Online instructors have identified several issues that must be addressed to facilitate better online learning experiences, including authentic experiential education, building community, technology for remote learning, and supporting learners. Online forums are often used by users to express their frustrations, feelings, jokes, and even…

As asynchronous online discussions gain a broader usage due to the COVID-19 epidemic, the need for understanding of students' ideas from unstructured textual data becomes more pressing. In this experimental study, we examine the effects of recommendations on message quality and community formation from voluminous online discussions. Drawing on…

Many undergraduate and graduate courses have been recently converted to fully remote offerings due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Even within the remote structure, courses vary in their frequency of synchronous and asynchronous meetings. Fostering collaboration through students' idea-sharing and supporting their learning is especially challenging in…

In this article, I blend a review of existing research, results from an original qualitative study, and a decade of personal experience in order to examine the facilitation of significant learning experiences in asynchronous online courses. Research has repeatedly demonstrated that students who enroll in online courses do so for reasons of…

This study investigates the effectiveness of video-based learning compared to traditional text-based methods in distance education for software courses. The research was based on two samples of students (n[subscript 1] = 32, n[subscript 2] = 30) enrolled in the "Fundamentals of PSPP" distance course at the N.B. School of Design and…

In online education, learning design has a significant role in mediating student experience. Centralised approaches to learning design provide students with a coherent teaching approach across online units but little is known about their impact on the student. Understanding the influence of these overarching learning design features may be a…

Adaptive collaborative learning support (ACLS) aims to facilitate collaborative activities by providing intelligent feedback and support based on students' collaboration. Existing ACLS systems have been applied in various collaborative environments, ranging from co-located collaboration in the classroom to online learning environments. While these…

A strategic priority for university educators is to ensure graduates have developed a range of transferable skills. An important skill required by employers is the development of digital capabilities. The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated the move of courses into blended formats which provided an opportunity for educators to redesign their modules to…

Perusall, a web-based collaborative reading platform characterised by its social annotation functionalities, was introduced in a postgraduate teacher-training language-awareness course in Hong Kong during the shift to online teaching and learning brought about by the global COVID-19 pandemic. Tasks were designed on Perusall to engage the…

Researchers surveyed academic librarians to determine current software and practices used in synchronous virtual research consultations. The survey findings identified the top software products currently used by respondents for virtual research consultations. Through open-ended comments, it became clear that libraries are not tied to one…

By participating in asynchronous course discussion forums, students can work together to refine their ideas and construct knowledge collaboratively. Typically, some messages simply repeat or paraphrase course content, while others bring in new material, demonstrate reasoning, integrate concepts, and develop solutions. Through the messages they…

This paper explores the effective online teaching practices and activities used for an asynchronous online learning environment. During the 15-week semester, students had various opportunities to learn rigorous content while utilizing various technological tools. The course, called "How People Learn," offered diverse and exciting…

Communication between students and teachers is usually extended beyond the classroom's time and space. This communication, referred to as out-of-class communication (OCC), may impact students' academic, social, and emotional development. Today, OCC is facilitated via social media and instant messaging services, which may affect its nature. This…

Online instructional design and how to engage students cognitively in online asynchronous courses have been an ongoing question. This case study presents an intentional design of an asynchronous online graduate course to foster cognitive presence. The research questions investigate students' cognitive presence (CP) captured by two measures:…

After the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, China implemented the largest online education practice in human history. In the process, different teaching models coexist. Through a quasi-natural experiment, a total of 1,024 samples from Guiyang No.8 Middle School and another comparable school with the same conditions and students were enrolled for…