The capacity to foster interpersonal interactions in massive open online courses (MOOCs) has frequently been contested, particularly when learner interactions are limited to MOOC forums. The establishment of social presence--a perceived sense of somebody being present and "real"--is among the strategies to tackle the challenges of online…

The competence of distance educators has a significant impact on learners' success. The paradigm shift for universities to become distance and electronic learning environments justifies the urgency to address competency gaps in distance educators' competencies efficiently. From a strategic human resource development perspective, the systems theory…

Research has shown the importance of goal orientation in predicting academic performance for children, adolescents, and college students in traditional educational settings. Studies on this relationship within adult distance education, however, are lacking. To fill this gap, the present study was conducted to investigate the relationship between…

Tutoring involves providing learners with a suitable level of structure and guidance to support their learning. This study reports on an exploration of how to design such structure and guidance (i.e., learning scaffolds) in the Chinese online educational context, and in so doing, answer the following two questions: (a) What scaffolding strategies…

In the past decade, the educational scenario world over has significantly been impacted by open access and open education movements. The philosophy of openness and sharing forms the cornerstone of the open education movement. The distance education approaches, together with open educational resources (OER) and massive open online courses (MOOCs),…

Information and communication technologies aid marginalized groups in seeking social support, building proximate networks, and improving employment opportunities. However, one key factor that is understudied in the literature is the impact of open education resources (OER) on the employability of marginalized groups. This study focuses on open and…

The blog as a type of social software has been used in education for several years, and its positive effect in the field has been asserted in many studies. This study presents the factors of participants and blogs that predict blogging activeness during teaching practice and induction year. During the teaching practice and induction year all…

Universities depend on committed efforts of all staff members to function effectively. However, where occupational demands outweigh occupational resources, challenging work becomes stressful, followed by an exhausted, disengaged workforce. It is unlikely that disengaged university staff will provide adequate care and service to geographically…

Previous studies have described many scales for measuring self-regulation; however, no scale has been developed specifically for self-paced open and distance learning environments. Therefore, the aim of this study is to develop a scale for determining the self-regulated learning skills of distance learners in selfpaced open and distance learning…

Online instructors need to avoid unclear and confusing explanations of content, which can reduce the quality of learning. Extraneous load is reflective of poor instruction, in that it directs student effort towards processing information that does not contribute to learning. However, students may be able to manage poor instruction through effort…

This study investigated the impact of face-to-face contact sessions and online discussion forums on the academic performance of students at an Open Distance Learning (ODL) university (N = 1,015). t-Tests for independent samples indicated that students who attended a written assignment preparation contact session performed significantly better in…

The Online Student Connectedness Survey (OSCS) was introduced to the academic community in 2012 as an instrument designed to measure feelings of connectedness between students participating in online degree and certification programs. The purpose of this study was to examine data from the instrument for initial evidence of validity and reliability…

In this study, a blended synchronous learning environment (BSLE) was created to support a group of graduate students when they were taking a course. Instruction was delivered to both face-to-face (F2F) and online students simultaneously. The purpose of this paper is to present how this BSLE was gradually designed, implemented, and improved by…

Academic institutions such as the University of South Africa (Unisa) are using information and communication technology (ICT) in order to conduct their daily primary operations, which are teaching and learning. Unisa is the only distance learning university in South Africa and also in Africa. Unisa currently has the highest number of students on…

This study explored whether learning-related anxiety would negatively affect intention to persist with e-learning among students with visual impairment, and examined the roles of three online interactions in the relationship between learning-related anxiety and intention to persist with e-learning. For this study, a convenience sample of…