I’ve just been reading<\/p>\n
Brown, R. E. (2001)<\/p>\n
The process of community-building in distance learning classes<\/p>\n
JALN Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks, 5, 18-35.<\/p>\n
I have problems with the beginning of the article which is very bitty – particularly when the author defines her terms. However, it is a useful grounded account of the growth of a learning community. She identifies several benefits of a virtual learning community:<\/p>\n
Benefits of a virtual learning community<\/p>\n
* Overcomes feelings of being alone
\n * Can affect student satisfaction, retention and learning
\n * Possibility of continuing when course is over (this benefit doesn’t seem to be taken up)
\n * Community as resource university can draw on it for fundraising, recruitment
\n * Students responsible for their own learning & the learning of others
\n * Gain confidence in ability to express self
\n * Gain confidence in ability to express with intelligent people
\n * Learn from and about others in class
\n * Feel connected to class members
\n * Feel accepted into the community
\n * Feel worthy of membership
\n * Pass on feelings of validation and acceptance to others
\n * Genuine sense of belonging
\n* Lifelong\/continuing friends<\/p>\n
I think what she’s focused on here are the community aspects and she has, perhaps, ignored what it means to be a learning community. There’s nothing about building knowledge together – about challenging each other’s views or about constructive criticism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I’ve just been reading Brown, R. E. (2001) The process of community-building in distance learning classes JALN Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks, 5, 18-35. I have problems with the beginning of the article which is very bitty – particularly when the author defines her terms. However, it is a useful grounded account of the growth […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-virtual-communities"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/r.m.ferguson\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}