,41%

26,50%

0,00%

50,00%

Comparison Theme Graph

1st Phase 2nd Phase Average

Figure 7. Comparison theme graph

Comparison theme contains student opinions which compare listening lesson with DST practice lesson. This theme is important as it reveals the situation before and after the practice. It clearly reveals the effectiveness of the practice by making comparison. 106 codes in total were obtained from comparison theme. This theme’s

11

ratio to total number of codes obtained in 1st phase is %26.72, its ratio to total number of codes obtained in 2nd phase is %39.41, and its ratio to total number of codes obtained in both phases is % 26.50.

12,9

8%

1,53

%

1,53

%

2,29

%

1,53

%

1,53

%

15,6

1%

5,58

%

2,23

%

2,60

%

1,86

%

0,37

%

10,5

0%

3,75

%

1,50

%

1,75

%

1,25

%

0,75

%

0,00%

5,00%

10,00%

15,00%

20,00%

Its beıng betterthan prevıos

lıstenıng

Its beıng moreuseful

Betterunderstandıngcompared toprevıous one

Preferrıng thenew practıce

No dıfferencewıth the prevıous

one

Wantıng the oldpractıce

Common Codes in Comparison Theme

1st phase coding 2nd phase coding Average

Figure 8. Common codes in comparison theme

In Figure 8 common codes in comparison theme are given. The code of being better than previous listening is the most effective on the total among all with the ratio of 10.50%. This code’s ratio to the ratio of total codes in 1st phase is 12.98% and its ratio to the code number in 2nd phase is 15.61%. Being more useful is among the most effective codes on average of all codes with a ratio of 3.75%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 1.53% and its ratio to code total in 2nd phase is 5.58%. Being better than the previous one is among the ones with normal effect on average total of all codes with a ratio of 1.50%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 1.53% and its ratio to code total in 2nd phase is 2.23%. Preferring the new practice code is among the ones with normal effect on average total of all codes with a ratio of 1.75%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 2.29% and its ratio to code total in 2nd phase is 2.60%. The code of no difference with the previous one is among the ones with normal effect on average total of all codes with a ratio of 1.25%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 1.53% and its ratio to code total in 2nd phase is 1.86%. The code of requesting the old practice ha 0.75% effect. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 1.53% and its effect to code total in 2nd phase is 0.37%.

2,60

%

4,58

%

1,12

%

0,74

%

0,74

%

0,74

%

0,74

%

0,76

%

0,76

%

0,76

%

0,76

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%1,75

%

1,50

%

0,75

%

0,50

%

0,50

%

0,50

%

0,50

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,00%0,50%1,00%1,50%2,00%2,50%3,00%3,50%4,00%4,50%5,00%

List

enin

g w

ith

visu

als’

bei

ng m

uch

bett

er

Its v

isua

l asp

ect’s

be

ing

good Li

king

Its n

ot b

eing

goo

dw

ith p

hoto

Its n

ot b

eing

ver

yus

eful

Its b

eing

pos

itive

Its b

eing

suc

cess

ful

Ther

e is

no

chan

ge

Ther

e is

no

sign

ifica

nt c

hang

e

It w

ould

be

bett

erw

ithou

t vid

eo

It is

nec

essa

ry to

get

used

to li

sten

ing

with

out p

ictu

res

List

enin

g w

ith

audi

o’s

bein

g be

tter

Its b

eing

bet

ter w

ithvi

deo

Wan

ting

it to

be

prac

ticed

in o

ther

less

ons

2nd 1st 2nd 2nd 2nd 2nd 2nd 1st 1st 1st 1st 2nd 2nd 2nd

Codes With Uncommon Comparison Themes

Effect of the theme Effect of the totaly

Figure 9. Codes with uncommon comparison themes

12

Figure 9 comprises of uncommon codes in comparison theme. Listening with pictures’ being better is a code which exists only in 2nd phase. This code is among the ones with high ratio on total code number. Its ratio to the number of codes in 2nd phase is 2.60% while its ratio to total code number is 1.75%. Some part of the uncommon codes comprise of codes which reflects DST’ multimedia feature. Apart from that, there are codes reflecting before and after the practice such as comparison of lessons, liking, its being useful, its being successful etc. In this graph, there are negative opinions against the practice despite it has low effect on the total. The codes as not being good with photo 0.50%, not being very useful 0.50%, no change 0.25%, no significant change 0.25%, better without video 0.25%, willing to have the previous practice 0.25%, necessity to get used to listening without picture and listening with audio’s being better 0.25% are the codes with negative attitude towards practice. It is seen that these negative codes towards the practice has a minor effect on the ratio of total codes.

High Motivation Theme

22,90% 24,16%8,75%

0,00%

50,00%

High Motivation

1st Phase 2nd Phase Average

Figure 10. High motivation

High motivation theme comprises of opinions which shows the effect of practice on student motivation. The theme helps seeing the practice’s effect on student. In high motivation theme, 65 codes in total were obtained. Ratio of this theme to total code number obtained in 1st phase is 22.90% and its ratio to total code number obtained in 2nd phase is 24.16%, and its ratio to total number of codes obtained in two levels is 8.75%.

0,76

% 9,92

%

4,58

%

4,46

%

1,12

%

0,74

%

3,00

%

0,75

%

0,50

%

I t s b e i n g f u n T h e l e s s o n r u n n i n g w e l l L o v i n g t h e l i s t e n i n g l e s s o n

H i g h M o t i v a t i o n C o m m o n C o d e s

1st Phase Coding Rate 2nd Phase Coding Rate Average

Figure 11. High motivation common codes

Figure 11 comprises of common codes in motivation theme. It’s being fun code is among the most effective one on the total with a ratio of 3.00%. The ratio of this code to total code in 1st phase is 0.76% and its ratio to the number of codes in 2nd phase is 4.46%. Lesson running well code’s effect on average of all codes is 0.75%. Its ratio to code total in 1st phase is 9.92% and its ratio to code total in 2nd phase is 1.12%. Loving the listening lesson code’s effect to average of all codes is 0.50%. Its ratio code total in 1st phase is 4.58% and its ratio to code total in 2nd phase is 0.74%.

13

2,60

%

1,86

%

3,82

%

3,05

%

1,49

%

1,12

%

0,76

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%

0,37

%1,75

%

1,25

%

1,25

%

1,00

%

1,00

%

0,75

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

0,25

%

Its

be

ing

e

ng

ag

ing

Vis

ua

ls’

be

ing

in

tere

stin

g

Wa

nti

ng

th

e

con

tin

ua

tio

n

of

pra

ctic

e

Lov

ing

mo

re

tha

n t

he

p

rev

iou

s o

ne

Liki

ng

En

joyi

ng

Fe

eli

ng

go

od

Fa

cili

tati

ng

fo

cus

Sp

icin

g u

p

Its

be

ing

e

ffe

ctiv

e

Th

e p

rev

iou

s o

ne

’s b

ein

g

bo

rin

g

2 n d 2 n d 1 s t 1 s t 2 n d 2 n d 1 s t 2 n d 2 n d 2 n d 2 n d

U n c o m m o n C o d e s n H i g h M o t i v a t i o n

Effect of the theme Effect of the totaly

Figure 12. Uncommon codes in high motivation

Codes given in Figure 13 shows the uncommon codes of high motivation theme in 1st and 2nd levels. It only exists in the 2nd phase. Its ratio to the number of codes in 2nd phase is 2.60% and its ratio to the number of total codes is 1.75%. Visuals’ being interesting, willing to continue to the practice, desiring more than the previous one, liking and enjoying codes are the effective ones in this theme.

Low Motivation Theme

0,76%0,37% 0,50%

0,00%

1,00%

Low Motivation

1st Phase 2nd Phase Average

Figure 13. Low motivation

Low motivation theme is the theme gathering opinions on the practice’s negative effect on student. Two codes were obtained in total in low motivation theme. This theme’s ratio to total code number obtained in 1st phase is 0.76% and its ratio to the total code number obtained in 2nd phase is 0.37%. Its ratio to the total number of codes in both two phases is 0.50%.

0,76%0,37%0,25% 0,25%

0,00%

0,50%

1,00%

Getting a little bored Not teaching the lesson well

2nd Phs 2nd Phase

Uncommon Codes in Low Motivation

Effect of the theme Effect of the totaly

Figure 14. Uncommon codes in low motivation

14

Graph 18 shows the uncommon codes of low motivation theme in 1st and 2nd phases. 1st column shows the effect of codes in their own phases, 2nd column shows the two different phases’ effect on the total code ratio. There is only one code in each 1st and 2nd phases. It is seen that codes’ effect on the total is very low.

DISCUSSION This study aims to determine the effects of use of DST formatted texts instead of voice records in 2nd language learning listening course on listening skill and lesson. The fact that listening lessons made with DST positively affect learning and it is more effective than the listening lessons made by using voice records, it positively affects student motivation are reflected to research findings. Moreover, it is seen that DST develops listening skills both in creation process (Yuksel, Robin, & McNeil, 2011; Yang & Wu, 2012; Yoon, 2016; Aktas & Yurt, 2017) and as product output (Ramirez-Verdugo & Belmonte, 2007; (Abidin, Pour-Mohammadi, Souriyavongsa, Tiang, & Kim, 2011; Cigerci & Gultekin 2017) in the other studies conducted on listening.Wide range of opinions related to DST’ positive effect on learning environment are reflected to the findings. Half of the research findings are on DST’ effect on learning. This ratio and quality of the comments have revealed that DST supports listening education and contributes to learning. It is found that use of DST with multimedia feature instead of voice has positive effects on learning by enriching the learning environment. Frequent repetition of these opinions related to learning proves the effect of DST on learning. Use of different expressions on the effect of DST on learning and wide variety of codes is another evidence presenting its effect on learning. Among these opinions, opinion on DST’ facilitating learning is the most repeated one. Facilitating learning code is expressed in different ways such as facilitating learning of DST, pictures, visuals, video and watching. It is highlighted that these concepts giving the names of the codes are the elements creating the multimedia. With these different concepts, the effect of DST’ multimedia feature on learning is seen. Another remarkable code regarding the effect on learning is DST’ facilitating understanding of a word in the listening lesson. It is seen that multimedia helps guessing the meanings of foreign words and idioms (Mueller, 1980). In the other studies, it is underlined that multimedia facilitates listening skill and word learning (Jones, 2006; Hsu, Hwang, Chang, & Chang, 2013). If understanding the words and reaching the integrity of the subject accordingly, the first step of listening in learning a foreign language, it can be emphasized that DST helps listening by facilitating word learning. It can be said that understanding words brings about understanding the text. It has been perceived that text and visuals, when used related to audio text, have an easing role in understanding the language (Meskill, 1996). Visuals enable students to see what they know and think, connect and understand new with the known, express them with visual, audio, scientific and strong aspects (Kajder, & Swenson, 2004). It has been observed that visuals of the content improve level of comprehension, first seeing the visual facilitates understanding of what is listened (Mueller, 1980). There are few negative opinions on learning. It is mentioned that the visuals distract attention and attention is switched to photos. This situation can be explained by students’ being dependent on the book. Students’ being concerned about answering questions rather than understanding the text causes them to be in a dilemma. This situation can be explained with continuation of habits before the practice. Another remarkable finding is the opinion that the practice may be more effective in lower levels. Accordingly, the 2nd phase practice was made on a lower level of B1. Students’ starting to have a command on language shows that they need multimedia support less. In this regard, DST can be regarded as a tool which can be required by basic level students in language teaching. Opinions related to learning showed that stories’ roles of informing, teaching and education (Foley, 2013), DST as story’s new form can be used as a pedagogic application in listening education (Verdugo & Belmonte, 2007). Another theme appears in findings is that comparison of lesson before and after the practice. It can be noted that effectiveness of practice was clearly put forward by making comparison between normal listening lesson and practice lesson. There have been several evaluations on listening lesson based on voice recording and lesson made with DST. In the comparison, many views which can be defined as positive towards lessons with DST were reflected to the findings. The most emphasized view is that listening with DST is better than previous way of listening. It is expressed that this practice is more useful, and the lesson is better understood compared to a normal lesson. The most used expression in comparisons is listening to be good with pictures.

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Students used names reflecting multimedia features instead of DST. It is seen that codes like picture, visual, photograph express the same things. These codes meaning the same things with different concepts reveal that listening lesson with DST is better. There are opinions that can be regarded as negative despite of being in limited number. It is told that it has no difference with normal lesson, there should be old practice. However, this is limited to a couple of opinions of certain students. The comparison theme shows that practice is more effective than the old and has aspects affecting the lesson in a more positive manner.Another theme obtained with the findings is that lessons made with DST increase student motivation. It is expressed that lesson is fun, goes well and is liked. It is observed that visuals increase students’ attention and focus (Mueller, 1980). Students said that the lesson is interesting, effective and enjoyable. It has been found that it is more attractive to use video rather than listening voice recordings in a language class (Shrosbree, 2008). It can be said that motivation increase helped in having a fruitful lesson and getting the desired efficiency from the lesson. The theme exactly the opposite of high motivation is low motivation theme. Comments on low motivation are limited to the comments of a few students. Rareness of codes in a low motivation theme and being limited to a certain extent prove that the practice is effective, and DST provides high motivation. In learning theme and other themes, there are codes showing that DST’ multimedia feature is effective in language learning. In the study of Yoon (2016), it has been revealed that DST as a multimedia tool also supports foreign language development. In the research, it is seen that multimedia develops listening skill (Brett, 1995; Jones & Plass, 2002; Hernandez, 2004) and facilitates learning of a word (Jones, 2006; Hsu, Hwang, Chang, & Chang, 2013). This study and other studies have revealed that it is necessary to focus on multimedia in CALL, and to renew visual and audio channels for listening and watching (Hoven, 1999). In terms of multimedia, it is seen that role of computers should be considered (Hoven, 1999). The multimedia providing education possibility can be used in developing listening skills and enrich language education (Meskill, 1996). In this respect, especially DST can be thought as an educational tool. It can be said that the content of DST being an adjustable multimedia tool and being able to be arranged by a teacher provides a major advantage.

CONCLUSION This study is designed on the effect of DST with multimedia feature on listening education. Effect of DST, as the new form of story based on listening, on developing listening skill is observed during the process. Instead of only audial voice record, DST which appeals both to listening and watching skills of students was used and its effect was observed. Research findings have revealed that DST is effective on listening education. It is seen that DST is mostly effective on learning. When compared to listening lesson based on voice recording, it is seen that DST is an effective tool. By positively affecting students’ motivation, it made learning environment more functional. This practice is limited to DST use in listening education in Turkish teaching to Foreigners in B2 and C1 levels. Similar practices related to DST use can be applied in different language levels in terms of different skill.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORDr. Fatih TANRIKULU, is assistant professor at the Department of Turkish Education, Kahramanmaras Sutcu Imam University. Dr. Tanrikulu completed his Ph.D. in Turkish Education at Canakkale Onsekiz Mart University in 2014. His academic interest areas are computer assisted language learning, e-learning, L2 language learning and children literature. He has over than 4 journal articles published in national and international indexes, papers submitted to international meetings.

Fatih TANRIKULUFaculty of EducationAddress: Kahramanmaras Sutcu Imam University, Education Faculty, 46050, Kahramanmaras, TurkeyPhone: +90 3443004439E-mail: fatih3878@hotmail.com; fatihtanrikulu@ksu.edu.tr

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THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING WIZIQ INTERACTION PLATFORM ON STUDENTS’ ACHIEVEMENT, MOTIVATION AND ATTITUDES

Dr. Abdelrahman Mohamed AHMEDORCID: 0000-0001-6576-9791

Instructional and Teaching Technology DepartmentSultan Qaboos University

Muscat, OMAN

Dr. Mohamed Eltahir OSMANORCID: 0000-0003-0806-1978

Instructional and Teaching Technology DepartmentSultan Qaboos University

Muscat, OMAN

Received: 11/02/2019 Accepted: 04/04/2019

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this study was to assess the effects of using WiziQ platform as a virtual classroom on students’ achievement, motivation and attitudes. The sample of this study consists of 42 students enrolled in the course of “Educational and Information technology” at the college of education, Sultan Qaboos University. The participating students were assigned randomly to a control and experimental group (17 and 25 students respectively). Data collection tools included: an academic achievement test, motivation scale and attitude scale. The results of the study showed that there is a significant difference in the mean scores of the post-test between the control group and experimental group in favor of experimental group. The results also indicated that students in the experimental group developed positive attitude towards using WiziQ virtual classroom in their learning. In addition, the findings showed that students in the experimental group were more engaged and motivated to learn compared to their counterparts in the control group.

Keywords: Academic achievement, WiziQ platform, e-learning, motivation, attitude.

INTRODUCTIONThe emerging digital media and internet technologies are impacting the instructional and learning systems more than ever before. There is a plethora of research indicating that these technologies have added value to traditional classroom environments, and consequently changed the students’ learning needs, and the approaches of teaching and learning (Gedera, 2014; Bonk & Graham, 2006; Keller, 2008). Learning Management Systems (LMS), for example, have various attributes and tools that can be used to broaden teaching and learning experiences. These LMSs are used to create online learning environments for campus-based students and also to offer mixed mode and fully online courses (Dilani, John & Wright, 2013). Currently many universities integrate Learning Management Systems in their teaching processes and utilize blended learning to some of their courses in response to the diverse needs of today’s learners. There is a growing body of literature that highlights pedagogical innovations that foster higher-order thinking and enhance opportunities for active learning (Arum & Roska, 2010; Taylor, 2010). These innovations represent an ongoing paradigm shift from a teacher-centred to learner-centred learning environments (Barr & Tagg, 1995).Recent developments in distance learning technologies and associated pedagogical innovations have shown promising potential for synchronous instruction and live classroom interaction to remote students via live virtual classrooms (Falloon, 2011). These technologies, for example, can provide access to suites of interactive tools such as ‘virtual whiteboards’ and concurrent file sharing streamed video and audio attributes, and at the same time allow students to interact in real-time through text-based chat (Hrastinski, 2008). However, research on the attributes of virtual classrooms in e-learning is limited and inconclusive. This study aims to examine the effects of WiZiQ as a virtual classroom on students’ achievement, motivation and attitudes toward using virtual learning environments.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 2

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LITERATURE REVIEWAlthough distance education is increasingly becoming a viable alternative in higher education institutions, it is noted that most of the global initiatives have been asynchronous in nature Hrastinski (2008). However, with recent developments in hardware, software, and relevant communications tools, there exists a great potential for synchronous instruction and classroom interaction via live virtual learning environments. According to Falloon (2011), synchronous components have been present in many online courses for a number of years through text-based chat functionality. Research has shown that the integration of Learning Management Systems (LMS) in Higher Educational settings can often enhance teaching and learning experiences. According to Coates, James & Baldwin (2005), E-learning platforms such as Moodle, WIZIQ, Blackboard and Docebo offer powerful tools that provide course administration and pedagogical functions such as synchronous and asynchronous communication tools; content development and delivery; assessment and management of students’ activities. Smirnova & Deutsch, (2014) state that online learning through course management systems provides learners with opportunities to become self-directed lifelong learners. According to Dilani, John & Wright (2013), the available tools and features of e-platforms, improve learners’ engagement and consequently enhance their achievement and motivation. The following section highlights and synthesizes current literature that of particular relevance to e-platforms and their associated theoretical ground.

E-learning Platforms (WIZIQ & MOODLE)Research has shown that the effectiveness of the e-platforms, however, depends largely on their accessible tools and attributes (Coates, James & Baldwin, 2005; Dilani, John & Wright, 2013; Smirnova & Deutsch, 2014). For example; the Moodle e-Learning platform (Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) is a free open-source learning management system or e-Learning platform, which serves to help educators create online courses with a focus on interaction and collaborative construction of content. It is the most widely used LMS in the world and currently has over 68 million users world-wide (MOODLE.org, 2018). It has been used in Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) since 2006 as an e-platform for a large number of courses at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. WiZiQ, on the other hand, is a Web 2.0 platform (Figure 1), which can change the way that teachers and learners collaborate in either synchronous or asynchronous mode (Bosatn, 2011). This platform allows the participants to interact through text, audio, and video in a semi-live virtual classroom environment (Davis, 2005; Stevens, 2007). Course instructors, for example, can conduct online live classes and make use of the various tools and features such as: whiteboard, online PowerPoint, Word presentation, PDF, audio and video conferencing, text chatting, and can also record their classes for a later reference.

Figure 1. Virtual classroom

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With the evolution of emergent technologies, the synchrony of LMS and Web 2.0 environments have become a powerful combination (Smirnova & Deutsch, 2014). LMS such as Moodle and WiziQ seem to offer new opportunities for more collaborative learning where students can take control of their learning. These e-platforms provide many services to both teachers and students. Examples of these services include, but not limited to: customizable course design and layout, collaborative activities, learners’ engagement, convenient file management, notifications and automatic alerts, multiple progress tracking options, online assessments and feedback, automatic session recording, and cloud-based content library etc. The WiZiQ platform, for instance facilitates students’ engagement and interaction in a common virtual space (Stevens, 2007). This space contains a whiteboard with powerful drawing tools, which can be turned into multiple whiteboards for users to upload and share their multimedia presentations. Research has shown that Web 2.0 technologies, in general could be used to enhance learner engagement and motivation in a more participatory and personalized learning environment (Bostan, 2011). According to Fisher and Baird (2005), Web 2.0 technologies such as WiZiQ platform lead learners from Web content consumers to Web content developers. They further argued that learners are usually more engaged in their learning when provided with collaborative learning environments. However, these participatory environments require a deeper level of social interaction that engages learners in active knowledge acquisition and knowledge construction. Fisher (2012) emphasizes the essential value of e-learning platforms in encouraging collaboration and expanding learning opportunities. Hampel and Pleines (2013) noted that online forums and self assessment activities attracted high participation rates which, interns, improve learners’ engagement in their learning processes.Designing online blended environments, however, requires a careful balance of engagement activities and motivational strategies. Integrated motivational strategies in this study was guided by Keller’s ARCS model which has four conceptual components: Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction. The model was developed as an instructional design model to enhance learner’s motivation (Suziki, Nishibuchi, Yamamoto, and Keller, 2004). In addition to the overwhelmingly positive impact on learners’ engagement, a number of studies have demonstrated that virtual classroom environments can enhance students’ motivation for learning (Capshew, 2005; Chircu and Neacsu, 2015; Colakoglu and Akdemir, 2010; Dikmenli and Unaldi, 2013; Keller, 2008). Durmus and Karakirik (2006) claim that the use of an interactive web-based visual representation of dynamic objects increases not only students’ conceptual understanding and problem-solving skills but also promotes positive attitudes towards mathematics, and improves students’ motivation. Similarly, previous research has provided strong evidence for the impact of e-platforms on students’ attitudes towards virtual classrooms (Penjor and Zander, 2016; Serrano and Sanchez, 2011; Testa (2011). There seems to be a general consensus among researchers that transforming virtual spaces turn the Web into a new area of socialization which consequently promoted students’ positive attitudes towards these learning environments. Previous research, however, has not been conclusive with regard to the impact of virtual classrooms on students’ academic achievement. On one hand, for instance, research has shown that virtual classrooms provide conducive learning environments for improved academic achievement (Agrawal, Kumar, Balasubramaniam, Bhargava, Sinha, Bakshi & Sood, 2016; Barker & Gossman, 2013; Kaosaiyaporn, Atisabda, Plodkaew, & Promrak’s, 2015; Yilmaz, 2015). Tatli and Ayas, (2013), for example, point out that that virtual laboratories are at least as effective as real laboratories in terms of acquainting students with the experiment processes, and at the same time providing them with a safe experimental environment. While, on the other hand, a number of studies reported no significant differences in students’ learning and satisfaction (see for example, Hortos, Sefcik, Wilson, McDaniel & Zemper, 2013; LeShea, 2013). In the light of the reported literature, this study aimed to explore the impact of WiziQ as an interactive Web 2.0 platform on students’ achievement, motivation and attitudes towards virtual learning environments in a college-level course in educational technology (TECH5001) at Sultan Qaboos University. More specifically, the study aimed to answer the following research questions.

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Research Questions1. Is there any significant difference in the mean scores of students’ achievement between the experimental

and control group?2. What is the effect of WIZIQ interactive virtual classroom on student attitude towards online learning?3. Is there any significant difference in the mean scores of students’ Motivation between the experimental

and control group? METHODResearch DesignA quasi-experimental design with pre-post control group design was used in this study to investigate the effect of Wiziq as an interactive virtual classroom on students’ achievement, motivation, and their attitudes towards online learning.

Study Sample of the StudyThe sample consisted of all students enrolled in the Educational and Information technology course (TECH 5001) at the Department of Instructional and Learning Technologies with a total number of 42 (N= 42) students assigned randomly into two groups. The experimental group consisted of 25 students, while the rest of the class (17 students) were assigned to the control group.

Research InstrumentsAchievement test (pre-post test)

Given the nature of this study, three instruments were used for the data collection: An achievement test, a motivation inventory, and an attitude survey. The achievement test consisted initially of 30 questions (13 multiple-choice questions, 15 true/false questions, and two open- ended questions, with one mark for each). However, the test was validated and modified in light of the referees’ comments to include 28 objective questions in its final format. The reliability coefficient of the test was 0.87.

Motivation Survey (ARCS)

The study adapted the Instructional Materials Motivation Survey (IMMS) by Keller for assessing students’ motivation towards e-learning platform. The survey consists of 36 items: twelve of which for attention, nine for relevance, nine for confidence and six for satisfaction. The (IMMS) administered at the end of the course for the two groups. Alpha Cronach reliability for total survey was 0. 91, and for each dimension of the survey was 0.81 for attention, 0.81 for relevance, 0.67 for confidence and 0.64 for satisfaction. The response scale ranges from 1 to 5, with a minimum score 36, and a maximum score of 180, and a midpoint score of 108. However, it should be noted that the minimum, maximum, and midpoint scores for each subscale vary depending on the number of items in the subscale.

Attitude Questionnaire

The students’ attitudes towards Wiziq online virtual classroom was measured by an attitude questionnaire which consisted of 16 items containing positive and negative statements. The Alpha Cronbach reliability coefficient for the total survey was 0.83.

Procedures

All the students enrolled in the “Educational and Information technology” course was randomly assigned to the treatment groups with 25 students in the experimental group studied the course through WIZIQ

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e-learning platform (synchronous engagement). While the other 17 students assigned to the control group who studied through the normal MOODLE e-learning platform (asynchronous collaborative engagement). The duration for experiment in this study was 8 weeks. The two classes had a 4-hour class period every week where both groups were taught the same content by the same instructor. The WizIQ’s virtual classroom used in this study was a collaborative web conferencing environment which enables the instructor to communicate synchronously using audio, video or text chat, interactive whiteboard and content sharing. Figure 2 illustrates a typical classroom layout, with the video/audio, participants’ text-based chat, and presenter notes pods being visible. Other pods such as shared whiteboard, polling, desktop, and file sharing were revealed and used, as needed. Figure 3 shows the students’ comments on the virtual lecture.

Figure 2. A typical virtual classroom layout

Figure 3. Students’ comments on the virtual lecture

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At the end of the experimental treatment, a post-test was administered for both groups to test for students’ academic achievement. In addition, an attitude and motivation instruments were also administered at the end of the experiment.

RESULTSAcademic Achievement Before the experiment, the researchers administered a pre-test to ensure the equivalency of the two groups. The mean and standard deviation of the scores were 16.26 and 2.333 for the experimental group, and 17.00 and 1.03 for the control group, respectively. An independent sample t-test was used for testing the mean differences in students’ achievement of the two groups.

Table 1. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in the mean scores of the pre-test

Group N df Mean SD t Sig.

Control 17 40 17.00 1.03 1.226. .228

Experimental 25 16.26 2.33

As indicated in Table 1, no significant difference was observed in students’ mean scores between the control and experimental group (t = 1.226, .228, p > 0.05). Accordingly, the two groups were considered to be equivalent before the treatment.

Post-Test Achievement students’ achievement, an independent sample t-test was used to compare means scores of the achievement test for the two groups. Table 2 below shows the mean differences of students’ scores in the post test.

Table 2. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in the mean scores of the post-test

Group N df Mean SD t Sig.

Control 17 40 34.11 1.10 3.003 .005

Experimental 25 35.84 1.70

Table 2 indicates that there is a significant difference in the means scores of the post test between the control group and experimental group (t = 3.003, 0.005, p < 0.05) in favor of the experimental group. This result could be attributed to the online enrichment activities provided to students in the experiential group, such as students’ engagement in real-time learning sessions; practicing online communication skills; using WiziQ online whiteboard; involvement in an online discussion using course feedback; and quizzes. Taken collectively, these interactive activities seem to have a significant impact on students’ performance in the post test.In addition, the collaborative nature of WiziQ tools provided opportunities for students to interact with each other and share their acquire knowledge. This finding is supported by Barker & Gossman (2013) who used Virtual Learning Environment (VLEs) with similar tools and activities and concluded that VLEs were found to be very effective in improving students’ learning. Also, this result is in alignment with that of Agrawal et al., (2016). They reported that virtual classroom was found to be effective in improving students’ knowledge and skills. However, this finding contradicts the findings of LeShea (2013) which showed that incorporating live, synchronous class sessions into an online course did not increase students’ levels of achievement. It also contradicts Hortos et al’s (2013) findings which showed that there were no significant differences between medical students who received their lectures through virtual classroom and those who attended live lectures in medical student preparedness or academic achievement. Nevertheless, the impact of VLEs on students’ performance depends largely on the attributes of VLEs and the nature of interactive tools being utilized.

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What is the Effect of WiziQ Interactive Platform on Student Attitude towards Online Learning?

In order to answer the research question related to students’ attitudes, a questionnaire was used to assess their attitudes towards online learning. The descriptive statistics for each of the 16 items assessed using a five-point Likert scale of the students’ attitudes towards WiziQ online learning virtual classroom are presented in Table 3. The overall result indicates that students had a positive attitude towards online learning using WiziQ virtual classroom (mean=3.75).

Table 3. Mean scores of students’ attitudes towards online learning using WiziQ virtual classroom?

Statement N Mean SD

WiziQ learning platform is worthwhile. 18 4.61 .50

I have a desire to learn a lot about e-learning platform WiziQ. 18 4.56 .51

I feel that WiziQ learning platform encourage me to participate in the classroom discussion. 18 4.44 .62

I think it is important for me to learn to use different learning platforms. 18 4.39 .61

I think that WiziQ learning platform help to motivate students for learning. 18 4.33 .59

I feel that I am a competent WiziQ learning platform user. 18 4.3 .78

WiziQ learning platform do not scare me at all. 18 4.22 .94

I do not feel intimidated by a learning platform. 18 4.22 .43

I feel that there is a definite need for WiziQ learning platform in the classroom. 18 4.06 .73

I feel confident using different learning platforms. 18 3.94 .54

My training on WiziQ learning platform is adequate. 18 3.89 1.08

I think that WiziQ learning platform help students to collaborate with each other. 18 3.78 .81

The challenges of learning about new ways of engaging students by using technology are exciting to me. 18 3.56 .98

I am not the type that does well with WiziQ learning platform. 18 1.89 .68

I avoid using WiziQ learning platform as much as possible. 18 1.89 .32

Working with WiziQ learning platform makes me very nervous. 18 1.83 .62

Total 18 3.75 .24

Table 4. Students’ attitudes towards online learning using WiziQ platform One-sample test

Students’ attitudes scoreN df Mean SD t Sig. (2-tailed)

18 17 3.75 .28 66.918 .001

More specifically, table 3 shows that 9 out of 16 statements had high mean scores ranging between (4.06 – 4.61). The top six statements of the positive attitudes towards using WiziQ online learning platform as viewed by the students in the experimental group as follows: (a) WiziQ learning platform is worthwhile (mean score 4.61); (b) I have a desire to learn a lot about e-learning platform WiziQ (4.56); (c) ) I feel that WiziQ learning platform encourage me to participate in the classroom discussion (4.44); (d) I think it is important for me to learn to use different learning platforms (4.39); (e) I think that WiziQ learning platform help to motivate students for learning(4.33); and, (f ) I feel that I am a competent WiziQ learning platform user (4.3). The results also showed only three statements have a mean score of less than two. These are: I am not the type that does well with WiziQ learning platform (1.89); I avoid using WiziQ learning platform as much as possible (1.89); and Working with WiziQ learning platform make me very nervous (1.83). These results indicated that, students in the experimental group had positive attitude towards using WiziQ online learning platform in their learning. The student’s positive attitudes towards online learning could be attributed to the fact that the WiziQ online learning platform allows the learner to interact via text, audio, and video with other participants in a virtual classroom environment (Stevens, 2007). In such environment, instructors can conduct online live classes and make use of various features like: whiteboard, online PowerPoint, Word presentation, PDF, audio and video conferencing, text chat, class recordings for later reference.

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Moreover, as illustrated in table 4 students who use the WIZIQ platform appeared to be more engaged in their learning when provided with collaborative learning environments. They seemed to have developed appositive attitudes towards online learning (t = 66.918, .001, p < 0.05). These findings are in congruence with a number of studies (e.g., Fisher, 2012; Bostan, 2011; Hampel and Pleines, 2013). These studies in general indicate that WiziQ platform seems to encourage collaboration among students and consequently expand learning opportunities. They reported that students had a positive attitude towards the use of online activities as an integral part of a distance language course. It can be concluded that WiziQ learning platform provides a collaborative and enjoyable learning environment for the students which might have positively influenced their attitudes towards the teaching and learning processes.

Students’ MotivationIs There any Significant Difference in The Mean Scores Of Students’ Motivation Between The Experimental And Control Group?

With regard to the effect of WIZIQ virtual classroom on student motivation, an independent sample t-test was used to compare the mean scores of students’ motivation in the two groups. 17 student from the control group completed the motivation scale, while only 24 students from the experimental group filled the motivation scale.

Table 5. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in means of the students’ motivation

Group N Mean SD df t Sig. (2-tailed)

Control 17 3.41 .22097 39 3.886 .001

Experimental 24 3.63 .14217

Table 5 shows that there is significant difference in the mean scores of students’ motivation between the control group and experimental group (t= 3.886, .001, p < 0.05) in favour of experimental group. This result could be attributed to the role of WiziQ’s teaching tools in providing opportunities for students to collaborate and socialize in an online learning environment. In addition, WiziQ allows for recording entire class sessions for later reference. The recordings can be viewed online or downloaded and distributed offline to the students. Perhaps, it is these dynamic attributes of WiziQ that helped in increasing students’ motivation level. This finding is supported by Barker & Gossman (2013) who reported that the students using Virtual classroom exhibit greater motivation than their counter partners in traditional learning environments.However, the level of students’ motivation varies according to the different dimensions of the ARCS inventory. The following tables (6, 7, 8, and 9) illustrate the mean differences of students’ scores in the four dimensions in the ARCS inventory (i.e, Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction, respectively).

Table 6. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in means of the attention dimension of ARCS motivation

Dimension Group N Mean SD df t Sig. (2-tailed)

Attention Control 17 3.50 .32 39 2.23 .03Experimental 24 3.69 .22

Table 6 indicates that there is significant difference in the mean scores of students’ attention between the control group and experimental group (t= 2.23, .03, p < 0.05) in favour of experimental group. WiZiQ virtual classroom provides students with opportunities to interact with other participants in a common virtual space. This space contains a whiteboard with powerful drawing tools, which users can turn into multiple whiteboards, and upload PowerPoint presentations. According to Velagapudi (2013) providing students with opportunities to collaborate in sustained active engagement helps in raising students’ motivation in general and attention in particular.

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Table 7. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in means of the relevance dimension of ARCS motivation

Dimension Group N Mean SD df t Sig. (2-tailed)

Relevance Control 17 3.37 .28312 39 3.89 .001

Experimental 24 3.73 .28933

With regards to Relevance dimension of students’ motivation table7 shows that there is significant difference in the mean scores of this dimension between the control group and experimental group (t= 3.897, .001, p < 0.05) in favour of experimental group. This means that the group taught by using WiziQ virtual classroom shows high motivation level regarding relevance than their counter partners using the traditional method. This result could be justified by the fact that this learning environment offers opportunities for learners to take more control of their learning processes and engaged in contextually relevant activities.

Table 8. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in means of confidence dimension of ARCS motivation

Dimension Group N Mean SD df t Sig. (2-tailed)

Confidence Control 17 3.31 .24699 39 3.018 .004

Experimental 24 3.53 .22695

Table 8 indicates that there is significant difference in the mean score of the confidence dimension in the motivation inventory between the control group and experimental group (t= 3.018, .004, p < 0.05) in favour of experimental group. This means that the group taught by using WiziQ virtual classroom shows high motivation level in terms of confidence than their counter partners using the traditional method. This result could be attributed to the fact that the students in experimental group using WizIQ virtual classroom were more able to collaborate in real-time with tools like real-time virtual classrooms with multi-way audio, live video streams, integrated chat, online whiteboard, application sharing, and file transfer which help them build up their confidence level and expectancy towards success in this course.However, with regards to the Satisfaction dimension in table 9, the result showed that there is no significant difference in the mean scores of students’ satisfaction between the two groups (t= .918, .364, p > 0.05).

Table 9. Independent sample t-test scores for differences in means of the satisfaction dimension of ARCS motivation

Dimension Group N Mean SD df t Sig. (2-tailed)

Satisfaction Control 17 3.44 .20362 39 .918 .364

Experimental 24 3.51 .27766

Although students in general were satisfied with the course content, they appeared to be less satisfied with the type of corrective feedback they received on their performance in the course activities. Perhaps this may have impacted their overall level of satisfaction. This finding seems to be supported by several studies in massive open online courses “MOOCs” (e.g., Huang & Hew, 2016; LeShea, 2013) who also concluded that students usually were found to be less satisfied with the feedback they received in live synchronous learning environments compared to asynchronous learning environments.

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CONCLUSIONThe purpose of this study was to examine the effects of the virtual classroom by using WiziQ platform on students’ achievement, motivation and attitudes. The findings of this study are in congruence with a larch body of relevant literature. The results in general, indicated that WIZIQ can improve not only the students’ academic achievement, but also promote their motivation and attitudes towards online learning environments. Furthermore, with regard to the four conceptual components of the ARCS model, the study showed that, there is a significant difference in the mean scores of the attention, relevance and confidence dimension of motivation between the control group and experimental group in favor of experimental group. In addition, the study showed that, students in the experimental group who used WiziQ as a virtual classroom had positive attitude towards online learning. Perhaps the social openness in virtual environments contribute significantly to the improvement of the students’ engagement in the learning process, which consequently improve their academic achievement and motivation levels. However, future research might be needed to further explore the effectiveness of the various tools and attributes of WIZIQ as an interactive web-based environment in expanding the learning landscape for the students in different learning settings.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSDr. Abdelrahman Mohamed AHMED, is the Head of Assessment Unit at the College of Education, Sultan Qaboos University. He is also an assistant professor of educational technology, with over 10 years of experience in teaching graduate and undergraduate courses in the areas of instructional design, information and communication technologies, and research in educational technology. His current areas of research include technology integration, Social media, mobile learning, e-learning, distance education, and use of web 2.0 technologies in education.

Abdelrahman Mohamed AHMEDInstructional and learning Technologies Department, College of EducationAddress: Sultan Qaboos University, PC123, P.O. BOX 32, Alseeb, S. of OmanPhone: +968 2441 3798E-mail: abdoelhaj@squ.edu.om

Dr. Mohamed Eltahir OSMAN, is the Head of Instructional and Learning Technologies Department at the College of Education, Sultan Qaboos University. He is also an associate professor of educational technology, with over 20 years of experience in teaching graduate and undergraduate courses in the areas of instructional systems design, information and communication technologies, and research in educational technology. Before taking up his current position, he was previously the Assistant Dean for Postgraduate Studies and Research at the college of education, SQU. Dr. Osman is an Emeritus Board member and Vice President of the International Council of Education

for Teaching (ICET) for the MENA region. He has presented and researched extensively on issues related to school improvement, quality assurance, web-based learning environments, human resources.

Mohamed Eltahir OSMANInstructional and learning Technologies Department, College of EducationAddress: Sultan Qaboos University, PC123, P.O. BOX 32, Alseeb, S. of OmanPhone: +968 2441 3798E-mail: mosman@squ.edu.om

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THE ONLINE LEARNING SELF-EFFICACY SCALE: ITS ADAPTATION INTO TURKISH AND INTERPRETATION

ACCORDING TO VARIOUS VARIABLES

Dr. Nuh YAVUZALPORCID: 0000-0001-9275-275X

Faculty of EducationBolu Abant Izzet Baysal University

Bolu, TURKEY

Dr. Eralp BAHCIVANORCID: 0000-0001-5621-3302

Faculty of EducationBolu Abant Izzet Baysal University

Bolu, TURKEY

Received: 30/12/2018 Accepted: 21/05/2019

ABSTRACTThe aim of this study was to adapt the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale (OLSES), developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016) to determine university students’ self-efficacy perceptions in online learning environments, into Turkish, and to analyse the validity and reliability of the results of the scale. The original form of the scale, which is in English, consists of three factors (learning in the online environment, time management and technology use) and of 22 items. In this process, first of all the Turkish language equivalence of the scale was ensured, and then, in the light of the recommendations of experts in the field, the content validity of the scale was established. Next, to ascertain its construct validity, the scale was applied to 2,087 university students who were taking at least one of the campus-based common compulsory courses via distance learning. According to the results of the analysis performed in adherence with the exploratory factor analysis used in the original scale, one item was removed from the scale since it had a factor loading below 0.40, and a single-dimension scale consisting of 21 items was obtained. The factor loadings of the items in the scale were observed to range between 0.85 and 0.92. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of internal consistency calculated for reliability of the scale was determined as 0.987. Consequently, it is considered that inferences and interpretations to be made based on the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale consisting of 21 items and a single dimension will be valid and reliable. In the interpretations made of the research data, the variables of gender and school type were examined. No statistically significant difference was found between groups regarding either gender or type of school.

Keywords: Self-efficacy, online learning, scale adaptation, higher education.

INTRODUCTIONThe developments in current technology have led to changes in the way information is distributed and accessed. Internet technologies, which have become one of the most widespread methods of accessing information, have an effect on education systems and teaching-learning activities. In particular, the development of internet technologies has supported the development of distance learning technologies and led to the appearance of mass distance learning platforms. Nowadays, many studies are being conducted to ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of the distance learning method, which meets an important educational need. Important qualities of distance learning are presentation of lesson contents that are enriched with multimedia objects in online learning environments, synchronous and asynchronous use of online communication tools, and time- and space-independent service to students. Moreover, e-learning environments have the quality of enabling various communication technologies that can be used on independent platforms to be used together (Onal and Ibili, 2017).

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 3

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If individuals who utilise these environments have access to distance learning lesson content and possess the skills of time management and use of the relevant technologies, this will have a positive effect on their academic success (Taipjutorus, Hansen, & Brown). Beliefs regarding the ability to carry out these skills can only be revealed or explained with psychological variables. Alivernini and Lucidi (2011) state that self-efficacy is a good predictor of academic success and that it also assists students in adapting well to new learning environments. Indeed, self-efficacy is stated to be one of the most important psychological variables that can alter students’ perceptions regarding their study environments (Pajares, 1996). Therefore, it can be considered that self-efficacy will also have an effect on students’ success in online learning environments.

SELF-EFFICACYOne of the most important factors in social cognitive theory, self-efficacy is defined by Bandura as a quality that affects an individual’s judgement of him/herself and how his/her behaviour emerges, with regard to his/her capacity to organise the necessary activities to carry out a certain performance and to do it successfully (Askar and Umay, 2001). Moreover, Bandura (1977) expresses self-efficacy an individual’s beliefs regarding how well he/she can perform the actions required to deal with potential situations. Based on these definitions, developing individuals’ beliefs regarding how well they will carry out the activities they need to perform with regard to a certain aim may also affect their performances. Zimmerman (1995) emphasises that self-efficacy involves an individual’s judgements of his/her ability to carry out and succeed in a task. Naturally, self-efficacy is regarded as an important indicator in individuals’ execution of stressful tasks that they have never previously performed (Bandura, 1977).In many higher education institutions in our country, campus-based common compulsory classes are given via distance learning. A large majority of university students have their first experience of distance learning when taking these courses. In this context, it is considered that self-efficacy can be a significant factor in online learning environments, in which many students have their first experiences. Horzum and Cakir (2009) state that high student perceptions related to online technologies can affect students’ interaction with their classmates and instructors as well as their technology use behaviour. Furthermore, some researchers claim that self-efficacy can be a key component of academic success in online learning (Hodges, 2008). Shen, Cho, Tsai and Marra (2013) report that apart from online learning success, self-efficacy is also related to students’ previous online learning experiences and to their gender. Lim (2001) states that students’ computer self-efficacy has a significant effect on their satisfaction and on their opinions regarding participation in future online courses. Besides, Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016) report that students with a high level of online learning self-efficacy are more likely to be successful in online courses. Considering the above definitions and opinions of researchers, it can be understood that self-efficacy is an important psychological factor in online learning environments. Considering that self-efficacy, which is reported to have a significant effect especially on students’ academic success, affects the success of individuals’ online learning, it is believed that positive interventions made on students’ perceptions regarding their online learning will have an effect on their success. In this context, studies should be conducted to determine the variables that affect students’ online learning self-efficacy. In this way, higher education institutions can take the opportunity to increase students’ self-efficacies.Examining studies of the concept of self-efficacy in relation to online learning, it is seen that this concept is discussed in different ways in the literature. Stating that the majority of self-efficacy studies focus on the technology dimension (computer self-efficacy, internet self-efficacy, information-seeking self-efficacy, learning management system self-efficacy), Alqurashi (2016) reports that a limited number of studies focus on general self-efficacies and the learning dimension only in online learning environments. Examining the field literature in detail, some scales can be found that have been developed especially for online learning environments by researchers working on the self-efficacy dimension. One of these is the Online Technologies Self-Efficacy Survey Scale (OTSES) developed by Miltiadou and Yu (2000). The researchers who developed the OTSES scale state that the 29-item scale can be used in four dimensions (internet competencies, synchronous interaction, asynchronous interaction I and asynchronous interaction II) or in a single dimension. The OTSES scale was adapted into Turkish in four dimensions by Horzum and Cakir (2009), who conducted the validity and reliability analyses of the scale. The Web-Based Learning

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Self-Efficacy Scale (WBLSES), developed for older adults learning online, consists of 8 items (Nahm, & Resnick 2008). Another scale created for this subject was developed by Shen, Cho, Tsai and Marra (2013) to determine higher education students’ online learning self-efficacies, and consists of 35 items and 5 subscales (self-efficacy to complete an online course, self-efficacy to interact socially with classmates, self-efficacy to use a course management system, self-efficacy to interact with instructors, and self-efficacy to interact with classmates for academic purposes).Moreover, besides the scales mentioned here, it is seen that there are also studies (Ergul, 2004; Puzziferro, 2008; Randall, 2001; Zhang, Li, Duan & Wu, 2001) aimed at determining students’ self-efficacy perceptions in online learning environments, that include limited scale items related to self-efficacy used in conjunction with other psychological factors (motivation, self-regulation, self-orientation, satisfaction, etc.). Finally, there also exists the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale (OLSES), the adaptation and validity-reliability analyses of which are carried out within the scope of this study. The OLSES scale was developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016) and consists of 22 items and 3 subscales (learning in the online environment, time management and technology use). The most important feature that distinguishes the OLSES scale from others is the fact that since, during the development of the scale, no significant difference was found when it was implemented with different student groups with and without online learning experience, it is stated to be suitable for use with both student profiles. Moreover, the fact that the number of items (22) in the scale is low is also important in terms of practicability. Therefore, getting valid and reliable results with large scale samples including both experienced and inexperienced people as well as measuring online self-efficiacy with such a low number of Likert items directed the researchers to realize the adaptation of OLSES.It is expected that self-efficacy scales developed for online learning environments, which are developing rapidly under the effect of technological developments, will inquire about up-to-date information and tools. Therefore, up-to-date scales that are developed can be expected to provide more accurate results that conform to current conditions. Examining the studies and scales mentioned above, it can be understood that in consideration of the features of online learning technologies, number of items and current distance learning technologies, the most suitable scale created is the OLSES scale developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016).In this context, the aim of this research is to adapt the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale (OLSES), added to the field literature by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016), into Turkish, to analyse its validity and reliability for Turkish researchers and to interpret the results obtained from the study.

METHODThis research was designed as a quantitative study, and was conducted with a cross-sectional approach, which is actually a type of the survey studies. Survey studies are scanning studies carried out in a universe composed of many members, and, in order to reach a general judgement, with the entire universe or with a specific sample taken from that universe. Cross-sectional studies, however, are studies of separate groups whose development is accepted to represent various developmental stages and who are observed at a specific point in time (Karasar, 2003; Buyukozturk, Kilic-Cakmak, Akgun, Karadeniz and Demirel, 2010).

ParticipantsZimmerman and Kulikowich (2016), who obtained similar results with student groups studying in different fields and who either had or did not have online learning experience, stated that the scale can be adapted for university students who have different characteristics. In this study, with the aim of gathering data from students enrolled on different degree programmes, data were collected from students who had registered for campus-based common compulsory courses.In the spring term of the 2017-2018 academic year at Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University, there were 9,344 students taking at least one of the campus-based common compulsory courses (Principles of Ataturk and History of Turkish Revolution, Foreign Language, and Turkish Language) via distance learning. The

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OLSES scale, prepared as an online questionnaire, was completed voluntarily by a total of 2,230 students. However, it was decided to remove a total of 143 students, who had incompletely or inaccurately filled in the questionnaire and were determined by the various statistical analyses, from the dataset. Therefore, the remaining 2,087 students made up the study group. Of the students who formed the study group, 675 were male and 1,412 were female. Examining the age distribution of the students, participants’ ages were observed between 17-58 (mean=20,74). Since the campus-based common compulsory courses are generally first-grade courses, when the grade levels of the students are examined, it is seen that the majority of the sample consisted of first-grade students (1,323), with 462 people from second grade, 178 people from third grade and 124 people from fourth grade. Examining the distribution of the students’ school types, it is seen that out of a total of 1,406 faculty students in 10 different faculties, the majority of these were in the Education Faculty (447), the Economics and Administrative Sciences Faculty (430) and the Faculty of Science and Letters (189); that out of a total of 352 college students at 5 different colleges, the majority attended Bolu Health College (109), the College of Physical Education and Sport (70) and Gerede College of Applied Sciences (69); and that out of a total of 329 vocational school students at 7 different vocational schools, the majority were at Bolu Vocational School (91), Bolu School of Technical Sciences (86) and the Health Services School (65). Moreover, it was observed that in the university as a whole, students from 108 different departments participated in the study and that the highest participation was from the Business Administration (80), English Teaching (73) and Nursing (70) departments. Since a comparison aimed at ascertaining whether there were significant differences between departments was not undertaken, it is not important if a low number of students participated from any department. Therefore, the fact that a low number of students participated from the Ceramics Department (1), the Electronic Technology Department (1), the Physics Department (1), the Poultry Husbandry Department (1) and the Textile Technology Department (1) did not result in the removal of these data from the sample.

The Procedure and Data AnalysesThe data collection tool consisted of demographic information (gender, age distribution, grade level, school type) and the 22-item scale which is the Turkish-translated form of the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale. The scale items are of the 5-point likert type, and are in the form I completely disagree (1), I disagree (2), I am undecided (3), I agree (4) and I completely agree (5).In order to accelerate the data collection process and to reach a greater number of participants, it was decided to implement the scale, the Turkish translation of which had been completed, as an online questionnaire via the university’s learning management system (LMS). Then, the scale which was loaded into the LMS as an online questionnaire was made available to all students entering the system. The scale, which was completed voluntarily by students taking campus-based common compulsory courses via distance learning, was kept open on the LMS for a period of 4 weeks. The scale, the data collection process for which continued for 4 weeks, was answered by a total of 2,230 students.In the study, before moving on to the data analysis, the normality distributions, linearity analysis, removal of outliers and determination of empty data were aimed at, in order to reveal whether the data were suitable for analysis and whether they met the hypothetical criteria. For this purpose, scales in which more than five items in the item scales was left blank were excluded. In the remaining scales, in order not to alter the mean value, the mean for the relevant item was assigned to the items left blank (<23%). When determining the three values in the dataset, the Mahalanobis distances and Z scores were examined. The item scores in the scale were converted to Z scores. Z scores of all items were examined to determine whether they were between -3 and +3. Data with Z scores that were outside this range were regarded as extreme values (Cokluk, Sekercioglu and Buyukozturk, 2012). Another data assumption that needed to be examined was that of skewness and kurtosis values. Skewness and kurtosis coefficients are used to determine whether each of the items shows normal distribution (Tabachnick and Fidell, 2007). The skewness and kurtosis coefficients were calculated for the dataset collected. While examining the skewness and kurtosis coefficients, values between -2 and +2 were taken as the basis (Field, 2009). Following the extreme value and normality analyses carried out on missing or faulty data, it was decided to remove the

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data of 143 students from the dataset. Moreover, Kruskal-Wallis H test was performed on the demographic variables to investigate effects of gender and school type on participants’ online learning self-efficacy scores. The reason for utilizing this analyse instead of the parametric one (ANOVA) is that nature of data utilized in the study. The data came from Likert items whose scores were coded between 1 to 5 as mentioned above like as interval scale. However, researchers argue that Likert item scores should be accepted as ordinal scale, because respondents do not actually feel equivalance between these intervals (Boone & Boone, 2012; Turan, Simsek & Aslan, 2015). In other words, the distance between completely disagree (1) and I disagree (2) may be closer than the distance between I disagree (2) and I am undecided (3) according to participants. After the outliers had been removed from the dataset, the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) and Bartlett sphericity tests were performed to determine adequacy of the sampling and suitability of the data for exploratory factor analysis. The fact that the KMO sampling adequacy index was over %60 and that the Bartlett sphericity test was significant (p<.05) revealed that the data were suitable for factor analysis. The results of the KMO and Bartlett sphericity tests performed on the data are given in Table 1.

Table 1. KMO and Bartlett sphericity test results.

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy .981

Bartlett sphericity test

Chi-Square 59781.714

sd 210

Sig. .000

As can be seen in Table 1, a KMO value of .981 was found, revealing that there was a considerably good level of sampling adequacy. The result of the Bartlett sphericity test which reveals the suitability of data for factor analysis was also found to be significant (X²= 59781.714 p<.05). When the results obtained are evaluated, it can be seen that the sample size was adequate. Finally, principal component analysis together with oblimin rotation method was implemented to examine construct related validity of the scale results.

Scale

The OLSES scale was developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich in the year 2016. The scale was written in English and in its original form consists of three factors and 22 items. These factors are named learning in the online environment (10 items), time management (5 items) and technology use (7 items). The scale developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016) was applied to students aged 18-70 (average age 23.89) on degree programmes in different subjects on 18 different campuses of a multi-campus university. The researchers stated that they used data collected from 338 students, that 176 of the students had not previously taken courses via distance learning, and that 162 of them had previously taken one or more courses via distance learning. In the exploratory factor analysis carried out for all participants (N=338) in the research, principal component analysis (PCA) together with the oblimin rotation method was used. According to the findings they obtained, the researchers concluded that the 3 interrelated factors explained 55.89% of the total variance. The reliability results of the scale revealed Cronbach’s alphas of .890 (N=325) for the 10-item online learning environment subscale, .855 (N=328) for the 5-item time management subscale, and .843 (N=331) for the 7-item technology use subscale. From the exploratory factor analysis results, the researchers concluded that the item factor loadings ranged from .59 to .81, and that the mean factor loading was .71.

Translation Procedure For the present research, first of all, permission to use the scale was obtained via email from the researchers who developed it, Zimmerman and Kulikowich. Then, after obtaining permission from the Human Research Ethics Committee of Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University, the adaptation study was begun.During the adaptation of the scale into Turkish, the scale was translated into Turkish, a back translation was done in order to check this, expert views were obtained, and the final form of the scale was obtained,

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in that order. The Turkish translation of the original English form was done by one of the researchers and an expert in English. Then, with the aim of back-translating the Turkish version of the scale, the English translation was carried out by reciprocally exchanging the researchers’ Turkish translations. The translations that were made was discussed by four instructors, namely the expert in English, the researchers and an expert in computer education and instructional technology (CEIT), a joint decision was made, and the final form of the scale was obtained. As a result of the reviews made, certain changes were made to the scale. Besides vocabulary and predicate changes, it was decided to convert the 6-point likert scale of the original version to a 5-point likert scale in order to make it more practicable.

FINDINGSTo examine what kind of structure was revealed by the Turkish form of the scale in the adaptation study, exploratory factor analysis was performed. As in the original scale, in the exploratory factor analysis, principal component analysis and the oblimin rotation method were used. Following the factor analysis performed, the scale appeared in a single-dimension structure and when the factor loadings were examined, it was seen that the factor loading of -.154 in the 2nd item was below <.40. It is recommended that items with factor loadings below .40 are excluded from a scale (Stevens, 1996). Therefore, the 2nd item was removed from the scale and the analysis was repeated. The factor loading distributions of the scale items are shown in Table 2.

Table 2. Factor loading distributions of OLSES scale items

Items Factor Loading

Item 1 .859Item 3 .894Item 4 .887Item 5 .875Item 6 .858Item 7 .917Item 8 .912Item 9 .908

Item 10 .913Item 11 .845Item 12 .882Item 13 .910Item 14 .921Item 15 .918Item 16 .913Item 17 .897Item 18 .906Item 19 .862Item 20 .894Item 21 .896Item 22 .898

Eigenvalue (total) 16.781Explained total variance (%) 79.908

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Examining the above table, it is seen that the factor loading distributions of the items ranged between .845 and .921 and that the mean factor loading value was .894. Moreover, it can be seen that the total eigenvalue of the scale was 16.78 and that this explained 79.91% of the total variance. When the three-factor structure in the original scale was applied to Turkish students, a single-factor structure was formed. The single-factor structure created by the 21 items (the 2nd item found in the original scale was removed) following the exploratory factor analysis can also be seen in the scatter plot in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Scatter plot for exploratory factor analysis

For the reliability study, the internal consistency coefficient (Cronbach’s alpha) was examined. The statistical analysis performed for this purpose revealed a Cronbach’s alpha value of .987 for the online self-efficacy scale. In the original (English) form of the scale, the reliability coefficients for the three subscales ranged between .843 and .890. According to the reliability result obtained from the adaptation study, it can be said that the scale has a high degree of reliability. When it comes to the descriptive statistics, median and mode scores were utilized instead of mean scores since the data were collected through a Likert scale (Boone & Boone, 2012). Also, range was preferred instead of standard deviation, because of the similar reasons. Those descriptive statistics was presented in Table 4.

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Table 4. Self-efficacy scale item scores of university students

Items Mode Median Range

1. Navigate online course materials efficiently. 4 3 4

2. Communicate effectively with my instructor via e-mail. 4 4 4

3. Communicate effectively with technical support via e-mail, telephone, or live online chat.

4 4 4

4. Submit assignments to an online dropbox. 4 3 4

5. Overcome technical difficulties on my own. 3 3 4

6. Navigate the online grade book. 4 4 4

7. Manage time effectively. 4 4 4

8. Complete all assignments on time. 4 4 4

9. Learn to use a new type of technology efficiently. 4 4 4

10. Learn without being in the same room as the instructor. 3 3 4

11. Learn without being in the same room as other students. 4 4 4

12. Search the Internet to find the answer to a course-related question. 4 4 4

13. Search the online course materials. 4 4 4

14. Communicate using asynchronous technologies (discussion boards, e-mail, etc.) 4 4 4

15. Meet deadlines with very few reminders. 4 4 4

16. Complete a group project entirely online. 3 3 4

17. Use synchronous technology to communicate with others (such as Skype). 4 4 4

18. Focus on schoolwork when faced with distractions. 3 3 4

19. Develop and follow a plan for completing all required work on time. 4 4 4

20. Use the library’s online resources efficiently. 4 4 4

21. When a problem arises, promptly ask questions in the appropriate forum (e-mail, discussion board, etc.)

4 4 4

Note. * 2nd item was removed from scale following factor analysis.

Examining the scores related to the items determining the online self-efficacy perceptions of the university students in Table 4, is it seen that the item scores were generally close to each other. When the median scores for the items are examined, it is seen that these scores in items 1, 5, 6, 11, 17 and 19 presented the lowest scores. However, 3 as the midpoint (in range of 1-5) score still does not correspond to a low score. From this descriptive analyse it can be said that participants’ feel themselves self efficacious related to online learning environments.In the inferential analyses made for the students’ total scale scores, the gender and school type variables were taken into consideration. In this context, when the total self-efficacy scores of the university students were compared according to the gender variable, the following table was obtained.

Table 5. University students’ self-efficacy scores according to gender

Groups N Mean Rank Sd χ² p

Male 675 1032.101 .390 .532

Female 1412 1049.69

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When the university students’ self-efficacy scores were examined according to their gender, it is seen that male and female students had mean rank scores close to each other. Female participants’ mean rank score were slightly higher than those of male students. However, the results of the Kruskal-Wallis H test indicated that there was not a significant difference in total self-efficacy scores of the university students in terms of gender (X2=.390, p>.05). When the total self-efficacy scores of the university students were compared according to the type of school they attended, the following table was obtained.

Table 6. University students’ self-efficacy scores according to school type

Groups N Mean Rank Sd χ² p

Faculty 1406 1042.67

2 1.120 .571College 352 1070.11

Vocational School 329 1021.74

When the participants’ self-efficacy scores were investigated in terms of their school type, it is seen that faculty, college and vocational school students had mean rank scores close to each other. College students’ mean rank score were slightly higher than students of other school. However, the results of the Kruskal-Wallis H test indicated that there was not a significant difference in total self-efficacy scores of the university students in accordance to their school type (X2=1.120, p>.05).

CONCLUSIONIn this study, the Turkish adaptation study of the Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale (OLSES) developed by Zimmerman and Kulikowich (2016), and aimed at university students with and without online learning experience, was conducted, and the obtained results were analysed with reference to the university students’ gender and school type variables.The translation of the scale into Turkish was made by language and field experts, and the Turkish form was compared with the original English form by means of back-translation into English. The items in the translations that best expressed the original scale were selected through discussion by the language and field experts (a total of four instructors). For the structural validity of the scale, exploratory factor analysis was performed. Following the factor analysis, a single-dimension scale appeared. Since the 2nd item of the scale items had a factor loading of less than .40, it was removed from the scale. According to the analysis results of the 21-item, single-dimension structure of the OLSES scale, it was seen that the factor loading distribution of the items varied between .845 and .921, and that the mean factor loading value was .894. Moreover, it was seen that the total eigenvalue of the scale was 16.78 and that this explained 79.91% of the total variance. The internal consistency coefficient (Cronbach’s alpha) of the scale was .987, indicating a high degree of reliability.The fact that the three-dimensional structure formed in the original scale appeared as a single dimension in the Turkish form may be considered to be due to cultural differences. Furthermore, the need to remove the 2nd item, “Find the course syllabus online”, from the scale may be considered to be due to the conflicting responses given by the students. Approximately 38 teaching staff are assigned to the campus-based common courses at the relevant university. Although it is recommended by the distance learning centre that the lesson programme be loaded into the distance learning system, it appears that some course instructors did not load the programmes onto the relevant learning page. Due to this situation, although a section of the students were able to access the lesson programmes, another group of them were unable to access the page relevant to their lesson programme even if they wished to. Because of the restriction mentioned above, the scale can be validated in further studies in which the 2nd item is also included. However, it is not anticipated that this situation will cause a change in the factor structure of the scale.

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In conclusion, the proofs related to the validity and reliability of the single-dimension inventory made up of 21 items for the OLSES scale prepared for online learning environments were obtained in its Turkish form. This inventory, which can be used in Turkish, can be utilised for determining the self-efficacies of individuals especially in online learning environments. Moreover, it is anticipated that the scale can be used for students both with and without online learning experience and that it will produce similar results for both groups. During the research, inferential analyses of the data obtained from the students were made with regard to the variables of gender and school type. In this context, although the median scores according to the gender of the university students were relatively higher in favour of female students, it was concluded that the difference between the genders was not statistically significant. Although this finding is contrary to the research findings of Shen, Cho, Tsai and Marra (2013) and Chang, Liu, Sung, Lin, Chen and Cheng (2014), similar findings were obtained in some studies in the literature (Akkoyunlu and Orhan, 2003; Ergul, 2004; Hung, Chou, Chen and Own 2010). Besides, when the total self-efficacy scores of the university students was examined, it was concluded that gender had no effect on self-efficacy perception. In the analyses performed to determine the university students’ total self-efficacy scores according to type of school, it was seen that generally, all groups had a high level of self-efficacy. The median scores of vocational school students were observed to be relatively lower than those of faculty and college students. However, according to the results of the Kruskal Wallis H test performed, this difference was not found to be statistically significant. There are studies in the field literature which reveal that no significant differences were found among students’ self-efficacies with regard to similar distance learning programmes (Kuo, Walker, Schroder and Belland, 2014; Ozturk, 2015). Therefore, university students’ total self-efficacy scores were examined, it was concluded that there was no effect at all in terms of their school type. The OLSES scale, the Turkish adaptation of which was carried out within the scope of this research, can be used to define the areas that students perceive as weaknesses. This information can be used to define interventions aimed at improving students’ online learning self-efficacy (Zimmerman and Kulikowich, 2016).When the research findings are considered, different psychological variables that can affect students’ success must be identified together with self-efficacy perception, which is an important psychological variable in university students’ online learning environments. If several psychological variables are evaluated at the same time, the relationships between the variables and the demographic factors can be defined, and factors that may affect students’ success and satisfaction can be revealed. In this way, interventions can be carried out by higher education institutions that will contribute to students’ success.

Acknowledgements: This study is supported by Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University Projects of Scientific Investigation, Project Number: 2018.02.01.1345.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSDr. Nuh YAVUZALP, has received his BSc degree in computer teacher education from Firat University in Turkey and his MSc degree in educational sciences department of Firat University. Dr. YAVUZALP has received his doctoral degree (PhD) in educational sciences department of Firat University. He has studied as a researcher in Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University since 2013. His research interests include instructional technologies, e-learning and distance education. He has over than 3 journal articles published in international indexes, 1 international book chapter and other national and international articles, papers submitted to international meetings.

Dr. Nuh YAVUZALPDepartment of Computer Education & Instructional Technologies, Faculty of EducationAddress: Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University, 14030, Bolu, TurkeyPhone: +90 374 2541000,E-mail: nuhyavuzalp@gmail.com

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Assoc. Prof. Dr. Eralp BAHCIVAN, has received his bachelor, master’s and doctoral degree (in 2012) on science teacher education from Middle East Technical University, Turkey. He has studied as a researcher in Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University since 2013. His research has mainly focused on epistemological beliefs, teaching belief systems and pedagogical content knowledge of in-service and pre-service teachers. He has over than 30 journal articles published in international indexes, 2 international book chapters and other national and international articles, papers submitted to international meetings.

Dr. Eralp BAHCIVANDepartment of Science Education, Faculty of EducationAddress: Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University, 14030, Bolu, TurkeyPhone: +90 374 2541000,E-mail: eralpbahcivan@hotmail.com

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APPENDIXCevrimici Ogrenme Oz-Yeterlik Olcegi [Online Learning Self-Efficacy Scale]*

Hic

Kat

ilmiy

orum

Katil

miy

orum

Kara

rsiz

im

Katil

iyor

um

Tam

amen

Kat

iliyo

rum

1. Cevrimici (online) ders materyalleri arasinda etkili bir sekilde gezinebilirim.

2. Cevrimici (online) ders izlencesini bulabilirim.

3. E-posta yoluyla dersin ogretim elemani ile etkili iletisim kurabilirim.

4. Teknik destek ile e-posta, telefon veya canli cevrimici (online) sohbet yoluyla etkili bir sekilde iletisim kurabilirim.

5. Odevleri cevrimici (online) bir depolama alanina (Dropbox, Google Drive, Yandex Disk, One Drive vb.) yukleyebilirim.

6. Kendi kendime teknik sorunlarin ustesinden gelebilirim.

7. Cevrimici (online) olarak yayimlanan notlarimi (odev, sinav vb.) ogrenebilirim.

8. Zamani etkili bir sekilde kullanabilirim.

9. Tum odevlerimi zamaninda tamamlayabilirim.

10. Yeni bir teknolojiyi etkili bir sekilde kullanmayi ogrenebilirim.

11. Ogretim elemani ile ayni sinif ortaminda olmadan ogrenebilirim.

12. Siniftaki diger ogrenciler ile ayni sinif ortaminda olmadan ogrenebilirim.

13. Ders ile ilgili bir sorunun cevabini bulmak icin internet’te arama yapabilirim.

14. Ders ile ilgili materyalleri internete arayabilirim.

15. Eszamansiz teknolojiler (tartisma grubu, mesaj panosu, e-posta vb.) kullanarak iletisim kurabilirim.

16. Cok az hatirlatici ile cevrimici (online) gorevlerin son teslim zamanina uyabilirim.

17. Bir grup projesini internet uzerinden cevrimici (online) olarak tamamlayabilirim.

18. Baskalariyla iletisim kurmak icin eszamanli teknolojileri (Skype, WhatsApp, Messenger vb.) kullanabilirim.

19. Dikkat dagitici bir sey ile karsilastigim zaman okul calismalarina odaklanabilirim.

20. Gerekli calismalarin tumunu zamaninda tamamlamak icin bir plan gelistirebilir ve uygulayabilirim.

21. Kutuphanenin cevrimici (online) kaynaklarini verimli bir sekilde kullanabilirim.

22. Bir problem ortaya ciktiginda, uygun bir cevrimici (online) tartisma grubunda (e-posta, tartisma panosu, WhatsApp grup, Facebook grup vb.) problemi sorabilirim.

Note. * 2nd item was removed from scale following factor analysis.

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THE ROLE OF SERVICE QUALITY MANAGEMENT IN STUDENTS’ RE-ENROLLMENT

Dr. SUGILARORCID: 0000-0003-3037-2158

Faculty of Education and Teacher TrainingUniversitas Terbuka

Jakarta, INDONESIA

Received: 14/02/2019 Accepted: 16/09/2019

ABSTRACTThe students’ re-enrollment can reflect as one of the indications of an educational institution’s service quality and student loyalty. The re-enrollment is identified by the condition that students enrolled in one semester would re-enroll in the next immediate semester. The main concern of this article is that there are many interrelated variables affecting students’ re-enrollment. Those variables mainly included service quality management of higher distance education, student characteristics, student academic success, accessibility to student learning support services. The study applied ex-post-facto method with a sample of 3539 students and used a statistical technique of the binary logistic regression to identify factors related to student re-enrollment in three regional office centers of Universitas Terbuka, Indonesia, identified as low, medium, and high in service quality management. The results revealed that the students’ re-enrollment is affected by the level of service quality management modulated factors: (1) the student personal characteristics, (2) the level of success in previous semesters, and (3) the participation in the learning support services. The paper discusses the implications of managing the students’ re-enrollment based on the findings.

Keywords: Service quality management, regional office center, re-enrollment, distance higher education, support services.

INTRODUCTIONThe primary mission of distance education, especially in developing countries like Indonesia, is to improve access to higher education for people, who for various reasons, can not reach conventional higher education. In Indonesia, the participation rate of higher education is currently only 29%, whereas the Ministry of Higher Education set the target to be 35%. To achieve the objective, the Indonesian government plans to open higher distance education in conventional higher education. Also, the government encouraged the Universitas Terbuka, which was the only open and distance university in Indonesia which was founded in 1984 and had about 300,000 students, to increase the number of students to further contribute to higher education enrollment rates.Distance education can indeed be a solution to increase enrollment rates in higher education. As stated by the rector of the Open University at the ICDE Conference in 2015 that in Indonesia, Universitas Terbuka (UT) contributes 12% of the participation rate in higher education (Sharma, 2015). The contribution of higher distance education to participation rate in higher education has also occurred in other countries. For instances in China, by the end of 2007 more than six million people had graduated with a degree or certificate, and over 40 million people had received various training through distance education (Li, 2009). In 2017, 24 percent of all enrollments in higher education in India was in distance education (Daniel, 2017).The success of higher distance education to contribute significantly to the enrollment rates in higher education depends on how the higher distance education recruits new students and retains existing students to keep re-registration every semester. For simplification, the relationship between the number of students in a semester could be expressed in the equation as follows:

Total Students in Current Semester = (Total New Students) + (Total Students Re-enrolled from previous Semester)

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 4

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In this paper, the definition of re-enrollment is an event that a student re-enrolled in one semester after he/she enrolled as a new student in the previous semester. The problem faced by distance education institutions is that the percentage of non-re-enrollment student tends to be high. Students’ re-enrollment tension is a severe problem of Universitas Terbuka (UT) and probably also in any open and distance learning universities since the unenrolled phenomena could be an early warning for students’ withdrawal. In UT, the average percentage of students’ re-enrollment was around 75%. In the UK, Simpson (2016) reported that the re-enrollment rates for several distance institutions compared with the UK full-time showed that distance institutions tended to have much higher dropout rates than the UK full-time. Therefore, in the case of UT as in many other distance higher education institutions, students’ re-enrollment has become the primary concern in increasing public participation in higher education nationally. Some theoretical frameworks could explain the re-enrollment phenomena in the distance higher education context. The theoretical approach used here was the student-university fit theory. The theory emerged from person-environment (P–E) fit theory based on the assumption that “performance is a function of the interaction between people and their environment, and that good fits promote well-being and contribute to feelings of mastery, self-confidence, and satisfaction, while poor fits are expected to result in negative outcomes such as dissatisfaction, boredom, depression, somatic complaints, and increased smoking and drinking” (Gilbreath, Kim, & Nichols, 2011, p. 48). Some researchers have applied the student-university fit theory to explain student performance in a university environment. Applying the student-university fit theoryLe, Robbins & Westrick (2014) found that persistent learning behavior was affected by individual difference factors, including ability and interest for college students of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Accordingly, Smart, Feldman & Ethington (2006) provided a theoretical linkage between variations in patterns of students’ re-enrollment that students’ re-enrollment indicated as the fit or congruence between their personality types and their chosen academic environments. The relationship between students’ characteristics and university norm have been reported by Suhlman, Sassenberg, Nagengast & Trautwein (2018) that one-third of university students drop out from undergraduate studies affected by the fit between students’ self-construal and university norms. The above student-university fit theory could be applied to distance higher education with some notions as follow: (1) an academic environment of the distance higher education reflected in various quality service in offering students learning support services including distributing learning material, face-to-face tutorial, online tutorial, face-to-face examination, and online examination, (2) students’ personal characteristics, included gender, age, working status, and marital status, could be considered as personality types which would be fit or unfit with the academic environment,, (3) students’ academic attainment (GPA and credits attained) could be viewed as rewarded or reinforced by the academic environment, and (4) the students’ re-enrollment indicated the fit between students and the academic environment of the distance higher education, therefore, it is possible that a better fit of the student-university could result in improving the students’ re-enrollment.The above student-university fit theory could be applied to distance higher education with some notions as follow: (1) an academic environment of the distance higher education reflected in various quality service in offering students learning support services including distributing learning material, face-to-face tutorial, online tutorial, face-to-face examination, and online examination, (2) students’ personal characteristics, included gender, age, working status, and marital status, could be considered as personality types which would be fit or unfit with the academic environment,, (3) students’ academic attainment (GPA and credits attained) could be viewed as rewarded or reinforced by the academic environment, and (4) the students’ re-enrollment indicated the fit between students and the academic environment of the distance higher education, therefore, it is possible that a better fit of the student-university could result in improving the students’ re-enrollment.Service quality in a service organization is a measure of the range to which the service delivered meets the customer’s expectations (Yousapronpaiboon, 2014). The customer of distance higher education are students and the employer of alumni. Students expect to finish their study in time and academic attainment they planned. The employer of alumni expects the graduates have competencies fit the nature of the work, for instances that the graduate can adapt their skills to the demands of the task. The quality assurance system is a management tool to achieve service quality objectives. Universitas Terbuka pays excellent attention to service

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quality management system. Universitas Terbuka has a particular unit, the Center for Quality Assurance, to handle service quality management systems. Since UT’s students spread out in distant areas, then the real service quality felt by the students are the services provided by the regional office centers. In practice, the central office of Universitas Terbuka specified a service quality policy as listed in the document of Distance Education Management System, the regional offices implement it as a guideline, and the implementations will be audited every year by external auditors. The Distance Education Management System of Universitas Terbuka has a vital role in quality assurance in Universitas Terbuka, as described by Darojat (2018):

The university has had a formal quality management system, known as Simintas UT since 2003, adapted and contextualized from the [Asian Association of Open Universities]- AAOU’s QA framework. AAOU’s Quality framework has been regarded as a leading model for the university self-assessment and shared by all staff at UT head office and regional centers. These quality guidelines clearly explain quality criteria for different quality areas. Along with the use of the quality manuals, the university has used the results of quality audit to inform its current practices through different strategies including the development of QA manuals. UT’s quality manuals also constitute the university’s QA policies that must be regarded as a major reference for all units or departments in developing internal mechanism and implementing quality. With regard to the implementation of QA in different quality areas, it was found that the application of QA has been supported by the development of [Standard Operating Procedure]-SOPs equipped by their work instructions. (p. 86).

The Center for Quality Assurance of UT coordinates the process of audit for each regional office centers. UT used an external organization, which is internationally recognized, to conduct the process of auditing. The Center for Quality Assurance also managed the results of the auditing process and could be used to rank the 39 regional office centers based on the level of quality service in managing higher distance education. Based on that ranking, one could classify the regional office center by Low, Medium, and High in quality service quality management. In this paper, the classification of regional office centers as a Low, Medium, High in quality service management based on information from the Center for Quality Assurance.Several pieces of research regarding interrelated among academic environment discussed the variables of student personal characteristics, student academic attainment, and student re-enrollment as an indication of students’ success. Hamid & Yip (2019) studied service quality in distance education for comparing private distance education institution and public distance education; however, the study did not mention the students’ re-enrollment. Choi, Lee, Jung, & Latchem (2013) discussed the re-enrollment issues without relating it to service quality directly, instead to stress on the importance of feedback from institution to the students that a lack of feedback in students’ studying at a distance were directive subjects to non-re-enrollment. Furthermore, it confirmed that the learners’ perceptions about the value of the degrees and their ages, gender, and educational backgrounds were also found to have generally led to the decisions not to re-enroll. Godfrey & Matos-Elefonte (2010) showed that student backgrounds, academic societies, and academic characteristics played a role in the likelihood of reaching student goals that would reflect in student re-enrollment; this report discussed re-enrollment without explicitly connecting to service quality. Similarly, Stephan, Davis, Lindsay, & Miller (2015) described the early college success of students affected by (1) enrolling in only non-remedial courses in the first semester, (2) completing all attempted credits in the first semester, and (3) persisting to the second year of college The study also found that variables for student demographic characteristics, high school academic achievement, and behavior related to whether a student achieved success in the early college years or not. The University of Maryland University College (2015) reported an analysis of predictive models of students’ success in college and identified that a factor associated with the students’ success was the students’ GPAs. The results showed that students’ performance in their first semester at UMUC remained crucial in relating to re-enrollment, retention, and graduation and the first term GPA might be an indicator of factors contributing to students’ success, beyond academic abilities. Sugilar (2018) predicted that the students’ re-enrollment in the distance higher education and concluded that age, GPA, credits earned, and face-to-face tutorial participation were significant predictors for re-enrollment. The above studies highlighted, although no study mainly discussed the role of service quality in re-enrollment, the position of students’ characteristics, utilizing learning resources within a learning environment, and

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feedback received by the students from the environment, to the students’ success in a learning environment. Some hypotheses proposed in this report were that the quality of learning environment as reflected by the quality level of regional office mediated the factors of the students’ personal characteristics (gender, age, marital status, and working status), academic achievement (GPA, credits attained), and utilizing learning resources (participating in online tutorial, online examination, and face-to-face tutorial) in affecting the student success and satisfaction as indicating in student’ re-enrolling. The main focus of this paper is to explain how the service quality of the regional service center has a role in the students’ re-enrollment. The students’ re-enrollment was defined by the event that new students enrolled in one semester will re-enroll in the immediate next semester. In UT context, there are 39 regional offices which are spread out within vast areas and islands in Indonesia. A factor affecting re-enrollment in one area will not inevitably affect the students’ re-enrollment in other areas. Does the service quality of regional office centers have a role in the effect of the students’ characteristics, academic achievement, and the students’ level of utilizing learning resources to students’ re-enrollment?

METHODThis quantitative study using the ex post facto investigation aims to identify factors influencing of students’ re-enrollment. Kerlinger and Rint (1986) explained that an ex post facto research aims to study some relationships of variables through observation to a condition which already exists. Therefore, an ex post facto research uses data already collected and not necessarily purposed for research. Cohen, Manion, & Morison (2000) asserted that an ex post facto research was similar to an experimental research, i.e., an experiment research used different treatments to groups to determine differences in the dependent variables, meanwhile, an ex post facto research begins with groups that are already different that brought the differences on the dependent variable. This research used three regional office centers selected from existing 39 regional office centers of UT. The Office of Quality Assurance UT identified those three regional office centers as Low, Medium, and High in quality service management. The data of new students in the 1st semester of 2017 and the re-enrollment data in the 2nd semester of 2017 were available in the database of Student Record System (SRS). The SRS is a computer application system which was developed by UT to manage the student data. SRS provided the 3539 records of the new students registered in the three Regional Office Centers with low-medium-high in services quality. Every record of the student consists of regional office centers code (one of the three regional offices centers understudied), student identification, gender code, age, GPA, academic credit attainment, participation in face-to-face tutorial, participation in online tutorial, participation in online exam, and status of re-enrollment in the 2nd semester of 2017. The statistical technique used for analyzing the data was the binary logistic regression (Peng, Lee, & Ingersoll, 2002). The binary logistic regression has been successfully applied to predict enrollment decisions of prospective students of distance education programs (Ozturk, 2019). The binary logistic regression only requires the dependent variable to be binary variable (for example, the value of the variable is 0 or 1) while independent variables can be an interval, ordinal, or categorical. In this paper, the dependent variable was the re-enrollment status variable which was denoted by 1 for re-enroll and 0 for the non-re-enroll student. The independent variables were the hypothetical variables affecting students’ re-enrollment. The independent variables consisted of the level of quality service of the regional office centers (Low, Medium, High), personal characteristics (age, gender, and marital status, academic achievement GPA, credits attained), and student participation in learning support services (face-to-face-tutorial, online tutorial, and online examination). To avoid the occurrence of too many empty cells and to make a more straightforward interpretation, the independent variable is set to have a value of 0 or 1, except for the quality service of regional office centers that have the level values as Low, Medium, and High. Therefore, the variables age, GPA, and credits attained were valued by 0 or 1 according to the median of the data; for example, the GPA was valued by 1 if it was more than 2.0, otherwise valued by 0, since the median of GPA was 2.0. Similarly, the variables of age and credits attainment split into 1 or 0 according to their median value.

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The binary logistic regression uses the Wald Chi-square statistics to test the statistical significance of regression coefficients. Hosmer & Lemeshow Test test the goodness of fit of the regression model to the data. As R2 in the multiple linear regression, in the binary logistic regression, the parameter of Nagelkerke’s R2 for describing the number of variations in the dependent variable that can be explained by the independent variables.

FINDINGS The 3539 new students in the 1st Semester of 2017 in the three regional offices of UT were categorized as re-enrolled and non-re-enrolled students in each regional office in the 2nd Semester of 2017 as shown in Table 1.

Table 1. Re-enrollment of the three regional offices in 2017

The Service Quality Management of Regional Office Centers

The Number of New Students enrolled in the 1st Semester of 2016/2017

The Percentage of Students re-enrolled in the 2nd Semester of 2016/2017

Low 518 428 (82.6%)

Medium 1173 998 (85.1%)

High 1848 1314 (71.1%)

Total = 3539 Average = 79.6%

Table 1 shows in general that the average of students’ re-enrollment percentage of the three regional offices was 79.6%. The medium quality service of the regional office center of UT has the highest percentage of students’ re-enrollment by 85.1%. This regional office center has recognition as the regional offices with the most students participating in the face-to-face tutorial. Meanwhile, the high-quality service of the regional office of UT attained a re-enrollment level of 75.2%. This regional office center was a regional office categorized as the highest number of students in 2017. The low-quality service of the regional office of UT attained 82.6%. Chi-square test based on Table 1 showed that there was a relationship between the service quality in managing distance education in the regional office centers and the level of students’ re-enrollment, (Chi-Square value = 89.591, df = 2, p = 0.00).

Table 2. Percentage of students’ re-enroll among regional offices and categories of indicators

Factors / (Variable Value)The Service quality management of

Regional Office Centers

Low Medium High

A. Personal Characteristics

1. Gender

Female (0) 82.5% 83.6% 68.7%

Male (1) 82.8% 87.0% 73.7%

2. Age

≤ 24 (0) 82.2% 87.3% 71.1%

> 24 (1) 82.8% 80.9% 71.1%

3. Marital Status

Unmarried (0) 78.5% 85.7% 70.6%

Married (1) 86.3% 83.0% 72.3%

4. Working Status

Unemployed (0) 80.7% 86.2% 69.6%

Employed (1) 83.0% 84.3% 71.3%

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B. Academic Attainment

5. Credits Attained

≤ 84% (0) 73.5% 75.9% 48.9%

> 84% (1) 91.9% 94.1% 89.6%

6. GPA

≤ 2.0 (0) 78.1% 65.0% 58.8%

> 2.0 (1) 95.0% 92.6% 93.4%

C. Partcipation in Learning Support Services

7. Participation in Online Tutorial

No (0) 83,6% 81.4% 51.7%

Yes (1) 83.6% 88.9% 74.4%

8. Participation in Online Examination

No (0) 82.5% 84.6% 70.3%

Yes (1) 85.0% 97.6% 92.4%

9. Participation in F2F Tutorial

Yes (0) 82.6% 62.8% 69.6%

No (1) 0% 89.6% 85.5%

Table 2 presented a description in more detail that the level of service quality management showed to modulate the effect of the factors to re-enrollment. The descriptive statistics in Table 2 was intended to introduce the problem for further conclusions using statistical hypotheses testing in the next discussions. Table 2 uncovered some description of factors related to re-enrollment, as follows:

• Forthevariablesofstudentpersonalcharacteristics,thegendervariablesindicatedtodifferentiatethere-enrollment; however, in the low-quality service management of the regional office center, there was a slightly different between female and male in the percentage of re-enrollment, 82.5% of female and 82.8% of male. For the students’ age variable, in the medium-quality regional office center, the age seemed like differentiated the percentage of re-enrollment, i.e., 87.3% for the students with age lower or equal to 24 years and 80.9% for age over 24. In the low-quality regional office center, 86.3% of married students were re-enrolled more than the percentage of 78.5% for unmarried students. In the high-quality regional office center, the working status variable slightly differentiated the percentage of re-enrollment, 69.6% of the unemployed students to 71.3% of the employed students.

• Forthevariablesofacademicattainment(creditattainedandGPA),inallthreeregionalofficecenters,students’ credits attainment differentiated the percentage of re-enrollment. In the low-quality regional office center, the percentage was 78.1% for the lower group of credits attainment (less or equal to 84% credit attainment) and 95.0% for the higher (more than 84% credit attainment). In the medium-quality regional office center, the percentage was 65.0% for the lower group and 92.6% for the higher group. In the high-quality regional office center, the percentage was 58.8% for the lower group and 93.4% for the higher group. When it comes to GPA, the re-enrollment percentage of students with a higher GPA (more than 2.0) showed to have higher re-enrollment percentage than the students with a lower GPA (less or equal to 2.0), i.e. 78.1% and 95.0% in the low-quality regional office center, 65.0% and 92.6% in the medium-quality regional office center, and 58.8% and 93.4% in the high-quality regional office center.

• Inthevariablesofutilizingsupportservices,students’levelofusinglearningsupportserviceslookedlike to differ the re-enrollment percentage in the high and medium-quality management of regional office centers, but not in the low-quality management of regional office center. Participation in online tutorial showed to have the most percentage of re-enrollment in the high-quality regional office center, 51.7% for non-participating, and 74.4% for participating. Participation in the online examination appeared to have a more significant effect to the percentage of re-enrollment in the high-quality regional office centre since there were 70.3% students re-enrolled for non-participating and 92.4%

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students re-enrolled for participating students. Participating in the face-to-face tutorial looked to have a more significant effect in the medium-quality regional office center, 62.8% for non-participating and 89.6% for participating. Unfortunately, there was no data for participation in the face-to-face tutorial in the low-quality regional office center.

As mentioned earlier, Table 2 showed descriptive statistics and needed to test for statistical significance for conclusions. Table 3 presented the statistical significance of the individual regression coefficients (βs) tested with the Wald Chi-square statistic. The test was generated using SPPS with splitting output by the quality service management of regional office centers (Low, Medium, and High). The Hosmer & Lemeshow test of the goodness of fit suggested that the model was fit to the data as p=0.168 (> 0.05), p=0.525 (> 0.05), and p=0.757 (>0.05) respectively for Low, Medium, and High regional office centers. Nagelkerke’s R2 suggested that the model explained roughly 15%, 27%, and 35% of the variation in the outcome for Low, Medium, and High-service quality of regional office centers, respectively. The result was impressive since the more level of service quality of the regional office was then the more the factors understudied give a positive direct effect to the re-enrollment.According to Table 3, in the significance (sig.) column, the significance values of gender factor were 0.845, 0.930, and 0.678 for Low, Medium, and High of quality service management of regional office centers respectively. Since the significance values were higher than 0.05, then the gender variable did not affect re-enrollment regardless of quality service management of regional office centers. However, age and working status made a significant effect on re-enrollment in the medium quality service management of the regional office, as well as marital status in the regional office with low-quality service management. Meanwhile, credit attained and grade point average made a significant effect on the re-enrollment regardless of the quality service of the regional office. The online tutorial made effective only in the high-quality service of a regional office, but not in the medium or low-quality service of a regional office. The online examination and face-to-face tutorial made an effect on the regional offices with high and medium service quality management.

Table 3. The coefficients of regression

Variables The QMS of ROCs B S.E Wald Df Sig. Exp(B)

A. Personal Characteristics

1. Gender

Female (0)

Male (1)

Low -.053 .271 .038 1 .845 .948

Medium -.017 .193 .008 1 .930 .983

High .051 .124 .173 1 .678 1.053

2. Age

≤ 24 (0))

> 24 (1)

Low -.379 .346 1.200 1 .273 .685

Medium -.757 .268 7.987 1 .005* .469

High -.026 .148 .031 1 .861 .974

3. Marital Status

Unmarried (0)

Married (1)

Low .636 .298 4.565 1 .033* 1.889

Medium .120 .294 .166 1 .684 1.127High .182 .163 1.248 1 .264 1.200

4. Working Status

Unemployed (0)

Employed (1)

Low .003 .343 .000 1 .993 1.003Medium .490 .223 4.824 1 .028* 1.632

High .048 .180 .072 1 .789 1.049

B. Academic Attainment

5. Credits Attained

≤ 84% (0)

> 84% (1)

Low 1.125 .280 16.158 1 .000* 3.081 Medium 1.264 .216 34.278 1 .000* 3.539

High 1.755 .132 177.248 1 .000* 5.785

6. GPA

≤ 2.0 (0)

> 2.0 (1)

Low 1.248 .427 8.527 1 .003* 3.482Medium 1.220 .231 27.829 1 .000* 3.386

High 1.546 .183 71.384 1 .000* 4.694

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C. Participation in Learning Support Services

7. Online Tutorial

No (0)

Yes (1)

Low -.066 .259 .064 1 .800 .937 Medium .299 .196 2.321 1 .128 1.348

High .546 .158 11.966 1 .001* 1.726

8. Online Examination

No (0)

Yes (1)

Low .537 .657 .668 1 .414 1.711 Medium 2.487 1.039 5.732 1 .017* 12.026

High 1.400 .499 7.885 1 .005* 4.054

9. Face-to-face Tutorial

Yes (0)

No (1)

Low - - - - - -Medium .855 .248 11.902 1 .001* 2.351

High .548 .259 4.463 1 .035* 1.729

*) Significant at

The last column, EXP(B), presents a calculation exponent of the coefficient of regression, eB. For example, the gender factor in the high-quality service management of the regional office center have B coefficient equal to 0.051, so give EXP(B) = e0.051 = 1.053, as seen in Table 3. The EXP(B) values are used to interpret the B coefficient of binary logistic regression, that a change of one unit in a predictor variable implied a change in the likelihood of dependent variable (Park, 2013; Field, 2013). For predictor with binary values, interpreting the EXP(B) was more natural, since change one unit in predictor variable mean change from 0 to 1. For example, the EXP(B) = 1.03 in the column of gender factor and the high-quality service management of regional office center on Table 3 said that male (denoted by 1) students were 1.03 times more likely to re-enroll than female (denoted by 0) students. However, the value of B = 0.051 was not significant, as indicated by p-value = 0.678 (> 0.05); hence, the data did not support the conclusion. In the following discussions, the findings will only focus on the significant variables in Table 3:A. Students’ Characteristics

• TheEXP(B)oftheagevariableswas.469intheregionalofficecenterwithmedium-qualityservice,implying that the students aged below or equal to 24 years were 0.469 times less likely to re-enroll than the students aged over 24 in the subsequent semester. In other words, older students have 1/0.469 = 2.132 times more likely to re-enroll than younger students.

• TheEXP(B)ofthemaritalstatusvariablewas1.889inthelow-qualityservicemanagementoftheregional office, indicated that the married students were more likely to re-enroll than the unmarried students. It meant that the married students were 1.889 times more likely to re-enroll than unmarried students.

• TheEXP(B)of theworkingstatusvariablewas1.632inthemediumqualityservicemanagementof regional office center, indicated that the employed students (with the variable value equal to 1 in Table 2) were more likely to re-enroll than the unemployed students (with variable value equal to 0 in Table 2). It meant that the odds of the employed students were higher than unemployed students to re-enroll by 1.632 times.

B. Academic achievement • TheEXP(B)forthecreditsattainedwas3.081,3.539,and5.785respectivelyforLow,Medium,and

High-quality service management. It indicated that the students with credits attained more than 84% were more likely to re-enroll than the students with credits attained less than or equal to 84% by 3.081, 3.539, and 5.785 times in low, medium, and high-quality service regional offices respectively.

• ForGPAvariable, it revealed that theEXP(B)of theGPAwas3.483,3.386,4.694 for theLow,Medium, and High-quality service management of regional office centers respectively. Its showed that the students with GPA more than 2.0 were more likely to re-enroll than the students with GPA less than or equal to 2.0 by 3.483, 3.386, 4.694 times in the regional office with Low, Medium, and High-quality service management respectively.

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C. Learning support service• TheEXP(B)oftheparticipationintheonlinetutorialvariablewas1.726inthehigh-qualityservice

of the regional office. The result indicated that, in this regional office, the students who participated in the online tutorial were more likely to re-enroll than the unparticipated students by 1.889 times. In other words, participation in the online tutorial had an effect on re-enrollment for the students who registered in a regional office with high-quality service management.

• TheEXP(B)oftheparticipationintheonlineexaminationwas12.026and4.054inmediumandhigh-quality service of regional offices respectively, but it was not significant in low-quality service of the regional office. It indicated that in medium and high-services quality regional office centers, the students who participated in the online examination were more likely to re-enroll than the students who did not participate in online examination by 12.026 and 4.054 times respectively.

• InregionalofficecenterswithMediumandHigh-servicequalitymanagement, theEXP(B)of theparticipation in the face-to-face tutorial was 2.351 and 1.729, respectively. The result offered a point that the students who participated in the face-to-face tutorial were more likely to re-enroll than the students who did not participate by 2.351 and 1.729 times, respectively.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONThis paper considers that the students’ re-enrollment is an indication of service quality management of a distance higher education institution to maintain the student’s success and to increase students’ retention. The students’ retention in the distance higher education environment, as indicated by their re-enrollment in each semester, is due to various factors. This research specifically identified that the students’ success related to five factors. Firstly, the level of service quality management of regional office centers affected the students’ re-enrollment. Secondly, the individual characteristics related to maturity, as specified by age, marital status, and working status, affected the students’ re-enrollment, i.e., the more mature the students are, the more chance the students have for re-enrolling and succeeding. Thirdly, the academic success in previous semesters, as showed by GPA and credits attained, contributed to re-enrollment, i.e., the more GPA and credits earned in the previous semester the more probability for the students to re-enroll in this semester. Fourthly, the availability of learning support services had an effect to re-enrollment especially for regional office centers with High or Medium quality service management, in the Low-quality service management of regional office centers the students’ participation in the learning support service did not affect re-enrollment. Fifthly, the level of service quality management provided by the regional office centers modulated the effect of student characteristics, students’ academic attainment in the previous semester and students engaged in learning support services on students’ re-enrollment, the more level of service quality was the more these factors affect positively to the students’ re-enrollment.There is a growing number of higher education institutions to adopt quality assurance to enhance students’ educational experiences (Tezcan-Unal, Winston, & Qualter, 2019). However, some academics scrupled to adopt quality assurance in higher education. Ryan (2015) reported that academics felt the quality audit was futile and bureaucratic because their work focuses on research and teaching, and the academics want to maintain autonomy. Nicholson (2011) informed that the adoption of quality assurance programs from the world of business into higher education tends to inhibit innovation in the instructional process rather than advance it. Also, the adoption of the quality assurance into education institutions tend to encourage mechanistic activities in an educational setting (Plimmer, Clarke-Okah, Donovan, and Russell, 2012; Ryan & Brown, 2012; ). On the controversy of adopting quality assurance in the distance higher education institution, this study unveiled that adopting quality assurance in distance higher education of UT through its regional office centers indeed has positively affected student’s satisfaction and loyalty as reflected in students’ re-enrollment, and the level of quality service management of the regional office centers changed positively to the effect of the factors affected on students’ success.The essence of quality service management of regional office centers could be traced to the principal in managing service in the distance higher education. Dzakiria, Kasim, Mohamed, & Christopher (2013) asserted that the structure of ODL provides learners with the most considerable flexibility and provides control over time, place and pace of learning and that “one important element, in accordance with the

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flexibility, that tends to define success factors for students attending an ODL program is the level of interactivity within the student-tutor-content dyads.” (p. 1). It has thus become highly essential that to improve the ODL experience, increase attrition rates, and maintain good long-term standing, equitable provision of such interaction and interactivity should be a non-negotiable priority for ODL institutions. Above all, the service quality provided by distance higher institutions is the heart of managing the students’ re-enrollment. The quality service management of a distance higher education institution should cover aspects of quality education delivered by the institution to satisfy the stakeholder’s needs. The quality service should emphasize students’ success through providing interaction and interactivity of the student-tutor-content. Hence, the future research of quality assurance effectivity should focus on the role of quality service management of a distance higher education institution to students’ success in academic achievements, such as improvement of students’ GPA, the students’ credits attainment, and the students’ length of time to complete their study. Furthermore, the future research of quality assurance should emphasize improving the quality of interaction between tutor and student, as well as content and student. Also, the future research should scrutinize the role of quality service management of a distance higher education institution to quality of learning material preparation and learner support services and quality of assessment on students’ learning. The practical recommendation could improve the service quality of regional office centers of UT:

• UTshouldstrengthenhumanresourcesinregionalofficesshouldbestrengthenedbyhavingmuchtraining in delivering services to the students.

• UTshouldequiptheregionalofficecenterswithhigh-techforfacilitatingstudentstointeractwithtutors, learning resources, and other students.

• TheQualityAssuranceCenter ofUniversitasTerbuka should supervise the regional office centersexhaustively by formulating the service quality guidance, coaching how to perform service quality, and arrange sufficiently intensive auditing.

• TheregionalofficecentersarethedisplayofUTinregionsandareasfarfromtheheadquartersandconfront directly to the students; therefore the regional office centers should receive enough funding for delivering service to the students.

Acknowledgements: The early draft of this article was presented in the 31st Annual Conference of the Asian Association of Open Universities, 2017, with full funding from Universitas Terbuka. I am grateful to the Rector of Universitas Terbuka, Prof. Ojat Darojat for any assistance for finishing this report. Very special gratitude goes to Prof. Karnedi and Prof. Gorky Sembiring, the heads of Institution of Research and Community Services of Universitas Terbuka, for arranging a workshop for finalizing this manuscript.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSUGILAR, is an Associate Professor of Education at the Universitas Terbuka, Indonesia. He is currently as a lecturer at Department of Sciences and Mathematics Education. His academic interest areas are open and distance learning, e-learning, STEM education, and mathematics teacher education. He has published some articles in international journal and international book chapters. He also actively presents articles in some national and international conferences on distance education or mathematics education.

SUGILARDepartment of Sciences and Mathematics Education, Faculty of Education and Teacher Training Address: Universitas Terbuka, 15418, Jakarta, IndonesiaPhone: +62 021-7490941E-mail: fkip@ecampus.ut.ac.id

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DEVELOPING ONLINE SENSE OF COMMUNITY: GRADUATE STUDENTS’ EXPERIENCES AND PERCEPTIONS

Dr. Jesus TRESPALACIOSORCID: 0000-0002-3162-3601

Department of Educational TechnologyBoise State University

Boise, USA

Dr. Lida J. URIBE-FLOREZORCID: 0000-0001-8254-4228

Department of Educational TechnologyBoise State University

Boise, USA

Received: 16/01/2019 Accepted: 25/02/2019

ABSTRACTBuilding a sense of community (SoC) is an important process in the success of distance education and students’ retention. However, developing a community in online learning environments is not an easy task. The purpose of this research study is to explore perceptions of graduate students on SoC and learning after using different collaborative activities with diverse forms of interaction (text, audio, and video) in an online educational research course. Quantitative data from two surveys and qualitative data from individual interviews were collected. Findings indicate that multimodal and scaffolding interactive activities help to support connectedness and learning, and therefore foster online graduate students’ sense of community. The results of this study add to the literature with regard to instructional strategies used to support the development of online sense of community.

Keywords: Sense of community, online learning, distance education, instructional design.

INTRODUCTIONCommunity is a prominent concept in educational contexts. For instance, previous research regularly discussed about communities of learners (Jonassen, 1995; Rogoff, 1994), communities of practice (Barab & Duffy, 2012; Wenger, 1998, 2000), knowledge-building communities (Scardamalia & Bereiter, 1994), learning communities (Hill, 2012; Lenning & Ebbers, 1999; Retallick, Cocklin & Coombe, 1999), community of inquiry (Garrison, 2017), and professional learning communities (DuFour & Eaker, 1998; Stoll et al., 2006). While the concept of community differs in ways in each of these lines of research, a common characteristic is the bounded group of students involved in cooperative learning through meaningful interaction with others (Misanchuk & Anderson, 2001). Community takes on even more relevance for online educators because their students typically do not have a chance to meet and learn in the same place and time, which could lead to feelings of isolation and loneliness (Ludwig-Hardman & Dunlap, 2003; McInnerney & Roberts, 2004). Early educators began experimenting with ways to create communities in their learning environments. Cross (1998) summarized this interest in three broad categories: (1) a change in the philosophy of knowledge based on a social construction, (2) research on learning outcomes, motivation, cognition, and intellectual development, and (3) pragmatic reasons such as educating students for the workforce and responsible citizenship. Especially for online education, interest on developing online communities led to a number of popular books (see Haythornthwaite & Kazmer, 2004; Luppicini, 2007; Palloff & Pratt, 1999, 2004, 2007; Tu, 2004). Besides the general recognition of its relevance, there is a need to conduct studies from diverse programs, populations, and disciplines to understand the perceptions of online participants toward community building (Liu, Magjuka, Bonk & Lee, 2007; Luo, Zhang & Qi, 2017). Based on previous

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research on instructional activities that support the building community in online environments, this study was designed to explore students’ online learning experiences with multiple interactive activities. Thus, working with a specific population of online students enrolled in a cohort-based Doctor of Education (EdD) program, the purpose of this study was to investigate graduate students’ perceptions of both the course and sense of community. The research questions that guided this study stated: In an online graduate course on educational research,

• Howdostudentsratethecourseanditssenseofcommunity?• Whatarestudents’perceptionsabouttherelevanceofinteractiveactivitiestopromotelearningand

community?

LITERATURE REVIEWAmong the many factors that impact student success in online courses, the development of online communities has become an important area of interest, especially in higher education(Bond & Lockee, 2014; Roberts & Lund, 2007). However, developing an online learning community is not an easy task (Hill, 2012). In the following paragraphs, previous studies on instructional strategies to develop sense of community are presented along with a discussion on synchronous and asynchronous activities to promote collaboration. Finally, the community of inquiry model (CoI) (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2000) is reviewed as a framework to analyze students’ perception about the relevance of collaborative activities to promote learning and community.

Building Sense of CommunityRovai (2002b) supported that virtual classrooms have the potential to develop sense of community at the levels of traditional classrooms and defined classroom community based on four dimensions: spirit (recognition of membership), trust (willingness to rely on other members of the community), interaction (either task-driven or socio-emotional in origin), and commonality of expectation and goals (learning). Brown (2001) also identified a three-stage process for building community in distance learning classes: making friends for a comfortable communication, community conferment (acceptance), and camaraderie that is achieved after a long-term relationship. There have been several attempts to identify general recommendations to promote community in online environments (see Table 1). One constant recommendation, included in more recent studies (Luo, Zhang, & Qi, 2017; Oha, Ozkaya, & LaRose, 2014), is the design of collaborative activities that promote interactions. For instance, Shackelford and Maxwell (2012a) found the learner-learner interactions that are most predictive to a sense of online communities are introductions, collaborative group projects, sharing personal experiences, whole-class discussions, and exchanging resources. Using Rovai’s (2002a) Classroom Community Scale (CCS), Dawson (2006) also found that students who communicate more with peers and staff have a significantly higher degree of sense of community. Thus, research supports that sense of community (SoC) can be developed in an online learning environment through interactions. However, these interactions do not spontaneously take place and it is relevant that students share a sense of online community (Gunawardena, 1995). As Wegerif (1998) stated, “Forming a sense of community, where people feel they will be treated sympathetically by their fellows, seems to be a necessary first step for collaborative learning.” (p. 48). Thus, there is a necessity to mediate group activities that promote interaction and collaborative learning.

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Table 1. Some recommendation/activities to promote online sense of community

Authors Recommendation/Activities

Berry (2017)Create a warm and welcoming tone, use technology to provide supportive feedback and to engage all students, and create a personalized learning experience.

Haythornthwaite, Kazmer, Robins, and Shoemaker (2000)

Promoting initial bonding, monitoring and supporting continued interaction and participation, and providing multiple means of communication to support the need to engage in work and social interaction, both publicly and privately.

Palloff and Pratt (2007) Interaction/communication, social presence, negotiated guidelines, effective course design, and collaborative/transformative learning.

Rovai (2002b)Transactional distance, social presence, social equality, small group activities, group facilitation, teaching style and learning stage, and community size.

Shackelford and Maxwell (2012b)Instructor modeling, support and encouragement, facilitating discussions, multiple communication modes, and required participation.

Swan et al. (2000) Consistency in course design, contact with course instructors, and active discussion.

Synchronous and Asynchronous Collaborative ActivitiesIt has been empirically shown that the success of online learning courses depends on designing collaborative learning activities (Hrastinski, 2008a). Multiple studies agreed that discussions activities in online learning environments promote students’ learning through collaboration (An, Shin, & Lim, 2009; Hew & Cheung, 2013; Kent, Laslo, & Rafaeli, 2016). Furthermore, online discussions also facilitate social interaction among students providing opportunities to share not only task-related messages but also thoughts about daily life (Cho & Tobias, 2016). Embedded in the process of discussing in online environments, it is the construct of interactivity (Ken, Laslo, & Rafaeli, 2016). Based on the social-constructivist pedagogy of distance education and the development of two-way communication technologies, synchronous and asynchronous interactions are relevant activities to create opportunities for students’ construction of knowledge (Anderson & Dron, 2011). In one hand, asynchronous discussions forums can be defined as “technological resources that enable members of a group to interact in different times and locales to explore topics and discuss ideas from different perspectives through messages that remain as longs and can be complemented” (Luhrs & McAnally-Salas, 2016, p. 31). Asynchronous activities are a widely used strategy in distance education to bring students and the instructor together to facilitate critical discourse and reflection based on an initial query posted at the begging of the session (Trespalacios & Rand, 2015). However, as could happen with lectures or problem-based environments, asynchronous online discussions bring also limitations like students’ feelings of disconnection (Andresen, 2009). Although asynchronous text-based discussions are one the most commonly used communication strategy (De Wever, Schellens, Valcke, & Keer, 2006), online discussions can have different formats and designs such as students-led versus instructor-led, text-based versus audio or video-based, small-groups vs whole-class, and synchronous versus asynchronous discussions. These different formats allow multiple combinations like instructor-led video-based synchronous discussions developed using Google Meet or Zoom technologies. For example, Ice, Curtis, Phillips, and Well (2007) found that the use of asynchronous audio feedback was associated with feelings of increased involvement, enhanced learning community interactions, and retention of content, and with the perception that the instructor cared more about the student.On the other hand, synchronous e-learning, supported by video conference or chat rooms, has the potential to help online students in the development of communities (Hrastinski, 2008b) and learning through interactions (Martin, Parker, & Deale, 2012). For instance, in live synchronous web meetings, students and instructor organize their schedules to meet at the same time but not in the same place enhancing learners’ sense of community (Fadde & Vu, 2014). Thus, in asynchronous online courses, synchronous activities provide additional elements to the interactions such as instant communication and feedback that help establish other as being “real” and “there” (Lowenthal, Dunlap, & Snelson, 2017).

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Community of InquiryTo analyze students’ perception about the relevance of collaborative activities to promote learning and community, this study draws upon the community of inquiry model (CoI) (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2000). Grounded in a collaborative constructivist view of teaching and learning, the CoI is defined “as a group of individuals who collaboratively engage in purposeful critical discourse and reflection to construct personal meaning and confirm mutual understanding.” (Garrison, 2011, p. 15). According to the CoI framework, there are three interdependent presences to support the development of meaningful learning experiences in a community of learners: social, cognitive, and teaching presence. Social presence is defined as “the ability of participants to identify with a group, communicate openly in a trusting environment, and develop personal and affective relationships” (Garrison, 2017). Cognitive presence is defined “as the extent to which learners are able to construct and confirm meaning through sustained reflection and discourse.” (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2001, p.11). Finally, teaching presence is defined as “the design, facilitation, and direction of cognitive and social presences for the purpose of realizing personally meaningful and educationally worthwhile learning outcomes” (Anderson, Rourke, Garrison, & Archer, 2001, p. 90).Previous research has already identified relationships between SoC and the different presences in the CoI (Shea, 2006). For instance, open and effective communication, defined as key aspects of the social presence, are also necessary to establish a sense of community in online learning environments (Garrison, 2007). Using Rovai’s Classroom Community Scale, Shea, Li, and Pickett (2006) found a significant link between students’ sense of community and effective instructional design and “directed facilitation” on the part of course instructors. Additionally, in a review of multiples studies, Garrison (2007) stated, “The consensus is that teaching presence is a significant determinate of student satisfaction, perceived learning, and sense of community.” (p. 67). Finally, Rovai (2002c) found a significant relationship between classroom community and cognitive learning in an online educational environment.

METHODParticipants and ProceduresTwelve students (five male and seven female) enrolled in an educational research online graduate course participated in this study. The demographic data shows that all the students in this course were mature, mostly over 30 years of age, and were full-time workers. All of them had a background in education with six participants currently working as teachers, two instructional coaches, two technology coordinators, one school librarian, and one working as a content specialist for a large publishing company. At the time of the study, eleven participants lived in the United States (i.e. three from the east coast and other three form the west coast) and only one participant lived overseas. Additionally, ten participants were Caucasian and two were Hispanic.The three-credit course is required for all students in the Educational Technology doctoral program. Doctoral students enrolled in the cohort-based online EdD program are scheduled to take a foundational course on educational research during their second semester of the program. This course teaches students to review quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods research approaches in education, and focus on research studies and methodologies in Educational Technology. Additionally, students discuss preliminary elements that are necessary before designing a research proposal such as reviewing the literature, deciding on to use a theoretical framework, selecting an appropriate research methodology, and employing good writing and ethical practices.

SettingThe online graduate course in Educational Research had six instructional activities where students need to interact in different levels with their classmates, the instructor, and the content. These activities are (1) an introductory activity in VoiceThread where students post a video introducing themselves, watch other students’ introductions, and record at least three posts to interact with their classmates; (2) a small-group presentations where students prepare a synthesis of a specific content of the course for the whole class; (3)

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three whole-group asynchronous discussions where students use the knowledge they have learned to answer two questions (Appendix A) and get involved in a discussion with their classmates; (4) synchronous video conversations with the instructor to ask questions or clarify doubts related to the course content; (5) a peer-review activity where students provide feedback to one of their classmate’s final projects that consist of a proposal for a research study; and (6) a critique paper where pairs of students selected one peer-reviewed journal article and assessed it based on a specific set of guidelines. The main source of information in the course was Creswell’s (2014) Educational Research: Planning, Conducting, and Evaluating Quantitative and Qualitative Research. The main goal of the course stated that at the end of the course students were able to develop a research proposal in educational technology. Thus, different activities like discussion questions and the content of the presentations were designed to help students to reach this main goal.

Data Collection and AnalysisData for this study are from three sources: 1) Classroom Community survey, 2) course evaluation survey, and 3) synchronous semi-structured interviews. Quantitative data for the study was gathered from Rovai’s (2002a) Classroom Community Scale (CCS) that examines sense of community in a learning environment. This survey has 20 Likert-scale questions (strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree, and strongly disagree) composed of two subscales of connectedness and learning:

Connectedness represents the feelings of students regarding their cohesion, spirit, trust, and interdependence. Learning represents the feelings of students regarding the quality of their construction of understanding and the degree to which they share values and beliefs concerning the extent to which their learning goals and expectations are being satisfied. (Rovai, 2002c, p. 325).

CCS was administered at the end of the course as part of the course evaluation. This data was anonymous and the instructor had access to it after grades were submitted to the university system. Total possible classroom community scores range from 0 to 80 and scores on each subscale (learning and connectedness) can range from 0 to 40, with higher scores reflecting a stronger sense of community. Cronbach’s coefficient alpha for the full classroom community scale was 0.93, suggesting strong reliability (Rovai, 2002a). Additionally, course evaluations filled anonymously by students at the end of the course were also used to obtain data regarding students’ perceptions of this graduate course and the instructor. The survey contains twelve Likert scale questions with four questions related to the course design and eight questions related to the instructor performance (Appendix B). Finally, all twelve graduate students were invited to participate in a 20 to 30 minutes interview and seven participants accepted the invitation (Appendix C). Interviews were transcribed and texts were qualitatively analyzed reducing and interpreting the data to identify codes and themes (Saldana, 2015). In addition to the thorough description presented in the findings, peer debriefing was used to ensure the trustworthiness within this study. Peer debriefing was conducted with the second author during the qualitative analysis of the data, where codes and themes were questioned, justified, and verified until a total agreement was reached (Creswell & Creswell, 2018). Additionally, to avoid possible discomfort to talk about the course with the instructor (first author), the second author, also a faculty in the same program, interviewed the students after they completed all the activities in the course.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONTo answer the first research question on how students rate the course and its sense of community, we analyzed data from the two surveys and we found that, on average, participants found positive the role of the instructor, the design of the course, and the development of sense of community on the online graduate course. As shown in Table 2, From the Classroom Community Scale survey, students agreed that the instructional activities designed in the course foster sense of community (62.3 out of possible score of 80). Results from the subscales showed that students agreed that they felt connected to each other (29.1 out of possible score of 40) and felt that they achieved their learning goals in the course (33.2 out of possible score of 40). Additionally, results from the course evaluation survey showed that students valued highly the performance of the instructor (seemed prepared, fostered learning, etc.), the assessment activities, instructional materials, and peer-collaboration activities as well (Appendix B).

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Table 2. Average scores from Rovai’s survey

Mean SD

Total Learning community 62.3 9.7

Connectedness subscale 29.1 6.2

Learning subscale 33.2 4.5

To answer the second research questions related to the students’ perceptions about the interactive activities to promote learning and community, seven of the twelve students accepted voluntarily the invitation to participate in a semi-structured interview. From these participants, five have been part of a cohort in our doctoral (EdD) program and two to the specialization in Ed Tech (EdS) program. This could have impacted how participants perceived the SoC and collaboration in this course. However, one of the participants from the EdS program indicated “I think even if I hadn’t known any of these people before this course, I would probably still have the same opinion of the activities.” (Allison). Thus, the three major findings from the qualitative analysis are (1) Multimodal interactions support connectedness, (2) Scaffolding interactive activities support learning, and (3) Online collaboration is difficult but desired by graduate students. These findings are discussed below and supported by direct quotes from the students. Pseudonyms were used to protect the identities of the participants. Appendix C provides an example of the coding categories that were used for the study.

Multimodal Interactions Support ConnectednessWhen interpreting this finding using the CoI model, one recognizes that allowing students the opportunity to introduce themselves using videos, help them to project their individual personalities, and at the same, take the feeling of being part of a group promoting social presence (Garrison, 2011). Opposite to the written communication, video introductions allow students to show themselves and use spoken communication to present what they want about the job, hobbies, family, etc. Besides belonging to a cohort where they know each other from previous classes, participants had an opportunity to talk about themselves. As Allison indicated,

I thought that the voice thread introduction discussion was very helpful in getting what it was intended for, getting to know people and the fact that is... had the video component as well as the audio. . . gave it a sense of really interacting with the people as opposed to just a text discussion which can help with the community. But, I think being able to put up the video, have other people respond with their videos and exchange communication that way, was very . . . it was really enjoyable, in terms of working with the other people on that.

Although VoiceThread introductory activity did not require multiple interactions, it helped participants to find affinity with members of the class. As Julia indicated,

...we made introductions, you shared some things about yourself, your vision, and what you wanted to research, and what you’re hoping to gain. All of those things happened, but then it was kind of, I felt like, it up to me to go, ‘Okay, these are the three people who are kind of interested in similar things. Now I’m going to keep an eye out for them in the forums.’ I feel like it extended the opportunity for collaboration, but the activity in and of itself wasn’t particularly collaborative.

The synchronous meetings with the instructor and members of the small group were described as a useful opportunity to support the teaching presence. For instance, Allison stated,

“it was helpful, again because it was alive, it was sort of a video chat. So, it was much more of a meeting type of feel more face to face, even though it’s technologically mediated.”

He went on and clarify,

“It was very helpful to get that opportunity to say okay, this is kind of the direction we’re going in, does that make sense, is that the sort of thing you were looking for as an instructor.”

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David also stated the preference for this activity,

“...we also had to meet with our professor and with the group of people that we were doing the VoiceThread with and ask him questions. I thought that was the most beneficial thing I did just because we had the face to face time with the professor and we were able to ask him questions regarding what we needed to do even globally about the whole class, not just about the project we were working on together.”

This finding is related to Berry’s (2017) conclusion on a study in online doctoral classrooms,

“instructors helped students develop a sense of community by creating a warm and welcoming tone in the classroom, and by using technology in a variety of ways to engage all students and create a personalized learning experience.”

Thus, following the CoI model, the educator’s role falls into the facilitation category trying to resolve students’ issues (Garrison, 2011).

Scaffolding Interactive Activities Support LearningA second common theme we noted in the data was the one related to the students’ experiences with those activities that move them forward in the final course project. The majority of participants described the preferences for activities that emphasize the use concepts to prepare them for the development of a research proposal. For instance, discussing the whole-class asynchronous discussions, Frank stated,

“I really appreciated the content of the discussion boards because we had to apply what we were reading to our own research, our own research topics. By writing about research topics, and the research problems and questions, and different methods for qualitative and quantitative, I think posting that and getting feedback, not only from classmates but also the professor, I think was very helpful in really understanding how to create a research [proposal]…”

In the small group activity, participants needed to develop a VoiceThread presentation based on a few chapters of the course textbook identifying key issues, describing their relevance for the research process, and discussing how these key issues are relevant to them. For this activity, Sheri, who was a member of the first group, stated,

“It [presentation] required me to make sure that I really understood the reading. That is never a bad thing. We were all a little confused that the beginning of it about the fact that we had to apply it to ourselves. That made it even better because it wasn’t just reiterate the reading, it was talk a little bit about how it applies to what you’re thinking. It was- I thought it was useful.”

In the CoI model, the cognitive presence is described in four phases: triggering (conceptualizing a problem), exploration (searching relevant information), integration (constructing meaningful solutions), and resolution (assessing the proposed solution). Combining the different learning activities such as asynchronous discussions, research proposal draft development, research proposal peer-review, and the completion of the research proposal helped to promote cognitive presence. For instance, having the creation of a research proposal as the main learning outcome of the course, the discussion questions were developed to trigger and explore potential topics that students would like to develop a research proposal. As recommended in the CoI model, participants had the freedom to select the topic based on their experience or previous studies (Garrison, 2017). During these discussions, participants responded to these questions and the classmates and the instructor provided feedback about the quality of their research ideas in the educational technology field. Additionally, to promote integration, the discussion questions were purposefully created in the way that students kept building the different sections of their research proposal based on the feedback obtained from the previous discussion. In this way, students have the time to reflect and integrate the feedback obtained during the discussions. Finally, to move into the resolution phase, students submitted an initial draft of the complete research proposal that was reviewed by one of their classmates. Participants reflect on the comments provided for the peer-review activity, asked questions if any, and submit the updated research proposal as the final course project. The peer-review was also another activity that was described relevant because participants had the opportunity to assess another classmate’s research proposal. About this activity, Michael stated,

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“I already learned more from the reading of someone else’s and critiquing someone else’s almost than just my own. It provided the ability to support each other, those activities, and I liked that part. I think that did build community, that you’re trying to help somebody else do a better job on their paper and identify things that you have questions about.”

Michael went on an described the value of connected assignments to reach the course main goal,

“all the course activities support the process of writing the paper. Feedback from instructor and peers, discussions, etc. valuable for the final product.”

Online Collaboration is Difficult but Desired by Graduate StudentsCoinciding with previous studies on potential issues in online collaborative environments (Bennett, 2003; Reeves, Herrington, & Oliver, 2004), participants described that collaboration in online education is difficult. Their busy lives with family and full-time jobs allow short periods of time to dedicate to their studies. This is an important issue when it is additionally required to meet and collaborate with classmates. Although students participated in a social event at the beginning of the semester and had a synchronous meeting to ask questions, participants had inconvenient to work together in small groups. For instance, in the critique paper activity, where participants chose their own partner agreed on a journal article where both are interested and write a critique, they liked it because was just two participants involved. For instance, Lisa indicated,

“For me the most relevant [activity] was the two person critique, the article critique. Mainly because just me and my partner, it was a kind of common interest and we were able to just kind of explore that into what it means personally for us in addition to from our own kind of research interests.”

However, comparing this article critique paper with the small group presentation, where the instructor created the groups of four students, it was not the same experience. For instance, Julia compared them,

“That [critique paper] was very, very helpful. It was just nice to develop a relationship with one other person, through the remainder of the course... I think actually as opposed to, we did a presentation earlier in the semester, where there were four of us and that almost felt too big. There were a lot of moving parts, and it just kind of came down to, for us, establishing some roles. It ended up, I think, feeling less collaborative than the two person peer article review.”

Michael also described difficulties preparing the VoiceThread presentation,

“I don’t think we got together to actually discuss it.” Michael went on, “Two of us in the group were working ahead, and two came during the last week to enter their things or maybe a day before it was due or two days before it was due.”

Finally, David described explicitly the difficult to work collaboratively in online environments,

“As far as collaborating with other adults in an online environment, I think it’s hard.”Asking participants recommendations to improve activities, there was a consensus that more interactive activities would be beneficial. Two specific recommendations came from the analysis of the data: (1) Relevance of instructor-led synchronous meetings: Looking for different types of communication besides text-based, having small groups meeting lead by the instructor have the potential to foster interactions and promote different presences from the CoI. For instance, David stated,

“I think the synchronous discussions force you into working with people or even discussing things with them in a different type of format than just the typing, because I would always pre-write all of my posts. I think it has some type of qualities to it that force people to be a little bit more genuine or make them think about things in a little bit of a different way.”

Related to the more synchronous meeting, Lisa stated,

“The only suggestion I would have is to add a, I don’t know what they call these... usually one anyway synchronous meeting just to ask questions or whatever, kind of talk to people. They’re not mandatory.”

(2) Improve the organization of small-group interactions: As was discussed in the previous finding, small group presentations were the less favorite activity because of the difficult to meet and organize the work.

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In the same way, the peer-feedback activity, where students assess the draft of one classmate and provide feedback and a separate Microsoft Word form, could be improved designing additional communication channels. For instance, talking about this peer-feedback activity, Julia recommended,

“I would almost love to see that kind of feedback in the context of a Google doc. Instead of submitting the Word document at that point, and then kind of pushing it out to someone else, if you were to be partnered with someone. For instance, I think I had [Maria]’s paper. Instead of me pushing out ... I guess just giving drafts that are more fluid, so that we could provide comments, but also, dialogue.”

Lisa also made a recommendation in the whole-class asynchronous discussion to improve interactions,

“My only problem with the discussions is that they tended to be kind of too big as like everybody involved. It’s overwhelming and it’s hard to read everything.”

Lisa went one and recommended,

“if say there are 20 people in class and you have four groups of five people you can get a little bit more detailed conversations going instead of maybe having to reply to if seven people, eight people reply to your initial post it just gets very difficult. But if it’s only two, three people you’re always talking to you can go a little bit more in depth I think.”

Social interaction is an important aspect to foster collaboration. With a lack of social interaction, there is no real collaboration (Kreijns, Kirschner & Jochems, 2003). Additionally, Kreijns et al. alerted us about two pitfalls while designing social interaction in computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL): (1) Taking social interaction for granted, and (2) Restricting social interaction to cognitive processes. Authors went on and suggested four strategies to deal with these issues: (1) implement collaborative learning methods, (2) build interactivity, (3) change instructor’s and/or learners’ role, and (4) increase social presence. Thus, it is important to organize synchronous live events to make students more familiar with each other allowing more socio-emotional interactions to take place. It goes hand-in-hand with the social presence discussed in the CoI (Garrison, 2017). According to Gunawardena (1995), the development of social presence and a sense of community are the keys to promoting collaborative learning and knowledge building.

CONCLUSIONS AND LIMITATIONSAlthough e-learning has allowed institutions to expand his education mission reaching more students outside of their physical boundaries, we are still at the beginning of understanding how to satisfy the educational needs of the more diverse population enrolled in our online education programs. As Desai, Hart, and Richards (2009) stated, “the challenge for learning institutions and instructors was to provide a sense of community with constructive feedback and provide open forthcoming communications as well as recognizing membership and feelings of friendship, cohesion, and satisfaction among learners.” (p. 333). However, community in online courses rarely happens on its own. Instead, research suggests that instructors must plan for and facilitate the development of community online. We set forth to explore students’ perceptions of classroom community and specifically how certain instructional strategies might help develop a sense of community in fully online graduate courses. While our results should not be generalized to a larger population, they do serve as a starting point to investigate further how online educators can support the development of connectedness and at the same time promote student learning. This study helps to illustrate examples of different instructional activities and online interactions that can promote sense of community in an online learning environment. It describes some of the pros and cons that can arise when graduate students are learning collaboratively in an online environment. The study also reveals how the Community of Inquiry model can be a useful lens to analyze and design online environments that encourage sense of community between students.Social and academic participation of students is essential to foster online communities (Misanchuk & Anderson, 2001). When students were asked to describe the favorite aspects of the instructional activities, findings revealed that students preferred those activities that allow meaningful interactions with their classmates. Additionally, students recommend improving activities that allow better channels of communication that improve their interactions. On the other hand, asking students about their least

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favorite activities, they pointed mostly to the small group presentation because of the lack of communication that could allow them for a better organization and more productive interactions. These findings describe how online doctoral students are looking forward to working with their classmates, and instructors need to carefully consider designing such environments that support meaningful interactions through social, teaching, and cognitive presences. Looking together at the results from the surveys and the findings from the interviews, we can conclude that scaffolding interactive activities with multiple types of interactions help to support connectedness and learning, and therefore online graduate students’ sense of community.This study has potential limitations. First, it is the context in which study was conducted, including, the specific subject area (introduction to educational research), mode of course delivery (fully online course), the academic level of the course (doctoral level), and researchers’ bias through the direct involvement with participants and data analysis. Finally, it should be noted that this study did not collect data about individual differences (e.g., prior knowledge, motivation, cognitive load, and self-regulated learning) or perceived value of the students about the course and teaching and the three dimensions of the community of inquiry model. To be able to triangulate the findings and draw inferences about the effects of the proposed learning tasks, future studies should collect these data types to describe more conclusive findings.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSJesus TRESPALACIOS, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Technology at Boise State University. He teaches online graduate courses on instructional design and research methods. His scholarly activity includes online education, communities in online environments, and professional development for teachers. He earned his Ph.D. in Instructional Design and Technology from Virginia Tech.

Jesus TRESPALACIOSDepartment of Educational Technology, Boise State UniversityAddress: 1910 University Drive, Boise, USAPhone: +01 2084267105E-mail: jesustrespalacios@boisestate.edu

Lida J. URIBE-FLOREZ, is an associate professor at Boise State University and the chair of the Educational Technology Department. She teaches research and leadership courses. Before Boise State University, she was a professor at New Mexico State University. She earned a Master’s degree in applied mathematics at University of Puerto Rico (2001) and a Ph.D. degree in mathematics education at Virginia Tech (2009). Her research interest includes online education (eMentoring, advising and sense of community), teacher education (including teacher candidates and in-service teachers) as well as the use of tools to support learning in mathematics classrooms. Her work has been presented and published in several national and international venues.

Lida J. URIBE-FLOREZDepartment of Educational Technology, Boise State UniversityAddress: 1910 University Drive, Boise, USAPhone: +01 2084264089E-mail: lidauribeflorez@boisestate.edu

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APPENDIX AAsynchronous Discussion Questions

Discussion #1• Question#1:Inchapter2,Creswelldiscussedtheprocessof identifyingaresearchproblem.

Describe a topic in the Educational Technology field that you are interested and a research problem that you would like to investigate. Please, also identify the audience who would read and potentially benefit from your potential research study.

• Question#2:UsingtheeducationaltopicandtheresearchproblemyouidentifiedinQuestion1, please discuss whether your research problem can and should be investigated (pages 61-63). In your post, please include answers to the questions asked by Creswell (Can you gain access topeopleandsites?Canyoufindthe time, locate resources,anduseyour skills? should theproblemberesearched?)

Discussion #2• Question#1:WiththenewinsightsgatheredfromCreswell’sChapter4,turntheresearchtopic

you have chosen into a quantitative study. Please, include a brief description of the research topic/problem and write a quantitative purpose statement and two or three quantitative research questions.

• Question #2: Using the quantitative study that you described in question #1, design aquantitative data collection procedure. Specify the population and sample, the permissions that you will need, the types of quantitative information you will collect, whether you will develop or locate an instrument, and the administrative procedures that will ensure standardization and ethical practices.

Discussion #3• Question#1:Usingthesameresearchtopicyouhavebeenworkingsofar,assumeyouaregoing

to design a qualitative study. Please, (1) write a qualitative purpose statement, and a central question and sub-questions (follow Creswell’s scripts to generate these items), (2) determine people and research site you would like to study, and the type of purposeful sampling you would use, (3) The type of data you would record and what protocols you would use, and finally (4) list the anticipated field and ethical issues that you would need to consider before you conduct your data collection.

• Question#2:Sinceyouhavenowreviewedallthedifferentstepsintheprocessofeducationalresearch, in your own words, describe this process in metaphorical terms (ex., “the process of educational research is like learning to read another language.”). Please, explain your metaphor.

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APPENDIX BEnd-of-Course Students’ Evaluations

Question Responses Mean (From 5)*

The instructor seemed prepared for class 9 4.89

The instructor fostered learning in this course 9 4.89

The assessment methods were clearly explained 9 4.89

Assessments and/or other products reflect course objectives 9 5.0

The readings were aligned with course objectives 9 5.0

Peer collaboration was offered 9 4.78

The instructor has a thorough knowledge of the subject 9 4.89

The instructor stimulates interest in the subject 8 4.88

The instructor communicates ideas and information clearly 9 4.89

The instructor is genuinely interested in helping students 9 5.0

The instructor treats students with respect 9 5.0

I would take another class from this instructor 9 4.89

*1: Strongly Disagree; 2: Disagree; 3: Neutral; 4: Agree; 5: Strongly Agree

APPENDIX CInterview Questions

1. In this graduate course, you have experienced several collaborative activities (VoiceThread introductions, small-groups VoiceThread presentations, whole-class discussions, and peer feedback). What was the mostrelevantonefromyouandwhy?

2. Whatwasthelessrelevantcollaborativeactivityinthiscourseandwhy?3. Whatwouldyourecommendtoimprovethelessrelevantactivity?4. Dothecollaborativeactivitiesmadeyoufeelconnectedtoothersinthiscourse?5. Do the collaborative activities made you feel that you had opportunities to learn about educational

research?

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THE IMPACT OF DIGITAL STORYTELLING ON ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF SIXTH GRADE STUDENTS IN ENGLISH

LANGUAGE AND THEIR MOTIVATION TOWARDS IT IN JORDAN

Dr. Yousef Ahmad ALJARAIDEHORCID: 0000-0003-3708-2962

Faculty of Educational SciencesJerash UniversityJerash, JORDAN

Received: 22/01/2019 Accepted: 22/07/2019

ABSTRACTThis study aims to identify the impact of digital storytelling (DST) on academic achievement of sixth grade students in English language and their motivation towards it in Jordan.DST plays an important role in the maintenance and progress of English language.The research uses a quasi- experimental method. The sample of the study consists of (50) male students were purposefully chosen from public schools at Jerash governorate. They were distributed into two groups: Experimental group which has (25) students learning English language through DST, and control group which has (25) students. They are taught the same content in traditional way. The findings of the study showed that there are statistically significant differences in students’ academic achievement and students’ motivation towards learning English language due to teaching method in favor of experimental group which DST strategy is the main method used in English language. Statistically significant differences were also found in students’ motivation towards learning English language due to teaching method in favor of experimental group. In the light of the results, some recommendations were set like integrating DST in the teaching and learning English language.

Keywords: Digital storytelling, academic achievement, English language, motivation, Jordan

INTRODUCTION Recently, in the 21st century teachers supposed to have information and communication skills (ICT). All modern strategies related to teaching and learning process are fully lies on technological skills. Thus, teachers should be able to promote their content using contemporary devices like; computer, internet, mobile learning, flipped learning and so on. To keep teachers up to date with those concepts, training courses should be actively implemented and more attention should be paid to teachers’ professional development especially practical issues that deals with integration technology inside and outside the classroom sitting. Therefore, Digital storytelling (DST) should be one of the most potent in classroom teaching and learning process.In the history of development teaching and learning method, DST has been thought of as a key factor in students’ progress. DST is defined as a new story which is created by combining elements of multimedia such as text, sound, animation, video, and image (Dupain & Maguire, 2005). Those elements are incorporated together by using certain computer software. The intentional goal of DST is explaining an ambiguous concept. Usually the duration of the given story is between two and ten minutes (Robin, 2016). Besides, DST presents the content in visual way, this kind of learning help the students keeping the abstract concepts as mental picture in their memory. In this perspective, Sarıca and Usluel (2016) have indicated that students’ writing skills and visual memory were significantly improved due to utilizing DST. In addition, it improves English language skills of students as well as their grammar and accent. DST has seven basic elements: the first is point of view: It is the main theme that the author tries to send it to audiences. The second is dramatic question: It is a question like plot of story which grasps student’s attentions in order to complete the story. In addition to that, this question will be answered at the end of story. The third emotional content: It is the ability to make connection between the theme of story and

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 6

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audiences’ real life situations. The fourth is the gift of your voice: The way in which the story is designed to be understandable by student. The fifth is the power of the sound track: Sound, song, and music which are added to the timeline of story. The sixth is the economy: Delivering the content without elaboration. The final element is the pacing: The rhythm of the story, it might be fast or slow (Robin, 2008).A primary concern of DST is the role it is playing in improving English language skills. Thus, designing and selecting DST gives the students a great chance for practicing English language in meaningful way (Wilson, 1997; Nilson, 2010). Besides, it could provide new generations with abilities and competences of 21 century such as self-efficacy, self- learning and self-progress. In addition, it can bring motivates that can help them to gain more achievements in education (Gay, 2010).Several studies investigating on DST Sylvester and Greenidge (2010); Malita and Martin (2010) have been carried out and revealed that integrating DST as instructional tool contribute in developing thinking skills, clarifying the ambiguity of the content, increasing communication skills and enhancing pedagogical and social levels of students. Similarly, Abdel-Hack and Helwa (2014); Meadows (2006) and Benmayor (2008) reported that DST reinforces students’ engagement, increases reflection and improving retention.

LITERATURE REVIEW Almost every paper that has been written on DST includes a section relating to the effectiveness of DST and the development of teaching methods. Atkas and Yurt (2017) evaluate the impact of DST on academic achievement of students in Turkish literature course. The sample of study has (61) students divided into two groups: Experimental with (31) students and control group with (30) students. The results showed that there is a significant difference in students’ achievement between two groups in favor of experimental group which taught by using digital storytelling. Similarly, Kotluk and Kocakaya (2017) added that the experimental students’ scores who taught physics through digital storytelling where greater than students’ scores in control group. Also students’ attitudes and self-efficacy were positively affected by DST.A broader perspective has been adopted by Mokhtar, Halim and Kamarulzaman (2011) who argues that reading skills of English language has improved by using DST strategy.Thelinguistic wealth and number of vocabulary are increased.This view is supported by Yang Wu (2012) who writes DST has significantly a great impact on academic achievement and critical thinking of students in English as foreign language. Foelske (2014) explains that motivation; literacy skills and involvement are improved by using DST. Likewise, Dreyer (2017) holds the view that the professional growth program for teachers should include training courses on the use of DST. It can be concluded that DST has educational value at the school and university levels as well as developed skills of both students and teachers that finally can pour into main contributions of improvementand development of educationand learning process.In fact, English as foreign language (EFL) courses should be taught by implementing DST for their positive impact on learning English language skills. In addition, DST can enhance the students’ ability and motivation to improve their learning English (Tahriri, Tous & Movahedfar, 2015). LoBello (2015) also supported this view via his research conducted to assess the impact of DST on the writing skills among fourth grade students in USA schools. The results of his study revealed that students’ performance in writing skills were improved. Besides, students’ motivation toward technical writing was significantly boosted positively. Correspondingly, Somdee & Suppasetseree (2012) DST could help in enhancing students’ writing skills and improving critical thinking among students. On the other hand, DTS also has a potential approach to enhance students’ speaking skills. Abdel-Hack & Helwa (2014) indicated that DST can do more than other approaches in developing the conversational ability of students. On the teaching side, teachers usually use DST for educational purposes to improve their students’ skills by providing them vital and practical experiences such as DST. The instructional aspect of DST and its impact on students’ performance was discussed by Smeda, Dakich & Sharda (2014). They pointed that DST is a meaningful tool to blend the content of subject matter taught with given tasks in order to create interactive environment inside the classroom. They also stated that DST as learning strategy has the ability to enhance student’s performance through their active engagement in the given tasks. Robin (2016) stressed that involving students in the design of DST contributes in improving creativity and communication skills throughout they will be able to organize their information and ideas and recreating them into story form.

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The implications of DST have been addressed in several small-scale investigations as Chao & Hung (2014) noted that students’ oral proficiency, attitudes, perceptions, self-confidence, and motivation were improved by using DST. Also Connie (2017) indicated that both of students and teachers are expressed a high motivation towards DST. However, Gakhar (2007) conducted a study to assess pre-services teachers’ attitudes and intention to use DST; he employed qualitative and quantitative procedures in order to collect a precise data. The finding showed that there are no significant differences in pre-services teachers’ attitudes toward DST due to teaching method since their attitudes were high before integrating DST. In this case, motivated learners are somewhat prefer to working at all assignment still the end, with regards to some conditions they may face such as interruption or frustration (Ormrod, 2014).Continuously, motivation was considered as a perquisite to ensure students’ success. Data from several sources identified the increased of learning associated with motivation. Consistently numerous studies were attempted to explain that motivation is critical to many issues, such as the academic operational process, and the students’ views and expectations should be progressed positively (Shernoff, Csikszentmiahlyi, Schneider & Shernoff, 2003). As well as Bredvick (2016) indicated that students were motivated and evolved actively with each other with significant collaboration while using technology. Kasami (2017) investigated that DST assignments have a direct impact on students’ motivations for learning (EFL). Finally, recorded results were gathered by educational experts: Ivala, Gachago, Condy & Chigona (2013) reported the production of digital stories improved the students’ commitment in their learning, in which eventually led to a deep understanding of the subject matter.

Problem Statement English language is the universal language; it is a crucial factor to ensure educational success in public and higher education. The past decade has seen the rapid development of using technology in learning process.Thus, most of educational institutions especially in the Third World countries try to provide students with English and technological skills to be able to cope with contemporary digital age. In the history of development English, DST has been thought of as a key factor in progressing the educational process especially in Jordan. In fact, there are set of factors affecting learning English language resembling; students’ negative attitudes toward learning English language, lack of ICT devices in public schools, lack of ICT integration in teaching English language, and lastly the teaching strategies are heavily depended on conventional learning (Khan & Khan, 2016; Alhmadi, 2014). So that, the current study tries to find whether a new strategy (DST) could improve students’ achievement and motivation towards learning English language or not. This study tries to answer the following research questions:

1. Are there significant differences in students’ academic achievement based on the teaching method (traditional way / DST)?

2. Are there significant differences in students’ motivation toward learning English language regarding teaching method (traditional way/ DST)?

Research ObjectivesThe study offers some important insights into the following objectives:

1. Identify students’ achievement in English language through explore the mean differences between control and experimental groups.

2. Identify students’ motivation toward learning English language by exploring the mean differences between control and experimental groups.

Importance of the StudyThe significance of the study comes from dealing with a new innovation (DST). It is known that most children across the world like social media like YouTube. They spent many hours in watching cartoon videos; DST strategy presents the content of subject matter taught in motivated way as similar as to YouTube way. DST strategy also simplifies the abstraction in English language themes and terms. Therefore, interestingly,

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this correlation is related to the implementation of the DST in the learning process as the study aimed to investigate. In fact, the study explicates that DST becomes a beneficial way for both of students and teachers. Finally, by incorporating this strategy, exhausting a direct and indirect way, this study tries to improve students’ English and technological skills in learning English language. Besides, those skills, in the end, help a new generation to be up-to-date with a new innovative technology.

METHOD Research Design The researcher follows quasi experimental approach. Descriptive statistic and One-Way-ANACOVA were used to analysis data.

Sample of the Study The sample of the study consisted of (50) male students from sixth grade were purposefully selected from Jerash public schools in the first semester at academic year 2017-2018. They were equally distributed into two groups: The first group is control group consisted of (25) students. They are taught English language by traditional way. On the other side, the second group is experimental group consisted of (25) students. They are taught English language by DST strategy.

Instruments The current study has three instruments they are;

1. Achievement test: (25) multiple-choice questions were prepared by researcher based on the content analysis of the unit five (entitled “we are going to the bird park”) which is included in English language textbook of sixth grade, after that the behavioral objectives of unit were identified according to the content analysis. Finally, table of specification was prepared which is included the outcomes of the unit five.

Achievement test validity and reliability: the test validate by ten of faculty members from Jordanian universities in the field of curriculum and instruction, measurement and evaluation, and methods of teaching English to ensure the linguistic integrity of the test’s items, and its relevance to the students’ levels. The experts modify, delete, and add some items, and the researcher takes the comments into consideration. The reliability of test was checked by conducting the test (pre-test) on (20) students from population of study. After two weeks, the researcher conducted the test (post-test) again on the same sample. The reliability value was (.87) which means the test has a high degree of reliability.

2. Motivation toward English Language Scale: Student’ motivation towards English language learning scale with (20) items was developed based on the previous studies (Kasami, 2017; Glynn, Taasoobshirazi, & Brickman, 2007, Tosun, 2013). The validity of questionnaire was checked by all (14) educational sciences faculty members at Jerash University. While the reliability was checked by using the questionnaire on (20) students from population of study. After two weeks, the researcher distributed the questionnaire again on the same sample. The reliability value was (.91) which means the questionnaire has a high degree of reliability.

3. Digital Storytelling: The DST was designed based on (ADDIE) model consist of five stages:a. Analysis: In this stage, the researcher analysis students’ needs and preferences, so that DST

was designed in a convenient way that is relevant to the students’ real life. Moreover, students’ performances, abilities and motivations were analyzed.

b. Design: In this stage, the researcher set the desired behavioral objectives and outcomes such as students should be able to understand the main idea of lesson after watching DST; they should be able to recognize the new vocabularies and themes which are included in the story; and they should be able to express their opinions toward the story’s events.

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c. Development: This stage includes gathering multimedia elements like; text, pictures, sounds and videos. The researcher collected the relevant multimedia throughout internet, recording sound, and scanning some picture from the unit five (we are going to the bird park). The researcher used Adobe Flash Cs5 and Sound Forge in order to produce the DST.

d. Implementation: In this stage, the DST was introduced to experimental group. The duration of current DST is eighteen minutes. DST material consists of all Unit five subjects, while the control group was taught the fifth unit (we are going to the bird park) by traditional way. The pre-test and post-test was conducted in the first semester of academic year 2017-2018.

Figure 1. Digital storytelling application

e. Evaluation: In this stage, the researcher can determine the impact of the DST on students’ achievement and their motivation toward learning English. Also the researcher conducts the evaluation throughout the achievement test and students’ motivation scale.

The external validity of DST was validated by groups of educational technology professors from various Jordanian universities. All their comments were taken in to researcher’s consideration. The researcher conducted DST on (20) students from population of study but out of the study’s sample in order to check the usability and the ease of use of DST by students. Moreover, the purpose of pilot study is that find the ambiguous themes which may be faced by students.

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RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS Result Related to the First Question“Are there significant differences in students’ academic achievement due to teaching method (traditional way- DST)”?To answer this question of the study means and standard deviations of students’ academic achievement based on teaching method (traditional way- DST), were computed as presented in tables 1.

Table 1. Descriptive analysis of students’ academic achievement scores due to teaching method (traditional way- DST)

Group Mean Std. Deviation N

DST 14.36 3.43 25

Traditional way 10.68 3.66 25

Total 12.52 3.97 50

Table 1 shows that the mean scores of academic achievement of students in experimental group (M= 14.36, SD= 3.43) were higher than students’ scores in traditional group (M= 10.68, SD= 3.66), to find out whether there are statistical significant differences in these means.One way ANCOVA was conducted and the results are shown in tables 2.

Table 2. One way ANCOVA results of students’ academic achievement based on teaching method (traditional way & DST)

SourceType III Sum of

Squares Df Mean Square F Sig.Partial Eta Squared

PRE ach 4.248 1 4.248 .333 .566 .007

Method 169.602 1 169.602 13.309 .001 .221

Error 598.952 47 12.744

Corrected Total 772.480 49

Table 2 shows that there are statistically significant differences in students’ academic achievement between two groups in favor of DST F (1, 47) = 169.602, p = .001, partial eta squared = .221. This result may refer to a new strategy (DST) was designed in interesting way to attract students’ attentions, also the nature of students (sixth grade) at this age prefer playing games and watching stories and learning. Thus, what is interesting in this data is that DST reinforces all of that features, in addition it contributes in grasping students’ concentration, engaging students in given tasks and understanding ambiguous and abstract themes. All of these distinctive advantages of DST significantly had improved the students’ achievement in the experimental group who had been taught English language by using DST strategy. In accordance with the present results, previous studies have demonstrated that Yang Wu (2012) study, in which all have indicated that using DST in learning English language could enhance students’ performance. Finally, the result of the current study is in consistency with Kotluk & Kocakaya (2017) study. It also has a positive correlation with Tahriri, Tous & Movahedfar (2015) study. We can explain the results of current study that the students learn English language any time and any place by using DST; because of the teachers distributed DST CD into students. In this case, we notice that this strategy fill the gap between theory and practice. Those finding consisting with Atkas and Yurt (2017) study which is indicated DST had significant impact on academic achievement of students in Turkish literature course.

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Result Related to the Second Question“Are there significant differences in students’ motivation toward learning English language due to teaching method (traditional way- DST)”?To answer this question of the study; means and standard deviations of students’ motivation towards learning English language based on teaching method (traditional way / DST), were computed as presented in table 3.

Table 3. Descriptive analysis of students’ motivation towards learning English language based on teaching method (traditional way- DST)

Group Mean Std. Deviation N

DST 4.19 .403 25

traditional way 3.09 .473 25

Total 3.64 .706 50

Table 3 shows that the mean scores of students’ motivation in experimental group (M= 4.19, SD= .403) were higher than students’ motivation scores in traditional group (M= 3.09, SD= .473), to find out whether there are statistical significant differences in these means.One way ANCOVA was conducted and the results are shown in tables 4.

Table 4. One way ANCOVA results of students’ motivation toward learning English language due to teaching method (traditional way / DST)

Source Type III Sum of Squares Df Mean Square F Sig. Partial Eta

Squared

pre attitudes .309 1 .309 1.623 .209 .033

GROUP 14.893 1 14.893 78.199 .000 .625

Error 8.951 47 .190

Corrected Total 24.440 49

Table 4 shows that there are statistically significant differences in students’ motivation toward learning English language between two groups in favor of DST F (1, 47) = 78.199, p = .000, partial eta squared = .625. This result it may refer to that DST strategy enhances the interaction between students and teachers and between students themselves. It also supports the communication skills of the students. This can be explained that DST strategy gives the students the opportunities to express their opinions and summarize the story using their own language. There was a significant positive correlation between using the DST method and the students’ progress. Therefore, this kind of learning motivate the experimental group students to learn English in motivated way in comparison with control group students who had been taught English language in conventional way, traditional way, or face-to-face teaching method. Data from this table can be compared with the data in previous literature (Bredvick, 2016; Kasami, 2017; Shernoff et al., 2003) which revealed that integrating DST in the learning and teaching process give students a high motivation to learn English language. Finally, the findings observed in this study mirror those of the previous studies that have examined the students’ motivation towards the DST. This is may refer to that students around the world prefer to learn by fun such as video and DST. This is clear in previous studies (Connie, 2017; Ivala et al., 2013) which revealed that motivation is key and crucial factor in learning English language.

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CONCLUSION One of the most significant findings to emerge from this study is that DST strategy is commonly used in modern schools. it also showed that DST simulates and imitates students’ learning styles. In Fact, DST is an ideal way for presenting new, ambiguous, and abstract content.Thus, it is recommended as a meaningful tool to teach English language for foreign students especially in primary stage. These results explained up important insights into the significant role of DST in enhancing Students’ ability in learning English. In fact, DST blended multimedia together in order to produce useful story for the students, its duration is eighteen minutes approximately. Learning based on multimedia attract more senses compare with traditional learning, learning content through multimedia (DST) helps students to preserve and remember information easily. In other words, presenting the content as story is an interesting and enjoying technique which makes students more active, motivated and attractive to learn English language. As in our study, the more surprising correlation is flowing up with the DST positive impact on students’ academic achievement in English language. Moreover, the most striking result to emerge from the data is that DST has a significant effect on the boosting students’ motivation towards learning English language. Finally, the study has gone some way towards enhancing our understanding to the importance implementation of DST in the entire educational system of our schools or at least partially substantiates the traditional way in teaching.

RECOMMENDATIONS Set of recommendations were presented according to the results of the study;

1. Integrating DST strategy in teaching and learning English language for the sixth grade.2. Although the current study is based on a small sample of participants, the findings suggest holding

intensive training courses in designing and using DST in classroom setting.3. Conducting more studies about the impact of DST on students’ achievement in other courses such as

mathematics and science.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORDr. Yousef ALJARAIDEH, is an Associate Professor in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in Education at Educational Sciences faculty, Jerash University. Dr. Aljaraideh gained his Ph.D. in Educational Technology at October, 2009 from University Utara Malaysia. His academic interest areas are learning ICT in Education, social network analysis, educational hypermedia and multimedia, Mobile Learning, open and distance learning, e-learning, and use of internet in education. Dr. Aljaraideh is a Director of Consulting Center at Jerash University, and He has over than 22 journal articles published in international indexes, and other national and international articles, 6 papers presented in international conferences

Dr. Yousef ALJARAIDEHDepartment of Curriculum and Instruction, Faculty of Educational sciencesAddress: Jerash University, 26150, Jerash, JordanPhone: 0096226350521E-mail: yacob_yacob@yahoo.com

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RE-DESIGNING THE DESIGN BRIEF AS A DIGITAL LEARNING TOOL WITH PARTICIPATORY DESIGN APPROACH

Dr. Duysal DEMIRBASORCID: 0000-0003-1130-1469

Faculty of Architecture and DesignEskisehir Technical University

Eskisehir, TURKEY

Dr. Sebnem TIMUR OGUTORCID: 0000-0003-2919-7364

Faculty of ArchitectureIstanbul Technical University

Istanbul, TURKEY

Received: 19/05/2019 Accepted: 26/08/2019

ABSTRACTToday, industrial design education is faced with a new group of students who have met daily life technologies from a very early age. The transformations in educational environments are becoming more and more important for project-based and student-centered design education model. Understanding the needs and expectations of the changing student profile has become essential for design education, which puts new and original outputs as the main objective. Students’ expectations of having a say in their own learning environments also provide an important opportunity for them to play an active role in the focus of this change. The aim of this study is to determine the design criteria of a new learning tool in line with the needs and expectations of the new generation industrial design students with a student-oriented approach. Participatory Design workshops were organized to expose expectations of the current learners about a new Design Brief in a digital and online medium. In this qualitative study conducted with participatory design method, gamification elements were used to increase students’ motivation, interest, and participation. Design criteria for a new generation design brief have been introduced with participatory design method. All suggestions were found to indicate a more interactive structure depending on the variable and cyclical structure of the design.

Keywords: Design education, new millennium learners, participatory design, design brief, gamification.

INTRODUCTION It has become more and more important to determine the expectations and needs of a new generation that has experienced daily life technologies since the early ages in new educational environments. While Pedro (2009)defines this generation as New Millennium Learners, he draws attention to the fact that these students have different expectations, needs and characteristics than previous generations. It is seen that the use of technological facilities frequently in educational environments changes/ transforms the way we transfer of course contents and the tools and environments used in lessons. This rapid change also necessitates the systematic management of the learning. In design education, which is based on a project-based learning model, the intersection of learning management and project management is becoming more and more difficult for design education. It is seen that there is an attempt to use “Design Brief ” as learning management tools in design education (Demirbas & Timur Ogut, 2018). Design Brief is a printed document that consists of the project’s theme and basic information about how the process will be handled. Phillips (2004) refers to Design Brief as an explanation of the project scope. Considering the habits of New Millenium Learners; using mobile technologies such as smartphones, tablets and tablet PCs, it is becoming increasingly important for this document to be in an environment that is instantly accessible, shareable and even rearrangeable.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 7

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In parallel with this change and transformation in learning environments, the industrial design discipline is also repositioning itself as a discipline in which multiple fields work together (ICSID, 2015)In this transformation, the actors of the design process are actively involved in processes that vary from designer to end-user. In terms of occupation, the involvement of people from different fields in the design process is considered as an element enriching the process. While the tools used in these environments in design education are often designed by academics, it is seen that the students who are the end-users are not involved as decision-makers and stakeholders in the design process of these tools. Especially in recent years, both the transformation of the definition of the profession and the transformations of the student characteristics, expectations and needs (Pedro, 2006) point to the need for a new generation education environment (Prensky, 2001).In this study, we will share the results of a Participatory Design workshop which aims to reveal the needs and expectations of the new generation learners through the “design brief ” which is used as a basic tool to share the project subjects with students and which includes and determines the basic elements of the process in industrial design education.The aim of this study is to set out the basic criteria for a new generation brief to be used in design education with Participatory Design methods and tools. Findings will be presented under the titles of content and formal suggestions as components that can guide a new generation of “design brief ”.

LITERATURE REVIEWDesign BriefDesign studio courses in Industrial Design education are handled within a learning-centered approach with a project-based learning model that will form the basis of design education. The “Design Brief ”, which includes sections such as project prospects, purpose and scope, process expectations, evaluation criteria and working schedule, is one of the key components of this process (Jones & Askland, 2012; Ryd, 2004) The Design Brief in an educational context has two intended users: an academician who prepares the document and the student who takes this brief. The strategic differences between teaching and learning processes also change and differentiate the way these two stakeholders use the Design Brief (Demirbas & Timur Ogut, 2018). With this document, the academicians tell the students how the expectations and process will be handled and the students can act accordingly by being informed about the criteria and time planning for the project. In-studio education, the Design Brief is very important in terms of being the first step of the project process. Not only does it starts the process which the students and project coordinator will work together, but it also includes the steps with which the process will be carried out. As expressed by Philips, despite its various names, the brief is essentially a description of the scope of the project; it is a document that identifies the calendar of the project, the quality of the resulting product, and helps to control the project and decision process (Phillips, 2004)It is seen that students’ relations with the Design Brief are becoming weaker and not used in the way that they are predicted. In Design Education, it may be difficult for a design brief to meet expectations in the process depending on its current structure(paper-based and rigid) while transferring both the content of a project theme and the management role (Demirbas & Timur Ogut, 2018). Lawson (2005)states that the traditional design process should begin with the preparation of the design brief and defines this document as a “start”. However, Nina Ryded (2004)draws attention to the fact that the design brief should be treated as an information process which develops gradually rather than being well prepared at the very first stages. This viewpoint offers significant potential for meeting the expectations of new millennium learners to use the tools in learning environments in a more interactive way.

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Participatory DesignHow, in the design process, rather than the product itself, users started to come to the forefront, while in the learning environments, the shifting role of learners to the center is fed by the same paradigm shift; a more democratic participatory approach.Participatory Design is defined as non-designers and designers contact with any product or system working together in the design process(Sanders, Brandt, & Binder, 2010). The Participatory Design expresses, in the shortest sense, an approach to the right of persons to be influenced by the results of a design to have a say in the design (Manzini & Rizzo, 2011). In this context, we can say that opportunities offered by Participatory Design in the professional field, should also be evaluated in design education. Participatory Design is also defined as a collective process where designers, users, and other stakeholders often come together through workshops (Hussain, Sanders, & Steinert, 2012)In the discussion of whether the Participatory Design is a method or an approach, Spinuzzi (2005) treats Participatory Design as a methodology with its own methods and tools, not as an approach, and says that “Participatory Design is research”. While the Participatory Design is not different from social science research procedures as a research approach, it is similar in terms of other qualitative research approaches and methods and tools (Bergold & Thomas, 2012). In the participatory design, the users, ie the participants, are found as experts of their experience (Bedir Eristi, 2017; Visser, Stappers, van der Lugt, & Sanders, 2005). While the involvement of learners in the design processes of the learning environment is possible through Participatory Design methods and tools, this approach not only contributes to meeting the needs but also contributes to the understanding of learning processes (DiSalvo, Yip, Bonsignore, & DiSalvo, 2017)Workshops are also an important tool for informing people about the current problem and sharing and visualizing their ideas and values among design-solution proposals(Ahn, 2007). The importance of workshops in terms of Participatory Design is often explained by the fact that participating actors become part of the design social process (Luck, 2003a), actively participating in the discussion, debate and decision of the (Luck, 2003b; Malinverni, Mora-Guiard, & Pares, 2016; van Manen, Avard, & Martínez-Cruz, 2015) The learners, who are one of the two users of the brief, assume a participatory role as non-designer of a brief, though they are only using the brief as they never took an active part in the design process.

GamificationGamification has been defined as a set of philosophies and methods aimed at making these activities more effective and useful by using the concepts and actions associated with playing games within activities outside the game context (Hamari, 2013; Muntean, 2011; Sierra, 2013). Karl Kapp (2012) defines Gamification as “the use of game-based mechanics, aesthetics, and game thinking” to motivate people to connect, to motivate them to take action, to encourage learning and to solve problems.Kevin Werbach(2015)discussed all the elements of gamification in three dimensions as Dynamics, Mechanics, and Components under the title of “Gamification Toolkit”. Yilmaz (2015) details the three-dimensional structure of Kevin Werbach and lists the elements of all dimensions as follows.

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Gamification ElementsAvatar Challenge RelationsAchievements Player level Collecting resourcesFighting Award EarningsTeam Rewarding Winning statusInteractions Score CollectionsFeedback Badges RulesMissions Virtual Savings - Money Leadership chartGoals Freedom of choice TeamworkStorytelling Turn CompetitionOpen content Social Graph Luck factorProgress level

Figure 1. Gamification elements

Simulation of real-life environments in-game environments is very important in terms of enabling the new generation to take risks to the trial-error path in these environments, to be more courageous in decision making, and to enable problem-solving skills to be developed through repeated attempts in different environments (Kapp, 2012)(Klopfer, Osterweil, Groff, & Haas, 2009). The full evaluation of the gamified learning environments, which are seen as an important tool in the development of skills such as creative thinking and problem solving, will enable us to explore common themes that may be used in meeting the objectives of the design studio courses.While gamification can be used as a research method by itself as an environment in which the participant participates actively and in-depth data is obtained (Bedir Eristi, 2017) it has been used as an element related to the tool kit in conducting Participatory Design workshops in this research. Gamification has also been chosen as a tool in accordance with the conceptual framework of the research to determine the approach to be used in delivering and communicating the content to be produced in an online environment. The aim of this study is not to obtain a gamified online brief, but to reveal the expectations and suggestions of the learners for a brand new design brief in an online medium.

METHODOLOGYThis study aims to reveal the expectations and needs of the new generation students in reconstructing the design brief as a digital learning management tool. In accordance with a student-centered approach, to re-design the Design Brief, not for learners but with them, Participatory Design has been implemented to provide a basic model for this study. The “gamification” approach has been used as an element that motivates participants to reveal the expectations and needs of new millennium learners who have been familiar with digital games and gamified mediums since early ages.The qualitative research process was carried out with the Participatory Design approach to reveal critical design principles of a new learning tool for new generation industrial product design students to be used in design studio courses with a learning-centered view. The importance of Participatory Design approach in this study is allowing the researcher to use special methods and tools in his / her research focusing on design problems related to learning environments. Participatory Design workshops were organized to expose expectations of the current learners about the creation and sharing of the Design Brief in a digital and online medium.A Participatory Design workshop titled “Brief Re-Edited With Gamification Elements ” has been carried out between 21-23 September 2016. A total of 11 students from different universities attended the workshop which was held within the scope of “National Design Research Conference (UTAK) organized by the Faculty of Architecture at METU.Gamification approach has been used as a tool to bring out and also to help express the expectations, needs, and recommendations of new generation industrial product design students. In order to determine the priority criteria of a new generation learning tool suitable for the interactive and dynamic structure of the

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design process, the game mechanics and components experienced by the students from early ages have been used. Suggestions for the design of a tool that students will use were presented with the help of basic concepts and items used in gamified applications.

Participants The call for participation in the workshop has been shared with the students via the conference website. In parallel, a poster was prepared to be shared on social media and shared through the researcher’s personal social media account. In the Participatory Design approach, the contribution of the various stakeholders in the domain of the problem to be solved is expected in the solution process, but it is not possible to include all of the contributors in the process (Menconi, Grohmann, & Mancinelli, 2017). As the research is designed to reveal the expectations and needs of the current design students, participants have been identified as graduate students studying in industrial design in Turkey. Within the framework of the potential contribution of needs and expectations of students that are expected to be unveiled at the workshop for a new brief the most basic criterion was to take the “Design Studio” courses to attend Participatory Design workshop.After the participant list of the workshop was shared by the organizing committee, a Facebook event page was used to invite the participants. Brief information about the workshop and the communication information of the workshop executives are shared on the page. A short informative text and a list of required materials were shared with the e-mail addresses of all participants in the workshop attendance lists and the workshop

Data Collection and Analysis Video and photo-shootings were used in the workshop documentation. The interviews of the participants along the presentation of design proposals were recorded as a video with permission from the participants. (Buur, Binder, & Brandt, 2000; Malinverni et al., 2016) Poster presentations, oral presentations, and discussions were used to gather data.During the workshop and during the presentation of the design proposals that emerged as a result of the workshop, video recording was taken. A content analysis method was used to examine the relation of each group with the design proposal and the proposal of the expressions used in the presentations.

The Toolkit Development Process for a Participatory Workshop A toolkit was developed for the Participatory Design workshop. The key features of the new millennium learners have been considered in the design of the kit. “When developing tools to be used in the workshop, the design process must be simplified as in a design process guide, providing a participant role-level that the project participants can manage, and more diverse and sensitive items”(Ahn, 200). A special toolkit has been designed for diversity and precision in increasing participation and motivation. In the design of toolkits, cards and items printed in the A4 format were used.In the Participatory Design process, card usage has a wide usage potential in terms of ease of use and ease of production (van den Hoven, Vermaas, & van de Poel, 2015) While Wolfel and Merrit( 2013) (2013) classified the cards used in the design process divided in three;

1. General-purpose2. Customizable cards and3. Specific content-specific cards

It seems that customizable cards contain guidelines that describe how non-designers use cards in participant design processes (van den Hoven et al., 2015), as participants can add new cards and change cards(Wolfel & Merritt, 2013). The cards are also used for different purposes such as idea generation, inspiration, participation, empathy and to overcome the problems that arise in a design process(Wolfel & Merritt, 2013).In designing the cards to be used in this workshop, both a customizable card and a specific content card design approach have been used. In the design of cards, the “gamification approach” which is frequently used especially for the new generation learners.

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The gamification themed cards used in the workshop were used as a tool to enable students to discover and express their needs and expectations.

Gamification Card Set Design

The tool kit used in the workshop consists of card decks and a design brief. Elements brought together as Gamification toolkit for cards are divided into categories by being categorized by the same headings. There are 40 cards on each card deck. 3 of them contain general contents, 31 of them contain Gamification elements. There are 6 blank cards on each deck.The Design Brief, which is used as the most common tool of transferring the project theme in industrial design departments, has been prepared specifically for use in this workshop by using existing design brief templates (, 2010), in accordance with the learning outcomes of the Product Design IV course in the fourth spring semester of Anadolu University undergraduate programs (“Akademik Dersler - Tanitim,” n.d.).The brief titled “Cooking Unit” consists of 3 pages in total A4 format. The brief was distributed in print as a participant.

Execution of Workshop The workshop was conducted at the METU Faculty of Architecture where the conference took place. The four-session workshop lasted four hours in total.

Part One

The first 30 minutes of the workshop were devoted to informing the participants about the meeting and the workshop. Information on the participants of the workshop, the purpose of the participant design workshop and the use of the data to be obtained from the workshop were shared with the students. A presentation (powerpoint) on basic concepts and items related to Gamification has been made with regard to the card set used in the workshop. A presentation was made for each card, explanation, and examples of the role of the concepts in gamification are shared.Participants were grouped by the workshop organizers. The first reason for the participants’ working as a group is to prevent the close friendship relations of the students from the same university and class to the workshop to create a communication environment that can prevent their subjectivity at the point of expressing individual decision and recommendation in group work. Secondly, to encourage the emergence of new and different ideas as a result of group interaction and group dynamics of participants from different educational environments (Cokluk, Yilmaz, & Oguz, 2011)

Picture 1. Information presentation about the workshop

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Cards previously prepared, containing gamification items were distributed to the students and explanations were made for the use of each item (Picture 1)

Picture 2. Set of cards distributed to the participants

Part Two

The printed “design brief ” specially prepared for this workshop which is eligible for 3rd-grade students was distributed. The students were given 10 minutes to review the “brief ”. After this step, it is required to redesign the “brief ” which is given in print with the Gamification cards present in the hands of the groups in the direction of their expectations and preferences. Participants were given blank cards so that their cards could reflect their own items. In the poster presentation, the students benefited from gamification cards and printed brief by cut-and-paste technique.

Picture 3. Sharing the printed brief with participants

Part Three

Students are asked to discuss how to recreate a new generation of the design brief with different media and tools. In this direction, students were asked to prepare a poster with a size of 50 * 70 cm, expressing how a “brief ” with their own preferences and anticipations should be conveyed in the delivery of project topics using gamification elements. The purpose of this poster session is defined as not to present itself as a design brief, but to highlight in which parts of the brief and for what purpose the Gamification elements are used.

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When students prepare their posters, they have cut and redesigned the cards distributed to them. They used the images and texts contained in the cards separately. They have resized the cards to include only the title of visual and short description. There are no restrictions on the tools to be used in the preparation of the posters.

Picture 4. Poster preparation of students

Part Four

Students share oral presentations of posters they have prepared with other groups. During the presentation of each group, discussions have been held on the use/relevance of brief proposal and gamification elements with the participation of all students and executives involved in the workshop.

Picture 5. Presentations of student groups

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FINDINGSIn the following table, the principles that help us frame the design proposals for each group are shared due to video recordings, the workshop process and the notes taken by the project team during the presentation.

Table 1. Use of Gamification elements in Groups

Gamification Elements GROUP 1 GROUP 2 GROUP 3 TOTAL

1: Avatar 0 0 1 1

2: Achievements 0 0 0 0

3: Fighting 0 0 0 0

4: Team 0 1 0 1

5: Interactions 1 1 1 3

6: Feedback 1 1 0 2

7: Missions 1 1 1 3

8: Goals 1 1 1 3

9: Storytelling 0 0 0 0

10: Open content 0 1 0 1

11: Progress level 1 1 1 3

12: Relations 1 1 1 3

13: Collecting resources 0 1 0 1

14: Earnings 1 1 0 2

15: Winning status 0 1 1 2

16: Collections 0 1 0 1

17: Rules 0 0 1 1

18: Leadership chart 0 1 0 1

19: Challenge 0 0 0 0

20: Player level 0 0 0 0

21: Award 0 0 0 0

22: Rewarding 1 0 0 1

22: Score 1 0 1 2

24: Badges 1 0 0 1

25: Virtual Savings - Money 0 1 0 1

26: Freedom of choice 0 0 0 0

27: Turn (turn) 0 0 0 0

28: Social Graph 1 0 0 1

29: Luck factor 0 0 1 1

30: Teamwork 0 0 0 0

31: Competition 0 0 0 0

Group 1A total of 3 students participated in this group. In the first group, a total of 11 conceptions of Gamification have been used.

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Figure 2. First group poster presentation

The group expressed the most important problem in the studio as time planning:

“The start and finish date is a big prelude to us.... what task we have to complete in the design process while we are going on ... what we would have achieved if we completed this task ...”.

In the Brief Proposal, the things to be shared or delivered at the course hours in the work calendar section is referred to as “tasks” by the students. In relation to this, the expectation is that there should be a provision that can be obtained when the task is completed. The students cut the phases of the design process, which is divided into weekly work schedules, one by one and put them on top of each other, and they re-constructed that part as a printed standalone item to carry with them (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Separation of work calendar from a brief

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One of the suggestions for the project courses was that the academicians should explain the expectations by visual examples and share them in the digital environment. A similar expectation was expressed as the need to explain the issue when starting the project:

“Small visuals can be used to explain the project like small keywords”.The first group has been a proposal to share the resources that have been reached within the frame of individual or group researches made on the project subjects on a common digital platform. This recommendation is expressed using interaction and relationship elements (Figure 2). Instead of sharing the printed and printed resources, students have set criteria for digital accessibility and visual support. They stated that they expect to reach the samples or sources through the online links which will be shared through these environments.

“We do not go and search at the library, we do not read those books a lot, we all aim to provide access to most things via digital media”.

Another student supported this expression as follows:

“if the sources are shared on paper we never type those letters one by one online, we do not look at it at all”

One of the basic expectations of the students is ensuring their design processes to be followed by academicians and immediate and continuous feedback on their learning situation. Students recommend a badged to be obtained if they complete the stages of the design process on a weekly basis in the studio and to be encouraged to express what they have been feeling to be doing or completing something. They express that feeling something like “completing” is an important source of motivation in the process.One of the prominent expectations come out of the poster presentations and oral presentations are more visual elements to be used in briefs. The group spokesman stated this expectation: “The briefs can be visualized a little bit more… as briefs come out of the same formats … like always black and white.....not in the classic A4 format, the brief can be different. It is seen that the use of visual elements for sharing the sources and examples is a visual expectancy for a new brief format, and the use of more visual elements in the writing-oriented briefs is an expectation for style.

Group TwoA total of 4 students participated in this group. In the second group, a total of 17 concepts of gamification were used.

Figure 4. Second group poster presentation

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One of the important and interesting findings of the workshop is that this group defines as “hacking the brief ”( in accordance with the new language of its own generation) , that they vigilantly construct the design process due to the expected outcome of the process when all stages are shared at the same time on the design brief. As a result, the group, who thinks that they do not pass the design steps as efficiently as they would like to arrive fast, suggest that the briefing should be shared in turn by sharing the information of each step by dividing them under the titles of analysis, synthesis, and creation. The group stated that the resources should also be shared in order according to these stages, which is a limiting effect on the process.

Figure 5. Hacking Brief

Group students expressed the basic expectation and proposal that the brief should take place in a digital environment. They have defined the advantages of the digital environment as the opportunity to reorganize and customize the brief.They expressed the possibility of preparing individual programs in the work schedule as a result of sharing the Brief in a re-editable format or environment according to the expectations and needs of the students;

“We’re fragmenting the brief, after that, you can create your own calendar. For example, let’s say a student wrote his design phases, he will click on it if he/he complete, the system will remind like; “you have 3 days left” if he/she didn’t complete. That reminder will always come like; you don’t complete, complete... Not after everything is over, but in the process. “

Students have used the Achievements, Progressive Level, Freedom of Choice, Feedback, Mission and Goal cards in the personalized working calendar proposals.

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Figure 6. Personalized working calendar proposal

One of the important design proposals of the students has been a digital platform for the sharing of both personal work and general resources and documents related to the project. Digital medium examples like Pinterest, Google Drive, or social media accounts, where content is produced and shared are used to define the usage scenario of this new environment, as well as the Analysis and synthesis steps of the design process, have been prioritized. This expectation was expressed in a poster presentation using the Communication, Interaction, and Team Work cards together.The group has used “hashtags”, for shares to be made on this proposed digital platform, as represented by square marks (#) in social media accounts or messages in a specific context. Also, in these proposals, (again with the usage of their own generations of specific language/jargon) if the shares reach a numerically specific target, they defined the badges to be earned depending on the share type as items motivating the process and motivating the students. The winning status, Virtual Savings, Rewarding-Rewards, Collections and Leadership Table cards, which are targeted to establish interaction based on sharing, are used. The Competition card emerges as a particularly coveted element of being used in all of the group’s proposals

Group ThreeA total of 4 students participated in this group. In the third group, a total of 11 concepts of gamification were used.

Figure 7. Third group poster presentation

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The third group started their presentation by saying the brief has become a personal tool for each of the students, a not for general use in the studio after it has been shared by academicians. The group spokesman stated this situation as follows;

“We started out from this point; brief is coming out of you and it comes to us, then it becomes ours... Here we are thinking of a persona… I could now write my notes here and it should be mine “.

Despite the absence of an oral expression or visual element, the drawing on the presentation poster has been treated as an Avatar item. Students define the classes in the design education as “levels” and position them next to the personal visuals to visually express the studio lessons that the student has taken during his undergraduate studies and how much more project lessons he or she should take.

Figure 8. Customizable brief proposal with Avatar Card.

As regards the personalization of the Brief, the brief has been redesigned as a printed tool in which students can take notes associated with the course and create their own work plans during the course weeks. The students expressed these proposals as follows:

“Since Brief is ours now, we can use it as a notebook; to write down things came to our mind at that moment ... because we are underlining the words, we draw arrows on the edges of the paper. We take notes like I should do these this week or I have done that according to the weekly plan, take notes of important information we heard from the academician. We turned brief to a position that we always carry with.”

Students have explained the main purpose of this proposal as a learner’s ability to create his own work schedule and visualization of the progress of the process as a whole.They used the card representing the Winning Status after the last week of the project in the working calendar. They have supported the work calendar with visual elements that will include the labels to be given as a result of the completion of the steps by the academicians. The students expressed the ultimate goal of these proposals:

“I need to see for self, like yes it is over...”. Students expressed the proposals for the reorganization of the Brief, which include scope, purpose and other items, while editing schedule with personalizable areas as follows; “Not just to carry a paper, not just a paper, it can be something we can draw, we can write, we can take note of everything from week to week, something we can see our levels,”

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Figure 9. Students’ visual work calendar proposal

In the verbal discussion part, the students stated that all these elements used for brief proposals are a result of the requests to be followed by academicians in the process. One of the students stated that if the processes were not followed up, the process became complicated and the work to be done started to accumulate

DISCUSSIONS AND CONCLUSION As stated in the previous sections, the aim of the workshop is not to design a new brief but to determine the expectations and needs of the incoming industrial design students based on the students’ recommendations. This study, therefore, contributed to closing the gap in the current literature by focusing on exploring students’ expectations and needs for the use of a digital and online learning tool in a special field such as design education while the literature generally focused on the testing of systems and applications designed in accordance with predetermined needs and expectations. As one of the important conclusions of Cook-Sather’s research (2014), participatory design processes have helped students explore different perspectives on their own learning experiences and explore the needs they had not previously been aware of.The Gamification cards used in the workshop were used as a tool to enable students to discover and express their needs and expectations. The analysis of the students’ poster presentations and the data obtained from the oral presentation and discussion sections were expressed in 9 different codes under the theme of expectations from the brief. The distribution of students’ expectations in groups is presented in Table 2.

Table 2. Students’ expectations from a brief

FREQUENCYTHEME CODES GROUP1 GR0UP2 GR0UP3

Expectations from brief

Portable transport 1 0 1To be placed in a digital environment 2 3 0Use of visual elements 4 0 1Make it possible for students to feel progress 1 1 2Personalization 0 2 1Notification of learning status 1 0 1Allowing you to control the learning process 0 1 1Examples sharing 2 1 0Visualization of the phases of the design process 0 0 1

It seems that one of the basic expectations of the students is personalization. The personalization recommendation is expressed as leaving areas for the students to organize and change in the brief in line with their expectations and needs, as well as to make personal notes. The reorganization expectation is shared regarding the working calendar. Parallel to the stages of the design process shared by the academicians it is possible to create a work schedule in which students can place their own sub-goals. This finding is consistent with the findings of other studies which reported that personalized learning is one the key factors guiding

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basic needs and expectations of new generation learners in online learning environments (Afacan, 2018; Pektas & Gurel, 2014). The design proposal of the two groups has been related to the sharing of the brief in the digital environment. They have defined the advantages of the digital environment as the opportunity to reorganize and customize the brief. In addition to the fact that the work schedule can be rearranged by the students, sharing becomes an important theme. The concept of sharing in the studio has been expressed in two different dimensions as sharing the resources that students have reached during the research process among themselves, sharing the sample images or documents related with the project by the academicians. Referring to the proposal for sharing resources by two of three groups it is understood that sharing during the early phases of design which expressed with different names like analysis-synthesis as a research phase, there is a belief that will have a positive impact on the design process. The possibility of accessing the resources contained in brief online was expressed as a very positive option by the students. This finding supports the finding reported by Pektas and Gurel (2014).We can also consider the visual expectation of the students in the briefs in two dimensions; the shared resources or examples shared with them are expected to contain more visual elements, and the second relates to the use of more graphic elements or visuals with text on brief. This finding is parallel to Pektas and Gurel’s research ( 2014) that revealed visual expectations of students in their LMS practice which the authors associate with the importance of “visual thinking” in design.When we look at the expectations of learners in terms of learning management, it has been seen that expectations for visualization of the process immediately followed by a personalized work schedule proposal. The visual expression of situations related to learning, which is expressed by students as progressing, completing stages, or performing tasks, has been treated as a demand to follow their own learning processes.The design education system continues to be accepted as an education system where face-to-face communication and hard copy printouts are used extensively in the studio. In the study, it was found that the idea of having the design brief in a digital environment motivates students to discover and express their special needs as well as physical interactions in the studio. This finding is consistent with the findings of other studies in related literature which reported the positive effects of the dualistic relationship between physical and virtual learning environments. (Afacan, 2018; Vignati, Fois, Melazzini, Pei, & Zurlo, 2017).

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSDr. Duysal DEMIRBAS, works as research assistant at Eskisehir Technical University, Faculty of Architecture and Design, Department of Industrial Design. Dr. Duysal Demirbas had her doctoral degree in Industrial Product Design from Faculty of Architecture, Istanbul Technical University at 2018. Her research areas include design research, design education,furniture design and R&D through university-industry projects.

Duysal DEMIRBASDepartment of Industrial Design, Faculty of Architecture and Design,Address: Eskisehir Technical University, Iki Eylul Campus, 26555, Eskisehir, TURKEYPhone: + 90 222 321 35 50 E-mail: dtutuncu@eskisehir.edu.tr

Dr. Sebnem TIMUR OGUT, is a Professor at Istanbul Technical University, Faculty of Architecture, Department of Industrial Product Design. Her research interests focus on industrial design, graphic design, design theories, design methods, semiotics, material and visual culture studies, ethnography and objects as cultural facts.

Sebnem TIMUR OGUTDepartment of Industrial Product Design, Faculty of ArchitectureAddress: Istanbul Technical University, 34437, Istanbul, TURKEYPhone: + 90 212 293 13 00 / 2303 E-mail: timurseb@itu.edu.tr

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ENGAGEMENT IN DISTANCE EDUCATION SETTINGS: A TREND ANALYSIS

Ayse BAGRIACIK YILMAZORCID: 0000-0002-9971-2440

Department of Computer Education and Instructional TechnologiesAydin Adnan Menderes University

Aydin, TURKEY

Dr. Phil BANYARDORCID: 0000-0003-2527-0755

School of Social SciencesNottingham Trent University

Nottingham, UK

Received: 18/10/2018 Accepted: 18/02/2019

ABSTRACTThis study examined studies focusing on student engagement in distance education using a trend analysis technique. 154 studies published in web of science database were included in the study. Analysis showed that there is an increasing effort to understand student engagement. Researchers are mostly focusing on instructional design and educational technology. More effort is needed in the area of distance education systems and theories. The findings offer support for Chickering and Gamson’s Seven Principles of Good Practice as important in promoting student engagement in distance education. However, six new components were added to these principles: media properties, student characteristics, teaching method, course/content design, innovative techniques, and instructor competencies.

Keywords: Student engagement, online education, distance education, seven principles of good practice, systematic review.

INTRODUCTIONDistance education, which has started its journey as correspondence learning, now has a variety of forms such as web based, online, blended, ubiquitous, mobile and e-learning, and all these terms are used interchangeably (Karatas, Bagriacik-Yilmaz, Dikmen, Ermis, & Gurbuz, 2017). Regardless of how it is named, distance education has become an essential component of higher education (Bernat & Frailing, 2015; Toven-Lindsey, Rhoads, & Lozano, 2015). It is recognized in the literature that distance education has many opportunities and benefits. However, it is still necessary to question the quality of distance education to provide better learning experiences, and student engagement is one of the issues that needs to be questioned (Chen, Gonyea & Kuh, 2009).Student engagement is considered as an important component of learning environments and an important predictor of student retentions and success (Chen et al., 2008; Chickering & Gamson, 1987; Kuh, 2009; Herrington, Oliver, & Reeves, 2003; Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005). Engaging students is a challenging task both in face-to-face and distance education settings. Because the students are physically separated from the other students and instructor in distance education, it becomes more difficult to engage students (Bolliger & Halupa, 2018; Moore, Utschig et al., 2008). Currently, the studies focused on the factors that influence student engagement and the strategies to ensure student engagement in online learning/distance education are increasing (Ma, Han, Yang, & Cheng, 2015; Martin & Bolliger, 2018). Student engagement is defined as “the time and energy students devote to educationally sound activities inside and outside of the classroom, and the policies and practices that institutions use to induce students to take part in these activities” (Kuh, 2003). Similarly, according to the definition of the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE®, 2017) engagement is related to the amount of time and effort students

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 8

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committed to their studies and educational activities, and institutions’ effort to get students to participate in learning activities. Engagement was also considered as the frequency with which students participate in learning activities (Smith, Sheppard, Johnson, & Johnson, 2005).In the framework for student engagement named seven principles (SP) for good practice in undergraduate education, Chickering and Gamson (1987) stated that good college education should provide (1) student-faculty interaction, (2) student collaboration, (3) active learning, (4) prompt feedback, (5) time on task, (6) high expectations, and (7) respect for diverse talents and ways of learning. While this framework was created for face-to-face learning environments, in a follow-up study Chickering and Ehrmann (1996) argued how these principles are related to technology-enhanced learning environments. Furthermore, there are studies evaluating web-based distance learning environments (Graham, Cagiltay, Craner, Lim, & Duffy, 2000) or students’ perspectives about virtual classrooms (Cakiroglu, 2014) based on these principles. These principles are used as a base for the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), used to measure participation in Canada and the United States (NSSE, 2017).In the literature there are two theories that refer to engagement, the Theory of Engagement (Shneiderman, Alavi, Norman, & Borkowski, 1995), and Flow Theory (Csikszentmihalyi 1997). The balance between the degree of skill and the degree of challenge is the basis of Flow Theory. The flow experience occurs if the challenge level is neither too much higher nor too much lower than one’s skill level. If this balance is not provided, one can experience apathy, anxiety or relaxation (Csikszentmihalyi 1997). Shernoff, Csikszentmihalyi, Schneider and Shernoff (2003) suggest that the learning activities should be challenging and relevant, however they should allow learners to feel confident in their ability and control in their learning environment.Engagement Theory is a conceptual framework for technology-based learning and teaching. It was based on Kearsley and Shneiderman’s experiences. In this theory, it is emphasized that to increase engagement in learning environments, meaningful interaction with other students and worthwhile tasks are essential. The theory has three basic principles, relate, create and donate. The first principle is related to team efforts and collaboration which is also emphasized in SP (Chickering & Gamson, 1987). Second, one aims to make learning a creative and purposeful activity. The precious contributions made while learning help students to engage and this is the logic of the donate principle. This principle can be supported by authentic learning contexts (Kearsley & Shneiderman, 1998).Although no one of the frameworks or theories mention any types of engagement, it is possible to see a considerable number of studies (Hew, Huang, Chu, & Chiu, 2016; Northey, Bucic, Chylinski, & Govind, 2015; Pellas, 2014, Sun & Rueda, 2012) conducted based on the engagement types identified by Fredricks, Blumenfeld and Paris (2004). Engagement was considered as a multifaceted concept by the researchers. They have identified three types of engagement, behavioral, emotional and cognitive based on the previous studies on engagement. It is stressed that these engagement types are not isolated but interrelated concepts. Behavioral engagement is related to participating in academic and social/extracurricular activities while emotional engagement is about the positive and negative reactions to instructors, other students, academics and school. Cognitive engagement refers to the student’s thoughtfulness and willingness to complete learning tasks (Fredricks et al., 2004).As previously mentioned, engagement is an important concept both for face-to-face and distance education settings. Accordingly the number of the studies on student engagement in distance education settings is dramatically increasing. For instance, in Web of Science database while the number of articles which include the words distance education (and types of distance education), engagement and student/learner in its topic was 33 in 2011, it has increased to 135 in 2016. When it is considered the student dropout or attrition rates are higher in distance education than traditional education (Boston, Ice & Gibson, 2011; Boyle, Kwon, Ross & Simpson, 2010; Cochran, Campbell, Baker & Leeds, 2014; Simpson, 2013) and engagement is a key for the retention, it is not surprising that the number of studies about student engagement is increasing.Today, it is almost impossible to imagine a distance education system without an online component. And online learning has both opportunities and challenges to promote engagement (Tomas, Lasen, Field & Skamp, 2015). In online learning, students often need to be self-directed and engaged in their learning because they had no enough reinforcement and prompts from their instructor and the other students (Delen, Liew & Wilson, 2014). Student engagement and the effects of teachers’ behaviors on engagement are issues that attracts researchers’ attention (Ma et al., 2015).

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There is a growing body of research on engagement in distance education settings. Researchers are trying to find out the ways to increase engagement in these learning environments. Besides, there is a significant effort to determine the factors affecting student engagement. For instance, Carpenter, Reddix and Martin (2016) have examined the effects of Web 2.0 tools usage in blended education on students’ engagement and retention, and have reached positive results in terms of increasing engagement. Positive findings have also been reached in the studies using some specific Web 2.0 tools such as Wiki (Neumann & Hood, 2009; Snodgrass, 2011), Facebook (Maisonneuve, Chambe, Lorenzo, & Pelaccia, 2015; Northey et al., 2015), and podcast-vodcast (van Oordt & Mulder, 2016).In a study conducted by Matthews, Adrews and Adams (2011) to examine the role of social learning spaces on the student engagement, it was found that these spaces can contribute to enhance student engagement in blended learning environments. Similarly, Thoms and Eryilmaz (2014) compared the effects of online social network (OSN) and learning management system (LMS) on students’ opinions, and at the end of the study students stated that OSN provides higher engagement than LMS. It is possible to see some conflicting results in the literature. For instance, Park et al. (2015) found that whether the instructor is in the online discussion forum doesn’t affect student engagement. While the importance of encouragement by the instructor (Kuiper, Solomonides, & Hardy, 2015), instructor’s course preparation, guidance, assistance (Ma et al., 2015), and online participation and e-moderating skills (Armellini & Aiyegbayo, 2010) were emphasized as important components to promote student engagement. Acoording to a very recent study (Martin & Bolliger, 2018) learner-instructor engagement strategies were the most valuable one. Another contradiction can be seen in studies on discussion boards. In a study conducted by Fukuzava and Boyd (2016), it was stated that the discussion board had no effect on the engagement, however the positive effects of discussion boards on engagement were stressed in some studies (Sutherland, Howard, & Markauskaite, 2010; Mehvar, 2010; Xie, 2013).Engagement has been found to be related to or supported by various variables in the literature such as self-efficacy (Prior, Mazanov, Meacheam, Heaslip, & Hanson, 2016), tutoring styles (Chae & Shin, 2016), gamification (Hew, Huang, Chu, & Chiu, Tan & Hew, 2016), affect sensitive intelligent systems (Chen, Luo, Liu, Liu, Zhang, & Kolodziej, 2016), adaptive learning systems (Brinton, Rill, Ha, Chiang, Smith, & Ju, 2015), peer evaluation (Adwan, 2016), team based learning (Tsai, 2015), flexible flipped learning (Wanner & Palmer, 2015), self-determined learning (George-Walker & Keeffe, 2010), self-regulated learning (Conway, Johnson, & Ripley, 2010), problem based learning (Stebbings, Bagheri, Perrie, & Blyth, 2012), role play activities in virtual reality settings (Gregory & Masters, 2012), and blended learning (Lee, 2016; Leslie, Beverley, & Sian, 2015; Protsiv, Rosales-Klintz, Bwanga, Zwarenstein, & Atkin).As it can be seen, engagement has a complex structure and different studies reach different results about engagement. At this point, reviewing all these results from a holistic point of view will be helpful in understanding the concept of student engagement in depth. Such a review is important in terms of determining the trend of studies on student engagement. In this regard, the aim of this study is to examine the research studies conducted between 1970 and 2016 on student engagement in distance education settings. In accordance with this aim the following research questions were considered:

1. What is the distribution of studies concerning engagement in distance education according to the year of publication?

2. Which countries are the major contributors of the filed?3. What is the situation of authors’ collaboration in the field?4. What is the distribution of studies according to disciplines?5. What is the distribution of studies according to research areas?6. What are the sample sizes of the studies?7. Which research models are used?8. Which data collection tools are used?9. Which variables are influencing or related to engagement in distance education settings?10. Which theories are used to ground the studies?11. Which technologies are used?

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METHOD Research DesignThe aim of this study is to systematically examine the studies on engagement in distance education. This review is based on trend analysis technique. Trend analysis was based on descriptive analysis, one of the qualitative research methods. In the descriptive analysis technique, data are organized and interpreted according to previously devised categories (Yildirim & Simsek, 2013). In this study, an evaluation form created by the researchers was used. It is necessary to use inclusion and excluding criteria in order to select appropriate publications for the purpose of research when it is considered engagement has a popular and long history. The Web of Science database has been included in the review because it has high quality publications (Hung & Zhang, 2012). One of the reasons for the selection of this database is that it contains many well-known and leading magazines in the field of distance education (Zawacki & Richter, 2009) such as Open Learning (OL), Distance Education (DE), the American Journal of Distance Education (AJDE), the Journal of Distance Education (JDE), and the International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning (IRRODL). The search was based on the specified words, “distance education” or “distance learning” or “blended learning” or “blended education” or “mobile learning” or “mobile education” or “m-learning” or “e-learning” or “online learning” or “online education” or “ubiqitous learning” AND “engagement” or “engage” or “engaging” or “engaged” AND “student” or “learner”. In addition to the search words, criteria such as to be written in English, to be full text (not only abstract), and to be article (not proceedings, reports, thesis or books) were used. At the end of this search 553 articles have been reached. 22 articles can not be included in the study because they were not accessible from both researchers university database. Since only the Web of Science database is used, the number of duplicate articles is very small. After removing 22 inaccessible and 4 duplicate articles, a total of 527 articles remained. These 513 articles were examined based on inclusion and exclusion criteria which are explained below. Finally, 154 articles were remained after applying the criteria. The distribution of the articles by journals was given in Table 1.

Table 1. Distribution of the studies by journals

Journals f %

Computers & Education 11 7.14Australasian Journal of Educational Technology 10 6.49IRRODL 8 5.19Internet and Higher Education 7 4.55Computers in Human Behavior 6 3.90Distance Education 6 3.90American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education 6 3.90BMC Medical Education 5 3.25British Journal of Educational Technology 5 3.25Journal of Computer Assisted Learning 5 3.25Anatomical Sciences Education 4 2.60Higher Education Research & Development 4 2.60Educational Technology & Society 3 1.95

IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies 3 1.95

Journal Of Geography in Higher Education 3 1.95Educational Technology Research and Development 2 1.30Interactive Learning Environments 2 1.30New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia 2 1.30Nurse Education in Practice 2 1.30Other 60 38.96

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Data Collection Inclusion and Exclusion CriteriaThe articles to be included in the review were selected according to the specific inclusion and exclusion criteria. In order to be included in the study, the article must have reached a conclusion about the factors that affect or relate to engagement. Since the focus of this research is distance learning, studies that focus only on the use of a particular software for a short time in the class are not included in the research. In addition, literature review studies and the studies which made general interpretations only based on assumptions are also excluded.

ReliabilityIn order to ensure the reliability of the articles to be included in the review, 20 articles selected randomly from all the articles were examined by the two researchers according to the inclusion / exclusion criteria and disputes were resolved by discussing them. In addition, 20 randomly selected articles are coded by two encoders according to the evaluation form in order to ensure intercoder reliability. Cohen’s Kappa coefficient is used for intercoder reliability. Cohen’s Kappa was calculated as 0.67 in the first step. The two encoders then discussed and agreed on the differences and Cohen’s Kappa was set to 0.84 in the second calculation. 0.75 and above indicates that the reliability between the encoders is excellent (Landis & Koch, 1977).

ClassificationsClassification of Discipline

Subject disciplines were classified by using the classification method developed by Wu, Wu, Chen, Kao, Lin, and Huang (2012). Table 2 shows the classification of disciplines established by Wu et al. (2012), based on the studies of Franklin (1999) and Wanner, Lewis and Gregorio (1981).

Table 2. Disciplines and sub-disciplines used as a base in the classification of discipline

Discipline Sub-Discipline

Human Sciences History, languages and linguistics, literature, performing arts, philosophy, religion, visual arts

Social Sciences Anthropology, archaeology, area/regional studies, cultural and ethnic studies, economics, social studies, gender and sexuality studies, geography, politics, psychology and sociology

Natural Sciences Space sciences, earth sciences, life sciences, chemistry, physics

Formal Sciences Computer sciences, logic, maths, statistics and system sciences

Professional and Applied Sciences

Agriculture, architecture and design, business studies, theology, education, engineering, environmental studies and forestry, family and consumer sciences, health sciences, human physical performance and recreation studies, journalism, media studies and communication, law, library and museum studies, military sciences, public administration, social service and transportation

Classification of Method

The method classification was made by using a form created by Goktas et al. (2012). This classification framework was selected because it is detailed and clear. In this classification, methods are divided into four categories as quantitative, qualitative, mixed method similar to Creswell’s (2013) classification and literature review. Quantitative studies are separated into two sections as experimental (fully experimental, quasi-experimental, and weakly experimental and single-subject) and non-experimental (descriptive, comparative, correlational, screening, ex post facto, and secondary data analysis). Qualitative studies include culture analysis, case studies, grounded theory, critical study, case study, historical analysis and conceptual analysis. Mixed studies are separated into three sections as explanatory, exploratory and triangulation studies. The final category -literature reviews- involve meta-analysis and literature review. In the current study authors have added action research and design based research to the qualitative studies.

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Classification of Research Areas

In the study, the classification of research area was made by using a classification system developed by Zawacki & Richter (2009). In this classification there are 15 research areas which were organized into 3 broad categories. The main categories are macro level (Distance education systems and theories), meso level (Management, organization, and technology), and micro level (Teaching and learning in distance education). Macro level includes sub-categories named (1) access, equity, and ethics, (2) globalization of education and cross-cultural aspects, (3) distance teaching systems and institutions, (4) theories and models, and (5) Research methods in distance education and knowledge transfer. Meso level has seven sub-categories named (1) management and organization, (2) costs and benefits, (3) educational technology (4) innovation and change, (5) professional development and faculty support, (6) learner support services, and (7) quality assurance. Last category, micro level consists of (1) instructional design, (2) interaction and communication in learning communities, and (3) learner characteristics sub-categories.

FINDINGSDistribution of Studies by the Year of PublicationIn Web of Science database, the first study on student engagement in distance education was published in 1994. However, the first study that meets the inclusion and exclusion criteria of the current study was found in 2000.

1 1 1 1 2 2

7 8

1511 13 13

17

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2000 2002 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

Figure 1. Distribution by the year of publication

The number of studies have increased steadily since 2000 (Figure 1). There is a growing effort to determine the factors influencing or related to student engagement in distance education. It may related to the fact that engagement is an important variable to promote student retention in distance education (Tower, Walker, Wilson, Watson, & Tronoff, 2015), and distance education has become an essential component for the institutions (Bernat & Frailing, 2015; Toven-Lindsey, Rhoads, & Lozano, 2015).

Major Contributor Countries of the FieldFigures 2 and 3 present the major contributor countries of the field. The countries have less than 2 articles are gathered under the “other” category.

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62 2 2 3 3 3 4 5 5 6 8

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and China

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Figure 2. Publication frequencies based on first authors’ country

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Figure 3. Publication frequencies based on intervention country

The USA, UK and Australia are the major contributor countries (Figures 2 and 3). Similarly Karatas, Bagriacik Yilmaz, Dikmen, Ermis and Gurbuz (2017) have found that the USA, UK, Taiwan, and Australia are the major contributors. Furthermore these countries were determined as major contributors in mobile, ubiquitous and synchronous online learning studies (Hwang & Tsai, 2011; Hung & Zhang, 2012, Martin, Ahlgrim-Delzell, & Budhrani, 2017). It is surprising that Taiwan which is usually among the first three countries in distance studies ranks 6th. Another conspicuous point is that Turkey that has a distance mega-university (Anadolu University, 2017) has not shown the expected contribution.

Authors’ Collaboration TendenciesThe number of multiple-author studies are well ahead of the single author studies (Figure 4). The authors prefer to work in collaboration with their colleagues. Similar results were reached by Zawacki-Richter et al. (2009), Zawacki-Richter and von Prummer (2010), and Karatas et al. (2017). Zawacki-Richter et al. (2009) have found that the collaboration tendencies of the authors are increasing by years and they related this situation with emerging communication technologies. The collaboration between the authors may help to enrich the body of knowledge in the field. Besides, it is beneficial for the authors in terms of providing high impact publications (Costas & van Bocheve, 2012).

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Figure 4. Number of authors in the studies

Distribution of Studies According to DisciplinesThe disciplines were determined based on program that students are studying. Studies mostly focus on professional and applied sciences discipline (53.16%), followed by social sciences (8.42%), and formal sciences (6.84%) (see Table 3).

Table 3. Distribution of the studies according to disciplines

Disciplines Sub disciplines (f) Total f %

Professional and Applied Sciences

Health sciences (44), Education (22), Business studies (14), Engineering (11), Media studies and communication (3), Human physical performance and recreation studies (2), Library and museum studies (2), Journalism (1), Agriculture (1), Law (1)

101 53.16

Social sciencesSocial sciences (3), Economics (3), Anthropology (1)

Psychology and sociology (8), Geography (1)16 8.42

Formal Sciences Computer sciences (8), System sciences (2), Logic (1), Maths (1), Statistics (1) 13 6.84

Human sciences Performing arts (3), Languages and linguistics (2), Philosophy (1), Religion (1), Visual arts (1) 8 4.21

Natural Sciences Life sciences (4), Earth sciences (2), Chemistry (1) 7 3.68

Unspecified The studies that haven’t stated the discipline even though they could state. 32 16.84

Non-specified The studies that that can not specify any discipline. 13 6.84

Considering sub-disciplines, it can be said that studies mostly conducted in health sciences context (f=44). Our findings support the study results conducted by Wu et al. (2012) in terms of discipline. However, they have reached different results in terms of sub-disciplines as the highest frequency belonged to languages and linguistics in their study. Health sciences was the second most studied sub-discipline in Karatas et al.’s (2017) study. At this point it is necessary to say it was expected that education would be the first sub-discipline because the theme of the research is “distance education”.

Distribution of Studies According to Research AreasA categorization was performed based on the framework created by Zawacki-Richter et al. (2009). The majority of articles focused on issues that refer to the micro perspective (49.47%). The most studied areas are instructional design (39.21%), educational technology (31.32%), distance teaching systems and institutions (8.42%), and interaction and communication in learning communities (5.53%) (see Table 4).

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Table 4. Distribution of studies according to research areas

Research areas Sub research areas f % Total f Total %

Macro level: Distance education systems and theories

Distance teaching systems and institutions 32 8.42

41 10.79

Theories and models 9 2.37

Access, equity, and ethics 0 0

Globalization of education and cross-cultural aspects 0 0

Research methods in distance education and knowledge transfer 0 0

Meso level: Management, organization, and technology

Educational technology 119 31.32

151 39.74

Innovation and change 10 2.63

Professional development and faculty support 8 2.11

Quality assurance 8 2.11

Learner support services 3 0.79

Management and organization 2 0.53

Costs and benefits 1 0.26

Micro level: Teaching and learning in distance education

Instructional design 149 39.21

188 49.47Interaction and communication in learning communities 21 5.53

Learner characteristics 18 4.74

When it is considered that the educational technology area was ranked fifth in Zawacki-Richter et al.’s (2009) study, it can be said that educational technology has gained popularity. Similar results were also reached in a study examining research trends in Turkish distance education (Bozkurt, Kumtepe, Kumtepe, Aydin, Bozkaya, & Aydin, 2015). Examining the table it can be clearly said that the distance education studies need to consider the macro level areas.

Sample Sizes of the StudiesThe percentages of the studies with sample sizes 1-30 (24%), 31-100 (29%) and 101-300 (25%) are quite close (Figure 5). Although they have divided the groups in different ranges Martin et al. (2017) has found that sample sizes between 1-100 are the most commonly used. However, in the current study the biggest pie belongs to the studies with the sample size 31-100 (29%) which is similar to the results of the study conducted by Karatas et al. (2017). Kilic-Cakmak et al. (2015) also found that this sample size is the most used one in educational technology studies published in 2013. This situation may be due to the fact that these samples are more available to researchers.

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Sample Sizes of the Studies

Figure 5: Distribution of the sample sizes

The percentages of the studies with sample sizes 1-30 (24%), 31-100 (29%) and 101-300 (25%) are quite close (Figure 5). Although they have divided the groups in different ranges Martin et al. (2017) has found that sample sizes between 1-100 are the most commonly used. However, in the current study the biggest pie belongs to the studies with the sample size 31-100 (29%) which is similar to the results of the study conducted by Karataş et al. (2017). Kılıç-Çakmak et al. (2015) also found that this sample size is the most used one in educational technology studies published in 2013. This situation may be due to the fact that these samples are more available to researchers.

Research Methods and Patterns Used in the Studies

The field is dominated by the quantitative studies (49.70 %) (see table 5 and figure 6). Similar result were reached by Zawacki-Richter et al. (2009) in distance settings. More specifically Karataş et al. (2017) determined quantitative methods as the most commonly used ones in distance education considering interaction. The same result was reached by Bozkurt et al. (2015) examining distance education dissertations in Turkey.

Table 5: Distribution of Research Methods and Designs Utilized in the Studies

Research methods Research designs f Total f %

Quantitative

Weakly experimental 53

75 49.70

Correlational 10 Fully experimental 4 Descriptive 2 Ex post facto 2 Quasi experimental 1 Comparative 1 Secondary data analysis 1 Learning analytics 1

Mixed Triangulation 56 57 38.01 Explanatory 1

Qualitative Case study 16

21 13.64 Design based research 3 Action research 2

24%

29%25%

6%3%3%

10%1-30 (f=37)

31-100 (f=44)

101-300 (f=38)

301-500 (f=9)

501-1000 (f=5)

1001+ (f=5)

Figure 5. Distribution of the sample sizes

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Research Methods and Patterns Used in the StudiesThe field is dominated by the quantitative studies (49.70 %) (see table 5 and figure 6). Similar result were reached by Zawacki-Richter et al. (2009) in distance settings. More specifically Karatas et al. (2017) determined quantitative methods as the most commonly used ones in distance education considering interaction. The same result was reached by Bozkurt et al. (2015) examining distance education dissertations in Turkey.

Table 5. Distribution of research methods and designs utilized in the studies

Research methods Research designs f Total f %

Quantitative

Weakly experimental 53

75 49.70

Correlational 10

Fully experimental 4

Descriptive 2

Ex post facto 2

Quasi experimental 1

Comparative 1

Secondary data analysis 1

Learning analytics 1

MixedTriangulation 56

57 38.01Explanatory 1

Qualitative

Case study 16

21 13.64Design based research 3

Action research 2

Literature review Meta-analysis 1 1 0.65

It is obvious that the mixed method studies (38.01 %) and qualitative studies have increased over the years (Figure 6). In support of this finding, qualitative designs were found as the most used ones in synchronous online learning (Martin et al., 2017). It is surprising that triangulation is the most preferred research pattern. It can be said that the researchers are collecting both qualitative and quantitative date in order to get deeper information about distance education.

13

Literature review Meta-analysis 1 1 0.65 It is obvious that the mixed method studies (38.01 %) and qualitative studies have increased over the years (Figure 6). In support of this finding, qualitative designs were found as the most used ones in synchronous online learning (Martin et al., 2017). It is surprising that triangulation is the most preferred research pattern. It can be said that the researchers are collecting both qualitative and quantitative date in order to get deeper information about distance education.

Figure 6: Distribution of the research methods by years

Research Methods and Patterns Used in the Studies

Table 6: Types and Distribution of Data Collection Tools Used in the Studies

Data collection tools f % Survey 64 27.58 Log data 57 24.57 Student interviews 33 14.22 Observation 18 7.76 Student opinions 12 5.17 Focus group interview 11 4.74 Scale 8 3.45 Open ended questions 5 2.16 Student grades, pass/fail rates (achievement) 5 2.16 Discussion transcripts 6 2.59 Faculty/instructor interviews 4 1.72 Academic engagement form 2 0.86 Dropout-retention rates 2 0.86 Participation rates to system 2 0.86 Other (Include tools used less than two.) 3 1.29

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018

Qualitative Mixed Quantitative Review

Figure 6. Distribution of the research methods by years

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Research Methods and Patterns Used in the StudiesTable 6. Types and distribution of data collection tools used in the studies

Data collection tools f %

Survey 64 27.58

Log data 57 24.57

Student interviews 33 14.22

Observation 18 7.76

Student opinions 12 5.17

Focus group interview 11 4.74

Scale 8 3.45

Open ended questions 5 2.16

Student grades, pass/fail rates (achievement) 5 2.16

Discussion transcripts 6 2.59

Faculty/instructor interviews 4 1.72

Academic engagement form 2 0.86

Dropout-retention rates 2 0.86

Participation rates to system 2 0.86

Other (Include tools used less than two.) 3 1.29

Surveys (27.58 %) are the most commonly used data tools to measure student engagement (Table 6). This is followed by log data (24.57 %) and student interviews (14.22 %). Survey and interviews were found as the most used data collection tool in many studies (Bozkurt et al., 2015; Karatas, Ozcan, Polat, Yilmaz, & Topuz, 2014; Karatas et al., 2017; Martin et al., 2017) focusing distance education or types of distance education. However log data is not a data source that we are used to see in these studies. For instance only Martin et al. (2017) and Karatas et al. (2017) have mentioned the log data as a data source. It can be said that log data is gaining popularity and it is considered as a powerful tool in determining engagement in distance education.

Variables Influencing or Related to Student Engagement in Distance EducationAll the variables found as influencing or related to engagement were determined and categorised. Seven principles created by Chickering and Gamson (1987) were used as categories. Six new categories were created in relation to the variables’ characteristics. In qualitative studies, the researcher can use a framework that exists in the literature to categorize the codes. If there is no suitable framework, the researcher may construct the categories according to the similarities of the codes, in a logical manner (Yildirim & Simsek, 2013). In this study, categories were created based on literature, experiences of the researchers and two expert opinions.

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Table 7. Variables influencing student engagement in distance education

Categories Variables (f) Total f %

Active learning techniques (Stated in the seven principles framework created by Chickering and Gamson, 1987).

Diverse assessment techniques (7), Activities based on collaboration (Team-based learning/competition, peer interaction, Online collaborative learning/ Small group assignments) (7), Gamification (2), Innovative methods (2), Integrating diverse multimedia learning objects (2), Problem based learning (2), Augmented learning (2), Web based technology usage (2), Accessing online resources (1), Active learning techniques (1), Audience response system (i.e., a clicker) (1), Blended learning with active learning components (1), Cloud-based reflective learning environment (1), Digital storytelling (1), Giving previous feedback exemplars (1), Inquiry based learning (1), Integration of student-generated audio files (1), Participation in video conferences (1), Promoting lived experience (1), Relevance to learning (1), Role play activity in second life (1), Task based instruction (1)

40 19,70

Media properties

Social network software/Facebook usage (8), Mobile communication tools (Tablet PC, mobile phone) usage (6), Using e-learning tools (2), Clicker usage (2), Learning object usage (2), Web based technology usage (2), Interactive television (1), Web 2.0 tools usage (1), Simulation software (1), Wiki usage (1), Cloud-based learning environment (1), Interactive software usage (1), Second life (1), Online discussion (1), Asynchronous collaborative group work (1), Multimedia (1), Considering learning platform characteristics (1)

33 16,26

Student characteristics

Achievement (3), Motivation (3), Self-regulation (2), Intention to persist (2), Self-efficacy (2), Satisfaction (2), Self-esteem (1), Computer self-efficacy (1), Age (1), Gender (1), Situational interest (1), Student emotions (1), Institutional presence (1), Internet skills (1), Student cognition (1)

23 11,33

Teaching method Blended learning (11), E-learning (2), Face to face learning (2), Flipped learning (2), Synchronous online learning (1), M-learning (1) 19 9,36

Respect for diverse talents and ways of learning*

Learner customization (4), Self-regulated learning (2), Scaffolding students (2), Adaptive learning (1), Open Social Student Modeling (1), Affect sensitive intelligent system (1), Self-determined learning (1), Student agency (1), Academic standing (1), Mentoring (1), Motivating students (1), Considering students’ characteristics (1), Knowledge-related identity congruence (1)

18 8,87

Student collaboration-interaction*

Online collaborative learning (3), Team-based learning (3), Online discussion (2), Peer interaction (2), Peers’ befriending motivating, collaborating, and instructing efforts (1), Small group assignments (1),

Online oral communications (1), COI based blended learning design (1),

Positive group dynamics (1), Peer assessment (1)

16 7,88

Student-faculty interaction*

Instructor’s guidance/assistance/support, mentoring students (5), Accessible instructors (2), Engagement of faculty (1), Tutors’ online participation (1), Regular and appropriate communication (like f2f students) (1), Responsiveness of the moderator (1), Motivating students (1),

Online oral communications (1)

13 6,40

Time on task* Blended learning (8), Reminders and announcers (2), Flexible flipped learning (1), Monitoring students (1) 12 5,91

Course/

content design

Well-designed student/discussion forums (2), Clear expositions (1), Using helpful course resources (1), Designing digital resources (1), High quality courses that are specifically designed for online learning (1), Highly structured learning environment (1), Compulsory course (1), Flexibility (1), Course design (1), Using synchronous and asynchronous communication together(1), Promote engagement in the first weeks (1)

12 5,91

Innovative techniques

Gamification (2), Augmented learning (2), Innovative methods (1), Adaptive learning environment (1), Interactive software usage (1),

Innovative methods (1), Digital storytelling (1)9 4,43

Prompt feedback* Timely feedback (1), Feedback (1), Feedback software usage (1), Personalized feedback (1) 4 1,97

Instructor competencies

Instructor’s course preparation (1), responsiveness of the moderator (1),

Tutors’ e-moderating skills (1)3 1,48

High expectations* High level questions (1) 1 0,49

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Most of the researchers have reached results about using active learning techniques (Table 7). The second variable was determined as media properties. It can be said that the properties of the media are quite important in promoting student engagement. At this point it is necessary to remember the debate between Kozma (1991; 1994) and Clark (1994;1995). Contrary to Clark’s claim, the prominence of the media was determined in this study. Similarly, Bollgier and Martin (2018) have found that according to students the most valuable component of the online courses is course materials. Besides, engaging with the course materials increases the possibility of retention (Kumar & Shastry, 2019). Another important component is student characteristics. In order to promote student engagement in distance education, instructors or instructional designers need to consider student characteristics (Williams, Stafford, Corliss, & Reilly, 2018). The teaching method used, blended, flipped, adapted etc. is important. Besides, students state in the studies that the course design affects their engagement. The results of the study by Rienties, Lewis, McFarlane, Nguyen and Toetenel (2018) support this statement. They have found that the way instructors design the modules directly predicts students’ behaviour in virtual learning enviroments. At this point the importance of instructor competencies becomes clear. Using innovative techniques support student engagement. It is necessary to state that there is a significant effort on determining the effects of social media on engagement. Furthermore all of the principles determined by Chickering and Gamson (1987) are important in order to promote engagement in distance education.

Theories and Frameworks Used to Ground the StudiesTable 8. Theories and frameworks used to ground the studies

Theories f %

Self-Determination Theory of Motivation 4 2.53

Seven Principles 4 2.53

Original models developed by the researchers 4 2.53

Transactional Distance Theory 3 1.90

Community of inquiry 2 1.27

Community of practice 2 1.27

Sharon Pittaway’s engagement framework 2 1.27

Theory of Engagement (Shneiderman et al. 1995). 2 1.27

Other (used less than twice) 25 15.82

Not specified 110 69.62

Three theories/frameworks were used more frequently than others, Self-Determination Theory of Motivation (2.53 %), Seven Principles (2.53 %), original models developed by the researchers (2.53 %). The reason for using Self-Determination Theory of Motivation (Deci & Ryan, 2004) may be due to it being a theory that tries to make the activities meaningful for the students and so make them participate in the activities (Tan & Hew, 2016). However, because the seven principles framework was a framework for student engagement, it was expected to be used more. The efforts of the researchers to create new models or frameworks is worthwhile but not enough. Furthermore, majority of the studies (69.62 %) haven’t used any particular theories or frameworks. Many of the theories used in these studies were not directly related to student engagement. The lack of using theories or frameworks was also emphasized in some previous studies (Karatas et al., 2014; Karatas et al., 2017).

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Technologies Used in the Studies

17

Technologies Used in the Studies

Figure 7:

Technologies/Media Tools Used in the Studies

Learning management systems (LMS) are used frequently (Blackboard/WebCT f=32 and Moodle f=17) in the studies (Figure 7). Some researchers (f=14) try to develop original LMSs, websites or software. LMS was also determined as the most used technology in the studies conducted by Karataş et.al. (2017) and Martin et al. (2017). The LMS is followed by many collaborative tools such as wiki, Google docs, MOOCs, blog, discussion forum, Facebook etc. When it is considered promoting student collaboration is an essential component for engagement (see Table 7) it is not surprising that researchers focus on these collaborative tools. Besides, it is beneficial to mention that 33 of the studies haven’t stated any technology, and because 43 of the technologies have been stated only once these Technologies haven’t been given in the figure.

CONCLUSION In line with the literature (Ma et al., 2015) results of this study showed that the efforts on understanding student engagement in distance education have been increasing over the years. This increase is not surprising when it is considered that engagement plays a vital role in promoting student retention, and increasing student retention rates is quite important for educational institutions. As some countries such as the USA, UK, and Australia have many studies on the subject, many countries need to put more effort in order to contribute to the area. Although the majority of studies are expected to be conducted in the field of education, most of them have been conducted in the health sciences. Therefore, it can be said that the researchers in the field of education need to make more efforts in this regard.

Most of the studies focused on issues that refer to the micro perspective (instructional design, interaction and communication in learning communities, and learner characteristics), and the number of studies conducted in macro-level (distance teaching systems and institutions, and theories/models etc.) is not sufficient when compared with micro and meso-level. It can be said that researchers may consider focusing on macro-level topics.

It is hopeful that the number of mixed methods studies is increasing. Mixed method studies are worthwhile in terms of providing deep information. On the other hand, when it is considered that the most commonly used data collection tool in the studies examined is surveys, it may be recommended that developing and using more valid and reliable tools such as scales is needed.

0

5

10

15

20

25

2 0 0 2 2 0 0 4 2 0 0 6 2 0 0 8 2 0 0 9 2 0 1 0 2 0 1 1 2 0 1 2 2 0 1 3 2 0 1 4 2 0 1 5 2 0 1 6Blog Discussion forum Facebook Podcast, vodcastWeb 2.0 Adobe Connect Sakai Second Life

Figure 7. Technologies/media tools used in the studies

Learning management systems (LMS) are used frequently (Blackboard/WebCT f=32 and Moodle f=17) in the studies (Figure 7). Some researchers (f=14) try to develop original LMSs, websites or software. LMS was also determined as the most used technology in the studies conducted by Karatas et.al. (2017) and Martin et al. (2017). The LMS is followed by many collaborative tools such as wiki, Google docs, MOOCs, blog, discussion forum, Facebook etc. When it is considered promoting student collaboration is an essential component for engagement (see Table 7) it is not surprising that researchers focus on these collaborative tools. Besides, it is beneficial to mention that 33 of the studies haven’t stated any technology, and because 43 of the technologies have been stated only once these Technologies haven’t been given in the figure.

CONCLUSIONIn line with the literature (Ma et al., 2015) results of this study showed that the efforts on understanding student engagement in distance education have been increasing over the years. This increase is not surprising when it is considered that engagement plays a vital role in promoting student retention, and increasing student retention rates is quite important for educational institutions. As some countries such as the USA, UK, and Australia have many studies on the subject, many countries need to put more effort in order to contribute to the area. Although the majority of studies are expected to be conducted in the field of education, most of them have been conducted in the health sciences. Therefore, it can be said that the researchers in the field of education need to make more efforts in this regard. Most of the studies focused on issues that refer to the micro perspective (instructional design, interaction and communication in learning communities, and learner characteristics), and the number of studies conducted in macro-level (distance teaching systems and institutions, and theories/models etc.) is not sufficient when compared with micro and meso-level. It can be said that researchers may consider focusing on macro-level topics. It is hopeful that the number of mixed methods studies is increasing. Mixed method studies are worthwhile in terms of providing deep information. On the other hand, when it is considered that the most commonly used data collection tool in the studies examined is surveys, it may be recommended that developing and using more valid and reliable tools such as scales is needed. Determining the factors affecting student engagement in distance education was the most important part of this study. All of the articles were examined in terms of variables effecting student engagement and these variables were classified based on the seven principles framework (Chickering & Gamson, 1987). It was found that all the principles of this framework were important in promoting student engagement in distance

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education. However, six new components need to be considered: media properties, student characteristics, teaching method, course/content design, innovative techniques, and instructor competencies. These new components may be tested with structural equation modeling or multiple regression analysis in future studies.

LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONSThe current study has some limitations. The first limitation is that this study only examined the Web of Science database. Although the most popular journals in the field are included in this database it is still necessary to examine other databases. The second limitation is that some authors are using the words involvement and participation instead of engagement. In this study, only the word “engagement” was considered when searching the database. However, when examining the articles, the studies which were using engagement in abstract but involvement or participation in the body of the article were also included in the study. Future studies may include all these words in searching words. As it was recommended under the heading conclusions, focusing on the major level issues of distance education such as distance teaching systems and institutions, and theories/models etc. is necessary. Besides, future studies may consider developing more valid and reliable tools to measure and understand the student engagement in distance learning environments. Using a theoretical base has a vital role in conducting a comprehensive research. However, in this research, it has found that the majority of the studies haven’t used any particular theories or frameworks. Accordingly, it is advisible for the future studies to ground the reseaches on a relevant theoretical base. Finally, for practitioners, in addition to the seven principles of Chickering and Gamson (1987) we recommend considering the six new components media properties, student characteristics, teaching method, course/content design, innovative techniques, and instructor competencies when constructing education.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSAyse BAGRIACIK YILMAZ, is a research assistant in Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technologies at Aydin Adnan Menderes University. She has gained her M.A. degree from Gazi University. She has been doing her Ph.D. on distance education since 2015. Her studies focus on distance education, online learning environments, instructional technologies and educational technologies. He has publications in international and national indexed journals and presented papers in many symposiums. She has taken part in a completed Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership project as a researcher. In 2017, she was a visiting scholar at the University of Nottingham Trent in the UK for seven months.

Ayse BAGRIACIK YILMAZDepartment of Computer Education and Instructional Technologies, Faculty of EducationAddress: Aydin Adnan Menderes University, 09000, Aydin, TurkeyPhone: +90 2562142023,E-mail: ayse.yilmaz@adu.edu.tr

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Dr. Phil BANYARD, is Associate Professor in Psychology and is currently Head of Department. Phil Banyard has been with the Nottingham Trent University for over 25 years during which time he has also been a Chief Examiner for GCSE and then A Level Psychology. Prior to joining the University, he did time as a psychiatric nursing assistant, a community worker and a lecturer in further education. Phil Banyard’s research activity focuses on education. For the last 15 years he has been a leading member of projects studying the impact of digital technologies in schools. This work

attracted grants in excess of £1,000,000 from government agencies and the European Commission. He continues to publish on this topic. Another area of work has been the development of A-Level Psychology in the school sector and its impact on the character of the subject. Phil Banyard’s 30 year involvement with schools examinations facilitates a combination of practice and research. Other research activity includes publications on health information and the promotion of healthy behaviours, and also the benefits of narrative in training programmes. Phil BANYARDPsychology, School of Social SciencesAddress: Nottingham Trent University, NG14FQ, Nottingham, UKPhone: +44 115 8485585,E-mail: phil.banyard@ntu.ac.uk

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PERCEPTIONS AND OPINIONS OF GRADUATES ABOUT THE EFFECTS OF OPEN AND DISTANCE LEARNING IN TURKEY

Dr. Betul KAN KILINCORCID: 0000-0002-3746-2327

Faculty of ScienceEskisehir Technical University

Eskisehir, TURKEY

Dr. Berna YAZICIORCID: 0000-0001-9843-7355

Faculty of ScienceEskisehir Technical University

Eskisehir, TURKEY

Dr. Bulent GUNSOYORCID: 0000-0001-6370-189X

Faculty of EconomicsAnadolu UniversityEskisehir, TURKEY

Dr. Guler GUNSOYORCID: 0000-0002-0104-9784

Faculty of EconomicsAnadolu UniversityEskisehir, TURKEY

Received: 15/02/2019 Accepted: 28/05/2019

ABSTRACTOpen and distance learning in higher education provides an opportunity to individuals who cannot attend university full time on campus. Urban area residents especially have an advantage by accessing such higher education. There are almost three million people who receive university education in this way, and almost 1,5 million students in the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University. On campus university graduates can also register for any department as a second university to receive university education in the Open and Distance Learning System. Therefore, the number of students and graduates increase every year. The purpose of this study is to analyze the role of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University, which has helped Turkish higher education by means of increasing economic and social welfare. To achieve the goal, 9131 graduates were surveyed. The results indicate that the Open and Distance Learning System in question has been effective with regard to their employment status (before and after education), income levels and their social-economic welfare positions.

Keywords: Educational leaders, educational policy, distance education, distance learning, opinions of graduates.

INTRODUCTION The education process, with its multi-dimensional presence is, perhaps, the most important tool in determining a society’s progress. Education contributes to people’s well-being not only by direct-financial dimensions, but also by indirect-moral ways. It is a clear fact that a society of happier people would inevitably achieve a better social welfare level. Education makes people healthier, reduces poverty, makes income distribution better, increases productivity by elevating the technology level and creates a free path for growth and employment.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 9

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For these reasons, education is not limited to youth, as it used to be, and lifelong learning is in great demand by countries throughout the world. Both compulsory and optional education are continuously diversifying, they are becoming independent from time and place and they are moving away from conventional forms of education. In this context, being parallel with advances in communication and information technologies, Open and Distance Learning (ODL) Systems were always likely to be investigated more than ever. These Open and Distance Learning Systems are important processes which help increase human capital in order to achieve higher economic and social welfare.

THE EFFECTS OF EDUCATION TO INDIVIDUAL AND NATIONAL INCOME The most important dimension of education is, perhaps, its individual and macro-economic effects. There is compelling evidence implying that investment in education affects economic growth, both directly and indirectly, which causes increases in earnings. One of the most important models used in studies in this area is Mincer’ s model (1974). He sees individual income as a function of education, experience and practice, and this model pioneered many studies after him. Possibly the very first empirical study in this field, Aukrust and Bjerke (1995), show that investments for education in Norway increased economic growth by 1,81% (Tilak, 1989). Schultz (1961a, 1961b) and Denison (1962) showed similar findings in their studies. Heckman and Klenow (1997) found that each additional year of education increases income per capita by 30%, Bassanini and Scarpetta (2001) and Sianesi and van Reenen (2003) postulate that an increase in average education of one year increases income per capita by between 3% and 6%. Gennaioli et al. (2013) found that for 97% of the world, each additional year of education increases income per capita by 26%. Breton (2003) claims that between 1950 and 1985, for 61 countries, national outputs increased due to increases in the productivity of education due to investments in education. Breton (2014) shows that an increase in average education by one year causes an increase in national income of 10% directly and 19% indirectly. In addition, there are interesting results from studies that imply primary enrollment to be more effective for emerging markets and higher education to be more effective for developed countries; as Mingat and Tan (1996). Bassanini and Scarpetta (2001) propose that, for OECD countries, an increase in education by one year increases productivity by 6%. While Ferreira and Litchfield (1998) reveal that between a 25% and 30% increase in income per capita in Chile was caused by an increase in educational attainment, Orazem, Glewwe and Patrinos (2007) show that, with a productivity increase in rural areas, poverty rates declined. Polachek (2007) and Davies (2003) show that human capital and investments in education cause increases in income levels. Known for his research into the relationship between education and the economy, Schultz, does not see any difference between institutions of education and institutions of industrial production.

THE EFFECTS OF EDUCATION TO INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIAL WELFARE It is thought that the process of education has a positive effect on individual and social welfare and happiness. Happiness and welfare are hard-to-measure factors due to their highly subjective construct. However, welfare mostly concerns financial life. Issues such as income, health, employment, earnings, and shelter are all parts of welfare since a lack of any causes sadness. Health, work and life balance, education, experience, social relations, civil life and governance, environmental quality, self-security and other subjective welfare proxies constitute the main dimensions of individual and social welfare. At this point, amongst all these factors, education is one of the most important concepts. In other words, education is a key factor and a common ground for all other factors of social welfare.Education creates a suitable social and cultural platform for development by changing individual and group behavior. By doing this, while cultivating stability, education acts as a catalyst that creates social dynamism for socio-economic evolution. One pioneering study on this topic is Becker’s paper (1993), which implies that by an increase in educational attainment, there is an increase in voting activity, artistic and sporting activities, a decrease in smoking and an upswing in health conditions. There are also empirical studies that show education decreases crime rates. On the other hand, there are studies that show that an increase in education creates social income inequality and poverty. For example, Adelman and Morris (1973) show the positive effects of human capital on income distribution. Psacharopoulos (1977) shows that for 49

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countries, education explains 23% of income inequality, a result which is proxied by the Gini coefficient. Psacharopoulos and Ying Chu (1992) show that with increased education, income inequality and poverty in eighteen countries located in Latin America decreased. Patrinos and Psacharopoulos (2011) imply that each additional year of education causes a decrease in the Gini coefficient by 1.4 points. Tsakloglou and Cholezas (2005) proved that education (especially higher education) in Greece causes a decrease in inequality. Bourguignon (1995) and Bourguignon and Morrison (1990) argue that secondary education, to a degree, has a remedial effect on income distribution. There is much empirical evidence for education having positive effects on environmental consciousness, social unity, rates of saving, the health of mothers, their children and babies, and families generally, as well as technological progress (2001).

ECONOMICAL AND SOCIAL RETURNS OF OPEN AND DISTANCE LEARNINGThe methods of open and distance learning play important roles, especially with regard to populous countries’ educational needs. This is because generalizing formal education at a country level is a costly and time-consuming process. At this point, open and distance learning may be seen as a useful choice. In countries where open and distance learning is handled strategically and systematically, the operation easily reaches large masses. In this context, previous positive effects of education on social welfare may also be approved for open and distance learning. At this point, the first thing that comes to mind is people in work who benefit from open and distance learning could directly increase their individual welfare and life standards. After completing their education with more possibilities, such as finding new work, gaining promotion, and gaining wage increases, it is natural that they enjoy an increased level of welfare. In addition, open and distance learning could help people beyond financial considerations. The process of education may make people more conscious. Learners may become more conscious consumers and become healthier.Studies that examine the effects of open and distance learning on economic and social welfare are relatively rare. Actually, in general, formal education and open and distance learning methods are approached in unison. Studies in this field are generally centered on gender, and specifically on the effects of open and distance learning on women’s educational attainment and its advantages. For instance; Ambe-Uva (2010) studied the ODL system’s contribution to poverty alleviation and the empowerment of women. Adewara et al. (2010) researched the performance of distance learning and full-time students. These two studies show the effect of ODL in Nigeria as a developing country. Sahin and Shelly (2008) measured Distance Education students’ perceptions and constructed a satisfaction model using structural equation models. Holzweiss et al. (2014) also studied perceptions of online graduate students’ in their paper. There have been studies which show the use of technology in distance education, besides their benefits from ODL, such as that of Tatar et al. (2015), Simsek (2005), Remedios and Richardson (2013). In addition, student contact with universities in the distance learning system has been put into question by Shea et al. (2015) and Moore (2011). Khan and Williams (2007) suggest that e-learning platforms are powerful tools for decreasing poverty and increasing the social welfare of disadvantaged groups (people on low income, the disabled, the long-term ill, minorities, and suchlike). Open and distance learning systems also have positive effects on income and poverty. Ferdousi (2010) points out that official distance education institutions have positive effects on gender inequality in Bangladesh and remarks that the Open University in Bangladesh creates opportunities for both adults and women by enabling them to study while working. Ofoegbu (2009), like Ferdousi (2010), emphasizes that open and distance learning systems provide women with primary education, thus decreasing gender inequality. In field research in Benin, Edo/Nigeria, it has been shown that open and distance learning has a significant positive impact on female enrollment rates, thus providing women with the same opportunities as men. The author of the study proposes that with such a system women could be able to continue engaging in income generating activities. Aderinoye and Ojokheta (2004) elaborate the effect of open and distance learning on sustainable development. The study, which points out the effects of open and distance learning on individual, social and national development, was carried out in Nigeria. The study, carried out using surveys, interviews and personal interaction, shows that distance education increases the number of choices people have, gives them awareness of current and future opportunities and, thereby, achieves a sustainable development continuum. Ambe-Uva and Adegbola (2009) studied the effects of open and distance learning

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on Africa’s social upheaval, poverty, conflict areas, marginalization and achieving the objectives of human development in Nigeria. The authors claim that the integrative power of open and distance learning and ICTs provide people with income and, thus, indirectly increase human security and decreases the spread of diseases, such as HIV/AIDS. Ghadoliya (2012), who argues that education is the most powerful power freeing agent, claims that Indian women enjoy an increase in their income through micro-finance, but that they lack the required banking or accounting skills, and that open and distance learning plays an important role filling the gap, thereby enabling them to perform better in their jobs. A study edited by Kanwar and Taplin (2001) was conducted in different countries and consists of case studies. In these studies, certain common conclusions were arrived at. These are that through distance education methods, women and mothers become of more assistance to their husbands, children and other family members without having to go far from home. Distance education also increases women’s self-care. Distance education helps children and eases their suffering. Through distance education, children are able to remain at home with their mothers. With distance education, women are more able to cope with their fears, and share their experiences and coping skills with others. Olakulein (2006) discusses the role of distance education in the empowerment of women. Starting from the results of research conducted in Nigeria, Olakulein (2006) points out that distance education is not only an efficient way of education, but is also relatively inexpensive, thereby significantly helping women whose reading rates and subsistence levels are highly disadvantageous. Arguing that a qualifying distance education system could save women and families from poverty, Olakulein (2006) stresses that, through education, social life may become possible and that contagious diseases may even decrease.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY The purpose of this study is to analyze the role of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University, which has helped Turkish higher education by means of increasing economic and social welfare. To achieve the goal, a survey study was conducted to alumni who had graduated from the Anadolu University Open and Distance Learning Faculty. To investigate whether ODL help increase human capital and make income distribution better and achieve a better social welfare level or not, a questionnaire was constructed to compare the situations of the students before and after graduation. The three main research questions are as follows:

1. Is there any difference difference between the earnings of graduates before and during the program?2. Is there any differences difference between the earnings of graduates during and after the program?3. Is there any difference difference between the earnings of graduates before and after the program?

Hence, the employment status (before, during and after education), income levels and social-economic welfare situations were determined. Also the opinions and perceptions of graduates on ODL system were examined and finally it was tested that if the difference on opinions were depending on gender or not.

METHODA questionnaire was constructed to compare the situations of the students before and after graduation. Overall Interval Realibility was determined as 0.87. Firstly, the demografic situation of the participants were given. The data obtained from the survey were analysed. To do so, t-tests, Chi-square tests were conducted and the results were summarized in the tables.

Participants The population was constructed with 852,730 graduates who had graduated from three different faculties of the Anadolu University Open and Distance Learning Faculty between 2000 and 2009. Data collection was provided by an online questionnaire consisting 39 questions. The graduates were contacted through the ODL automation system via email and asked to participate in the questionnaire using their ODL accounts. Therefore, the 9131 respondents to the questionnaire were accessed by the Anadolu University Alumni Union.

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Data Collection and Analysis The data collected by randomly included some items for the participants to evaluate the percentage of their answers regarding the ODL system. At the first part of the questionnaire form the demographic questions were asked to the respondents. The second part of the questionnaire consisted of fourteen questions in order to determine the socio-economic situations of the graduates. The last part was consisted of eighteen questions of Type Likert that were about the perceptions of the graduates. At this part, the participants were asked to use one of five different terms to express their thoughts whilst completing the questionnaire; definitely disagree (scored 1), partially disagree (scored 2), neutral (scored 3), partially agree (scored 4), and strongly agree (scored 5). As a result, they indicated the extent of their agreement or disagreement with the relevant statement on a five-point Likert scale. The questions were not only related to the economic situations of the respondents but also they were about the social lives of them. The survey was conducted using the internet. The graduates were asked to complete the questionnaire within a certain time by email. SPSS 20.0 and R were used to analyze the dataset.

FINDINGS The data consists of questionnaire forms from 9131 respondents who graduated from three different faculties; the Economics Faculty, the Business Faculty and the Open Education Faculty, of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University. The age distribution of the graduates is given in Figure 1.

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The questions were not only related to the economic situations of the respondents but also they were about the social lives of them. The survey was conducted using the internet. The graduates were asked to complete the questionnaire within a certain time by email. SPSS 20.0 and R were used to analyze the dataset.

FINDINGS The data consists of questionnaire forms from 9131 respondents who graduated from three different faculties; the Economics Faculty, the Business Faculty and the Open Education Faculty, of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University. The age distribution of the graduates is given in Figure.1:

Figure 1. Age distribution of respondents.

The graduates were asked if they would have had a chance to attend university if they had not attended distance education. The results show that many of the respondents, particularly those from urban areas, would not have been able to attend university. The gender distribution of the answers to this question is shown in Table. 1. Table 1. The gender distribution of respondents in regard to ‘having a chance to attend university’.

Gender Total female male

Chance for university

Yes 1736 2854 4590

No 1227 2996 4223 Explanations related to the economic welfare of graduates are summarized with three questions in the data collection. It is believed that the welfare of graduates of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University significantly changes following the program. For this purpose, the graduates were asked to compare their earnings before, during and after the program. Dependent sample t-tests for paired samples were used to test the research questions and the results are given in Table 2. Table 2 shows the t-test results for the main three questions. The first research question is about whether there was any significant difference between the earnings of graduates before and during the program. According to the results it essentially shows that the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University was effective on the previous and the current earnings of graduates at that time (p=0.000).

Figure 1. Age distribution of respondents.

The graduates were asked if they would have had a chance to attend university if they had not attended distance education. The results show that many of the respondents, particularly those from urban areas, would not have been able to attend university. The gender distribution of the answers to this question is shown in Table. 1.

Table 1. The gender distribution of respondents in regard to ‘having a chance to attend university’.

Gender Total

female male

Chance for university Yes 1736 2854 4590

No 1227 2996 4223

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Explanations related to the economic welfare of graduates are summarized with three questions in the data collection. It is believed that the welfare of graduates of the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University significantly changes following the program. For this purpose, the graduates were asked to compare their earnings before, during and after the program. Dependent sample t-tests for paired samples were used to test the research questions and the results are given in Table 2.Table 2 shows the t-test results for the main three questions. The first research question is about whether there was any significant difference between the earnings of graduates before and during the program. According to the results it essentially shows that the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University was effective on the previous and the current earnings of graduates at that time (p=0.000). The second research question is about whether there was any significant difference between the earnings of graduates during and after the program. The results show that the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University was effective on the current and the post-earnings of graduates (p=0.000). The third research question is about whether there was any significant difference between the earnings of graduates before and after the program. The results show that the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University was effective pre-earnings and the post-earnings of graduates. Overall, all of the questions are rejected at a 5% significance level showing that there was some evidence to suggest the Open and Distance Learning System at Anadolu University did have an impact on graduate earnings.

Table 2. t-test results: The earnings of graduates before and after education

Statement Mean Std. Deviation t-value Degrees of

freedom p-value

The earnings of graduates before and during the program in the Open and Distance Education Learning System did not change.

-0.50290 1.21800 -36.356 7752 0.000

The earnings of graduates during and after the program in the Open and Distance Education Learning System did not change.

-0.39803 1.46264 -24.059 7815 0,000

The earnings of graduates before and after the program in the Open and Distance Education Learning System did not change.

-0.34603 2.00753 -16.309 8952 0,000

It is reasonable to expect that the Open and Distance Learning System has impact on the life quality of graduates. The key focus is to identify if there is any contribution of the Open and Distance Learning System in providing graduates with a better life of quality. Therefore, in this part of the study regarding to the life of quality, the relationship among four selected questions are examined: the gender of participant; the status of the graduates when they were in the program; having an opportunity to study at any other university; and finding work after graduation from the Open and Distance Learning System. The four selected statements are tested using a chi-square test of independence. Table. 3 provides the results of the chi-square tests.The first statement is about whether ‘the status of receiving income whilst on the program’ and ‘the gender of graduates’ were independent. A chi-square test of independence of the relationship between the status of receiving income whilst on the program and the gender of graduates finds a statistically significant relationship between these statements (chi-square=367.070, p=0.000). Table 3 shows the amount of difference needed to make a decision based on the probabilities given in the table. As p=0.000 for the first test, this means that the status of receiving income whilst on the program and the gender of graduates are not statistically independent. This value is equal to also testing for the second and third statements in Table. 3. Hence, based on the probability (p=0.000), the relationship between ‘gender’ and ‘having an opportunity to study at any other university’ is not statistically independent. Moreover, the relationship between ‘gender’ and ‘finding work after graduation from the Open and Distance Learning System’ is also statistically significant. Finally, relationship between ‘the faculty’ and ‘finding work after graduation from the Open and Distance Learning System’ is

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not statistically independent at a 0.05 significance level. The probability of the chi-square test statistic (chi-square=10.530) was p=0.005 that was lower than the significance level. Therefore, the faculty graduated from the Open and Distance Learning System is statistically dependent with regard to finding work.

Table 3. Pearson Chi-Square Results

Statement Value Degrees of freedom p-value

No significant linear relationship between the gender and the status of graduates whilst on the program. 367.070 1 0.000

No significant linear relationship between gender and having an opportunity to study at any other university has not changed. 75. 734 1 0.000

No significant linear relationship between gender and finding work after graduation from the Open and Distance Education Learning System has not changed.

561.960 2 0.000

Any significant linear relationship between the faculty and finding work after graduation from the Open and Distance Education Learning System has not changed.

10.530 2 0.005

In Table 4, the percentages of the contributions based on a Likert type for the statements listed from 1 to 9 are given.Generally, the percentage of the ‘strongly agree’ respondents is higher than the percentage of the ‘definitely disagree’ respondents in all of the items except for the first and the last. This finding may be interpreted in such a way that graduates from the ODL system already had a say in their own families and an active social life involving ‘seeing experience (Simsek, 2005), such as excursions, journeys, theatre, cinema and so on’, regardless of the ODL system.

Table 4. Percentage of contributions

Statement Definitely Disagree (%)

Partially Disagree

(%)

Neutral (%)

Partially Agree (%)

Strongly Agree (%)

No. of respondents / participants

1 Having more of a say in the family than before

25.3

(2090)

17.5

(1445)

12.6

(1036)

22.4

(1843)

22.2

(1831)8245/9131

2 Finding a place in society13.6

(1055)

14.1

(1097)

11.2

(865)

27.4

(2122)

33.8

(2618)7757/9131

3 Building greater self-esteem12.7

(976)

8.5

(656)

8.8

(677)

22.1

(1705)

47.9

(3694)7708/9131

4 Awareness of social responsibility

14.6

(1123)

10.8

(834)

11.8

(893)

26.8

(2062)

36.3

(2796)7708/9131

5 Awareness of individual rights and responsibilities

14.5

(1107)

10.3

(786)

11.2

(851)

26.9

(2049)

37.1

(2829)7622/9131

6 Providing business development

11.8

(899)

9.8

(746)

11.8

(899)

26.9

(2045)

39.6

(3014)7603/9131

7 Increasing opportunities for work in everyday life

12.2

(925)

9.7

(739)

12.5

(953)

27.2

(2063)

38.4

(2916)7596/9131

8 Promotion at work23.3

(1700)

9.3

(682)

17.8

(1297)

18.9

(1375)

30.7

(2244)7298/9131

9Cultural activities, such as excursions, journeys, theatre, cinema and so on

37.6

(2742)

13.3

(968)

19.0

(1386)

15.7

(1146)

14.4

(1046)7289/9131

( ): refers to the number of respondents

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It is clear from the table that the greatest contribution of the ODL system to graduates’ lives is seen with 47.9% (almost half of the respondents) for item 3 which states that the ODL system helps them build more self-esteem. The second highest percentage is found as 39.6% for item 5, stating that having a knowledgeable background provides business development. Item 7 is also high (38.4%), stating that a degree from the ODL system widens the range of job opportunities in everyday life. The situation for item 8 is also notable, stating that 30% of respondents enjoyed promotion in business after their graduation from the ODL system.In Turkey, especially in urban areas, considerations regarding importance may vary due to gender. As a result, comparisons due to gender increase in importance. At this part of the study, the responses were compared according to the gender of the respondents for the eighteen items in question. The statements in question and the t test results based on the thoughts of the gender of the respondents were summarized in Table 5.

Table 5. The t tests of gender for eighteen questions

Statement Female Male P1. Contribution in family 3.09 2.93 .0002 Contribution in society 3.39 3.25 .0013. Contribution in self-confidence 3.68 3.53 .0004. Contribution being aware of social responsibility 3.41 3.30 .0085. Contribution in being aware of personal responsibility 3.42 3.35 .1106. Contribution in using telecommunication devices 3.28 3.22 .2157. Contribution in higher education 1.54 1.78 .0008. Contribution in professional life 3.61 3.40 .0009. Contribution in various opportunities 3.53 3.39 .00010. Contribution in being shielded from the risk of poverty 2.95 2.83 .00611. Contribution in being saved from poverty 2.35 2.41 .17012. Contribution in having work 2.19 2.47 .00013. Contribution in providing continuous work and salary 2.88 2.74 .00014. Contribution in promotion at work 2.84 3.08 .00015. Contribution in basic needs 2.34 2.35 .71316. Contribution in having no work when graduating from the Open Education Faculty 2.09 2.33 .00017. Contribution in cultural needs 2.31 2.40 .02818. Contribution in having no work due to private firm preferences 2.18 2.38 .000

As can be seen from Table 5. the contribution of their education in the family setting is different for males and females (p=0.000). The contribution for the females is more than that for males. Another significant difference is the contribution of their education in society (p=0.001). This contribution of the females is more than males for this item. The increment in the respondents’ self-confidence increases with the education they received. However, this increment is more for the females than males (p=0.00).Thoughts vary regarding social responsibility. The education the respondents received increases their social responsibility. This increment is more for the females than males with the difference genders being significant (p=0.008).The respondents were asked if their education contributed to their awareness of personal responsibility. Both the females and the males said that they thought that the education they received contributed to their personal responsibility and, according to t test results, this contribution does not change with gender (p=0.110).Both the female and the male respondents said that their education had been helpful with regard to using communication devices. There is no significant difference concerning this contribution for the females and the males with the p value for this t-test being calculated at 0.215. This contribution is slightly more for the females than the males.

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The respondents’ open and distance learning contribution to their higher education, professional life, opportunity in several ways, in getting work, providing continuously work and salary, promotion at work, in having no job when graduating from the Open Education Faculty, in having no work due to preferences of private firms is statistically significantly different for the female and for the male respondents. As can be seen from Table 5, all p values for these items are 0.000. In addition, the males usually find their education to be more advantageous for most of these items than the females. The item ‘risk of poverty’ is one of the most important among all the items for urban area residents. The female respondents believe that their education contributes in protecting them from the risk of poverty more than the males do. In addition, the p value calculated as a result of the t test is 0.006 for this item. The males believe that the contribution to cultural needs is more than the females do, with the t statistic being significant as =0.05. The p value is 0.028.The items for being saved from poverty and the contribution to basic needs are not different for the female and male respondents. The differences for these items are not statistically significant (p=0.170, p=713).

DISCUSSIONS and CONCLUSION The main results gathered from the questionnaire are as follows: working students have equal opportunities for learning while earning wages; wage differences among pre-studentship, studentship and post-studentship periods are significant; many of the alumni pointed that they are better off with regard to social welfare; the alumni are either further from poverty or they are recovering from poverty; being part of the alumni allowed them to achieve better nutrition, better clothing, and better accommodation and to reach a better place in society; have greater self-confidence; have a say regarding problems within their family; be aware of their social and individual rights and responsibilities; increase professional developments; be aware of more options for their lives and to satisfy cultural needs. These results seem similar to those obtained from Olakulein (2006) and Becker (1993) stated that there was an increase of the possibility of social life though education and there was an increase in artistic and sporting activities, respectively. Also, our results suggest common conclusions with Aderinoye and Ojokheta’ study (2004) that was pointing out the increase on the number of choices people have which can be thought as a sign in social development.In conclusion, Anadolu University Open and Distance Learning System makes important contributions to social and economic welfare, whilst helping to reduce poverty, particularly among urban area residents. Likewise in Ambre-Uva’ study (2010) and Khan and Williams (2007), the ODL system made contributions to poverty alleviation. They both showed that ODL had the positive effects in reducing poverty. The system provides large numbers of people with equal, or even better, benefits of conventional face-to-face education programs, which can increase their current performance. Thoughts and related perceptions that define the positives of the ODL system show an expected finding. Participants agree that the ODL system has made various positive contributions to their everyday lives. These results suggest common points as in Ferdousi’ paper (2010) that was indicating positive effects of the open university on both adults and women by enabling them study while working in Bangladesh. As can be seen in the literature, the ODL system is of marked importance in the lives of distance learners. Considering these findings, the research and applications for the development of the ODL system should go beyond the wide framework of educational issues.

Acknowledgements: The authors wish to thank Anadolu University Scientific Research Projects (Project No: 1110E174) for the financial support given.

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BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSDr. Betul KAN KILINC, is an Assoc. Prof. in Faculty of Science, Eskişehir Technical University. Dr. Kan Kılınç gained her Ph.D. in Statistics at December, 2010. Her academic interest areas are data science, supervised-unsupervised learning algorithms, data mining, nonparametric regression, multivariate statistics, open and distance learning and R statistical programming. She has over than 20 journal articles published in international/national indexes, 2 international book chapters, and other international/national proceedings submitted to international meetings.

Dr. Betul KAN KILINCDepartment of Statistics, Faculty of ScienceAddress: Eskişehir Technical University, 26470, Eskişehir, TurkeyPhone: +90 222 335 0580,E-mail: bkan@eskisehir.edu.tr

Dr. Berna YAZICI, is a Professor of Statistics in Faculty of Science, Eskisehir Technical University. Dr. YAZICI got her Ph.D. from Statistics in 2001 and became Professor in 2013. She studies and gives the courses on Design of Experiments, Regression Analysis, Statistics. She has more than 40 papers in international indexes, 2 international, 1 national book chapters and more than 50 proceeding papers. She currently works for Eskişehir Technical University, Department of Statistics

Dr. Berna YAZICIDepartment of Statistics, Faculty of ScienceAddress: Eskişehir Technical University, 26470, Eskişehir, TurkeyPhone: +90 222 335 0580,E-mail: bkan@eskisehir.edu.tr

Dr. Bulent GUNSOY, is a Professor of Economy at Faculty of Economics. He completed his Ph.D. in Economics at June, 1997. His academic interest areas are microeconomics, macroeconomics, globalization, structural reforms, development economics, open and distance learning. He has 12 journal articles published in international indexes, 6 national books, 9 national book chapters and other national and international articles, papers submitted to international congress.

Dr. Bulent GUNSOYDepartment of Economics, Faculty of EconomicsAddress: Anadolu University, 26470, Eskişehir, TurkeyPhone: +90 222 335 0580,E-mail: bgunsoy@anadolu.edu.tr

Dr. Guler GUNSOY, is a Professor of Economy at Economy Faculty, Anadolu University. Dr. Günsoy gained her Ph.D. in Economy at September, 1999. Her academic interest areas are macro economics, economic development, growth, poverty, women empowerment, open and distance learning, the effect of distance education on development. She has over than 10 journal articles published in international indexes, 3 national books, 5 national book chapters and other national and international articles, papers submitted to international meetings.

Dr. Guler GUNSOYDepartment of Economics, Faculty of EconomicsAddress: Anadolu University, 26470, Eskişehir, TurkeyPhone: +90 222 335 3454,E-mail: gcinier@anadolu.edu.tr

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COLLABORATIVE WRITING USING GOOGLE DOCS IN PRIMARY EDUCATION: DEVELOPMENT OF ARGUMENTATIVE DISCOURSE

Chrysoula ZIOGA ORCID: 0000-0001-7444-1528

3rd Experimental Primary School of EvosmosThessaloniki, GREECE

Dr. Konstantinos BIKOSORCID: 0000-0002-8616-8626

School of Philosophy and EducationAristotle University

Thessaloniki, GREECE

Received: 25/07/2019 Accepted: 02/09/2019

ABSTRACTThe aim of the present study was to determine the effect of a collaborative writing programme through the Google Docs writing tool on the production of argumentative discourse within the framework of Modern Greek Language teaching. The participants were 23 pupils in Year 5 who received a six-month period teaching intervation (two hours per week) that included collaborative writing activities of argumentative discourse. Prior to the beginning, and following the end of the programme the performance of all participants on argumentative discourse writing skills was evaluated with a 13-criteria Rubric scale. The results of the paired-sample t-tests showed a statistically significant difference between pre- and post tests in the majority of the criteria and the total scores of the rubric. It is therefore concluded that, the use of a Web platform may positively contribute towards the enhancement of argumentative discourse writing skills of pupils in Year 5 of Primary Education.

Keywords: Argumentation, collaborative discourse, Google Docs.

INTRODUCTIONThe production of writing, a teaching process that requires pupils to become familiar with its various stages of implementation, is one of the primary targets of education according to the Greek Interdisciplinary Common Curriculum Framework (Pedagogical Institute, 2003). In particular, Modern Greek Language teaching in Primary School, aims at the development of a pupil’s ability not only to handle its written and verbal forms adequately but also confidently, consciously, responsibly, effectively and creatively, thus actively participating in school as well as, in society. Indeed, it is essential that the most “powerful” types of writing (e.g. argumentation, essay, informative text etc) which apply in socio-cultural forms of power are immediately taught to the children, as most of these properties are outside the span of their immediate experience. Narration texts, as the main representative model of narrative discourse, contrary to other forms, continue their dynamic presence in the new school textbooks of the Modern Greek Language. The entry of persuasive argumentative texts as a representative sample of directive discourse, come in to overturn the one-dimensional teaching practice (Dinas & Xanthopoulos, 2007). Teaching the Modern Greek Language, in particular teaching writing in Year 5, aims at the cultivation and “development of a pupil’s ability to communicate accurately and effectively in writing, using form and style appropriate to the occasion” (Pedagogical Institution, 2003). Furthermore, the basic objective is for pupils to become familiar with a range of texts; amongst which are argumentative texts, which help pupils satisfy their practical, emotional, spiritual and social needs.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 10

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COLLABORATIVE WRITING AND ARGUMENTATIONArgumentation emerges from a need to teach pupils thinking skills. It is of utmost importance for pupils, in a democratic society to be able to develop critical thinking and that also includes their ability to assess arguments and counter-arguments in relevance to a variety of modern-day subjects (e.g. genetically modified food, solutions to global warming, etc) (Halpen, 1998). In 1958 the English philosopher Stephen Toulmin, dealt with the “primal confusion” of production and induction, suggesting his own model of analysis of argumentation called “The Toulmin model of argumentation”. This model found fertile ground in the teaching of verbal communication and it has influenced the schoolbooks which deal with the meaning of argument. Argumentation, whether it concerns traditional methods (face-to-face arguments- counterarguments and written argumentative texts) or the more modern approach which is based on the production of argumentative text via computers, helps us understand the way that the argument functions within an educational framework (Andriessen, 2006).Collaborative writing appears to be particularly productive in the writing of argumentative text. Pupils either become involved in a social procedure to co-construct and critique arguments or negotiate solutions on general problems and promote knowledge, in their attempt to bridge any conflicts that may arise (Golanics & Nussbaum, 2008). It is also educationally important since it helps pupils draw connections on their ideas, form alternative conceptions and reflect on the meaning and the evidence of these ideas by causing a conceptual change, a better subject matter understanding, as well as promoting complex and critical thinking. For example, pupils may collaborate or disagree by organizing and grouping arguments and counter arguments, creating discourses, using role-play, planning and executing a work-plan in common. These are good practices which are promoted through teaching either in small groups or in larger classes (Matsagouras, 2000). The results on collaborative argumentation for individual performances have also proved to be significant, and in particular for the introverted pupils, who find adversarial discourse threatening; the threat being that they might fail an argument and this would damage their self-impression on others (Nussbaum, 2008).

TEACHING APPROACH USING ICTNowadays there is a rapid technological evolution which the educational community cannot ignore. The emergence of new Web 2.0 tools can allow for activities to be saved for later use and can also substitute a number of high level human skills. Those tools have become an integral part of the daily work and family environment, as well as for the production of activity and quality time (Depover, Karsenti, & Komis, 2010). A major part of this New Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) has already been put into teaching practice by primary school teachers changing the traditional teaching approach. A Traditional teaching method can be defined as a procedurally teaching method in which the teacher displays, explains, and discusses the content of the Greek language to Year 5 students without the use of ICT. In relation to the subject of Modern Greek Language, integration of ICT may act as a better and more attractive method of teaching. In the New Pilot Study Programs (2011), for teaching the Modern Greek Language and Literature in Primary Education, stress is placed on the use of the ICT in teaching and learning, as well as in the value of collaboration. The ultimate target is considered to be the development of language skills, critical and digital literacy and, also, the reinforcement of pupils’ creativity, critique and research ability, according to the social constructivism and collaborative learning theory (Newby, Stepich, Lehman, & Russel, 2009).The web application Google Docs is a digital tool which helps pupils work in a collaborative learning environment. Sharp (2009) claims that this collaborative text-processing tool allows a group of people to process a document simultaneously; that is writing and monitoring, while at the same time, changes are made by the others. Collaborative writing using Google Docs comprises of coordinated collaboration, which allows participants to monitor all other participations while writing a text themselves, as it opposes any individual working independently of the other and then all individual work being combined into one final mutual document. Thus, it promotes a new collaborative working method which generates collective content, facilitates collaborative writing and group discussions. In this manner, Google Docs assist in creating a dynamic, collaborative learning environment where knowledge is gained through open discussions and exchange of ideas, via collaborative structure and active participation of the members (Su & Beaumont, 2011).

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LITERATURE REVIEWResearch on collaborative discourse teaching using an electronic environment in Greece was conducted by Antoniou (2001) and it concerned a sample of 74 pupils at the American College of Thessaloniki. In this research, collaborative learning was adopted for the teaching of argumentative writing in classes connected to computer networks and using Daedalous Intergrated Writing Environment – DIWE as their writing collaborative tool. The results of the study showed that the use of ICT could reinforce teaching in the production of written discourse. Following the reformation of Greek Curriculums for Elementary and Secondary Education in 2011, where the issue of teaching productive discourse using ICT arose, a small number of researches concerning the teaching of argumentative discourse through collaborative tools for students in Secondary Education were noted. More specifically, Delis (2015) studied and analyzed an intervention, which was implemented in one unit of the Modern Greek Language syllabus taught in Year 3 of Junior High School, using the electronic learning environment platform Moodle, where the students followed collaborative strategies in text production. The research pinpointed the potential for the inclusion of collaborative learning through an electronic environment, since its results demonstrated reinforcement in students’ language ability, in their digital literature, and also in other learning quality characteristics, such as collaboration, autonomy, authentic learning etc. In addition, research carried out on a sample of 39 students of Year 3 of Junior High School using Google Docs showed that collaborative writing in an electronic learning environment could be effective and, thus be introduced into the educational teaching practice of written discourse in Secondary Education (Drakou, 2014). A similar research but for Foreign Language teaching was carried out on a sample of 19 students in Junior High School, using electronic tool Google Docs (Exarchou, 2016). From the results it was apparent that Documents Google Docs could function as a tool in collaborative writing which could create an environment for the motivation of students, while stimulating their creativity as they are gradually led towards autonomy. The researcher claimed that her findings could be an aspect of interesting factor to help teachers to acquire insight into the procedures concerning the learning of a foreign language. Various researches have been carried out in higher education concerning collaborative learning in an electronic environment using Google Docs (Brodahl, Hadjerrouit, & Hansen, 2011; Suwantarathip & Wichadee, 2014; Zhou, Simpson, & Domoci, 2012). Their results showed that the method of collaborative writing, this particular feature of Google Docs, motivated the participants to learn more effectively and thus to make more of an effort in argument production. Also, it was ascertained that the students could perceive the importance of Google Docs as a useful collaborative tool while operating in small working groups thus reinforcing active participation, group interaction and the building of a common knowledge, leading to an improvement of writing skills. Additionally, the participants claimed that the actual promise of argumentative discourse via computers can become a reality in training where, they will not need to produce answers but only arguments in order to gain autonomy and consequently achieve dynamic learning. In a study by Chryssafidou (2014) carried out on a sample of 16 students, whose purpose was the comparison of computer argument diagrams to paper ones, it was evident that the computer presents more challenges to the user while there is also an improvement in the argumentative writing skills essential for the students. Moreover, a significant number of researchers and educators have used argumentative practices for teaching the content of school subjects, apart from Language, such as Science (Driver, Newton, & Osborne, 2000), Mathematics (Lampert, Rittenhouse, & Crumbaugh, 1996; Metaxas, 2011), History and Social Science (De La Paz, 2005). In these practices students had participated in an on-line environment constructing arguments and counter-arguments. In general, the interest for the development of argumentative discourse in Greece appears to be quite low. While there are particular references to students’ development regarding critical thinking through argument, the teaching of argumentative discourse occurs at a very low degree in the last three years of Primary Education to a much higher degree in Secondary Education. Furthermore, even though debating practices have been adopted and debate competitions are organized in our country, this only concerns Secondary Education. In Primary Education, debates only take place for Foreign Languages.

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PURPOSE OF THE STUDYThe purpose of the present study was to explore the effectiveness of collaborative writing through the web collaborative writing tool Google Docs for the production of argumentative discourse within the framework of Modern Greek Language teaching in Year 5 of Primary School. More specifically, the production of full argumentative texts was pursued by following the structural elements of argumentation. The pedagogical design and application of the programme was based on the theories of collaborative learning, constructivism, learning activities and distributed knowledge. Additionally, the communicative – text-centred approach of the language and the need for the utilization of web tools as an innovation in the educational procedure were taken into consideration. To examine the effectiveness of Web 2.0 tools in the teaching of Modern Greek Language for pupils in Primary Education Year 5, the following research question was set: What would be the effect of a teaching programme with the use of a collaborative web tool on the production of written argumentative discourse?

METHODThe pre- post intervention evaluation design was adopted to identify the effectiveness of the Google Docs environment in development of pupils’ achievement in argumentative discourse.

ParticipantsThe sample for this study consisted of 23 Year 5 pupils (11 boys and 12 girls) who randomly selected from an Experimental State school in Northern Greece. The participants came from various socio-economic backgrounds and had basic knowledge of computing and social networking experience. Also they had access to the internet both at home and at school.

Group Formation Pupils were distributed into six groups (5 groups of four members and one group of three members). The groups were formed according to the pupils’ writing performance so that they would be diverse. This method of distribution was selected as research has shown that group diversity can secure a variety of stimuli, reinforce social learning, and also discourage marginalization of weaker pupils (Kanakis, 2001). Consequently, the groups should be formed to include members whose skills will not differ to a great degree but will rather complement each other. Member roles (coordinator, leader, secretary, reader) were clearly defined and changed for every new text written by the pupils, so that manner each pupil could benefit from each role.

Organization of LessonsInitially, at the beginning of the programme, all pupils were taught the concepts of argument and argumentation. They were then taught the structure/organization of an argumentative text through a structured text as follows: a) Introduction/Prologue (pre- announcement/presentation of an issue/opinion or a problem), b) Data (use of examples and evidence) c) Justification/refutation (use of arguments/counter argument) and d) Conclusion/Epilogue (Ending/suggestions). The teaching was concerned with the reinforcement of pupils’ skills to identify arguments in a text, to comprehend their target, to use corresponding arguments and become persuasive through role-play, to write their arguments in a paragraph with a specific topic sentence, and to identify specialised vocabulary for argumentation. Then the pupils were formed into groups using the collaborative learning strategy and the group collaboration method was applied for the production of written discourse. Throughout the teaching of written discourse production, the three stages suggested by Flower and Hayes (1994) were applied.More analytically, each stage included the following:

a. Pre-writing: In this stage the activities that took place were: structured discourse-Debate, text comprehension questions, paragraph comprehension, diagram designing, vocabulary exercises, short paragraph production, summarizing and finally, writing-text style exercises.

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b. Writing: the pupils applied the discourse production method in the computer lab, where they were divided into four groups of four, and one group of three, sitting at the computer desk in pairs, and using collaborative tool Google Docs. They also used the diagram prepared in advance for the graph space provided. Document Google Docs was distributed to each pupil’s e-mail account, so that they all had access to the text.

c. Post-writing: the group of writers/pupils while maintaining their distributed roles, reviewed/improved their text by using all the given data based on the text processing strategy, so as to achieve the final format and improvement of their text. In particular, according to the Revised Protocol of Argumentative text (Varsamidou & Spantidakis, 2015) the coordinator organised the group members as such in order for them to edit the in text regarding content, structure, effectiveness, style and language.

Data Collection and Analysis Prior to the commencement of this program, the pupils were asked to produce a draft of the argumentative text in the form of an essay, as a pre-test, in order to determine their initial argumentative writing skills. A six month teaching intervention followed, which included two teaching hours per week. The teaching intervention took place in the classroom but also in the school’s computer lab using 12 P/Cs. The topics given to the pupils included, the argumentation concerning the choice of means of mass transportation or car, the possibilities offered or the problems that arise with the use of a P/C in the teaching process, allowing dogs permission in buildings, individual or team sports, the use of printed or electronic books. Following the end of the programme, as a post-test, the pupils were asked to produce a new argumentative text of an equal level of difficulty as the initial text. All written texts produced by the pupils were assessed by two evaluators, who are PhD holders in the Teaching of the Modern Greek Language. The evaluators were trained in the use of the rubric, initially by studying the criteria of the tool and its categories, and by discussing and resolving any queries. Each of the evaluators assessed five texts independent of the present research where the agreement between them, concerning the inter-rater reliability was determined as much for each criterion as for the total Rubric. To determine the intra-rater reliability, each of them randomly re-assessed two of the previous texts one month later.The results showed that the intra-rater reliability on each criterion for every evaluator was .98. The inter rater reliability for both assessors for each of the criteria in the Rubric ranged between ~.90 to 1.00. In the present study their agreement concerning the criteria ranged from ~.92 to .97.

The Scale

A scoring rubric was used for the evaluation of the pupils’ skills on argumentative text writing, a method of formative and summative assessment. The rubric provides quality criteria and a grading system which evaluates the performance of each pupil. The evaluation technique of the rubric includes a) performance evaluation criteria, which provide the appropriate requirements for a task to be considered correct b) task performance levels, including a numeric scale and c) a detailed description of criteria in each level (Andrade, 2001). Two experts in Modern Greek Language teaching evaluated the content validity of the rubric for accuracy, significance and validity accordingly. According to the feedback and suggestions of the experts, some corrections were made as to the number of the performance level and the different characteristics of each level. The final rubric for the evaluation of the argumentative text included the following 13 criteria: 1st claim/thesis of issue, 2nd support of issue, 3rd counterclaim, 4th evidence, 5th conclusion, 6th number of arguments, 7th vocabulary, 8th structure, 9th effectiveness, 10th flow, 11th content, 12th length of the text, 13th research. Each of the above criteria included the performance of the learner on a 5-point rating scale: 5=Excellent, 4=Very Good, 3=Good, 2=Average, 1=Low. The possible score of the rubric ranged between 1 to 5 in each criterion and from 13 to 65 in total.

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FINDINGSAccording to the results of the descriptive statistics the performance of the participants on each rubric criterion and also in its total is shown on Table 1.

Table 1. Means, standard deviations and statistical indexes of paired samples t-tests for each criterion and the total of the Rubric

CriteriaPre-test Post-test

Μ.Ο. Τ.Α. Μ.Ο. Τ.Α. t p

1ο : Claim 3.38 1.63 3.62 1.46 -.79 .437

2ο : Support 3.14 1.01 3.95 1.11 -3.6 .002«

3ο : Counterargument 1.19 .51 3.38 1.5 -7.36 .000«

4ο : Evidence 2.24 .89 3.52 1.4 -4.15 .000«

5ο : Conclusion 3.52 1.66 3.48 1.72 .132 .897

6ο : Number of Arguments 2.62 .74 3.81 1.28 -4.86 .000«

7ο : Vocabulary 2.52 .60 3.19 1.03 -4.18 .000«

8ο : Structure 2.57 .75 3.29 1.00 -4.18 .000«

9ο : Effectiveness 2.52 .75 3.62 1.11 -5.04 .000«

10ο : Flow 2.43 .75 3.38 1.02 -4.26 .000«

11ο : Content 2.43 .59 3.29 1.05 -3.87 .001«

12ο : Length 2.11 .77 4.14 1.15 -7.79 .000«

13ο : Research 1.00 .00 3.14 1.93 -5.09 .000«

Total 31.67 8.75 45.81 14.65 -5.83 .000«

Note.«p<.01

To determine the existence of statistically significant differences between pre- and post-test on the participants’ performance regarding the criteria and the rubric total, paired-sample t-tests were applied with significance level p<.05. Data analysis showed a statistically significant improvement on the rubric’s total scoring (t(20)=5.83, p<.001) between the pre- (M=31.67, SD=8.75) and the post-test (M=45.81, SD=14.65). Also, a statistically significant improvement was established on each rubric’s criterion performance, except for the 1st and 5th criterion as presented on Table 1.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION In the present research a teaching program on Modern Greek Language for Year 5 of Primary Education was applied by means of collaborative learning environment Google Docs. The aim of the programme was to evaluate the results of collaborative writing using the forenamed tool for the improvement of the writing skills on argumentative discourse. The pupils through a series of collaborative writing activities cooperated for the final production of argumentative texts (reports, articles, essays etc). The evaluation of the structural elements of written argumentative text was conducted by the use of an analytic rubric (scale). From the results of the research it appeared a significant improvement in nearly all the structural elements of written argumentative discourse. More specifically, after completion of the programme the pupils had improved significantly in almost all structural elements of written argumentative text as these were assessed by the use of the Rubric. In its total score, the mean of the class prior to the intervention ranged between “Average” (2) and “Good” (3). At the end of the intervention the class had moved one level higher as it achieved “Good” (3) and “Very Good” (4). Following the teaching intervention, pupils had improved their ability to organize argumentative texts in a manner that demonstrated the structure as well as their collaborative progress. The arguments and the defined structure of argumentative texts, as taught during the intervention, in contrast to conventional teaching as set by the Syllabus, appears to have led pupils to a further improvement of text structure and to the development of their writing abilities. Arguably, the multiple writing attempts of written arguments and

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the constant constructive feedback of the written work from the whole class may possibly have reinforced their critical and conceptual ability.In reference to the effect of the program on each structural element of the written argumentative discourse, as illustrated by the rubric’s criteria, the results led to a positive response for all the criteria except for the 1st and 5th where no improvement was observed. More specifically, the 1st criterion which concerns claim/thesis of the writer (inclusion of a strong argument which supports this view), did not demonstrate a significant difference after the intervention as neither did the 5th criterion regarding the conclusions. Students’ performance varied between “Good” and “Very Good” in the pre-test and was maintained at the same levels after completion of the program. It appears that, these criteria did not present any difficulty to the pupils, as pupils at this age are able to write a correctly formed introduction and come to a conclusion, as the structure of productive discourse (introduction/prologue, main body, conclusion) is taught in previous years. Generally, the pupils better comprehended the structural elements of argumentative discourse, such as the introduction of strong logical arguments to support issues, and argument-counterargument refutations. In particular, the production of counterarguments (arguments for the conversion) was almost absent (level “low”) in the pre-test while after the program implementation there was a significant improvement (level between “good” and “very good”). The pre-test finding supported the statement of Matsagouras (2002) that pupils at the age of 11 are unable to find opposing arguments to the proposed solution because they do not have the maturity to disprove the argument by counterargument. However, according to the results of the present research, after pupils’ guidance and development of their collaborative skills in written exercises for argument-counterargument, they are capable to achieve the mechanism for the refutation of arguments. Moreover, learners seemed to better understood the making use of examples, information and evidence to support an issue and to reinforce an argument. Also, an increase in the number of arguments and an improvement concerning the morphology of the text (grammar, syntax, coherence /cohesion) was observed. The continuous contact with the articles they had been given and the techniques of linking words-phrases for introduction of arguments appear to have facilitated an enhancement on the text’s morphology, vocabulary and also, effectiveness (argumentation, persuasiveness). Familiarity with textual and expressional structures which ensure coherence and cohesion in the text led to a quality improvement in argumentative writing as can be seen from the content, formation, flow, the syntax structure and the length of the final text product. Correspondingly, the use of third person provided the writer with a sense of detachment which gave objectivity to the text and thus, prompted the reader of the text to accept the opinion of the writer as it was well-documented in an accurate and scientific manner. Lastly, a significant improvement was demonstrated in the length of the text and the resources available. The final texts produced were visibly more extended in length due to collaborative writing and its resources as the pupils made use of the internet. Finally, argumentation as a teaching objective appears to have empowered the relationship pupils have with language, as they came into contact with argumentative discourse. Practice and familiarity with new syntax, structural and expressional texts, which characterize persuasive text, their morphology and style, facilitated the effective conquering of the language. In addition, the pupils comprehended how useful argumentative texts are and their connection to other teaching objectives and, to an extent, their function in everyday life. The writing skills of the pupils improved since they had several opportunities to produce written arguments and argumentative discourse. At the same time, collaborative writing activities using the web tool transformed the procedure into a game.The findings of the present study regarding the use of Google Docs in the production of argumentation text are in consistent with previous researches which have been implemented in the teaching of Greek language in secondary education (e.g., Antoniou, 2001; Drakou, 2014; Delis, 2015; Exarchou, 2016). Also they are consistent with results of studies with participants from the tertiary education (e.g., Brodahl, Hadjerrouit, & Hansen, 2011; Suwantarathip & Wichadee, 2014; Zhou, Simpson, & Domizi, 2012) and for teaching the content of school subjects other than Language (e.g., Driver, Newton, & Osborne, 2000; Metaxas, 2011; De La Paz, 2005). The investigations concerning primary education in Greece focused on the refinement of argumentation discourse without the Web2.0 writing tools (Egglezou, 2016; Sifaki, 2008). So the results of the present study are the first evidences for the positive effects of the ICT use in the production of written discourse.

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A limitation of this research study is the limited number of participants. Further research is required with a larger sample and from several areas and various types of schools. Furthermore, it would be useful to include a retention test, so as to ascertain whether an argumentative discourse teaching programme using collaborative tool Google Docs leads to learning. Additionally, further research is suggested for a comparison of the effectiveness of the present intervention with a second experimental group which would follow a collaborative argumentation writing method without a web tool and a control group which would follow argumentation skills’ teaching using activities from the textbook.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSChrysoula ZIOGA, is a general teacher with many years of professional experience. She currently works in 3rd Experimental Primary School of Evosmos in Thessaloniki, Greece. She obtained her Master of Science degree in Sciences of Education and Lifelong Learning in July 2017. Her academic interest areas are mainly focused on the integration of technology in education and the use of educational technologies in language learning. Digital learning objects, distance education and social media are also included in her interests.

Chrysoula ZIOGA3rd Experimental Primary School of EvosmosAddress: Directorate for Elementary Education, 56224, Thessaloniki, Greece Phone: +30 6974146591E-mail: xrysoulazioga@gmail.com

Dr. Konstantinos BIKOS, is a Full Professor in “Educational Schooling and Information Communication Technologies in Education” and head of the School of Philosophy and Education in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece). He is directing the “Microteaching Laboratory”, while his teaching and research interests include Human Relations in Educational Settings, the use of Information Communication Technologies in Education and Teachers’ Training.

Prof. Dr. Konstantinos BIKOSAddress: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki School of Philosophy and Education, 54124 Thessaloniki University of Thessaloniki (Greece)Phone: +302310.99.7385E-mail: bikos@edlit.auth.gr

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ISSUES AND CHALLENGES IN WEB-BASED DISTANCE EDUCATION PROGRAMS IN TURKISH HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTES

Dr. Hatice Gokce BILGICORCID: 0000-0002-3925-2497

Computer Education and Instructional Technology DepartmentOndokuz Mayis University

Samsun, TURKEY

Dr. Hakan TUZUNORCID: 0000-0003-1153-5556

Computer Education and Instructional Technology DepartmentHacettepe University

Ankara, TURKEY

Received: 29/06/2018 Accepted: 01/11/2019

ABSTRACTThis study aimed to examine the core issues and challenges with web-based distance education programs in Turkish higher education institutes. Formative research method, which is a qualitative research method in nature, was selected to analyze web-based distance education programs thoroughly. The study group comprised 4 higher education institutes, offering web-based distance education services in 2014-2015, located in different provinces of different geographical regions in Turkey, and with varying experiences. The research used interview transcripts from semi-structured interviews, documents (weekly reports, meeting reports, presentations, organization chart, and implementation procedures) shared by the distance education centers, and information gathered from their web sites. Primary research data were compiled from interviews with representatives of the distance education centers managing and upholding distance education services while the documents acquired from these centers were used to verify the interview findings. The study resulted in 9 core issues related to (1) program launching process, (2) legislation, (3) program structure, (4) instructional design, (5) assessment and evaluation, (6) communication and interaction, (7) support, (8) technical issues, and (9) program evaluation.

Keywords: Distance education, post-secondary education, country-specific developments, pedagogical issues, architectures for educational technology system.

INTRODUCTIONWeb-based education platforms are the most pervasive educational result of the recent developments; they have a huge impact in education world, especially in the field of distance education (Aparicio, Bacao, & Oliveira, 2016; Hamidi & Chavoshi, 2018; The Institute for Higher Education Policy, 2000). With the development of these platforms, web-based distance education is becoming essential in higher education institutes, schools, government departments, and many other organizations (Alsabawy, Cater-Steel, & Soor, 2016; Islam, 2016). There is an increasing number of demands to become an online learner (Rizvi, Rienties, & Khoja, 2019). In recent years, higher education institutes have especially served web-based distance education programs (Wolverton, 2018). According to the Council of Higher Education statistics in Turkey, 78 higher education institutes have active distance education programs including master’s degree, bachelor’s degree and associate degree programs which consist of approximately 40% of the institutes in Turkey. In addition, 3 institutes have open education faculties. In 2017-2018 academic year, 82,457 students were enrolled in distance education programs, 1,940,465 students were enrolled in open education programs which also served through web-based distance education, and 7,740,502 students were enrolled in formal education in higher education institutes (Council of Higher Education [COHE], 2018). These

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education-TOJDE January 2020 ISSN 1302-6488 Volume: 21 Number: 1 Article 11

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numbers imply that nearly half of the higher education students in Turkey are served with distance education system. Distance education offered both undergraduate degrees and graduate degrees. In Turkey, 74 of all higher education institutes have distance undergraduate (bachelor’s and associate degrees) programs, and 63 institutes have distance graduate (master’s degree) programs (COHE, 2018). There is an increased demand for distance undergraduate programs with 2,006,047 students enrolled in both distance education programs and open education faculty programs (Table 1). On the other hand, in the USA, one-third of all graduate students attend distance education programs, although 29% do so in undergraduate programs. Furthermore, statistics from the USA imply that 15% of students in postsecondary institutions exclusively attended distance education courses in the Fall of 2016. On the other hand, 14% of the students exclusively attended distance education courses in the Fall of 2015 (NCES, 2017). Additionally, although on-campus enrollment has fallen by 5% since 2012, overall distance education enrollment has grown according to the statistics (Pearson, 2017).

Table 1. Turkey’s distance and open education statistics

Program Type Degree of the ProgramNumber of

Universities

Number of

StudentsTotal Number of

Students

Distance Education

Programs*

Doctor of Philosophy Degree 0 0

82,457Master’s Degree 63 16,875

Bachelor’s Degree 27 36,023

Associate Degree 47 29,559

Open Education Faculty

Doctor of Philosophy Degree 0 0

1,940,465Master’s Degree 0 0

Bachelor’s Degree 3 1,018,070

Associate Degree 3 922,395

*Distance education programs are mainly served by distance education centers instead of an open education faculty.

While distance education services in higher education institutes have been increasingly provided with new generation technologies, effectiveness of these programs has also been discussed. Achieving success and quality in distance education services has become the focus of both educators and researchers. Distance education has brought both new challenges and advantages to the design and distribution of education (Tirzui & Vrabie, 2014; UNESCO, 2002), it is a critical decision for higher education institutes to adapt themselves to distance education. Since it is a newly developing era for institutes, instructors, and students, there are many challenges that need to be focused on. It is important to be aware of these possible challenges so as to address them while designing successful programs. Many sources in the literature point to challenges in distance education. Main challenges in distance education literature are lack of face-to-face interaction between student-instructor and student-student (Folowo, 2007; Yazici, Altas & Demiray, 2001; Galusha, 1997; Li, 2009), lack of training and professional development (UNESCO, 2002), lack of administrative support (Bonk, 2001), lack of instructor support services (Galusha, 1997), lack of student support services (Folowo, 2007; Galusha, 1997), designing student materials without due consideration of appropriate pedagogy (Tuzun & Cinar, 2016), misuse of technology (Folowo, 2007), instructors’ lack of experience in distance education (Bonk, 2001; Li, 2009), lack of campus atmosphere (UWB LT, 2011), curriculum’s lack of convenience to distance education (Li, 2009), and lack of creativity in course design and material development (Cronje, 2001). Web-based distance education differs from the traditional in-class education in many aspects. To ensure the effectiveness of the web-based distance education programs, unlike in-class traditional education, distance education programs should meet the requirements of the distance education and should provide students with knowledge and skills that they would gain from in-class education. To achieve this, the focus should obviously be on characteristics, components, and relationships between these components of the web-based distance education system in the process of transition to distance education (Girginer, 2002). In the literature, there are studies that lay the stress on components for a design plan for online learning program delivery

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(Boehler, 1999), factors for acceptance of web-based distance education (Bhuasiri, Xaymoungkhoun, & Ciganek, 2012; Selim, 2007), indicators to use in e-learning benchmarking model for higher education institutes (Sae-Khow, 2014), and relation between learning strategies and academic performance in distance education (Neroni, Meijs, Gijselaers, Kirschner, & Groot, 2019). Moreover, there are studies that focus on the areas of strengths and weaknesses in the institutionalization of distance learning at higher education institutes (Pina, 2008), policy issues for distance education (Simonson, 2007), and quality issues in web-based distance education environments with an emphasis on students (Markovai, Glazkova, & Zaborava, 2017). In addition to these studies, there are some studies that concentrate on instructional design model proposals for web-based distance education (Tuzun, 2001; Tuzun et al., 2011; Tuzun & Cinar, 2016; Cronje, 2001; Passerini & Granger, 2000), distance education models for developing countries (Yazici, Altas, & Demiray, 2001), and also program developing processes for web-based distance learning (Turkoglu, 2003; Balci, 2010). Web-based distance education is a new way of teaching and learning. Institutes, instructors and also learners have different needs and expectations in web-based environments which necessitates new methods, new technologies and new priorities. Thus, institutes are reviewing and redesigning their libraries, instructional design, time, content, performance issues and etc. in order to adapt the new methods and priorities into the web-based instruction (Hamidi & Chavoshi, 2018). In this way, it is an important point to know about the core issues and challenges in web-based distance education programs. Although there are prior studies that highlight web-based distance education, this study differs from others by emphasizing issues and challenges related to web-based distance education from a broader perspective that includes detailed components to help new institutes to start web-based distance education programs. Examining the core issues and challenges in web-based distance education is important both to serve as a pathfinder for new beginners and to overcome suspicions about web-based distance education. Thus, this study aimed to examine the core issues among these components, characteristics, and relationships.

AIM OF THE STUDYThis study aims to examine the core issues and challenges in web-based distance education programs in Turkish higher education institutes. Furthermore, depending on these issues and challenges, suggestions are presented in a framework. This framework might be a useful guide for institutes in the process of designing a web-based distance education program. The research questions of the study are: 1) What are the core issues and challenges with web-based distance education programs in Turkish higher education institutes? 2) How should these core issues be organized within a framework as a guide for higher education institutes that will launch web-based distance education programs?

METHODTo examine web-based distance education programs in a sample of higher education institutes’ distance education centers, the formative research method, which is a qualitative research method, was used. This type of research seeks to answer the questions: “What works well?” “What needs to be improved?” and “How can it be improved?” (Reigeluth & Frick, 1999). In this study, well working aspects and the aspects to be improved are presented based on the findings. Then, a framework proposal was put forward about the current situation of web-based distance education programs in higher education institutions in light of relevant research in the literature. As a result, the components of an ideal framework for web-based distance education programs and the criteria for these components are defined.

Research Context and ParticipantsThe study group of the research consists of 4 Turkish higher education institutes that offer web-based distance education in 2014-2015, in various provincial centers located in different geographical regions with differing years of experience. Purposeful sampling was used to select the study groups. The higher education institutes were selected based on their experience in distance education. The experience of these institutes in distance

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education services was measured by two indicators. These were a) the number of years they had been offering web-based distance education and b) the number of programs they had been offering. In addition, higher education institutes in differing geographical locations were chosen. Institutes with accessibility among the higher education institutes with similar characteristics were selected for the research. Information concerning these higher education institutes is presented in Table 2 and Table 3.

Table 2. Information about the higher education institutes

Institutes Geographical RegionWeb-based Education

Offered SinceNumber of Programs

Institute 1

Institute 2

Marmara Region 2001 25

Black Sea Region (Seaside city) 2009 19

Institute 3 Black Sea Region 2012 10

Institute 4 Eastern Anatolia Region 2009 11

*Number of programs are stated according to 2016

Table 3. Description of distance education programs in the higher education institutes

Institutes Program Types and Numbers*

Institute 1

Master’s Degree Programs (17)

Associate Degree Programs (7)

Bachelor’s Degree Completion Programs (1)

Institute 2

Master’s Degree Programs (7)

Associate Degree Programs (8)

Bachelor’s Degree Completion Programs (1)

Pedagogic Formation Programs (1)

Certificate Programs (2)

Institute 3Master’s Degree Programs (4)

Associate Degree Programs (6)

Institute 4Master’s Degree Programs (7)

Bachelor’s Degree Completion Programs (4)

* 2016 data

Furthermore, participants that were interviewed during the data collection process, consist of the manager of the distance education center, deputy manager, system administrator, and content development/graphic design specialist (Table 4). Overall, 10 interviews were completed with 7 participants.

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Table 4. Demographics of participants

ParticipantsOfficial Duty in the Distance Education

CenterInstitute Profession in University

Length of Service in the Distance Education

Center

Participant 1 Manager of the center Institute 1 Academician/Faculty member 6-7 years

Participant 2 Manager of the center Institute 2 Academician/Faculty member 3-4 years

Participant 3 Manager of the center Institute 3 Academician/Faculty member 3-4 years

Participant 4 Manager of the center Institute 4 Academician/Faculty member 1-2 years

Participant 5 Deputy manager Institute 2 Academician/Faculty member 1-2 years

Participant 6 System administrator Institute 4 Academician/Faculty member 2-3 years

Participant 7 Content developer Institute 2 Graphic designer 3-4 years

Data Sources and Data CollectionThe research used interview transcripts from semi-structured interviews, documents (weekly reports, meeting reports, presentations, organization chart, and implementation procedures) shared by the distance education centers, and information gathered from their web sites. Interview transcripts are the primary data sources. Documents acquired from distance education centers were used to verify the interview findings. Data sources and data collection process are presented in detail in Table 5.

Table 5. Data collection process

Method Source Process

Interviews Personnel working at distance education centers of higher education institutes

Interviews were carried out face-to-face or via a web-based video conference system with officials at relevant distance education centers of higher education institutes. All interviews were recorded. Interview transcripts were produced based on the records. These transcripts are the primary data sources.

Document analysis

Organization Charts

Promotional Presentation/Document of the Center

Meeting Presentations/Reports

Informatory Presentations for Internal Use

Evaluation Report Files for Internal Use

Principles of Implementation

Regulations

Interviewees shared with the researchers documentation pertaining to work processes, promotional information and organization charts of programs at distance education centers, sample reports used for evaluation, and procedures and regulations of implementation. The aforementioned documentation was studied to verify interview transcripts, which are the primary data sources.

Web site review Distance Education Center Web Sites

Distance education centers’ web sites were reviewed. Notes that are produced during the review were used to verify the interview findings.

The semi-structured interview questions were developed by the researchers. To provide internal validity, the interview questions were forwarded to three field experts, who are different from the authors, by e-mail for expert opinions and finalized afterwards. The interview questions were mostly about distance education centers’ experiences while opening and conducting web-based distance education programs in higher education institutes. Interview questions were structured into 10 subcategories including 37 questions. In addition, one introduction section for demographic information. The subcategories are named as organizational structure (6 questions), legislations (5 questions), technology use (5 questions), infrastructure

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(1 question), measurement and assessment (2 questions), continuous development and in-service training (1 question), guidance and counseling (4 questions), instructor support (5 questions), student support (7 questions), course development (1 question), and final advisory section (2 questions). In addition to these 37 total questions, some questions have additional subquestions. Some sample questions are presented in the following:

“Which issues/points do you focus on while you are making decision to open a new distance education program is opening? (How do you get the program opening application or offer? What reasons do you want in a program opening application? Do you want a preliminary study or report? Could you inform us about a program opening process including getting offer or application?)”

“Is there any evaluation process (program evaluation) for web-based distance education programs? If yes, how do you manage this process? Which criteria or which scales do your organization use?”“How do your organization handle the course development process? Is there a team work? If yes, who are the people in this team? (Their specialities or background information) How did you organize the coordination between this team and the faculty members?”

“What are the measurement and evaluation methods that you use in web-based distance education programs? Examination system, projects, homeworks, etc. (Student measurement and evaluation) How do you manage the examination/Project/homework or any other assignments delivering system? Electronic or printed environments? Do the methods that are used vary for different programs or for different degrees (bachelor degree, graduate degree etc.)?”

Interviews were conducted face-to-face or using web-based video conferencing. With the permission of the interviewees, the interviews were recorded and transcribed. Overall, transcripts are produced from 10 interviews with 7 participants from 4 institutes. First, interviews were conducted with the managers of the distance education centers in order to understand the general organizational structure through semi-structured interview forms. The following interviews were organized based on the missing issues of first interviews. These interviews were conducted with a deputy manager, a system administrator, and a content development/graphic design specialist. The first 4 administrator level interviews were completed over approximately one and half to two hours for each. The additional three interviews were completed over approximately 15 to 45 minutes for each.

Data AnalysisThe final interview transcripts resulted in 73 single-spaced pages in 12-point Times New Roman font. A preliminary coding was conducted by marking possible codes while the interview transcripts were read line-by-line by two researchers in digital format. The researchers conducted the coding process together to ensure the reliability of the research results. After the researchers shared their preliminary coding, by discussion on the meanings of the statements, consistency with the preliminary coding was verified. Then, the interview transcripts were subjected to content analysis by transferring them to the data analysis program. The coding was completed in three stages: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding (Glaser, 1992; Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1990; Strauss & Corbin, 1998). The richest documents were selected by joint decision of the researchers after the preliminary coding process. Then, open coding stage began with these documents. Once sufficient amount of codes was revealed with 100% agreement of the two researchers, the researchers continued with the axial coding stage, in which categorical structure of the study emerged. As a result of the 6 richest documents coding schema, 569 codes were grouped under 13 categories. When deciding on the transcript to continue the coding with, the code saturation in preliminary coding was considered. The category saturation was reached when a total of 727 codes were generated under 13 categories by the total coding process. Analysis continued with the selective coding in which researchers checked for the repeating codes and categories and organized the relationships between the codes and categories. In the end, 608 codes were obtained in 9 categories which represented the core issues. These are: program launching process, legislation, program structure, instructional design, assessment and evaluation, communication and interaction, support, technical issues, and program evaluation.

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Lincoln and Guba (1985) suggested the criteria of credibility, confirmability, dependability, and transferability to evaluate the trustworthiness of qualitative research. To ensure the trustworthiness of data, the findings were obtained about the first two distance education centers. Then, by adding two more centers to the study group, the results were examined to see if they verified the original findings. The research concluded that the initial research results corresponded to those of the added two centers. Two researchers were included in the study to ensure confirmability and dependability. To increase their transferability, the study groups’ characterization, such as their years of experience, number of programs, and geographical regions were presented to be defined in detail (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). Moreover, during the coding process, documents and web-site review notes were also used to verify and support the interview transcripts.

FINDINGSThe findings presented with 9 core issues (Table 6) and related challenges in web-based distance education programs in Turkish higher education context are presented in this section.

Table 6. Issues and related components

Issues Related Components Number of codes Total codes

Program Launching Process

Institutional Mission and Vision 9

37Criteria for Opening a Program 7Application Process 12Preparations for Program Opening 9

LegislationPrinciples and Procedures 8

15National Qualifications Framework for Higher Education in Turkey (NQF-HETR) 7

Program Structure

Personnel Structure 32

143Department Structure 26Coordination 29Student Affairs 17Stakeholders 39

Instructional DesignDesign Elements 56

174Course Design 99Use of Learning Management System (LMS) 19

Assessment and Evaluation

Exam Types 8

42Exam Application Methods 6Exam Organization 7Alternative Assessment and Evaluation 21

Communication and InteractionCommunication and Interaction Channels 18

29Communication and Interaction Types 11

SupportStudent Support 27

62Teaching Staff Support 26Personnel Professional Development 9

Technical IssuesHardware 13

80Network 3Software 64

Program EvaluationEvaluation Elements 19

26Formative Evaluation 5Summative Evaluation 2

TOTAL 608

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Issue 1: Program Launching ProcessInstitutes that participated in the study were asked about their reasons to launch distance education services and how they relate this with their institutional mission and vision. One of them mentioned that their institutional aim was to make their education more accessible and that distance education was a way to accomplish this aim as mentioned in the following quote:

“Our aim is to use the distance education opportunities in order to improve the quality of our education services. [In addition, we aimed] to make our education more accessible and to develop human resources related with this aim. As well, we had goals to make more research about these issues when we began to serve distance education.” (Participant 3, Institute 3)

In the process of opening web-based distance education programs in higher education institutes, presence of a target group, availability of the teaching staff in the academic unit, suitability of the course content to distance education, and economic consequences are the criteria encountered frequently. Opening a distance education program requires applying to the presidency of the higher education institute and then to the Council of Higher Education (COHE) in Turkey. It was found that for approval of the program by COHE, information was obtained by evaluating the institutional infrastructure, software and hardware, preparation and production of distance education course materials, training, student support, and assessment and evaluation. Preparations to open the programs approved by COHE start with assignment of instructors, appointment of coordinators, preparation of content, and instructional design and organization of any educational training that may be needed. A program launching process is explained in an interview as in the following quote:

“After the two units [in the university] come to an aggreement, that which the academic department and us [the administration of distance education center] decided [and] say that we are starting this program, the academic department or the faculty prepares the [application] file. After the file is prepared, it arrives to the academic department or faculty. Then, we receive the file, we review it and then we add a supplement to the file related with distance education issues which differs according to the courses. Examples for the supplements are instructional design about distance Education, technical infrastructure, and criterias related with the requirements of COHE. We attach an information file containing these, and send it back to the relevant academic department. Then the process continues like this, the academic department sends an official writing to the senate of university […]. After being approved, [the file] is sent to COHE. [In COHE] distance education commission study group examines the file [focusing on] whether this program is applicable for distance education, whether the instructional design that presented in the file is logical, whether the technical infrastructure is sufficient or how the system that promised in there might be executable. Then, the relevant department of the university is called to come and make a presentation. If the commission is convinced, they approve the application and education department of [COHE] informs the university with a official writing. The process goes on.” (Participant 2, Institute 2)

“We get the approval from COHE and the program arrived [to our distance education center.] We immediately contact with the related academic department and say them we need to assign a program coordinator officially. After the coordinator is assigned [in the academic department side], we assign a program supervisor and a preliminary study is done. We decide the instructors for the courses and give them quick transition seminars to distance education. In the context of how live session courses is delivered, how course notes are prepared, in which calendar plan and how the course notes should be prepared. […] As a summary, the process progress like that assigning the coordinator and responsible people of the openning program, organizing the orientation seminars of the instructors and preparing the course contents. (Participant 3, Institute 3)

When higher education administrations decided to offer distance education, a rapid process was initiated. Attempts have been made to correct deficiencies that arose from the use of trial and error, and it has been found that needs assessment was not performed in the planning stage. Thus, distance education in the selected programs started with great eagerness, but has not achieved the desired outcomes, and many challenges that could not previously be taken into consideration have emerged and timely solutions to them

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have not been forthcoming. This shows that it is important for institutes to plan strategically before opening their programs. When web-based distance education is adapted without careful planning, it will end with failure. Also, since it is rather very costly to serve a web-based distance education, failure will result in cost overrun for institutes (Aydin & Tasci, 2005).

Issue 2: LegislationThe legislation regulating web-based distance education programs in higher education institutes is the Procedures and Principles regarding Distance Education in Higher Education Institutes prepared by COHE (Council of Higher Education [COHE], 2014). Institutes must follow these procedures and principles to apply to open a distance education program or course. They are bound by these procedures and principles for assessment, budgeting the income and expenses of distance education, exam fees, and faculty pay. The functioning of these programs within institutes is further regulated with institutional legislation.National Qualifications Framework for Higher Education in Turkey (NQF-HETR) emerges as an important factor in the design of the web-based distance education programs opened by higher education institutes. Courses in web-based distance education programs should be offered in accordance with NQF-HETR legislation, aiming to teach domain knowledge, the ability to work independently and to take responsibility, learning skills, communication skills, social skills, and domain-specific competencies.

Issue 3: Program StructureThe administrative structure of web-based distance education programs in higher education institutes includes an administrative board of directors, deputy directors, and instructors from academic departments. In some institutes, deputy directors specialize in the management of academic, administrative, or technical issues. The personnel structure includes part-time personnel -mainly students- and permanent personnel. In addition, research assistants from academic departments are also assigned to distance education centers for supplemental instruction.Personnel from a variety of fields are employed as needed in these programs and may be responsible for system management, software development, animation development, website content management, graphic design, video shooting and editing, instructional design, content development, assessment and evaluation, public relations, or administration. While these personnel are employed by departments in some institutes, others are employed on the basis of individual projects. Furthermore, in institutes with decentralized campuses, all work processes are carried out by individual departments, rather than by the central administration as it is stated in the following quote. The departments, on the other hand, have structures comprising units such as management, student affairs, editorial offices, Information Technology (IT), content development, support, assessment and evaluation, exam organization, and advertisement units.

“We have satellite studios. We have satellite studios and staff in each of our campuses. In other words, we do have 15 people here at the center, but we have studios in 6 other locations and 2 or 3 colleagues who work in these studios, supporting local instructors there. […] Frankly, we don’t have much work left to do most of the time; as local studios are located close to them and we have campuses scattered across the city, they receive such technical support from the staff at local studios and they learn there.” (Participant 1, Institute 1)

The biggest challenges encountered in web-based distance education programs are that the institutes are unable to find trained personnel, unable to retain the trained personnel, and excessive workloads. When institutes are opening distance education programs, they are unable to find qualified personnel in the relevant areas to work in them. Institutes that open programs with their own personnel have difficulty with organization and completing tasks since the personnel on hand do not have comprehensive knowledge of these processes and large workloads are assigned to them. Some programs have attempted to do a lot of work with limited personnel, leading to labor exploitation. Additionally, it was found that the research assistants assigned by academic departments to work in distance education centers are working over their capacity. Research assistants, who contribute to the work of academic departments on the one hand and prepare web-based distance education programs on the other, experience hardships in their graduate education.

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Furthermore, administrators, instructors, and technical staff are important stakeholders of this system. It was found that the stakeholders of web-based distance education programs in higher education institutes, including institute directors, teaching staff, and relevant distance learning center employees should work in close communication and cooperation with each other. Therefore, coordinating the communication between each stakeholder effectively is an important issue (Ozaygen, 2000). Some institutes have developed systems to coordinate between distance education centers and academic departments as mentioned in the following quote:

“In fact, as the distance education center, [...] We said to ourselves that we are a technical unit, what we mean by that is that we have a technical work, and not that we are a technology unit. Our job is to process, prepare and ensure the implementation of the materials submitted to us. So, the academic unit is the primary actor in charge of the preparation of these materials. That is, we assume that the institute is directly responsible for the quality and the implementation of an academic program if a master’s program is in question, and the faculty is so if an undergraduate program is in question. […], we say when we are to launch any program, when we decide as [the center]. Initially, we assign a coordinator to ensure the coordination at [the center], communicate with the relevant academic unit and solve the potential problems, issues that may arise when the program is fully in place through joint efforts with the academic unit, and we refer to this individual as [the center] coordinator. We also ask the relevant academic unit to assign a distance education center coordinator on their part. For example, we ask the institute… the institute of educational sciences [the professor in charge] to assign a coordinator for the 3-5 programs we run with [their] unit. And then they assign a [center] coordinator for us. So, in fact both institutes assign respective coordinators to establish relations. In addition to the coordinator at the institute, we ask one person from the department to be put in charge of each program in an academic capacity. The academic officer, or the academic coordinator becomes the one in charge of the assignment of lecturers, level of courses to be offered, the kind of content of each course, measurement and assessment strategies, quality control issue, making preparations for students’ grievances, organizing some meetings if necessary, to offer high-quality content. So, we use the system of coordinators.” (Participant 2, Institute 2)

In these systems, coordinators were appointed by both academic departments and distance education centers. On the other hand, it can be seen that new centers have challenges about coordination due to lack of personnel and a well-designed mature coordination system. It was also found that difficulties are experienced in terms of organization due to lack of clear job definitions in web-based distance education programs. Thus, it was found that failure to coordinate between the distance education centers and academic departments and to define their mutual responsibilities in detail creates difficulty.

Issue 4: Instructional DesignThis study found that while instructional design is planned in accordance with learning objectives, in fields such as language, engineering, health or science designs vary based on needs specific to these fields. In instructional design, issues such as conformity of the programs to distance education in terms of content, activities, if any, and how these requirements are met in distance education are significant matters in the planning stages. The important issues to plan instructional design of distance education is mentioned as in the following quote:

“… instructional design is truly crucial; in other words, this is not simply a matter of submitting random documents. I will even go so far as to say that not even in formal [education] so much would be […]. Because, everything is put on record recorded here, in other words, you know everything: what the student is doing, which courses the student is complaining about, etc. That is why we say that the second most important [requirement] is to plan the instructional design and to identify measurement-assessment strategies in the best way possible. So, that is what we said about the second phase: the instructional design must absolutely be extremely well planned. Why do live classes matter? Are they needed or not needed? So, measurement-assessment strategies, the issue of [giving] feedback to students, [possible] assignment of projects etc. must be done well” (Participant 1, Institute 1)

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Moreover, the number of students is also an important factor in the selection of the design to be used with synchronous or asynchronous tools. Students’ demographics, their reasons for enrolling in the program, and levels of responsibility are also issues to consider in the instructional design process.The content of existing web-based distance education programs includes PDFs, presentations, and audio and non-interactive materials in video format. In the process of content development, the instructors in the academic unit submit content to the distance education center crudely in Word or PowerPoint format, and the distance education center personnel edit this content and convert it to electronic formats to upload to the system. Templates developed by the distance education departments are used for presentations, PDF documents for text-based content, and there are designated page and length indicators for the content. Since materials consist of mostly text-based documents, it was found that the programs examined in this study need to enrich their materials with new technologies as well.Another issue to bear in mind during the planning stage of web-based distance education programs is how to do experiments (Balci, 2010). In some programs, students come to the campus for a week in the semester for courses and programs that require practical or laboratory activities in the web-based distance education programs. Live courses are also an important issue in web-based distance courses since they give students a chance to interact with their instructors in person. The live courses of web-based distance education programs are offered via video conferencing systems. The management of these systems, the size and storage of records, organization and calendar of live courses as well as issues such as the purpose, frequency, and schedule of the live courses are important topics that need to be planned during instructional design. On the other hand, student participation in live classes in the web-based distance education programs was found to be low, so instructors need to offer activities to students that will increase their participation in live classes.Furthermore, some instructors prefer to record course presentation as well as the experiments conducted in a classroom environment instead of teaching the course content as live classes through videoconferencing. As mentioned in the following quote, these instructors use the ‘live classess’ option of videoconferencing tools as a forum platform to discuss the students’ questions:

“… some schools and some professors prefer to give online lectures. However, giving online lectures is no easy task as you should expect to have glitches with the videoconference any given time. These things happen with every videoconference. So, for example, you want to show something: I, for one, perform some of the experiments in classroom environment, I take experiment materials with me and film at the studio. Now, there is no way these [experiments] can be filmed using a single camera, only with a web camera. I have already taught my class in the best way possible at the studio. There is no way I can teach it again with the same level of performance, because I already did several takes until I perfected it. Students watch the video, take notes of points they don’t understand, ask questions at the live broadcast or on the interactive forum.” (Participant 1, Institute 1)

Use of LMS is another important issue in web-based distance education since it provides many benefits for educational processes (Aldiab, Chowdhury, Kootsookos, Alam, & Allhibi, 2019). A Learning Management System (LMS) was defined in the interviews as “the classroom that students attend.” LMSs are used as learning environments in which students can have access to course materials, chat with instructors and other students, or have discussions on the forums. LMS usage is an important issue in web-based distance education because the use of LMS in institutes compensates for the lack of face-to-face classroom instruction properties in distance education (Islam, 2016). LMS discards the physical location necessity for educational processes (Aldiab et al., 2019). Thus, course design in LMS is another important issue in distance education courses to provide students an online learning and teaching environment that provides the components of traditional learning and teaching.

Issue 5: Assessment and EvaluationAssessment in the web-based distance education programs is mainly carried out using midterm and final exams. While midterms are conducted online, final exams are conducted face-to-face. On the other hand, alternative assessment and evaluation methods other than midterms and final exams such as assignments and projects are followed in accordance with the preferences of the academic departments. The procedures

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and principles related to distance education in higher education institutes (COHE, 2014) stipulate that the assessment activities of courses offered by distance learning programs can be carried out face-to-face or online with or without supervision, and that unsupervised assessment cannot account for more than 20% of the course grade.Face-to-face exams were administrated in various ways, namely written on paper, oral examination before a jury, and on computers. These exams were applied within the scope of examinations accompanied by a supervisor, and they make up 80% of the overall assessment. Online quizzes and other alternative assessment methods contributed approximately 20% as unsupervised assessment. Institutes might be more flexible to design their assessment methods including alternative assessment types over online activities since students’ way of learning is changing in the digital age.

Issue 6: Communication and InteractionCommunication channels, such as phone, e-mail, SMS, fax, call centers, online live support systems, dialog boxes on web pages, social media, forums, video conferencing systems, learning management systems, and communication modes within LMSs are used in the web-based distance education programs of higher education institutes.Interaction has a significant role in e-learning (Guney, 2010). Unlike face-to-face in-class education, the limited face-to-face interaction in web-based distance education is an important aspect to be considered during program design. On the one hand, in online learning environments, students have access to many different types of interaction during the program as stated in the following quote:

“We already have a call center and a 444 hotline. Students can receive both academic and technical support at the call center. So, in summary, we offer sms services, call center, social media, e-mail, student information system, LMS and an online live support system on the web. That is where students, especially those students that have concerns at live classes, have the opportunity to talk to our live agents on the web.” (Participant 4, Institute 4)

In the programs examined, intensive interaction occurred between students on the forums. In live classes taught with a video conferencing system, students could establish one-to-one communication with the instructors and message each other through a messaging system similar to e-mail or the LMS. On the other hand, message boards were favored over e-mails for interaction between students and instructors, and for follow-ups from the institute. In addition, students met with coordinators both in the distance learning center and in the academic department in e-consultations using a video conferencing system.

Issue 7: SupportSince most activities in the web-based distance education programs are usually delivered from a distance, there is an orientation system mostly based on materials. Orientation is conducted using videos and other electronic materials prepared for the students by the distance education centers. Face-to-face training is used to introduce the system and is organized for students when they register at the institute. In addition to these, one of the institutes mentioned that they were planning to prepare an introduction course for students about the requirements of distance education which can be seen in the following quote:

“We are considering organizing a lecture at the beginning of the semester to not only inform the students about technical issues, but also about the kind of behavior expected of them to become successful students at distance education. All of our students. That is to say, we are planning to explain that distance education requires great responsibility indeed, thus to what extent it is important to attend daily classes every week as well as to participate in live classes, and to what extent it is beneficial to use the forums effectively. We are planning to explain all of these [points] in a short video.” (Participant 1, Institute 1)

Support available to students is structured by academic issues, technical issues, and administrative challenges. Students reach out to these support channels frequently by contacting the distance education center by phone or by means of online forums. While the expression ‘twenty-four seven’ is often used by distance education

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programs and is perceived as an indication of their sustainability, only forums could be considered as such to some extent. It was observed that phone support was only active during official business hours. One reason for students to quit the system or feel isolated in web-based distance education programs is the gap between students and instructors caused by lack of one-to-one contact between them. It was found that students received very late responses for the support requests they sent to distance education department personnel.Briefings and introductory meetings about distance education are organized for the instructors who lecture in the higher education institutes’ web-based distance education programs. Meetings are also organized at the beginning of each semester to share strategies and innovations. After instructors deliver course content to the relevant distance education center, necessary modifications are followed up by the distance education departments, and therefore, no content preparation training for instructors is held. Instructors who will teach in web-based distance education programs receive one-to-one applied training about live classes as well as technical training regarding live classes. Trial courses are generated in trial classrooms. While instructors adapt to live web-based teaching, technical support staff assists them for the duration of the course. Video tutorials, guidelines, and presentation templates for use in lectures and sample course videos are also prepared for instructors.Since instructors come from different domains, they have inadequacies in terms of giving distance education lectures. Due to their age and position, some have difficulties with giving these lectures. It was found that instructors have trouble adapting to alternative assessment methods and teaching styles in these programs since they lack sufficient feelings of desire and curiosity towards distance education, and they are not accustomed to these systems. It was argued that instructors maintained the habits and teaching methods they had developed in classroom education in web-based distance education classes. It is harder to adapt the instructors with lower computer literacy skills and a lack of experience. To overcome instructors’ resistance to new teaching methods with technology, it is essential to select tools that might be easy for instructors to use (Asoodar, Vaezi, & Izanloo, 2016). Furthermore, in addition to beginning orientation and training sessions at the beginning of the semester, continuous professional development about these new educational tools is essential for instructors’ adaptation process.Professional development for the personnel is another issue in the matters, as a result of the rapid developments in technologies and management of the systems and software. Personnel’s professional development is explained with the adaptation to new software and technologies by individual effort, with training and support from the institute and elsewhere. It was pointed out that personnel were seldom sent to external training because of their heavy workload; however, training is offered by the companies that sell software and hardware to institutes of higher education.

Issue 8: Technical IssuesTechnical issues include network, hardware, and software components. The issue of server hosting is a recurring item on the agenda of web-based distance education programs. Some of the servers used for the web-based distance education systems are hosted at universities. Some are hosted where the programs are studied, and some of them use rental hosting services. Furthermore, a wide variety of software for learning management systems, content development, video conferencing, learning materials, management, and exam are used in web-based distance education programs. They were open source or paid. Software integration, which allows different pieces of software to talk to each other and additional features to be added to them, is among the most important issues. Institutes with a good software development team were able to solve these kinds of issues internally, whereas institutes without one experienced difficulty and required external assistance for software development.

“[…] our student information system, in addition our web-based video conferencing system that we are using, and then what else we have. We are doing some development studies to provide our learning management system to communicate with video conferencing system, and learning management system with each other. We do not receive external support for these [developments], our computer center team is making these improvements. In addition, we help the organizations that we get our LMS systems in order to imrprove their LMS system. We are constantly [producing feedback for their system], we have requests. They are making these improvements for their own LMS.” (Participant 3, Institute 3)

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“We have a developer team but majority of our team was out of the university, which might a disadvantage of [our location]. We have developer team and we are making some modifications on Moodle, but these are limited. […] we are trying to develop our own alternative software applications to adjust our needs. [But] we also receive professional support out of the university. […]” (Participant 2, Institute 2)

Technical challenges of web-based distance education programs include Internet speed problems, database sizes, image freezing in the video conferencing, overloading, power outages, and the integration of different systems. Higher education institutes make major infrastructure investments to enable web-based distance education programs (Alsabawy et al., 2016; Stoffregen, Pawlowski, & Pirkkalainen, 2015). Since technical infrastructure is essential to serve distance education courses, the technical challenges must be reduced as much as possible.

Issue 9: Program EvaluationProgram evaluation has two types including formative and summative evaluation. The primary source for evaluation is reports obtained from the LMSs. For program evaluation, reports obtained from the LMSs were used as stated in the following quote:

“I also forgot to say that, we send monthly system logs and reports to academic unit coordinators every month. In other words, we [inform] the professor [saying] ‘look, there are 5 instructors in your course or program, and these instructors entered the LMS system on this date, for this long and wrote so many replies on forums.” (Participant 7, Institute 4)

Formative evaluation involved monthly meetings of participants from both distance education centers and academic departments where the progress of program was evaluated. In these meetings, logs and reports from the systems were presented. Issues regarding instructors, student participation in live classes, or incomplete activities and potential improvements were discussed. It was found that the formative evaluation of web-based distance education programs was a joint evaluation of the distance learning center and academic department, and senior management was not involved. Summative evaluation of web-based distance education programs was accomplished in meetings at the end of the semesters with participation from academic departments, distance education centers and, if any, supervisory commissions.

DISCUSSIONS AND IMPLICATIONSInstitutes put in a lot of hard work and spend a lot of money to launch a distance education program, but the program will end up a failure without a good planning process (Hetty Rohayani, Kurniabudi, & Sharipuddin, 2015). Thus, program launching process is the key to succeed in distance learning. Although there are some criteria applied both in higher education institutes and in COHE, the main problem with the program launching process is that institutes lack necessary readiness control mechanisms to put to work before opening a program. Institutes should be careful to focus on the essential factors that will be used to measure their readiness, and to obtain accurate information which will describe the real condition of the institute. Readiness is one of the most important issues, because readiness check will guide the institute management to implement more efficient web-based education projects. Therefore, higher education institutes should start their web-based distance education projects by measuring the readiness of their institutes (Boroits & Poulymenakou, 2004). They should also proceed by associating their institutional mission and vision with their policy in all administrative decisions, such as program and course design, selection of technologies, selection of teaching methods, and evaluation of their programs, considering them as a whole (Girginer, 2002). Some higher education institutes that have difficulty meeting the demand for web-based programs launch distance education programs and then do the planning as they move forward in the process. This appears to be one of the most important and fundamental reasons behind the failure of distance education programs (The Institute for Higher Education Policy, 2000). Furthermore, availability of academic personnel to open distance education programs, and their willingness to do so should be evaluated along with the requisite competencies and attitudes towards distance education. This study also found that in order to launch programs in some departments with inadequate personnel, instructors were compelled to

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give web-based lectures regardless of their wishes. However, instructors who want to offer their lectures in distance education are more successful than those who are forced to do so (Falowo, 2007).Legislation is a vital issue to examine both before opening a web-based distance education program and while conducting the program. All other components should meet the requirements of the legislation related to the Turkish higher education system. What is critical here is that the legislation should be updated based on the new needs of digital age students. Some flexibility in terms of instructional methods and assessment procedures should be allowed to instructors so that they are able to adapt.Program structure is also essential since it includes the organization of all issues related to personnel structure, department structure, stakeholders of the program, and coordination of all the stakeholders. Many personnel from different subject areas are involved in the provision of web-based distance education from technical issues, assessment, and material development to marketing and advertisement. In addition to personnel structure, there exists an academic aspect of the system which relates to the actual instructors and academic departments that offer distance education courses. Thus, this diversity needs to be organized in a structured way with a well-designed coordination system. Institutes should draw up their personnel structure, department structure, and their organization structure early in the planning stage. Instructional design, assessment and evaluation, communication and interaction, support, and technical issues altogether form the web-based distance education program components. Once an institute creates the program structure, then all these individual program components come together to shape the program design. Since student motivation and satisfaction result from positive experiences about the use of web-based course elements (Aparicio, Bacao, & Oliveira, 2016; Doll & Torkzadeh, 1988; Sun et al., 2008), it is essential for institutes to design each of these components accordingly.Instructional design is one of the essential issues because web-based distance education differs from traditional face-to-face education. First and foremost, defining an instructional strategy requires an understanding of what determines success in e-learning (Aparicio, Bacao, & Oliveira, 2016). In web-based distance education curricula, students’ values, needs, and experiences should have the same or higher level of quality as traditional classroom curricula (Bilke et al., 2006). Thus, the consistency of and the degree to which a web-based course design is compatible with the existing values, needs and experiences of students are important factors in increasing students’ academic performance (Islam, 2013; Islam, 2016). Furthermore, addressing students’ needs and supplying them with new experiences and skills will be helpful to motivate them to reuse these educational services (Alsabawy et al., 2016). Students have different learning strategies to succeed in a learning community (Neroni et al., 2019). Thus, students should be encouraged with various course activities to support different needs and expectations and sufficient interaction opportunities with their peers and instructors. In web-based distance education programs, use of live classes or virtual classrooms is poor. It was found that live classes are only available as part of presentation of the course content without reciprocal communication between the instructor and students. Moreover, it was observed that lengthy text documents such as Word and PDF files are used predominantly in web-based distance education programs. Literature suggests that one of the major challenges in web-based distance education is lack of creativity in course preparation; content is made available as downloadable PowerPoint files, simply transferred from an existing boring course structure to a website (Cronje, 2001). These text documents should be presented to students in more interactive formats using interactive technologies. In addition to these, LMSs are another important issue in instructional design. LMSs provide students to reach lecture notes, to attend exams/quizzes, to submit assignments, to communicate with their peers and also instructors, to receive feedback, to attend discussions, etc. (Aldiab et al., 2019). Thus, the design of these all components in the LMS is an important part of instructional design in web-based distance education courses. Assessment and evaluation are among the most challenging issues in web-based distance education. Legislation has rules that force instructors to set supervised exams, which constitute 80% of the student grades. Thus, instructors have restrictions when conducting alternative types of assessments like project-based assessment. There should be alternative ways of assessment in web-based distance education platforms. Since web-based distance education is mainly based on technology, students might use tools that allow collaborative work.Web-based distance education differs from traditional education format with its temporal and spatial aspect; therefore interaction opportunities and support mechanisms play a crucial role for both students and

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instructors. Students interact with their classmates, instructors, technology tools, course materials, and the content of the course on web-based platforms. Although these different types of interactions increase the learners’ chance of building their own knowledge, it is still important to provide them with more chances of interacting with their instructors and peers in the course (Asoodar et al., 2016). If the programs fail to provide enough interaction and communication opportunities, then students begin to feel lonely during the program. When students need help while working on the course content, they should have the chance of reaching their classmates, instructors, or any related person from distance education center to get that help. On the other hand, using messaging platforms which allow administrators to follow up the messaging traffic with reports is preferable for institutes so they can interfere when students cannot get answers to their questions.Technical issues have to do with the IT infrastructure of the web-based distance education platforms. IT infrastructure services are defined as the services that are supplied by the institutes to enable the users of the web-based education system to receive, exchange, and share the content of the education (Alsabawy et al., 2016). Thus, IT infrastructure is a critical factor in the success of web-based distance education (Alsabawy et al., 2016; Selim, 2007; Soong, Chan, Chua, & Loh, 2001). Higher education institutes should be aware of the critical impact of IT infrastructure services and should think about how investments in these services might affect the information and service quality, service delivery quality, and the success of web-based tools (Alsabawy et al., 2016). On the other hand, since technological infrastructure is readily accessible in the digital age, human factors and pedagogical factors become the key elements to success with these technologies. The use of technologies as applicable to defined goals in web-based distance education programs is key for instructional design.Program evaluation is another important issue that enable higher education institutes to become aware of the shortcomings in and to enhance their distance education programs. Program evaluation is applicable to all the issues including instructional design, assessment and evaluation, communication and interaction, support, and technical matters. Supervision and evaluation are important factors for successful learning in the higher education institutes; however, they are often overlooked by program directors (Darab & Montazer, 2011; Newman, 2003). The literature suggests that variables such as quality of technical systems, quality of the education system and its activities, quality of content, quality of support services, learner satisfaction, degree of utilization of the learner, learner’s desire to re-use the system, how many times the system is used, and degree of actualization of learning objectives be evaluated in a web-based distance education program (Hassanzadeh, Kanaani, & Elahi, 2012).Although there is a huge trend among higher education institutes to offer web-based distance education programs, they face many challenges. While new tools, course materials, improvements, environments, and standards are developed, the need for leadership and sample models in distance education persists (Bonk, 2001). Both institutes and instructors are accustomed to traditional methods of teaching and they need to change their habits to adapt to these new methods. They need a road map as well as consultancy to guide them in their decision to enter the distance education world. It is imperative that leading higher education institutes and instructors with a wealth of experience in distance education share their knowledge and experience with the new institutes and instructors in this field. Sharing sample sources and tools in free, online, open-source environments is also a noteworthy tool. Currently, each higher education institute independently makes an effort to develop its own content and materials for distance education courses. Yet, course content might be developed collaboratively by experienced instructors and domain-specific experts, which would also serve as a role model for beginners.This study aimed to present the core issues and challenges in web-based distance education programs by examining a sample of higher education institutes. Based on these issues and challenges, a framework is suggested as a guide for higher education institutes that will launch web-based distance education programs (Figure 1).

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Figure 1. Core Issues for web-based distance education programs in higher education In the suggested framework, circles represent the 9 core issues: program launching process, legislation, program structure, instructional design, assessment and evaluation, communication and interaction, support, technical issues, and program evaluation. Ellipses represent the components to focus on while designing the related issues. The issue of legislation is repeated four times with straight lines going through other issues, meaning it affects all aspects of a program. Moreover, program evaluation is represented with dashed lines, which means it is applicable to all issues, especially when it comes to the formative evaluation process of the program issues.Distance education programs begin with program launching process with 4 main components: institutional mission and vision, criteria to open programs, application process and preparations for opening the program. Legislation of COHE is the basis for opening a program. Once the program is approved, the second process step is the organization of program structure, which comprises 5 components: personnel structure, department structure, coordination, stakeholders, and student affairs. Instructional design, assessment and evaluation, communication and interaction, support and technical issues are the other important aspects of a distance education program. In instructional design, there are 3 components to focus on which are design elements, LMS usage, and course design. Assessment and evaluation primarily help determine exam types, exam organization, exam application methods, and alternative assessment and evaluation ways. As for communication channels, communication channels and communication types are the main aspects to be determined. Legislation is central to these issues since programs must be conducted in compliance with the COHE’s regulations for higher education institutes. Support is another important aspect of distance education and includes three main components namely, student support, personnel professional development, and teaching support for instructors. Additionally, technical issues are vital for web-based distance education, and they can be classified under 3 components namely, hardware, network, and software.

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The final important issue regarding distance education programs is program evaluation. Program evaluation should be planned in two components: formative evaluation and summative evaluation of the program.

CONCLUSION AND FUTURE STUDIESDistance education has indeed created an alternative form of education that eliminates the boundaries of time and space. Widespread use of computers, ever-expanding limits of the Internet and other technologies that accompany distance education has helped it gain great momentum (Tuzun et al., 2011; Hetty Rohayani et al., 2015; Balci, 2010; Pardue, 2001; Sun et al., 2008; Markova et al., 2017;). Today, web-based distance education platforms are referred to as the most dominant and advanced technologies in the field of distance education (Islam, 2016; The Institute for Higher Education Policy, 2000). Naturally, higher education institutes are the most important actors that should follow these developments. Therefore, it is key to be aware of the core issues and potential challenges of this new system while adapting the education system to the said new developments.The present study addresses the core issues and related challenges that an institute should focus on while attempting to open a web-based distance education program. These core issues are program launching process, legislation, program structure, instructional design, assessment and evaluation, communication and interaction, support, technical issues, and program evaluation. Since web-based distance education is a new way of teaching and learning for institutes, academics, and students; institutes should start with a good planning period. On the other hand, program structure issues, instructional design issues, assessment and evaluation issues, communication and interaction issues, support issues, and technical issues should be addressed with a focus on the distance education requirements. Legislation is the foundation on which all the other issues are built since programs are bound by the COHE’s rules. Additionally, distance education centers and institute administrations should apply both formative and summative program evaluations to enhance their programs.Although, like much scientific research, this study has limitations such as the number of participants and time, the researchers tried to get thorough information from the participating institutes and tried to summarize the main points which will be helpful for the higher education institutes. The participants of the study were from the distance education centers of the higher education institutes and included administrators and technical staff. In future studies, academic staff including instructors and students might be included in the study. Especially by expanding the participating staff, further information might be gathered on the existing challenges related to the core issues. In addition, for the purpose of verifying the validity of the study at an international scale, an analysis of these issues can be performed by international institutes with experience in web-based distance education. Thus, the issues and challenges found in Turkey can be compared to the practices of institutes in other nations.

Acknowledgements: In commemoration of Prof. Dr. Ugur DEMIRAY for his valuable contributions to this study as a member of the Doctoral Advisory and Examining Committees.

Authors would like to acknowledge The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) for their support.

Authors’ Note: This study is a part of PhD thesis of the first author.

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BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSDr. Hatice Gokce BILGIC, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology at Ondokuz Mayis University in Samsun, Turkey. She earned BS and MS in Computer and Instructional Technology Teacher Education (Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey), and PhD in Computer Education and Instructional Technology (Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey). Her research interests are distance education, e-learning, online learning, computer science education, programming education, and the design of distance education environments.

Hatice Gokce BILGICDepartment of Computer Education and Instructional Technology, Faculty of EducationAddress: Ondokuz Mayis Universitesi Kurupelit Kampusu, Egitim Fakultesi, BOTE Bolumu, 55139, Atakum, Samsun, TURKEYPhone: +90 362 312 19 19 / 5903E-mail: gokce.dogan@omu.edu.tr

Dr. Hakan TUZUN, is a Professor in the Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology at Hacettepe University in Ankara, Turkey. He earned BS and MS in computer education (Gazi University, Ankara, Turkey), and MS and PhD in instructional systems technology (Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana). In the past, Dr. Tuzun has worked as a computer systems teacher at vocational schools, a research assistant at the university level, a computer systems and network support expert at corporate and military sectors, and as an instructional systems designer in

various projects. His work involves the design of rich learning environments, frequently with the aid of technology but also by considering the culture of the learners and the communities they are part of. His publications and other information are available through the following website: http://yunus.hacettepe.edu.tr/~htuzun Hakan TUZUNDepartment of Computer Education and Instructional Technology, Faculty of EducationAddress: Hacettepe Universitesi, Egitim Fakultesi, BOTE Bolumu, 06800, Beytepe, Ankara, TURKEYPhone: +90 312 297 71 76E-mail: htuzun@hacettepe.edu.tr

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E-COLLABORATIVE TASKS AND THE ENHANCEMENT OF WRITING PERFORMANCE AMONG

IRANIAN UNIVERSITY-LEVEL EFL LEARNERS

Nazli AZODIORCID: 0000-0002-5738-977X

Department of Foreign Languages Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch Islamic Azad University

Isfahan, IRAN

Ahmadreza LOTFI ORCID: 0000-0002-3760-2430

Department of Foreign LanguagesIsfahan (Khorasgan) Branch Islamic Azad University

Isfahan, IRAN

Received: 12.02.2019 Accepted: 19.03.2019

ABSTRACTThe prevalence of using social software in foreign and second language settings has caused a resurgence of interest in collaborative writing. This study investigates the benefits of collaborative and e-collaborative tasks on writing performance of the students in a process-oriented approach. It, in fact, examines the effects on the accuracy, complexity, and fluency of the written text produced by the learners. To this end, the quasi-experimental design was employed and 74 intermediate students at Islamic Azad University (Isfahan Branch) in Iran participated in the study. They were divided into three groups by random assignment in which two experimental groups were required to perform their tasks in collaboration while only one of them had access to Telegram Application outside the classroom. The control group followed the conventional method of learning how to write. The Measures of One-way ANCOVA, having compared the pretests and posttests results, showed a significant change in the accuracy and complexity of the written texts produced by the students in the experimental group applying e-collaboration. It also revealed that there was no significant change in the fluency of the written texts produced by the students.

Keywords: Collaborative writing, e-collaborative writing, process writing, writing performance

INTRODUCTIONFor EFL/ESL learners, the ability to write effectively in the target language is an important skill and an essential productive activity (Hussin et al., 2015) and it is also believed to become more and more important around the world (Weigle, 2002; Ghoorchaei, Tavakoli, & Nejad Ansari, 2010). It is necessary to bear in mind that teaching English L2 writing differs from other skills given the fact that it is generally employed as a support skill in language learning as well. In general, there are four approaches for teaching and learning writing, namely, “product-focused approach”, “process-focused approach”, “genre-based approach”, and “process and genre based approach”. Product-based approach, which is a traditional one, provides the learner a model and the learners need to mimic it in order to generate a similar product. This approach is teacher-centered and its proponents believe that it enhances students’ writing proficiency (Ghufron, 2016). The process-focused approach, which is the approach applied in this study, focuses on how a text is written rather than the final outcome. The teacher in a process-approach classroom becomes the facilitator. In such classrooms, writing is essentially learnt, not taught.

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Similar to the product-focused approach, genre-based approach views writing as predominantly linguistic. The genre approach, however, places a greater emphasis on the social context in which writing is produced (Hyland, 2003). Finally, the Process-Genre approach is a combination of process approach and genre approach. The proponents of this approach propose that Process-Genre Approach regards writing as a process which includes knowledge of language, knowledge of the context and purpose (as in genre approach), and skills in using language. This approach allows the students to study the relationship between purpose and form for a particular genre as they use recursive processes of prewriting, drafting, revision, and editing.This research applied the process based approach, which in turn has had different models, namely the Schmidt model, the Van Galen model, the Hayes and Flower model, and the Hayes model (Gunes, 2007). Flower and Hayes (1981) proposed that the writing product must be improved during the writing process. They introduced three dimensions of the act of writing which later refined by Hayes (1996). After that, different stages of the process writing approach have been presented similarly with some differences in order that had been proposed by Flower and Hayes (1981). They emphasized multiple stages of the writing process, such as prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing. This writing process is dynamic and recursive in nature. Therefore, these stages are considered as essential parts of teaching writing skill in order to produce a text. However, working precisely on each stage might be refused by some teachers in their classrooms due to the time it demands, and some others believe it does not emphasize on teaching grammatical accuracy (Leki, 1991). Besides, teacher-led process activities may fail to accommodate individuals’ learning of self-regulation so as to develop their writing skills. Another instrumental discussion in language skills is what social constructivists maintain. According to Vygotsky (1978), learning is a social activity and it can be developed through social interactions. As far as teaching writing is concerned, such social interaction among learners can be provided by group or collaborative activities in the class. Collaborative writing entails the production of a shared document where group members engage in substantive interaction, shared decision-making and responsibility for the document (Allen, 1987). Additionally, Vygotsky’s (1978) idea of the zone of proximal development plays a significant role in understanding how collaborative learning occurs. Based on this theoretical framework, the group work or pair work for collaborative writing is in accord with social constructivists’ points of view. According to them, the assistance of the partner in such collaborative activities are called scaffolding. On the other hand, the group work in the classroom might be a tough task for learners. Leki (2001) believed that the learners are concerned about both more competent partners and others’ attitudes in a group and they wonder how much they can contribute to the group. By the advent of the Internet over the past two decades, and by its penetration into educational contexts, language learners are provided with new opportunities to be able to interact with each other, a key factor in developing language skills from a sociocultural view of learning (Vygotsky, 1986; Bronckart, 1995). Recently, nearly all language learners have experienced online communications due to its popularity in educational settings, especially for language learning. Rybushkina & Krasnova (2015) underscored the influential role online learning can play in the field of EFL/ESL writing. According to them, the conventional face-to-face learning environment might not be suitable for all students because every single learner has different learning abilities. Nevertheless, some learners and some teachers have faced many different problems while learning and teaching writing skill such as time constraints, inadequate facilities to support writing as well as lack of motivation which can be solved by Internet-based pedagogy and online learning environments (Krasnova & Ananjev, 2015; Cahyono & Mutiaraningrum, 2016).As far as language learning is concerned, online communication enhances learners’ access to comprehensible input, and then they can have more opportunities to practice language production. It should be added that such exercises are of great help for those who learn English as a foreign language. Over the past few decades, many research studies used blended learning and collaborative writing to enhance writing performance. Some researchers have investigated the effectiveness of blended learning in ESL/EFL writing skill (Adas & Bakir, 2013; Keshta & Harb, 2013; Shafiee et al., 2013; Arslan, 2014; Abdulmajid, 2014). Other researchers had also studied how using collaborative learning improves writing (Al-Ahmad, 2003; Taki & Fardafshari, 2012; Jafari & Ansari, 2012; Grami, 2012; Shukor & Noordin, 2014). Results of these studies indicated that blended learning and collaborative learning enhance students’ writing performance.

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Moreover, similar studies investigated the role of collaboration in the context of the present study. One research examined the effect of collaborative interaction on the development of writing skill in a homogeneous and heterogeneous context which showed a significant improvement in both groups after applying collaborative interactions among learners (Maftoon &Ghafoori, 2009). Another study investigated the effect of group work on writing accuracy based on gender. The results revealed that the students in the collaborative writing group outperformed the students with no collaboration and it also showed that the females in the group outperformed the males (Jafari & Nejad Ansari, 2012). Another research studied the effect of collaborative activities on the writing performance of Iranian intermediate EFL learners in the textbook evaluation course. The research showed that the students working in groups outperformed those writing individually based on such writing components as content, organization, grammar, and vocabulary (Hosseinpour & Biria, 2014).Additionally, other researchers in the field examined the effects of CMC in collaborative tasks. For example, one study investigated the effect of weblogs on the improvement of Iranian EFL learners’ writing skill which found that the blog helped them to improve their writing through the collaborative learning environment that was established and through the process of writing that was adopted (Dalir, Jafarigohar, & Soleimani, 2013). The other research in this area investigated the effect of participation in an online discussion forum on writing performance and attitudes of Iranian EFL learners which showed a significant development in both aspects after the group work (Gorbanpour, 2013).The studies reviewed here have operationalized collaborative writing tasks as tasks completed in pairs. Some of them investigated these tasks with the assistance of weblogs or online discussion forums as scaffolding from a sociocultural perspective. On the other hand, research findings on collaborative writing are mostly limited to the beginning stages of writing process which are pre-writing activities such as planning and brainstorming. Besides, most research focused on the product of writing rather than the process of writing. Thus, the process of writing has remained a private act, where writers are left alone to their devices when they are about to make important decisions. It should be noted that studies on collaborative writing have, by and large, focused on the attention to language and the socio-cognitive processes evident in such interactions. The nature of the writing process and the nature of the final written text have received scant attention. This study attempted to emphasize on the nature of process writing and tried to investigate how technological advances such as social networking applications could help improve collaborative writing in more effective ways. These applications such as Telegram, Whatsapp, and Wechat are online platforms which enables people to communicate in order to share personal or career interests and activities. Since most young learners are dependent on their smartphones, we can take advantage of such devices and encourage them to interact more with their peers. On the other hand, using such devices helps students to be in permanent contact with the members of their group and their teacher. The teacher can provide them useful resources based on students’ problems when they are not in class. To this end, this study aimed at examining the efficacy of applying online application devices, which was Telegram Instant Messaging Service, to enhance collaborative writing skills among Iranian undergraduate English students. The study attempted to measure the level of learners’ writing performance as far as the complexity, accuracy, and fluency of the writing are concerned. The research question that guide the study are:

1. Does collaborative writing have any significant effect on the Iranian EFL learners’ writing performance?2. Does implementing online application devices for enhancing collaborative writing in an E-learning

project have any significant effect on the Iranian EFL learners’ writing performance?Therefore, it was hypothesized that implementing online application devices which enhances collaborative writing does not have any effect on the Iranian EFL learners’ writing performance. In addition, it was hypothesized that collaborative writing has no effect on the performance of Iranian EFL learners’ writing.

METHODThe study was designed in a quasi-experimental method, and it was conducted with three groups i.e., one control group and two experimental groups. The study aimed at investigating the effects of collaborative and e-collaborative tasks on the learners’ writing performance. The control group followed the conventional

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method of teaching how to write. While one experimental group was provided by collaborative tasks in the class, the other experimental group experienced collaborative and e-collaborative tasks. The participants were majoring English Translation at Islamic Azad University, Isfahan Branch, and the research were carried out in a 2 hours writing course held once a week. All three groups were instructed to write Comparison-Contrast, Cause-Effect, and Classification essay following a process-oriented approach.

ParticipantsA total of 74 students participated in the project; 55 were female and 19 were male, and their age ranged from 21 to 29 years old. All the subjects majored in English Translation at Islamic Azad University (Isfahan Branch) in Iran. All of them had Persian as their L1, and they had studied English as their first foreign language in mainstream education; furthermore, they had learned the preliminaries of writing in another course two academic years before. Formally, the subjects were expected to represent intermediate level language learners (in the range of B1 on the CEFR scale). Although, it is, naturally, probable that some subjects may have been more proficient writers than the others, their university grades represented their overall skills. The selection of experimental and control groups has been done by random assignment. The study was done in the first and the second semester of the academic year 2017 and 2018. All the subjects in the three groups learned how to write the introductory, body, and concluding paragraphs of an essay as a process. They also learned how to write Comparison-Contrast, Cause-Effect, and Classification essays. This study required three groups; namely one control and two experimental groups. The subjects in one experimental group were asked to use an online device; applying e-collaborative tasks. To make sure that the subjects in that experimental group have no problems in using the Internet, they were asked before the treatment to check if they access smartphones and, moreover, they were clarified how to use Telegram Instant Messaging Service during the project. As all the subjects had sufficient techno-literacy in this regard, they did not need special instruction. Furthermore, the other experimental group had to write collaboratively in the class to which most learners were familiar. Nevertheless, the researcher explained the learners how to write in a group following the process approach in details.

ProcedureAs it is mentioned above, the selection of the three groups; namely two experimental groups (EG1 & EG2) and one control group (CG) has been done by random assignment. This study utilized several sets of data to address the research questions including pretest, posttest, Telegram Instant Messaging Service (Telegram Application), and three evaluation tools. The detailed procedure is explained in the following section.

Data Collection Procedures

At first, the pretests were administered to capture the initial differences among the participants to experimental groups before the treatment and to the control group at the beginning of the course. The pretest was a timed essay writing in which the students had to write an in-class essay within 50 minutes. To this end and in order to provide content validity for the study, three topics were given to students and they were required to select one topic and write an essay of 250 words. In order to select the writing topics, a variety of factors were taken into account (i.e., topics were neither too simple nor too difficult, they did not require specialized knowledge, and the topics were selected from everyday issues). Since these three topics revolved around participants’ life and society, it was hoped that they would have stimulated participants to write enthusiastically.The second step of the study was administering the posttests which learners in all three groups took a writing test, an essay writing with three selective topics similar to that of the pretest at the end of the courses. The purpose was to check if there was any significant difference between the average scores of the three groups’ performance on writing test, and if the treatment had any effect on the writing proficiency of the learners in experimental groups. This test was also designed to find out the extent of advance in the control group who received the traditional classroom-based writing instruction.

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Another part of the procedure of the project is utilizing Telegram Application. The learners in one of the two experimental groups (EG1) needed to apply an online device to share and assist the members of their group to complete their writing assignments when they were not in the class. Since the aim of this study was to estimate if using online application devices would improve learners’ collaborative writing to write more proficiently, these learners had this chance of writing in a group even when they were out of the class setting. This application was selected for several reasons. First of all, this application facilitates its users by providing the chance to share and access files and documents safely. Secondly, it can be installed both on cell phones and laptops or computers. The students participated in the control group were asked to complete their writing tasks both in the class and at home individually without any assistance. However, those who participated in the experimental groups were required to form groups of three member in order to do their writing tasks. The students were free to select their partners in their groups to avoid anxiety or interpersonal problems among the members. The main difference between the two experimental groups was using Telegram Application in one of them which enabled them to be involved in e-collaborative tasks. In fact, the researcher created a group in this application named Essay Writing Community which enabled its users to share and read writing assignments while they were away from the class environment. Following the process-based approach in writing, the EG1 participants were asked to brainstorm on the topic introduced by the researcher in the class and to organize their ideas in their groups in order to perform the first stage, prewriting. Then, while the subjects were at home, one member in each group wrote the first draft and shared it on the Telegram so that all other students were able to read the written assignment. After that, the second member of each group had to revise the text and send it on the Telegram. Next, the last member of each group had to edit the text with similar procedure. Now, the researcher as the instructor of the class commented on this written assignment and shared it on the Telegram. At last, each group wrote their final draft in the class based on the received comments. The participants were required to switch their roles as writer, reviser, and editor every week for each writing assignment. The writing stages and activities are illustrated in Figure 1. All the stages repeated every week for each assignment. A sample of group activities in Telegram Application presented in Appendix.

Prewriting(in the class)

•students brainstorm the topic and organize their ideas in groups in the class.

Drafting(at home)

•one student, as the writer, writes the first draft at home according to the selected ideas in the previous stage. S/he shares the first draft on Telegram. Other students in other groups get the chance to read it.

Revising(at home)

•Another student, as reviser, revises the text meaningfully. Then, s/he shares the second draft on Telegram.

Editing(at home)

•The third member of the group, as editor, checks the grammar and the mechanics of the text. After ediitng, s/he shares the third draft on Telegram.

Teacher's feed back(at home)

•The teacher checks the third draft and comment on the written assignment.

Publishing(in the class)

•Each group checks the final comments together in the class and the writer writes the final draft.

Figure 1. Procedures of the EG1 (e-collaborative tasks)

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Rating Procedures

The last step of this research is the one used for evaluating the pretests and posttests. This study aimed at detecting any changes on writing performance of the participants after collaboration and using Telegram Application. In order to assess participants’ writings to evaluate their skills and writing performance, measures of accuracy, complexity, and fluency were used. Accuracy reflects grammatical and lexical correctness and the L2 learners’ effort to control attentional resources in order to avoid errors, while complexity entails more elaborated language, that is, the effect of risk taking and “restructuring” language (Ellis, 2009). On the other hand, fluency refers to the number of words and the use of academic words in the writing. To evaluate three aspects of the participants’ writing performance:Accuracy: a list of 10 grammatical errors adopted from Ferris (2006) were used. The category includes verb tense, verb form, subject verb agreement, articles/determiners, non-endings, pronouns, fragments, run-ons, word choice, and miscellaneous errors.Complexity: the number of subordinate clauses made by each participant were counted per 100-word text.Fluency: the total number of words written were counted and divided by the total number of minutes it took them to write the task which was 50 in this study. The essays were rated by two competent raters based on these rating criteria, and in order to check the inter-rater reliability consensus statistically the Pearson product Moment Coefficient Correlation were used (Table 1). As can be seen in the Table 1, all correlations were greater than .70 which made the result satisfactory. The raters, the researcher herself and another colleague with the experience of teaching Essay Writing course at university for 15 years, evaluated the pretests and posttests of the participants.

Table 1. Inter-rater reliability of the raters

Pearson Coefficient Correlation

EG1 EG2 CG

Pretest

Rater1/Rater2.82 .86 .80

Posttest

Rater1/Rater2.85 .87 .86

Data Analysis Procedure

Data analysis was performed in light of the research questions of this study: a. Does collaborative writing have any significant effect on the Iranian EFL learners’ writing performance? b. Does implementing online application devices for enhancing collaborative writing in an E-learning project have any significant effect on the Iranian EFL learners’ writing performance?The three groups took the pretest, and the experimental groups were subsequently exposed to their relevant treatments, that was collaborative activities both in the class and at home, while the learners in the control group attended their regular classes bereft of collaborative activities either in the class or at home. At the end of the study, a posttest was administered to gauge the development of the participants in the experimental and control groups with respect to their writing performance. To come up with the results of the comparisons of the scores of the learners in the three groups, one-way ANCOVA was conducted; ANCOVA makes comparisons among the posttest scores of the (three) groups while controlling for any potential pre-existing differences on the pretest.

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RESULTSThis part provides the outcome of the analysis of the collected data. The scores in the three groups were compared based on the three aspects of their writing performances which are accuracy, complexity, and fluency.

L2 Writing AccuracyThe results of the comparison of the three groups on the posttest scores of accuracy are displayed in tables

Table 2. Descriptive statistics results comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on accuracy posttest scores

Groups Mean Adjusted Mean Std. Deviation N

EG1 4.63 4.81 2.23 29

EG2 6.32 6.44 3.29 25

CG 12.70 12.29 8.08 20

Total 7.38 7.84 5.79 74

As it could be seen in Table 2, the accuracy posttest mean scores of the EG1 (M = 4.63), EG2 (M = 6.32), and CG (M = 12.70) differed from one another. Regarding these mean scores, reminding one important point is in order: as it was explained before, the accuracy scores of the participants were computed by counting the number of different types of errors (e.g., subject-verb agreement, noun ending, articles/determiners, verb tenses, verb forms, fragments, run-on sentences, pronouns, and diction) in their writings; thus, the lower the score, the lower the number of the errors s/he made (and thus the more accurate the learner). This means that the EG1 learners (M = 4.63) were more accurate than EG2 learners (M = 6.32), who were, in turn, more accurate than the CG learners (M = 12.70). To find out whether the differences among these accuracy posttest mean scores were of statistical significance or not, the researcher had to look down the p value in front of the Groups row under the Sig. column Table 3.

Table 3. Results of one-way ANCOVA for comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on accuracy posttest scores

Source Type III Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig. Partial Eta

Squared

Corrected Model 1869.14 3 623.04 74.40 .00 .76

Intercept 11.02 1 11.02 1.31 .25 .01

Pretest 1056.95 1 1056.95 126.22 .00 .64

Groups 693.13 2 346.56 41.38 .00 .54

Error 586.13 70 8.37

Total 6491.25 74

Corrected Total 2455.27 73

Table 3 depicts that there was a statistically significant difference in accuracy posttest mean scores for the three groups because the p value under the Sig. column and in front of the Groups row was smaller than the pre-specified level of significance (.00 < .05). To find out the exact locations of the three groups’ differences, the Bonferroni post hoc test was conducted, the results of which are displayed in Table 4.

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Table 4. Results of the bonferroni post hoc test for comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on accuracy posttest scores

Groups Mean Difference Std. Error Sig. 95% Confidence Interval

Lower Bound Upper Bound

EG1EG2 -1.62 .79 .12 -3.56 .30

CG -7.48* .84 .00 -9.54 -5.41

EG2EG1 1.62 .79 .12 -.30 3.56

CG -5.85* .86 .00 -7.98 -3.72

CGEG1 7.48* .84 .00 5.41 9.54

EG2 5.85* .86 .00 3.72 7.98

From Table 4, it could be inferred that (a) the difference between EG1 and EG2 was not statistically significant although EG1 learners were more accurate than EG2 learners in their writings on the posttest, and (b) CG learners were significantly different from both EG1 and EG2 learners; that is, they were significantly less accurate than the EG1 and EG2 learners. These results are also graphically shown in the bar chart in Figure 2.

4,63

6,32

12,7

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

EG1 EG2 CG

Figure 2. The accuracy mean scores of EG1, EG2, and CG on the posttest

L2 writing ComplexityThe results of descriptive statistics for comparing the complexity posttest scores of the three groups of EG1, EG2, and CG are presented in Table 5:

Table 5. Descriptive statistics results comparing the EG1, EG2, and CG on complexity pretest scores

Groups Mean Adjusted Mean Std. Deviation N

EG1 5.29 5.52 1.96 29

EG2 4.20 4.18 1.87 25

CG 3.60 3.27 1.83 20

Total 4.46 4.32 2.00 74

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Table 5 shows that the mean scores of the EG1 (M = 5.29), EG2 (M = 4.20), and CG (M = 3.60) were different from one another on the complexity posttest. To figure out whether the differences among these mean scores were statistically significant or not, the researcher had to check the p value under the Sig. column in the row labeled Groups in the ANCOVA table (Table 6) below:

Table 6. Results of one-way ancova for comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on complexity posttest scores

Source Type III Sum of Squares

df Mean Square F Sig. Partial Eta Squared

Corrected Model 152.29 3 50.76 25.40 .00 .52

Intercept 62.38 1 62.38 31.22 .00 .30

Pretest 115.69 1 115.69 57.89 .00 .45

Groups 61.02 2 30.51 15.27 .00 .30

Error 139.86 70 1.99

Total 1768.25 74

Corrected Total 292.16 73

As it is depicted in Table 6, there was a statistically significant difference in the complexity posttest scores for EG1 (M = 5.29), EG2 (M = 4.20), and CG (M = 3.60) because the p value under the Sig. column was in the row labeled Groups was smaller than the pre-specified level of significance (.00 < .05). To find out where exactly the differences among the three groups lay, the Bonferroni post hoc test was conducted, the results of which are in view in Table 7:

Table 7. Results of the bonferroni post hoc test for comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on complexity posttest scores

Groups Mean Difference Std. Error Sig. 95% Confidence Interval

Lower Bound Upper Bound

EG1EG2 1.33* .38 .00 .38 2.28

CG 2.25* .41 .00 1.22 3.27

EG2EG1 -1.33* .38 .00 -2.28 -.38

CG .91 .42 .10 -.13 1.96

CGEG1 -2.25* .41 .00 -3.27 -1.22

EG2 -.91 .42 .10 -1.96 .13

In Table 7, it could be seen that the difference between EG1 (M = 5.29) and EG2 (M = 4.20) was statistically significant. This is so because the relevant p value in front of EG1-EG2 comparison was lower than the alpha level of significance (.00 < .05). Likewise, the difference between EG1 learners and CG learners (M = 3.60) on the complexity posttest was statistically significant (p < .05). However, the difference between EG2 learners and the learners of the control group did not reach statistical significance. These obtained results are also shown in the bar chart in Figure 3:

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5,29

4,2

3,6

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

EG1 EG2 CG

Figure 3. The complexity mean scores of EG1, EG2, and CG on the posttest

L2 Writing FluencyThe descriptive statistics results of the comparison of the fluency scores of the three groups on the posttest are shown in Table 8:

Table 8. Descriptive statistics results comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on fluency posttest scores

Groups Mean Adjusted Mean Std. Deviation N

EG1 4.99 4.90 1.33 29

EG2 4.26 4.30 .96 25

CG 4.25 4.34 1.26 20

Total 4.55 4.51 1.23 74

Table 8 shows that the fluency posttest mean scores of the EG1 (M = 4.99), EG2 (M = 4.26), and CG (M = 4.25) differed from one another. To find out whether the differences among these fluency posttest mean scores were of statistical significance or not, the researcher had to look down the relevant p value under the Sig. column Table 9:

Table 9. Results of one-way ANCOVA for comparing EG1, EG2, and CG on fluency posttest scores

Source Type III Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig. Partial Eta Squared

Corrected Model 35.13 3 11.71 10.64 .00 .31

Intercept 68.00 1 68.00 61.78 .00 .46

Pretest 25.59 1 25.59 23.25 .00 .24

Groups 5.86 2 2.93 2.66 .07 .07

Error 77.04 70 1.10

Total 1644.61 74

Corrected Total 112.17 73

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As it could be seen in Table 9, there was no statistically significant difference in fluency posttest mean scores for three groups of learners since the p value under the Sig. column was larger than the specified level of significance (.07 > .05), which is also shown in the bar chart in Figure 4:

4,99

4,26 4,25

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

EG1 EG2 CG

Figure 4. The fluency mean scores of EG1, EG2, and CG on the posttest

It is clear in Figure 4 that the EG1 learners had a mean score on the fluency posttest which was larger than the mean scores of the EG 2 and CG learners (who had roughly similar mean scores), but the differences were not considerable.

DISCUSSION The research questions sought to examine the effects of applying online application devices for enhancing collaborative writing on writing performance of the learners, and to compare the written products of the learners as a group or individual work. The findings demonstrated that when the learners are provided with some instruments and facilities to write collaboratively outside the classroom environment, they outperform the time they write collaboratively only in the class. It is actually the same for those who write collaboratively in the class compared to individual writing. Actually, pair work and group work has widely been advocated so far and used in most institutions all around the world, however, asking students to compose a text in a process-oriented approach as a blended mode ,that is, both in the class and at home has almost remained a theory. Following the social constructivists perspectives which claims pair work enhances writing performance among learners, the present study evaluated the learners’ writing performance as far as their accuracy, complexity, and fluency are concerned. According to the Table 3, using online application devices afforded the learners to improve their accuracy. It shows that when the learners edit their peers’ writing texts, they can foster attention to grammatical constructs and enhance their language learning. In fact, the learners need to have the ability to detect the grammatical errors in another texts. They are in a group with a sense of competition among the members and they share their comments on a platform where all other groups can see and read, therefore, as editors they do their best to perform it flawlessly. The benefits of editing are in fact threefold as far as improving the accuracy is concerned. The person who edits the text can learn during the editing activity, and the other member of the group with the role of writer who receives the comments can also benefit from it. Furthermore, the accuracy can be improved when the learners read the comments of the other groups and they would attempt to avoid such grammatical mistakes in their own writings. This result is line with Rybushkina & Krasnova’s (2015) study in which they stated that the conventional face-to-

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face learning environment does not necessarily suit all students since each individual student has different learning abilities and does not necessarily share similar ways of learning with other students. Nevertheless, Internet-based pedagogy and online learning environments have been found to help students as well as teachers to overcome various problems in the learning and teaching of writing skills.The second aspect of writing performance of the learners deals with the complexity. For the measure of complexity, the use of subordinate clauses was considered a crucial indicator of internal complexity in L2 writing performance of the participants. As can be seen in Table 6, both the participants in the e-learning project and the learners worked in groups in the class performed better. It can be inferred that when the learners spend more time on their tasks they can produce more complex sentences. In addition, the modifications they apply after editing stage can improve their writing ability as far as its complexity is concerned. Finally, these findings reveal that reading and reviewing each other’s texts will be beneficial to enable the learners improve their writing skills. Mohammadi (2017) also showed that collaborative and e-collaborative tasks had improvement on interactional complexity of her learners. Besides, she stated that collaborative writing has more potential in fostering the development of interactional complexity.The third aspect of writing performance evaluated in the present study is the fluency that the total number of words in the text were counted by the raters and then were divided by the total number of minutes it took to be written. According to the information provided in table 2.8, there is no significant difference between the participants who used online application devices and those who did not. There is also no significant changes between the second experimental group and the control group. These findings are compatible with the results of the study conducted by Storch (2005) concluded texts are shorter when they are written in pairs.All in all, the findings reveal that when in-class learning activities blend with e-learning activities in different stages of writing process, from brainstorming to publishing, there is a significant improvement both in accuracy and complexity of the written products. The possible explanations might be that viewing the classmates’ texts, taking more advantage of asynchronous mode of communication with more time at home, would help them expand the range of vocabulary and grammar they use. In addition, the various points having discussed in the class are available on the platform to review again and again by those who were present or absent in the class. Furthermore, the learners with lower proficiency levels sought help from the learners with higher proficiency levels in other groups whenever they were not able to reach a consensus over a problem.Last but not least, the role of the teacher cannot be overlooked. The teacher monitors the groups and their activities continuously, and provides a careful plan for them. The learners must be provided with appropriate feedback when necessary to avoid any fossilizations.

PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONSThe findings of the study may have some pedagogical implications. Accordingly, the results of the comparisons of the accuracy scores of the learners’ writing products in collaborative and e-collaborative groups indicated a statistically significant difference. It can be implied that the learners not only need to work together to facilitate brainstorming stage in their writing but also improve their grammatical abilities after editing each other’s texts. Therefore, the focus of the teachers in the writing courses must be on teacher evaluation, peer evaluation, and self-evaluation simultaneously, and the utilization of the technological advances can assist such evaluations. Similarly, Jafari and Nejad Ansari (2012) stated that collaborative writing can be beneficial for teachers in the sense that collaboration among students can result in more accurate texts as learners receive feedback from each other not just from their teacher.Furthermore, the findings of the complexity scores of the learners can suggest new ideas for the teachers. According to some research, if a text uses more syntactically complex sentences than a written text which consists primarily of simple sentences, this text would be perceived more superior (Beers & Nagy,2009; Saddler & Graham, 2005). It is clear that the cooperation among the teacher and the students can facilitate the act of writing and analyzing different possible structures on the same topic. When students learn how to manage and control their writings, they would be able to produce different varieties of sentences in one written task.

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Finally, according to the findings of the fluency scores of the learners of this study, there is no improvement in the length of the written products. It shows that further research is required to find ways to enhance the fluency of the EFL learners’ written products. One possible way to motivate the students to write longer essays or texts could be spending more time in the first stage of process writing. If they are given more time for brainstorming and organizing the ideas, they would be able to produce more details, examples and accordingly longer paragraphs. Therefore, the teachers who are interested in adopting the procedures performed in this study need to add more steps in the first stages of this writing process.The results of this research can be useful for textbook developers, foreign language instructors and learners, especially at universities where there is no accurate assessment for placement of the students in a class. To this end, the instructors can benefit from the more advanced learners as facilitators amongst the students in a group. In addition, the teachers will understand the importance of collaboration for enhancing their students’ cognitive development and they can use it in teaching and improving other skills such as speaking.

CONCLUSION To sum up, this study aimed to investigate the impact of e-collaborative tasks on EFL learners’ writing performance. The students in this research were instructed to write essays following process-oriented approach. According to the findings of the study, in a homogenous class at university the instructors can benefit from the more advanced learners as facilitators amongst the students in a group. In addition, the teachers will understand the importance of blending collaboration with online activities for enhancing their students’ cognitive development and they can use it in teaching and improving other skills such as speaking. Though the study had some limitations on the part of the participants and the course syllabus, it was difficult to ask the students to follow the steps at the beginning of the project and some of them were reluctant to do so. Most students prefer to write their assignments as quickly as possible no matter what the final product is. Moreover, the instructor had to follow the course syllabus and to cover specific parts which restricts the range of activities they can have during the course.

Acknowledgments: The authors wish to thank the second rater who spent her valuable time scoring the data and the students who participated in the study cooperating with the demanded requirements of the data gathering procedure.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSNazli AZODI, got her BA in TEFL from Najafabad University, Isfahan, Iran in 1994. She got her MA in TEFL from Islamic Azad University, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, Isfahan, Iran in 2007. She also got her PhD in TEFL from Islamic Azad University, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch. She is a faculty member of Islamic Azad University, Isfahan Branch since 2011. She has published 8 research articles in national and international journals. Her research interests are teacher education, teaching and learning strategies, and distance education.

Nazli AZODIDepartment of Foreign Languages,Address: Islamic Azad University, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, 81595- 158, Isfahan, IranPhone: +98 913 1011273 E-mail: azodi_n@yahoo.com

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Ahmadreza LOTFI, received his PhD in TEFL from PhD center of Islamic Azad University in Tehran in 1997. He is an associate professor of TEFL in the Department of Foreign Languages, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, Islamic Azad University, Isfahan, Iran. Dr. Lotfi has published about 80 research papers in national and indexed international journals. He has also published 5 books both in Persian and English mostly in Linguistics. He has been developing a radically minimialist theory of syntax. He has been teaching EFL learners and TEFL teachers for the last 28 years. His research interests include minimalist syntax, second language acquisition studies in generative grammar, and Iranian linguistics.

Ahmadreza LOTFIDepartment of Foreign LanguagesAddress: Islamic Azad University, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, 81595- 158, Isfahan, Iran Phone: +98 913 3178603 E-mail: lotfi.ahmadreza@gmail.com

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APPENDIX A Group Sample of E-collaborative Tasks

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INVESTIGATING THE ROLE OF FORMATIVE MOBILE BASED ASSESSMENT IN VOCABULARY LEARNING OF PRE-INTERMEDIATE

EFL LEARNERS IN COMPARISON WITH PAPER BASED ASSESSMENT

Dr. Nahid YARAHMADZEHIORCID: 0000-0003-4601-0557English Language Department

Management and Humanities Faculty Chabahar Maritime University

Chabahar,IRAN

Mostafa GOODARZIORCID: 0000-0002-4076-3147English Language Department

Management and Humanities FacultyChabahar Maritime University

Chabahar,IRAN

Received: 20/02/2019 Accepted: 21/05/2019

ABSTRACTThroughout this study technology and especially mobile phones was utilized in EFL classrooms in order to see whether it can influence the process of vocabulary formative assessment and consequently improve vocabulary learning of Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners or not. Two groups of pre-intermediate EFL learners participated in this study. Regarding the first group (FMA) the vocabulary learning of learners was assessed formatively during ten sessions using Socrative mobile application. The vocabulary learning of the second group (FPA) was also assessed formatively but paper and pen were the instruments used by instructor and students to take the tests. After applying quasi-experimental research design including pretest, treatment and posttest and after running independent sample t tests to posttest scores, the results showed that those pre-intermediate EFL learners attending in the group where vocabulary gain was assessed formatively using mobile application named Socrative performed significantly better in posttest than group assessed formatively based on paper and pen (Sig=0.03<0.05). The analysis of attitude questionnaire distributed among participants of the group assessed formatively using mobile phone exhibited that they possessed a positive attitude towards mobile based testing.

Keywords: Formative assessment, mobile based assessment, paper based assessment, attitude, vocabulary, pre-intermediate EFL learners

INTRODUCTIONBackgroundSince computers and smartphones have become essential elements of human life in many areas like business, offices ,and homes, language teachers have also tried to apply such technology as a new pedagogical tool in their classrooms in order to improve their students’ language learning. As a result, this positive outlook towards computers and smart phones’ usage in language learning has caused the emergence of computer assisted language learning (CALL) and mobile assisted language learning (MALL) methods. CALL and MALL are widely used to refer to the area of technology and its contributions to second language teaching and learning (Chapelle, 2001). Nowadays, because of their flexibility, size and capacities, mobile phones are beginning to replace computers. Consequently, many researchers believe that mobile phones are not only able to support formal and informal

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learning but also to complete the process of learning via computers. As Kukulska-Hulme, Norris and Donohue (2015) stated, students nowadays carry with them powerful devices with which they can:

• createandsharemultimodaltexts• communicatespontaneouslywithpeopleanywhereintheworld• capturelanguageuseoutsidetheclassroom• analyzetheirownlanguageproductionandlearningneeds• constructartifactsandsharethemwithothers• provideevidenceofprogressgatheredacrossarangeofsettings,inavarietyofmedia.

Since Chickering and Ehrmann (1996) coined the term MALL (Mobile Assisted Language Learning), mobile phones have recorded a tremendous growth in language learning and teaching field. In fact, MALL referes to the language learning that is assisted or enhanced through the use of a handheld mobile device (Chinnery 2006) and it is a subdivision of Computer Assisted Language Learning (Yang 2013). Therefore, many research projects started to investigate the role of MALL in various areas of language learning and teaching such as basic language skills including listening (Azara and Nasiri, 2014), reading comprehension (Chen & Hsu, 2008; Plana, Gimeno & Appel, 2013), pronunciation and speaking performance (Ducate & Lomicka, 2009; Han & Keskin, 2016; Mahmoud, 2013), grammatical accuracy (Baleghizadeh & Oladrostam, 2010) and writing (Allagui, 2014; Mahmoud, 2013) as well as subskills namely vocabulary (Taki and Khazaei, 2011) and idioms (Sahan, Coban & Razi, 2016).One area of language learning and teaching classes which can be influenced by technology usage is assessment. Bachman (2004) defined assessment as “a process of collecting information about something that we are interested in, according to procedures that are systematic and substantially grounded” (pp. 6-7). The result of an assessment procedure can be a score or a verbal description. Actually, teaching and learning processes always consist of two main essential and inseparable activities, namely: teaching and assessment. The two cannot be separated since teaching is always followed by administering an assessment to get an insight into the students’ ability and their understanding of the learning material which is being taught.This study aimed to work on the role of mobile based testing in an EFL environment. Using computers and online processes are vastly investigated before and the advantages and disadvantages of the role of computers as one area of technology in testing have been discussed. This study, thus, aimed to investigate any difference in learners’ performance in mobile based tests compared with paper based ones. As a matter of fact, a growing number of students possess smartphones or tablets and it is beneficial to guide learners towards an effective usage of such technology instead of forbidding them from bringing their smartphones to class. On the other hand, the application of mobile phones in formative assessment is investigated in this study. Formative assessment or assessment for learning takes place during learning rather than after learning which refers to summative assessment, and has an entirely different function: to provide ongoing feedback to both students, to improve their learning, and teachers, to improve their teaching (Spector et al., 2016). Thus beyond a difference in purpose, there are also crucial differences in timing between the summative and formative assessments: formative testing results are especially useful when they become available early in the learning process. Thus, this study aimed to investigate the role of smartphones in vocabulary learning of English students in a formative way.

Research QuestionsThe research question and related hypothesis is in the following:

Q1: Is there any significant difference between the vocabulary gain of Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners assessed formatively by paper and pen and those assessed formatively using a mobile device?

Q2: What is the attitude of Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners towards mobile based assessment?

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REVIEW OF LITERATUREAssessmentAssessment could be defined as a systematic process of gathering information about what a student knows, is able to do, and is learning to do. The information obtained from assessment, on the other hand provides a foundation for decision-making and planning for further instruction and learning. Therefore, assessment is an integral part of instruction that enhances, empowers, and celebrates student learning. However, testing is a way of conducting assessment which is technically associated with definite timing and settled procedures (Brown, 2004). Briefly, by using a variety of assessment techniques, teachers gather information about what students know and are able to do, and provide positive and supportive feedback to students.

Summative vs. Formative AssessmentAnother useful distinction to bear in mind is the function of an assessment: How is the procedure to be used? Two functions are commonly identified in the literature: formative versus summative assessments. Summative assessments are used to measure learning. They are typically administered at the end of an academic semester or year to discern whether and to what extent students have mastered concepts taught during the course; thus, summative assessments are primarily evaluative in their purpose (Varier, 2014). This type of assessment is also considered a high-stakes assessment because key decisions such as course grades, admissions, promotions, and evaluations of teacher and school performance are based on how students fare on these tests. Examples of summative assessments include standardized annual examinations in schools and mid-term and final examinations in college courses. Formative assessment, on the other hand, refers to a process in which assessments are used to inform instruction and support student learning. They are used by teachers to make instructional decisions, and by students, to become aware of their progress. Formative assessments can be formal in that they serve the diagnostic purpose of identifying gaps in understanding or informal as they are embedded in classroom activities to elicit student understanding. In other words, formative assessment is defined by Brown (2003) as evaluating students in the process of forming their competencies and skills with the goal of helping them to continue that growth process. The key to such formation is the delivery (by the teacher) and internalization (by the student) of appropriate feedback on performance, with an eye toward the future continuation (or formation) of learning.

Vocabulary Teaching and AssessmentActually, vocabulary is the flesh of a language whereas grammar is the skeleton. In order to be able to use the language productively, students must know certain amount of vocabulary, not only for communicating orally, but also in writing. Nation (2005) regarding the importance of vocabulary believed that vocabulary knowledge enables language use, language use enables the increase of vocabulary knowledge; knowledge of the world enables the increase of vocabulary knowledge and language use and so on. This contextualized approach to learning vocabulary can definitely help students increase their vocabulary through authentic interaction. According to Laufer (1997), among the components of language, vocabulary learning is a language component that has been the study matter of many linguists for many years. Probably because many scholars believe that vocabulary learning is at the heart of language learning and language use. In fact, it makes the essence of a language. Hence, as Laufer (1986) claimed, speakers cannot convey meaning and communicate with each other in a particular language without sufficient vocabulary knowledge.Assessing the vocabulary knowledge of EFL learners is both essential and reasonably straightforward. It is essential in the sense that words are considered to be the fundamental blocks of language, the units of meaning from which larger structures, such as phrases, sentences, paragraphs and texts are drawn. Many language teachers and applied researchers now recognize the importance of vocabulary learning and investigate ways of promoting it more efficiently. Hence, from different points of view, vocabulary can be seen as a central area in language teaching, requiring testing tools to check learners’ progress in vocabulary learning and to assess how sufficient their vocabulary knowledge is in order to meet their communicative needs (Read, 2000).

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Formative Assessment of VocabularyFormative assessment is anything the teacher does to assess or test her students’ levels of understanding about a subject while they are still learning that subject. There is a large range of formative assessment methods and techniques available to be implemented in the vocabulary learning process. It may be a quiz or a test, an oral question-and-answer session or a one-sentence summary, a one-minute paper or a group presentation. Using formative assessment and feedback gives students time to pause and evaluate their performances before they reach major assessments.Therefore, formative assessment plays a key role in vocabulary learning within the field of foreign language learning. Read (2000) claimed that ‘discrete, selective, context-independent vocabulary tests have been an integral part of the educational measurements science for the whole twentieth century’ (p. 115). They possess all the virtues of an objective language test and for a long time were considered to be very productive. Tests such as multiple-choice, gap-filling, matching, true/false items, cloze tests and C-tests are still greatly used.

Mobile Based AssessmentMobile-Based Assessment (MBA) is a relatively new mode of assessment that is delivered through mobile devices (PDAs, mobile phones, smartphones, tablets). MBA can be used both in the context of a pure mobile learning approach and also in a blended learning approach, as complementary or alternative to computer- or paper-based assessment. Mobile devices can be used in different assessment types, either inside or outside the classroom boundaries for formative assessment, self- and peer-assessment, work-based assessment, classroom polling, etc. Mobile devices and wireless technologies offer many affordances that can not only enhance existing but also introduce new opportunities to assess learning. Some of these affordances are: adaptivity and personalization, context-awareness, seamlessness and ubiquity, social media connectivity. One main advantage of using mobile applications for testing is the immediate feedback provided for both teacher and students. Actually, in order to have a fruitful formative assessment, feedback must be given to students in appropriate time. Hence, teachers need time to give feedback in formative assessment based on paper and pen, but using mobile applications for formative assessment, provides both teachers and learners with immediate feedback which can help leaners be aware of their strengths and weaknesses in order to improve themselves for future tests and consequently learn better. All in all, to overcome possible barriers with applying formative assessment, using mobile applications which are designed for testing is going to be investigated in this study. Consequently, in FMA group studied in this project, formative mobile based assessment is allocated and it is compared with another group where formative assessment is based on paper and pen.

METHODParticipantsThe participants of this study were 40 EFL learners who studied General English language at Chabahar Maritime University, Iran. Their age ranged from 18 to 22. The participants had been assigned to two different groups, each with 20 students, prior to the study and hence they were not randomly selected. The participants were all pre-intermediate EFL learners. They were all native speakers of Persian language and Balouchi. The participants of these two groups attended in their General English class 3 hours a week with the same instructor and textbook. The only difference between these groups was the type of assessment allocated to each one. A group assessed formatively using mobile application was named FMA group (n=20). The other class as FPA group (n=20), was also assessed formatively but based on conventional paper and pen tests.

DesignBased on the purpose and the nature of this study, quasi experimental design consisting of a pretest, treatment and a posttest was used to answer the research question. After applying a Longman proficiency test to all participants signifying that they all were at pre-intermediate level of English proficiency, one vocabulary

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pretest exhibited that there was no significant difference of vocabulary knowledge among the participants at the outset of the study. The treatment in two groups took 10 sessions to be performed. Since the study was around formative assessment, 10 quizzes based on vocabulary introduced in their textbook as new words were applied. One posttest, then, was designed to examine what two groups learned in these 10 sessions and determined whether there was any significant difference between two groups after treatment or not.

ProcedureAfter selecting the participants of the study and being assured that all were pre-intermediate EFL learners, the procedure was followed as below:

• Pretest: A pretest, anEnglish Vocabulary in Use Pre-intermediate and Intermediate Level Test, was applied to both groups to ensure that they had no significant differences at the outset of the study. Since the only independent variable was the mode of assessment (mobile based or paper based) and vocabulary knowledge was regarded as only dependent variable, an independent samples t-test was run by SPSS software to pretest scores of two groups.

• Treatment: After the pretest, the instructor started to teach both classes using the same method. The only difference was the type of assessment used by the teacher. In the group named FMA, formative mobile based assessment was applied. Therefore, during the semester students of this group took 10 vocabulary quizzes, one at the end of each session. These quizzes were based on the words taught in each given session and the sessions before. All the tests included 20 multiple choice items. The other group named FPA was also assessed through formative assessment. The same quizzes with the same questions applied to first group was applied in this group too, but paper and pen were the only instruments used by students to answer the questions.

• Posttest:The posttest composed of 20 multiple choice items based on whatever learners learned in their textbook throughout the course, was designed and administered in two groups to compare the scores of two groups after the treatment. Another independent sample t-test was run to posttest scores because the only independent variable was the mode of assessment (mobile based or paper based) and the only dependent variable was vocabulary learning.

• Attitude:As the last step in this study, an attitude questionnaire was distributed among participants in FMA group to find out the attitude of learners towards mobile based testing. This questionnaire “the attitudes towards mobile based test” was developed from Computer Anxiety Subscale (Loyd & Gressard, 1984).

InstrumentsLongman Proficiency Test

The Longman proficiency test used in this study was provided by Pearson Education Palsky for Catholic university of Lublin in 2004 which consisted of one hundred questions related to grammar and vocabulary. An assortment of guidelines was provided at the end of the questions specifying the range of scores falling within each level of proficiency, indicating that for example those who scored from 20 to 40 belonged to pre-intermediate language learners. The students had 60 minutes to answer all the questions. After correcting the papers and receiving the results, those whose scores were not in the range of pre-intermediate learners were removed from the study. Determining the proficiency level of students helped in composition of more homogeneous groups of participants and in providing an appropriate vocabulary pretest.

Pretest

The pretest of the current study which was applied to all three groups to ensure that they had no significant differences in vocabulary knowledge at the beginning of the study was based on fifty vocabulary multiple choice items of English Vocabulary in Use Pre-intermediate and Intermediate Level Test published by Cambridge Press and designed by Stuart Redman and Ruth Gairns (2008). The results of this pretest assured the researcher that all participants were at the same level of vocabulary knowledge at the outset of the treatment.

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Treatment Tests

Ten tests were administered in FMA and FPA groups as formative assessment. All the tests were based on the vocabulary introduced in the textbook taught by the instructor named Concepts and Comments. Each test included 10 to 20 vocabulary multiple choice items. The tests were based on the lessons taught during the present session and all other previous sessions. All the items in two groups were the same and the mode of assessment (mobile versus paper) was the only difference between two groups. Besides, all the tests were organized by the researcher and approved by the instructor. For all treatment tests a Kr_21 formula was used to approve the reliability of the tests.

Posttest

The posttest as one main stage of the study which examined any significant difference in vocabulary learning between all three groups after treatment was based on the new words introduced in each lesson of textbook named Concepts and Comments taught in these groups by the same instructor. It included 20 multiple choice items. The test was designed by researcher and approved by the instructor. To establish a valid posttest only new vocabulary introduced in the textbook was tested. The instructor taught 12 lessons of the textbook and the posttest was also organized based on these twelve lessons leading to the content validity of the posttest. KR-21 formula was used to confirm that the posttest was reliable.

Attitude Questionnaire

As the last instrument used in this study, an attitude questionnaire was distributed among participants in FMA group. This questionnaire “the attitudes towards mobile based test” was developed from Computer Anxiety Subscale, (Loyd & Gressard, 1984). First of all, since the research focused on using mobiles for testing, all statements were modified using the word “mobile” instead of “computer”. Then, 10 items were modified to reflect mobile attitude of those students who took part in vocabulary mobile based tests. The Hoyt estimate of internal consistency reliability of the revised subscale was 0.82 for this sample. The items were also divided into two positive (1_5) and negative (6_10) parts. To be easier for our participants, it was translated into Persian.

Socrative Application

As it was mentioned before the only difference regarding the treatment in this study was the type of assessment applied for each group of language learners. Assessment in FMA group was carried out by a mobile application designed for testing named Socrative by Master Connect. The teacher then creates a virtual room with a particular code in the application designed for teachers (which can be received from website with the address www.socrative.com ) and writes his questions there. Then, students install student` App and use the same code to enter the virtual room of questions created and organized by the teacher and answer the questions. The teacher can also manage the way the learners are to answer the questions; whether they should answer all questions at once or one by one. After the test, the teacher receives the results and can immediately share it with the learners. Therefore, throughout this study and to deliver the test onto the smart devices that students employ in class, Socrative Application was chosen as the quiz delivery system. It is a widely used, free web service that allows students to do quizzes or even answer quick questions in a manner of polling by using their smart phones. The students were trained on how to navigate the website/app a week prior to the beginning of Mobile based assessment, however, the training was minimal since no registration was required to use Socrative; students just needed an instructor generated room number.Since Socrative is the primary tool of this study that represents the Mobile Based-Testing, it is necessary to have a brief understanding of its functions. Diechman (2014) provided the following description:

Socrative 2.0 is an online assessment and student response tool that can be run on any platform that has a connection to the Internet. An AASL Best Website and Best App for 2013, this system was created by a team that is passionate about education, and that passion is obvious in their work. The system can be used as a student engagement tool and as either a formative or summative assessment

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mechanism. Laptop or computer users can just log in to join their class through a student website. An app is also available for tablets and smartphones. Two separate apps are needed to use the Socrative 2.0 tool: a Teacher App and a Student App that must be downloaded onto each device. As of this writing, both the online website and the tablet apps are free to all users. (p. 72)

Socrative application was chosen for this study because of its ease of use, its lack of cost (it is a free service), and its ability to quickly assess prior knowledge where students can easily get involved and assess their understanding of lessons; lessons which in this study were included in Concepts and Comments textbook.

DATA ANALYSIS AND RESULTSLongman Proficiency TestFirst of all a Longman proficiency test was administered to ensure that the participants of both groups were pre-intermediate English learners. The assortment proposed with the questions showed the range of scores falling in each level, therefore those who scored from 26 to 45 belonged to pre-intermediate language learners. The results of the proficiency test applied to both groups are shown in table 4.1:

Table1. Longman proficiency test for two groups

N Minimum Maximum Mean Std. DeviationFMA 20 19.00 62.00 33.2500 13.43552FPA 20 12.00 54.00 30.9000 11.81836Valid N (listwise) 20

As it is shown in table 4.1, the mean for each group is between 26 and 45 which means that all participants in both FMA and FPA groups could be regarded as pre-intermediate EFL learners. The results showed that the study was going to be conducted dealing with homogeneous learners and their proficiency level had no undesirable effect on the process of data collection and analysis.

Data Analysis for First Question of the StudyPretest

To answer the first question of the study, a pretest, first of all, was administered to both FMA and FPA groups. The experimental group was labeled as FMA because the vocabulary gain of this class was decided to be assessed formatively using mobile phone. The other group, on the other hand in which vocabulary gain was going to be assessed formatively based on paper and pen was labeled as FPA. The pretest was administered at the outset of the study to confirm that learners were at the same level of vocabulary knowledge before starting the treatment of the study.Descriptive statistics based on the results of pretest are shown in table 4.2.

Table2.Descriptive statistics for pretest scores

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean

vocabularyFMA 20 18.6000 10.34357 2.31289FPA 20 19.9000 9.55262 2.13603

A KR-21 formula was applied for analyzing the reliability of the pretest:

[ n/(n-1) * [1-(M*(n-M)/(n*Var))]= [(50/49)*[1-(18.6*(50-18.60)/50*106.09)]=0.86

The reliability of 0.86 declares that the pretest was benefited from a high range of reliability.

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Since the only independent variable regarding the first question of the study was the mode of assessment (mobile based or paper based) and the only dependent variable was vocabulary knowledge of participants, an independent sample t-test was run the results are shown in table 4.3.

Table3. Independent samples T-Test for pretest between FMA and FPA

Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances

t-test for Equality of Means

F Sig. t Df Sig. (2-tailed)

Mean Difference

Std. Error Difference

95% Confidence Interval of the

Difference

Lower Upper

Vocabulary Pretest

Equal variances assumed

.255 .617 38 .682 -1.30000 3.14835 -7.67350 5.07350

Equal variances not

assumed37.762 .682 -1.30000 3.14835 -7.67482 5.07482

The tables 4.3 gives the fact that although mean score of FPA group was higher (19.90>18.60), there was no statistically significant difference between two groups before starting the treatment (sig= 0.617>0.05). Therefore, the vocabulary knowledge of participant was not as much different to affect the process of research.

Reliability of Treatment Tests

Since the study is around formative assessment of vocabulary, 10 quizzes were administered during the term among both groups. All the tests consisting 20 multiple choice items were based on the vocabulary taught during the term. In order to get assured of the reliability of the tests, the scores obtained by participants of FMA group were analyzed. KR_21 formula was employed for measuring the reliability of each test. Table 4.4 shows mean, standard deviation and reliability of each test.

Table4. Reliability of treatment tests

ReliabilityStandard DeviationMeanTests0.854.5014.60Test 10.875.0413.05Test 20.844.614.20Test 30.83.615.6Test 4

0.823.716.3Test 50.733.714.25Test 60.793.7115.65Test 70.702.1617.45Test 80.863.5117.55Test90.893.2718.20Test 10

As it is shown in table 4.4, all the treatment tests which were administered through formative assessment were reliable tests.

Posttest

After applying different types of treatment in both groups, to find out any significant difference between vocabulary gains of two groups after the treatment, a posttest was administered. Descriptive statistics regarding the posttest scores are shown in table 4.5.

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Table5. Descriptive statistics for posttest of FMA and FPA

Groups N Mean Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean

vocab_posttestFMA 20 83.2500 14.62469 3.27018

FPA 20 70.7500 21.47673 4.80234

The reliability of posttest was analyzed employing KR-21 formula:

[n/(n-1) * [1-(M*(n-M)/(n*Var))]=[1.01*1-83.25(100-83.25)/100*21374.44)=0.94

The posttest can also be regarded as a reliable test because the obtained reliability was 0.94.Since the mode of vocabulary assessment (mobile based or paper based) was the only independent variable beside vocabulary gain of learners as the dependent variable, an independent sample t-test was proposed to be employed to see whether there was a significant difference in vocabulary gain of FMA group and FPA group after applying different modes of assessment throughout the treatment or not; table 4.6 is provided by SPSS software to answer the first question of the study.

Table6.Independent samples test for posttest between FMA and FPA

Levene’s Test for Equality of Variances

t-test for Equality of Means

F Sig. t Df Sig. (2-tailed)

Mean Difference

Std. Error Difference

95% Confidence Interval of the

Difference

Lower Upper

vocab_posttest

Equal variances assumed

4.576 .039 2.151 38 .038 12.50000 5.81004 .73819 24.26181

Equal variances not

assumed2.151 33.502 .039 12.50000 5.81004 .68611 24.31389

As it is shown in 4.4 and 4.5, beside the fact that mean score of FMA group where vocabulary formative assessment was based on mobile application was higher than FPA group where vocabulary formative assessment was based on paper (FMA mean=83.25> FPA mean=70.75), there was also statistically significant difference between two groups after the treatment ( sig=0.03>0.05). Therefore, the null hypothesis that says there is no significant difference between the vocabulary gain of Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners tested by paper and pen and those who are tested using mobile devices was rejected.

Data Analysis for Second Question of the StudyQuantitative Analysis

The second research question of this study which was about the attitude of pre-intermediate English learners towards mobile based assessment was answered quantitatively and qualitatively. An attitude questionnaire containing ten items was distributed among participants in FMA group. All 20 students of FMA group and 5 other students whose scores were not included in the analyses for first question of the study answered the questions. Descriptive statistics regarding the questionnaire result was run to determine whether the attitude of students towards such type of assessment was positive or negative. To answer the questions, respondents were asked to choose from a six-point Likert-type scale of agreement running from (1= Strongly Disagree, 2= Disagree, 3= somewhat disagree, 4= somewhat Agree, 5= Agree and six= strongly agree). The results are shown in Table 4.6.

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Table7.Descriptive statistics of questionnaire

N Minimum Maximum Mean Std. Deviation

1 Using the mobile for taking a test did not scare me at all. 25 2.00 6.00 5.3200 1.24900

2 I would not be threatened even if my classmates liked taking the test using mobile. 25 1.00 6.00 4.4800 2.16256

3 I felt comfortable working with mobile 25 1.00 6.00 5.3600 1.11355

4 Now that I have finished this test with mobile, I would feel at ease in taking other tests using mobiles. 25 1.00 6.00 5.2400 1.23423

5 I felt uncomfortable using mobile for testing. 25 1.00 6.00 1.9600 1.64520

6 I felt aggressive and hostile toward mobile when taking the test with it. 25 1.00 6.00 1.6400 1.28712

7 I got a sinking feeling when I saw that I had to use mobiles for test 25 1.00 6.00 2.2800 1.74452

8 Taking a test with a mobile made me nervous. 25 1.00 6.00 1.9200 1.55242

9 I would have felt better if I had taken paper and pencil test instead of mobile based test. 25 1.00 6.00 2.2800 1.76824

10 Using mobile made me uneasy and confused 25 1.00 6.00 2.3200 1.72530

Valid N (listwise) 25

The items of the questionnaire were divided into 2 sections. First four items were based on positive statements specifying positive attitude of learners towards Mobile Based Tests and the items 5 to 10 were negative statements.As it is shown in the table 4.6, the mean scores for the items stating positive sentences are consistently higher than the mean scores for the negative ones. Results in the above table showed that from the respondents’ perspective, the most widespread status with the Mobile Based Test is the success it made in the item 4 stating that “ I felt comfortable working with mobile “ with mean of (5.36), followed by the items 1 saying ‘’Using the mobile for taking a test did not scare me at all” and ‘’Now that I have finished this test with mobile, I would feel at ease in taking other tests using mobiles” which has been specified to be the following utmost important item with mean 5.24, this means that MBT has attracted the majority of examinees’ awareness and resulted in a positive attitude.

Qualitative Analysis

The qualitative section for answering the second question of the study was analyzed by employing narrative research design based on five open ended questions which were answered by the respondents based on whatever they felt and experienced throughout participating in 10 mobile based tests. The more frequently repeated answers to each question are provided in the table 4.8.

Table8.Open-ended questions and answers

Questions Answers

What did you like most about testing by mobile? faster speed, immediate feedback, attractive atmosphere of application, , not dealing with paper and pen, paper saving

What did you dislike most about testing by mobile? Some difficulties in accessing the application, Do you prefer taking the tests using mobiles or paper and pen? Yes: 23 students No: 2 students

Why would you choose a mobile based test over paper and pencil based test?

easiness, immediate feedback, attractive atmosphere of application, more concentration,

Do you have any other comment on how you felt about testing by mobile?

Cheating was not possible with using mobile application, motivation to participate in mobile testing session was higher than paper based testing, preferring to take other tests using mobile phones

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The answers to these open ended questions revealed that participants of the FMA group preferred mobile based assessment over paper based one. As it is shown in the table 4.7, easiness, faster speed, attractive atmosphere of application, and immediate feedback provided by application were all the advantages of mobile based assessment from the view point of participants. Some students also asserted that they were more motivated to participate in mobile based tests compared to paper based ones. On the other hand, the only drawback of using mobile for testing was that students had difficulty in accessing the application; consequently, it caused some problems for test takers to answer the questions in the required time. However, the mentioned problem can easily be solved with provision of a wireless network accessible to all students. All in all, considering both qualitative and quantitative data received from the participants in FMA group, it can be concluded that they had a positive attitude towards mobile based form of assessing vocabulary.

DISCUSSIONTechnology, nowadays, is considered as one main element of all English classes and has influenced the process of language learning and teaching. One section of English classes where technology is proposed to be used is assessment. The application of computers in assessment has been studied before, but nowadays computers have been replaced by mobiles which are used in our everyday lives. As mentioned by Klimova (2017), currently, there is an increasing trend in the shift from the use of traditional technologies such as a desktop computer towards the use of mobile technologies such as mobile phones or smartphones. Therefore, the application of such new technologies in English classes, especially the assessment part, is proposed throughout this study.One important section of each class is assessment that helps both students and teachers enjoy a beneficial class. Appropriate assessment helps students meet certain standards and be aware of the main purpose of their lessons. On the other hand, teachers use the assessment data to identify strengths and weaknesses in student performance, and to improve the quality of teaching and learning. Today, with the rise of post method pedagogy ideologies, formative assessment has replaced summative assessment and has been considered by more teachers (Black & Wiliam, 1998). In other words, assessment of learning (summative assessment) has shifted to assessment for learning (formative assessment), where assessment is in support of learning. As it was mentioned by Khodabakhshzadeh, Kafi & Hosseinnia (2017), formative assessment is a new concept in Iran and most of the teachers have not enough literacy of this kind of assessment. The majority of teachers still prefer the paper and pencil tests and summative ones. Therefore, to help teachers apply formative assessment which has been proved to be a substitution for summative assessment in English classes and to help teachers overcome the difficulties of administrating formative assessment, a simpler method of formative assessment based on technology was proposed in this study.To examine the effect of employing mobile based formative assessment in English classes and especially in vocabulary gain of EFL learners, two groups of students which were assigned to two different classes before the study were selected and the vocabulary skill of each group was assessed in different ways. The results of this process of applying these types of assessments answered the research questions of the present study.Briefly, the results of the present study exhibited the positive affect of applying mobile in assessing vocabulary skill of pre-intermediate English learners. As it was shown, formative assessment based on mobile applications was significantly more effective in vocabulary gain of pre-intermediate EFL learners than formative paper based assessment. These results are in line with most previous studies, some of which will be mentioned in what follows.The application of mobile phones in EFL classrooms was investigated before by many researchers like Liu and Wu (2016) whose findings indicated that the LINE-based learning activities helped students familiarize themselves with English vocabulary and improve their English reading comprehension. Throughout this study, the researcher moved further and examined the role of such technology in assessment part of EFL classes and it was concluded that assessment can also be significantly influenced by application of mobile technology.The results of the present study is also in accordance with Rakhyoot and Weir’s (2014) who empirically investigated the effectiveness of on-line formative assessment (OFA) and feedback in the context of an EFL

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course for postgraduate students at the University of Strathclyde. They concluded that on-line formative assessment with in-question feedback affords a worthy contribution to improving students’ learning. This study also supported the results obtained from Tarighat and Khodabakhsh’s study suggesting that MALA (Mobile Assisted Language Assessment) be used alongside other forms of assessment to form part of the learners’ final score just like Zheng, Su & Lian’s (2014), who developed an Online Formative Assessment System for a Chinese EFL course to support conducting formative assessment activities and further improving learners’ English language skills.On the other hand, while Gordon (2015) investigated the possibility of a difference between actual performance in Mobile Device Testing (MDT) versus Paper Based Testing (PBT), the present study tried to investigate the same possibility where both modes of assessment were conducted in a formative way and it was concluded that formative assessment based on mobile phones can improve vocabulary learning of students significantly. Gordon, however, reported that although testing based on mobile phones could be regarded as an alternative for paper based testing, no significant difference between them was witnessed. Therefore, contrary to the Gordon’s study, the present study showed that using mobile phones in assessment can lead to a significantly better learning of vocabulary. One main reason leading to such difference between the results of this study and Gordon’s may be is the nature of formative assessment in being equipped with immediate feedback provided after each test. In fact, one of the factors leading to better vocabulary learning in FMA group could be the immediate feedback which was provided by the Socrative application after each test. The students, then, became aware of their vocabulary knowledge and tried to study more for next test while in the other group, formative assessment was applied based on paper and pen and the students were not provided with immediate feedback. Actually, assessment with the provision of feedback (as its main distinctive feature) has an enormous advantage since students are informed about the continuous development in their achievement. Ainsworth (2006) alludes to the dissimilarity between tests and assessments by arguing that the latter can: “a) motivate students to be more engaged in learning, b) help students develop positive attitudes toward a subject, and c) give students feedback about what they know and can do’’ (p.22). In other words, the provision of feedback for both students and teachers during the term is necessary and leads to a better learning and teaching.Although the FPA group was also provided by feedback in this study, it took a long time for instructor to correct the papers after the test. Therefore, time distance between each test and the feedback provision in FPA group was not short enough to motivate learners to study more after each test. As stated by Kilickaya (2016), based on previous research on providing immediate feedback (Jonson, 2006; Chappuis & Chappuis, 2010; Pennebaker, Grosling & Ferrell, 2013; Fulcher & Owen, 2016), learners can benefit more from feedback on strengths and weakness, and in this perspective, the application was found to be highly efficient. Most assessments are done summatively (Mumm, Karm & Remmik, 2016). However, as formative assessment is believed to be providing more detailed feedback on the learners’ progress when compared with the summative approach, Socrative application, based on the participants’ views and experience in the classroom, seems to help teachers conduct formative assessment to determine students’ weaknesses and strengths by automated scores, which was in accord with Fageeh’s study (2015) and Rakhyoot and Weir`s (2014).The positive attitude of learners towards mobile based assessment would be considered as one main factor leading to such significant difference between FMA group and FPA one. The positive attitude of learners was concluded by analyzing the results of an attitude questionnaire distributed among the participants of the group whose vocabulary gain was assessed formatively based on a mobile application specified for testing. The results of the third question of this study are supported by the study done by Tarighat and Khodabakhsh (2016) who based on the interviews about the learners` attitude towards mobile based assessment for speaking declared that Mobile Assisted Language Assessment can be used alongside other forms of assessment to form part of the learners’ final score. The only difference was that the present study dealt with assessing vocabulary gain of learners. Therefore, beside mobile based assessment of speaking, EFL learners have positive attitude towards vocabulary mobile based assessment too.

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The other important factor helping FMA students learn better was that they were assessed with a device that was attractive to them and they also dealt with that in their everyday lives and of course they had a good attitude toward applying them in education. That is why they felt more comfortable using these devices and therefore they performed better and with higher level of energy. The students did not also need to take the mobile based tests in an especial laboratory. This could be regarded as an important advantage of mobile based assessment over computer based testing. Many other factors like time saving, atmosphere of testing sessions, and the attractions of the Socrative mobile application were beneficial for students using mobile based assessment to learn better.

CONCLUSIONAssessment as one main section of EFL classes was proved to be influenced by computers. CBT which stands for computer based test, according to previous studies, can replace paper based test appropriately. Thus, through this study the application of another technological device named mobiles in assessment was examined. Not necessary to say that because of the importance of vocabulary learning and also to narrow down the domain of study to get more reliable results, the vocabulary subskill was assessed in this study.Based on the results of this study, participants who were assessed formatively using mobile and an application designed for testing named Socrative, were significantly better vocabulary learners after ten sessions of treatment than other group in which vocabulary gain of learners was assessed formatively based on paper and pen. Therefore, it was concluded that applying mobile devices and testing applications in assessment section of EFL classes in a formative way, improves vocabulary leaning of participants better than those who are assessed formatively based on paper and pen.Formative assessment which is defined as the process of assessing students during the term for better learning is ignored nowadays by English teachers. Applying technology to facilitate this type of assessment in EFL class was suggested in this study. Mobile phone as a device which is considered as an inseparable part of human life was used as a means of performing a better vocabulary formative assessment. Immediate feedback as an advantage of mobile based formative assessment beside attractive atmosphere of mobile testing application and faster process of test taking differentiated this type of assessment with paper based ones where it took longer time for teacher to correct the papers and give the feedback to students. Being aware of their results in one test immediately, students tried more for next tests. Therefore, they learned more and performed better in consequent tests and posttest. Regarding implications and with considering the conclusion of the study using mobile applications which are designed and produced to facilitate the process of testing is implicated. But more clearly, the main implication of this study is the application of formative assessment based on mobile application which can give immediate feedback, put learners in an attractive situation better than conventional and boring paper based testing sessions, and help teachers save their time and design a better plan for the future of their classes based on their received results. University students studying general English participated in this study. English institutions and schools can also apply this type of assessment and encourage their students use their mobiles in a beneficial way instead of forbidding them from carrying their mobiles.Like any other research, this study also deals with some limitations and delimitations. First, based on the research questions of this study, 40 students from both genders took part in this study and their ages ranged from 18 to 22. These participants were from two intact classes studying general English at Chabahar Maritime University, and hence subject selection was not random. On the other hand, the research was intentionally delimited to EFL learners at the pre-intermediate language proficiency level to neutralize the effect of their language proficiency. In order to make the results more generalizable, other studies should include the participants of different language proficiency levels. Among all mobile apps which are used for testing, only one, Socrative App, was applied in the experimental class. Moreover, all tests in all groups were delimited to vocabulary and other areas of language were not included in this study.

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BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORSDr. NahidYARAHMADZEHI, is a Professor of Linguistics at Management and Humanities Faculty, English Language Department, Chabahar Maritime University. Dr. Yarahmadzehi gained her Ph.D. in Linguistics at March, 2010. Her academic interest areas are theoretical, social, as well as Educational Linguistics, psycholinguistics and bilingualism, e-learning, and use of internet in education. She has over than 7 journal articles published in international indexes, and other national and international articles, papers submitted to international meetings.

Dr. Nahid YARAHMADZEHIEnglish Language Department, Management and Humanities FacultyAddress: Chabahar Maritime University, Postal Code: 9971756949, Chabahar, IranPhone: +985435322753E-mail: venayarahmadi@ gmail.com

MostafaGOODARZI, received his Master’s degree in English Language Teaching at Management and Humanities Faculty, English Language Department, Chabahar Maritime University. Mr.Goodarzi gained his Master’s degree in English Language Teaching at March, 2019. His academic interest areas are use of internet in education, online testing, MALL, English language teaching methodology and applied linguistics. He is an English instructor in high schools, universities and institutions.

Mostafa GOODARZIEnglish Language Department, Faculty of Management and HumanitiesAddress: Chabahar Maritime University, Postal Code: 9971756949Chabahar, IranPhone: +98 9354703574,E-mail: mostafa.gudarzi1993@gmail.com

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Taki, S. & Khazaei,S. (2011).Learning Vocabulary via Mobile Phone: Persian EFL Learners in Focus. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2(6), 1252-1258.

Varier, D. (2015). A Case Study Examining Formative Assessment in a Postsecondary English Language Program, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, Department of Foundations of Education.

Yang, J. (2013). Mobile assisted language learning: review of the recent applications of emerging mobile technologies. English Language Teaching, 6(7), 19-25.

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BOOK REVIEW

AGAINST THE TIDE: CRITICS OF DIGITALISATION; WARNERS, SCEPTICS, SCAREMONGERS, APOCALYPTICISTS, 20 PORTRAITS

Written by Otto PETERS

Eda ATASOYSchool of Foreign Languages

Anadolu UniversityEskisehir, TURKEY

ISBN 9783814222851

Publication Date 2013

Publication Formats Hardcover and e-Book (PDF)

Publisher BIS-Verlag der Carl von Ossietzky Universitat Oldenburg

INTRODUCTION People are overwhelmed by the technology. We use them in every phase of our lives: while shopping, communicating, learning, exercising and many more. Thanks to digital technologies, we have an easier and happier life, but is it really so? After all, can we imagine a right without left, a sun without moon, water without fire, love without hate, life without death, a digitalization without corruption?

REVIEW OF THE BOOKOtto Peters, as a researcher, educator and theorist, has made great contributions to the development of distance education with his theory “The Industrial Model” and with his numerous other works. As a fact, this book came out of the motto of Peters “Nothing is true anymore without its opposite.”, so the whole book is framed upon paradoxes: a) the users use the digital tools to shape their environment but ultimately, the tools shape the users, b) the

technology makes people lonely and people use the very same technology to overcome their loneliness, c) so called time-saving technologies force us to use the time faster, and d) what is the real? We are surrounded by the copy of the copy. In this resource book, Peters gives a place to 20 critical voices of prominent and internationally acclaimed experts including heretics, critics, individualists, activists, traditionalists, distopists, humanists, cultural pessimists and many more. Each chapter in the book presents a critic of digitalisation and consists of five parts; a biographical background of the author, their motivation, main features of their work, reception and comments by Peters and others in the field. In the first chapter, Joseph Weizenbaum, as a heretic, provides a critical view into Artificial Intelligence (AI) and states humans are not machines because they are autonomous, and are capable of creating meaning and making interpretations. There is nothing like pure science or pure technology. None of them act alone apart from human beings. In the second chapter, Juan Luis Cebrián, as a concerned critic, has both great expectations and great concerns on digitalization. He provides some excellent remarks on the dark side of technology. He believes technology makes our lives easier and simpler but at the cost of what. For him, there is an information chaos on the

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internet which not only threatens law and order but also the logic of the humans by hypnotizing them until they no longer know what is real or unreal, what is true or false. We all become addicted to the Internet and technology subconsciously. In the third chapter, Jaron Lanier, as a nonconformist, assures that humans are not gadgets but humans. He challenges AI by saying what is real is humans not information. He also proposes the concept of “cybernetic totalists” which can be defined as a global technological brain in which all human brains are connected to each other on the web and criticizes it, since it vanishes the personal traits and individual bits. In chapter four, Bill Joy, as an individualist, sees the dangers of technology such as the violation of individual rights and privacy. He warns us on the use of technologies such as mobile phones, credit cards, and smart dust which allow tracking of people. One small fault that we make with technological systems may result in chain reactions and with AI or intelligent robots may result in extinction of human race.In chapter five, Don Tapscott, as an activist, expresses his hopes of digitalization such as its use for creation of a global wealth, education and health system as well as the dangers approaching. For him, technologies; a) change the governments and social institutions in a country, b) change the way we do business work or think, c) cause great problems in economy since traditional norms, plans and rules are not valid for digital economy, and d) cause the digital divide between the generations; the ones using the Internet and the ones not.In the sixth chapter, David Franklin Noble, as a traditionalist, declares a war against modern open and distance learning and considers it as a digital diploma mill and automation of higher education. In chapter seven, Aric Sigman, as a polemicist, draws attention into the negative biological effects of reduced social contact and states that social networking not only causes loneliness but also makes us ill by changing our sleeping habits, causing immunological and genetic changes in our bodies and increasing mortality.In chapter eight, Andrew Keen, as an alarmist, is concerned on Web 2.0 tools since they let “amateurs” replace “cultural gatekeepers, professional critics, journalists and moviemakers” in digital settings. On the internet, there is a huge amount of content published by anonymous authors which threatens the credibility of the online resources.In chapter nine, Susan Greenfield, as a dystopist, provides some scenarios for the future effects of digitalization on neurophysiology, psychology, pedagogy, and sociology. In one of the remarkable scenarios, she directs the question “what will happen to the kiss in the digitalized future?” and asserts there will be no demand for kiss by humans in the future digitalized world because we will all turn into beings lack of empathy and full of isolation.In chapter ten, John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, as reformers, focus on the different identities formed in the generations grown up exposed to the digital tools and the internet and draw a picture of a person in agricultural, industrial and internet ages. Also, they emphasize the worst effects of digitalization will be experienced in themes: overload, dossiers, aggressors, security, private sphere, and privacy.

In chapter eleven, Hartmut von Hentig, as a humanist, criticizes people since he thinks they surrender to the new technical media and believes that in this circumstance young people have three options: participate, drop out or “stand up to technological civilization”.In chapter twelve, Philip Bethge, as a satirist, declares the Internet as God departing from the similarities between the Bible and the Internet: Both of them have an answer to all questions, have a host of disciplines and promise “eternal life”.In chapter thirteen, Susanne Gaschke, as an admonisher, finds the new medium, that is the internet, “breathless” and “rapid” and the information on the internet “contextless”. For her, learning is no longer a dynamic process of understanding, internalizing, analyzing, synthesizing, and creating but mere passive absorption of knowledge through computer screens.In chapter fourteen, Nicholas G. Carr, as a man of letters, implies that the internet is changing our brains by its negative influence on our cognition and concentration and at the end creates “shallows”; that are people no longer use their brains efficiently.

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In chapter fifteen, Frank Schirrmacher, as a debate instigator, departs from disturbing experience of his own with the technology and confesses he loses control of his mind and thoughts. At the end, he proposes power training and self-control as a remedy for this problem to the readers.In chapter sixteen, Botho Strauß, as a dramatist, criticizes the secondary world; that is virtual world, and starts a revolt against it because this world is characterized by poverty of ideas, soulless economy and technological nihilism.In chapter seventeen, Sherry Turkle, as a hesitant sceptic, emphasizes that as a direct result of the digitalisation we lose our human characteristics and end up as loneliners. One reason of this is that we lost our confidence into humans and see the internet as a way to escape from our problems, disappointments, and pains.In chapter eighteen, Jean Baudrillard, as a cultural pessimist, discusses two concepts “hyperreality” and “simulacrum”. He states that via the technology we can go beyond our capabilities and enter a new world, a kind of world doesn’t need us. The postmodern world is full of simulations, images that pretend the real and if we are not careful, there will be surrounded up with the copy of the copy, that is simulacrum.In chapter nineteen, Paul Virilio, as an apocalypticist, defends the idea that everything comes with its side effects, so does the technology. Because of the internet, there is a mass of information that can be used for bad.In chapter twenty, Miriam Meckel, as an intellectual gamester, criticizes digital communication and questions the concept “permanent reachability”. To him, if a person is always reachable, he/she is not really there for anyone or anything. People feel obliged to reply all mails and texts they get, so they are not free anymore to do their own plans. “Against the Tide” is a book that must be read cautiously and repeatedly. In the book, none of the critics wants to block the digital development. However, they accept and welcome it with its both positive and negative sides. As a fact, digitalization is a tide, it is approaching, it is unstoppable, so it is meaningless, time consuming, and in vain to resist it. For specifically open and distance learners, instructors, researchers and practitioners who constantly use digital technologies in their practices, it will be wise to control it, take its power behind and surf.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHOR

Eda ATASOY, is a lecturer of English at Anadolu University. She gained her Bachelor’s degree in the field of English Language Teaching from Anadolu University in 2008 and her Master’s Degree in the field of English Language Teaching from Bilkent University in 2012. She is still doing her PhD, in the field of Distance Education at Anadolu University. Her interest areas are open and distance learning, dark web, research methods, open and distance learning theories, and rhizomatic learning.

Eda ATASOYAdress: Anadolu University, School of Foreign LanguagesTepebasi, Eskisehir, TurkeyPhone: 00-90-222-3350580 / 6128 Email: ekaypak@anadolu.edu.tr

REFERENCES

Peters, O. (2013). Against the Tide: Critics of Digitalisation; Warners, Sceptics, Scaremongers, Apocalypticists; 20 Portraits. BIS-Verlag der Carl-von-Ossietzky-Univ Oldenburg.

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BOOK REVIEW

MACRO-LEVEL LEARNING THROUGH MASSIVE OPEN ONLINE COURSES (MOOCS):

STRATEGIES AND PREDICTIONS FOR THE FUTUREEdited by Elspeth MCKAY and John LENARCIC

Murat ARTSINDistance Education Department

Bahcesehir UniversityIstanbul, TURKEY

ISBN9781466683242 (Hardcover)9781466683259 (e-Book)

Publication Date March, 2015

Publication Formats Hardcover, e-Book

Publisher IGI Global

INTRODUCTION Macro-Level Learning through Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): Strategies and Predictions for the Future is edited by Elspeth McKay and John Lenarcic. This book was published by IGI Global in 2015 also this book has 306 pages.The book consists of 14 chapters in four thematic sections. These sections and chapters are:• Chapter 1-4: Policy Issues in MOOCs Design: Emerging

Technology and Change Management Issues for eLearning in the MOOCs Environment

• Chapter 5: Social Networking and Collaborative Learning:Building MOOCs Communities

• Chapter 6-7: ePedagogy and Interactive MOOCs: ePedagogyand Students’ Use of HCI – Integrating Interactivity into Asynchronous MOOCs

• Chapter8-14:RichInternetApplicationsandEducationalPracticeofMOOCs:EducationalTrainingDesign

REVIEW OF THE BOOKChapter 1: Mining a MOOC: What Our MOOC Taught Us about Professional Learning, Teaching, and Assessment by Sandra Milligan and Patrick Griffin (2015). This section begins with a course at the University of Melbourne, ATC21S, and provides an overview of a MOOC development and teaching process in general. Also it includes answers to how to create MOOC designs and MOOC environments. To my view, the visuals and tables in this section are useful for understanding the subject.Chapter 2: Quality Assurance for Massive Open Access Online Courses: Building on the Old to Create SomethingNew by JustinWalls, Jo-AnneKelder,CarolynKing, Sara Booth andDavid Sadler. In thissection, quality assurance is examined in the context of the assessment of MOOC quality. Quality assurance

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was addressed using a MOOC at the University of Tasmania. In my opinion, the quality assurance process is important for the recognition of MOOCs in higher education.Chapter3:ProfessionalLearningthroughMOOCs?ATrans-DisciplinaryFrameworkforBuildingKnowledge,Inquiry, and Expertise by Jason M. Lodge and Melinda J. Lewis. In this section, the authors focus on the expertise needed by MOOC participants. Again in this section, the major roles of MOOCs are emphasized.Chapter4:MOOCsandtheArtStudio:ACatalystforInnovationandChangeineLearningDevelopmentand Studio Pedagogies by Howard Errey and Megan J McPherson. In this section, the authors refer to the challenges faced by the MOOCs in the context of openness, in addition to the management, design and policies of the MOOCs.Chapter 5: Internationalising Social Work Education Using Massive Open Online Courses by Linette Hawkins, Jennifer Martin, Elspeth McKay and Supriya Pattanayak. In this section, community building processes in MOOCs mentioned. However, a supporting case study mentioned.Chapter 6: Learning Theories: ePedagogical Strategies for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in HigherEducationbyEileenO’Donnell,SeamusLawless,MarySharpandLiamO’Donnell.Inthissection,e-pedagogical strategies for effective use of MOOCs in higher education are reviewed. The section discusses e-pedagogy and interactive MOOCs.Chapter 7: Beyond the Phenomenon: AssessmentinMassiveOpenOnline Courses(MOOCs) by AmitChauhan. In this section, the types of MOOC participants, MOOC completion rates, student interactions and evaluation processes mentioned.Chapter8:WhatisBestfortheLearner?AreMOOCstheAnswer?byCaroleA.BagleyandJanetWeisenford.This section is based on the question of what is best for students. The advantages and benefits of MOOCs are discussed in this section.Chapter9:DeceptivePromises:TheMeaningofMOOCs-HypeforHigherEducationbyStefanPopenici.This section has been a synthesis of issues that researchers and other stakeholders have been focusing on since the first day of the MOOCs. In this section, scientific researches, blogs, reports and media bulletins about MOOCs are examined. I found this section remarkable, which has an analysis of expectations for MOOCs.Chapter10:RedefiningtheClassroom:IntegrationofOpenandClassroomLearninginHigherEducationbyShikhaGupta,SheetalTanejaandNaveenKumar.Thissectionprovidesanevidenceoftheimpactandtraces of MOOCs on higher education. In my opinion, this chapter can give readers a perspective on the revolutionary advantage that MOOCs provide.Chapter11:MOOCs:EvolutionandRevolutionbyKennethRonkowitzandLynnetteCondroRonkowitz.This section focuses on the history of distance education and the evolution of MOOC also it focused on the discussion on research questions about MOOCs. To my view, this section will be useful for people who want to have an idea of the future of MOOCs.Chapter12:TheEvolutionofOnlineLearningandRelatedToolsandTechniquestowardMOOCsbyDrewParker and Kamal Masri. This section discusses the development of MOOCs. In addition, there has been a discussion about the technologies that can be used for MOOC development.Chapter 13: MOOCs in InitialTeacherTraining: Perspectives and Learning-Teaching Needs by CalosMongeLopez,PatriciaGomezHernandezandDavidMontalvoSaborido.Thissectionisaboutteachers’attitudes and needs towards MOOCs. It is stated that teachers can benefit from MOOCs. Additionally, it is stated that teachers do not have knowledge about MOOCs. In my perspective, it is very important that the teachers of the future should be educated with MOOC culture.Chapter 14: Challenges about MOOCs in Teacher Training: Differences between On-Site and OpenUniversity Students by Patricia Gomez Hernandez, Carlos Monge Lopez and Alba Garcia Barrera. In this section, the study carried out with university students. The current situation is presented with a case study. It can be said that the distinction between students at distance education universities and traditional universities is quite remarkable.

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CONCLUSIONThe revolutionary innovation provided by the MOOCs is effective in all higher education. Change has been inevitable for students, teachers, administrators and policy makers.MOOCs with flexible access are discussed in many different ways from the book Macro-Level Learning through Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): Strategies and Predictions for the Future written by Elspeth McKay and John Lenarcic. Information on the place of MOOCs in higher education, policy studies, network community process, practices and their reflection on traditional universities are presented. Completion rates and learner profiles in MOOCs have been the subject of many studies. In this book, in my opinion, there is little emphasis on studies on completion rates in MOOCs which is an issue to be considered in follow-up studies and, as a final remark, I believe that the book can be a good resource for researchers who is willing to learn more about MOOCs.

BIODATA and CONTACT ADDRESSES of AUTHORMurat ARTSIN, has been working as a Education Technologist in Bahcesehir University,DistanceEducationDepartment.Hecompletedhisbachelordegree inSakaryaUniversity,DepartmentofComputerEducationandInstructionalTechnologyin2016.HecompletedhismasterdegreeinAnadoluUniversity,DistanceEducationDepartmentin2018.HehasbeencontinuinghisdoctoraleducationinBahcesehirUniversity,DepartmentofEducationTechnologies.Heisinterestedinmassiveopenonline courses, self-regulated learning and learner- content interactions.

MuratARTSINE-mail: artsinm@gmail.comURL:https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Murat_Artsin URL:https://independent.academia.edu/MuratArtsin

REFERENCES

McKay, E., & Lenarcic, J. (2015). Macro-Level Learning through Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): Strategies and Predictions for the Future(pp.1-306).Hershey,PA:IGIGlobal.doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-8324-2