torsdag 8 november 2012

Theme 3: Quantitative Methods

Theme 3: Quantitative Methods

In the first text by Lowenthal, P. R. & Leech, N. (2009). Mixed research and online learning: Strategies for improvement. They talked about different way of performing research and culminating data by a new method that they’ve come up with. This is called the mixed method and it combines both quantitative data and qualitative data, where the differences are that in quantitative data you gather a large amount of “simpler” questions which are easily described with a value for example. How good was this Hamburger? 1-10, Where as Qualitative data is a much more abstract measurement where you go in depth with you questions and don’t have a predefined answering table. For example: What did this hamburger make you feel, and why? By combining these both methods Lowenthal & Leech tries to make research much more accurate and more relevant. The paper mentions that this method will increase in popularity in the near future and if so, the overall quality of research on online learning will increase. To conduct a mixed research is more complicated than doing either qualitative or quantitative research by themselves, this might be because its a relative new way of researching, but for it to really take of, researchers must really try this new method out.

The second text: Cleveland-Innes, M. & Campbell P. Emotional presence, learning and the online learning environment. Was about finding out if emotions exists in an online learning environment, and if so, how to best utilise them. The existence of emotions in online learning helps to explain and understand how to better form an educational frame that encourages and endeavours students to perform better in online learning environments. The study concluded that emotions do exist in online learning environments and that it can play as a factor for both sides, as it can either be a negative where the students feel sad or anxious, but also work as a positive with feelings of happiness and accomplishment.

Online learning environments or E-environments is still a fairly new platform that hasn't had the great impact many people predicted. With new platforms and environments comes new challenges that I think are the reasons why it hasn’t really taken yet. But as the area matures and the environments gets done the way its supposed to it might become a real competitor with traditional learning environment. And finding out that emotions play a social role in this subject is an important step to making it work the best it can.

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