Re-Thinking E-Learning Research
May 6, 2009
Norm Friesen · Thompson Rivers University, Canada
In education, novel practices, applications, and forms - from bulletin boards to Webcasts, and from online educational games to open educational resources - have been proliferating rapidly. However, research of these changing forms and practices has gravitated towards the methods and philosophical frameworks used to investigate and design earlier instructional technologies and practices: Technical progress is seen as single-handedly "impacting" education, human action is understood as fundamentally rational and rule-bound, and phenomena like education and communication are understood according to strictly functional models. In this talk, Dr. Friesen will describe how these understandings have been contradicted by unpredictable developments in technology and practice, and by changes in the theory underpinning research itself. Referring to his 2009 book, "Re-Thinking E-Learning Research: Foundations, Methods and Practices", he will outline ways in which research in distance education and e-learning can be re-thought, to catch up to new theoretical, technical, and empirical developments.
RELATED INFORMATION
SIMILAR SESSIONS
Online Students’ Expectations
Berge, Zane
Whether students think about them or not, learners all enter the formal educational arena with certain expectations. For instance, they have expectations about their role as a student and expectations about the ...
Match: e-learning
Exploring Research Issues
Anderson, Terry
In this session, Professor, former Canada Research Chair, and CIDER host Dr. Terry Anderson will overview the contents of a new open access book to be released by AU press this fall. The book overviews the major issues ...
Match: research
Understanding and Facilitating: Emotional Presence in an Online Community of Inquiry
Cleveland-Innes, Martha; Campbell, Prisca
Research on emotional presence within an online community of inquiry demonstrates the salience of emotion in online learning. Those engaged in online learning deal with the effects of emotion on a daily basis, whether ...
Match: e-learning
Research for Effective Online Learning
Anderson, Terry
This session with Terry Anderson overviewed Distance Education research, design-based research and the 'CIDER solution'.
Match: research
E-Learning 2.0
Downes, Stephen
This informative session by National Research Centre senior researcher Stephen Downes overviews the technologies, trends and thinking that are revolutionizing teaching, learning, government and ...
Match: e-learning
Best Practices and Lessons Learned: Developing, Implementing and Delivering Successful Distributed Learning Environments for your Students
Childs, Elizabeth; Jongedijk, Lara
What factors help to create effective online learning environments in K-12? In this session, Dr. Elizabeth Childs and Lara Jongedijk will report on the final data from nine provincial Connected Learner’s Technology ...
Match: e-learning
Sense of Irony or Perfect Timing: Examining the Research Supporting Proposed e-Learning Changes in Ontario
Barbour, Michael; LaBonte, Randy
Only weeks before the 2019 annual meeting of the American Education Research Association (AERA) was held in Toronto, Ontario, the provincial government announced a major reform of education for that province entitled ...
Match: e-learning
The CoI Repository and the State of CoI Research
Garrison, D. Randy; Cleveland-Innes, Martha; Vaughan, Norman; Stenbom, Stefan; et al.
The Community of Inquiry Framework is a more than 20-year-old distance education framework that focuses on community-based teaching and learning methods. In the time since its development, there has been a range of ...
Match: research
State of the Nation 2025: K-12 E-Learning in Canada
Barbour, Michael; LaBonte, Randy
The 2025 issue of the State of the Nation: K-12 E-Learning in Canada report marks its eighteenth year, and the thirteenth year of the Canadian eLearning Network's (CANeLearn) support of this research. The report ...
Match: e-learning
A Proposed e-Learning Policy Field for the Academy
Parchoma, Gale
In this session, Gale Parchoma will discuss her article "A Proposed e-Learning Policy Field for the Academy" published in the International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (2006). The article ...
Match: e-learning
