Synchronous discussions
Do you find there is a certain part of the day or evening that is more beneficial to gain higher participation with synchronous discussions?
Karin:
This is a tough question to answer. I have not discovered any data to support how time of day would influence the level of participation in synchronous discussions. As far as I know, students availability for the time slected to conduct these sessions would influence the number of students who are likely to participate; however, the degree to which they participate may not likely be influenced by the time chosen. Other factors such as for example, the Instrucotr's ability to manage the discussion session, provide timely feeddback, introducing new themes at the right time etc. could influence the level of student participation.
Satrohan
I think this type of discussion is wonderful
I find several concerns.
What happens as we have students from different time zones within the U.S. and in some cases different countries.
Joel
Joel:
This could be a limitation unless the Instructor is able to schedule Chat sessions on the same Tpoic at different times to accommodate students across time zones. This is easier said than done; however, if this can be done, better results can be achieved by providing all students access to the archived responses of the chat sessions after the topic has closed.
Satrohan
I believe it is a difficult challenge The results would be outstanding- greater participation and the quality of the results far superior
joel
Have you found that the typical protocol for chat-room discussions is to provide students with a transcript? I have taken a couple of hybrid courses myself and transcripts were generated by the Course Management System and provided by the instructor.
Josefer:
We encourage providing students access to transcripts to all Chat sessions. The exchange of information in a Chat session can be very rapid. Access to the transcript would enable students to review the content of the Chat session and assimilate the information therein.
Satrohan
What would be a sufficient time range for an adequate discussion? (1 hour, 2 hours, etc.)
Chrystal:
I am assuming that you are referring to a synchronous discussion. Many factors can influence the duration of the discussion; so it's difficult to estimate the duration.
I will avoid extending a Chat session to two hours as I suspect we will begin to lose too many students before it ends.
I would choose a topic, and a number of students, not to exceed five to participate in the session. By taking these measures, I will be able to manage the discussion forum in an effective manner, all students will have adequate time to participate, there should be sufficient time to exhaust the Discussion thread, and I will have time to summarize the discussion.
Satrohan
