Computer-Mediated Conferencing (CMC)
A version of the core material comprising this section is available for download as a printable version in pdf format. (The Adobe Acrobat Reader to allow viewing of pdf files is available for download here).
Using Communication Tools
We can define a tutor as 'a person who interacts directly with learners to support their learning'. This allows inclusion of face-to-face, fully distance and blended learning environments but it is evident that two-way communication is the key element in the relationship. Across all contexts - school, further, higher, workplace learning, the available technologies for learner support provide opportunities and challenges in terms of developing this relationship:
Asynchronous conferencing systems are used to join up people and resources, supporting communication and the sharing of information between staff and students, regardless of time and location.
Real-time interaction, virtual or face-to-face, allows spontaneity and immediacy for interchange of ideas and questions but in practice often impedes it.
Digitisation means that wider use of both teaching resources and contributions from students can be made from one teaching year to the next, requiring an extension and development of critical faculties to support appropriate 're-purposing'.
Word-processing now allows online interaction on assignment work, reflective feedback between tutor and learner, and between peers. Lines between feedback, collaboration and plagiarism may need re-drawing.
Email is simple to use, effective, and widely available. It has opened the floodgates to a flow of communication between individual students and academic staff, which was previously not available, and may not always be welcome, to overworked staff.
Telephone communication allows immediacy (once connected!) but invades privacy.
Mobile resources - phones, PDAs and combinations - currently fascinate educational research communities because of their potential, it is critical that we develop our understanding of their use in practice.
Asynchronous Computer-Mediated Conferencing
This section particularly addresses issues of Computer-Mediated Conferencing (CMC) as a teaching and learning resource, concentrating upon skills development within that context. At issue are the learning interactions afforded through the technology, between the learner and the content materials, between learner and learner, and between learner and tutor. Interaction between learner(s) and the mediating technology itself should not be, but often is, a factor for concern. We concentrate here on the educational use of asynchronous CMC - where conference participants write and upload messages to a conference at a time to suit their own convenience, as opposed to synchronous CMC - often known as 'real-time chat'. Some of these materials can be applied more generally to other types of communication tools listed in the introduction.
The core activity involves individual members of a learning community composing text and uploading it, usually through a computer terminal, to a networked server. This text may be read and responded to by others in that community, wherever they are and whatever their time-frame for study might be. Any such written contribution is added to an archive that is held on the network. Participants may read and respond to items as they choose, or as per a convention agreed within the group. The effect is a kind of unfolding written debate.
The way the conferencing environment looks, and indeed feels, to participants can differ considerably, depending upon the VLE in use and the communication it offers.
If you follow each of the two links below, you will see archive sections from different VLEs used for different year presentations, recording introductory activities for a Masters degree in:
- Online Education (Link to be added, checking permission)
- Distance Education (Link to be added, checking permission)
As these examples indicate, systems for supporting CMC differ enormously from product to product, both in the way they look and 'feel' as communicative tools, and in the degree of freedom they allow for user modification, control and access. Your institution may support one, or several, VLEs and you may have a choice as to which to use. The information in this section and its links should support you in making such a choice.
A report by Becta (2003) suggests that CMC is being used in some schools for pairing sixth form students with local business partners.
Another Becta report (2003) on ICT and Initial Teacher Training shows that CMC allows the establishment of communities of practice among student teachers.
There are few recorded examples of CMC use in FE. Some limitations that may be responsible are:
The previous lack of resources both inside college and in students' home / workplace.
The level of some students who have not yet become independent learners.
Students' limited confidence in formal written communications.
More widespread incorporation of CMC in teaching and learning may happen as more support resources become available.
A central aim of CMC learning environments is transactive communication where participants respond to and build on to each other's contributions, developmentally toward a mutual outcome. In postgraduate courses in particular, and arguably for adult professional development courses in general, where all participants have a range of complementary and contrasting experiences to bring to a common educational goal, there is a dependence upon peer exchange and development of information, ideas and practices.
An assumption that information exchange and discussion between your students and yourself, and amongst your students, will support and enhance learning stands in contrast to more didactic, or at least tutor-controlled, dialogue that takes place in other educational settings - online or off. There is a commitment to provide and support opportunities for 'co-operative learning'
'Co-operative learning is process-driven, i.e. those involved engage in a social process and have to pay attention to that process in order for them to achieve their desired end point. It involves people working in groups. There may be group 'products' towards which the learners are working, and there may be individual 'products' which are achieved through the people in the group helping each other deal with their own particular learning concerns.' (McConnell 1994)
