Students' Perception of Online Learning Resources
Steve Love, University of Portsmouth, UK.
This paper describes a pilot study designed to evaluate students' perception of a unit of
study organised around an online learning resource. In addition, students were asked to
evaluate "face-to-face" versus the chat-room as a learning environment.
The participants in this study were final year undergraduate Psychology students from the
University of Portsmouth who had chosen to take a course on Computer-Mediated
Communication. This course was organised around an online managed learning environment
called WebCT.
The students were informed, from the outset, that all information about the course would
be found on the course web site on WebCT. This included information about the course aims
and expected learning outcomes, assessment criteria, reference links to other relevant web
sites and a calendar of dates for student presentations (which formed part of the
coursework
requirement for this unit). In addition, students used the bulletin board facility
to provide information to the rest of the group about their presentation topic (e.g.
title, useful references) and introduce what the seminar topic for the week would be.
Students were also encouraged to add any relevant web links that they came across during
their own independent
study and use the email facility to contact the course leader or other group members if
they had any questions or comments to make about the course.
The second aim of the pilot study was to evaluate "face-to-face" versus the
chat-room as a learning environment. Each week students held a seminar either in a room,
"face-to-face" around a table or the seminar would take place online, using the
WebCT chat-room facility.
To evaluate the online learning resource students were asked to complete a
5-point, Likert-type attitude questionnaire at the end of the course. The questionnaire
covered topics such as presentation of the online materials, navigation around the online
learning resource and overall user satisfaction. For the comparison of
"face-to-face" versus the chat-room as a learning environment, students were
given a series of open-ended questions to answer (the open-ended questions were also
presented to students at the end of the course). These included questions asking students
about what they liked and disliked about the two types of seminar set-up and which one
they preferred as a learning environment.
The results obtained from the Likert questionnaire analysis indicated that students' found
the online learning resource informative and easy to use. When
"face-to-face" was compared to the chat-room as a learning environment, students
preferred the "face-to-face" environment. The students listed turn-taking
problems, social isolation, and a deeper level of understanding
obtained in the "face-to-face" environment as factors that would inhibit them
from using the chat-room facility.
This paper will present, in detail, the results obtained from the pilot study and discuss
the implications for those designing online learning resources for undergraduate units of
study.