What Is Student Isolation?

Student isolation can be a diversity issue. Why are online students experiencing a disconnectedness from the course? Who are these students?

Asynchronous Courses Can Foster Student Isolation.

A lack of face-to-face interaction can cause student isolation. Isolation can stem from a lack of a sense of belonging. When students experience a learning environment where they feel like they belong, feelings of alienation (or isolation) are diminished (Bronfenbrenner, 1986)

Active & Social Learning in Higher Education

Lev Vygotsky (1978) shared that learning is an active, social, and collaborative activity. 'He believed that learners construct knowledge through their interactions with one another. Jerome Bruner (1996) added the idea that culture is an important consideration when it comes to learning. We cannot understand learners’ cognitive capacities until we begin to acknowledge cultural differences, or diversity.

Culture and socialization are central to learning in the online higher education space.

  • Situated Learning Theory & COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE

  • Scholars Etienne Wenger & Jean Lave (1991) discussed notion communities of practice

  • A community of practice includes a group of learners that come together with a shared goal or real-world problem (Knowles, 2004; Preece, 2000, Wink, 2015).

  • The work of Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave (1991) highlighted the fact that the tools we use in the online space (i.e., learning management systems like Canvas or Blackboard), are not themselves spaces where communities of practice can be formed.

  • Communities of practice are formed around situations that matter to people & members come together over a period of time over these important situations.

Why does all of this matter? How does this address student isolation in online courses?

  • Chickering and Ehrmann (1996) published an article for the American Association of Higher Education: 7 principles for good teaching practice in the online space

  • Principle #7 states that good teaching practice= honor different ways of learning and knowing. Students come from diverse backgrounds & have varied ability levels & learning inclinations, so the online learning environment should acknowledge & properly respond to these differences.

  • Culture can interact with technology, which is relevant to the online context, where students taking asynchronous courses have diverse backgrounds (Bradshaw (2017).

  • In online communities, learners have a shared goal & when given an environment where they can interact, they may form strong emotional ties (Preece, 2000).

  • In order for these deep connections to occur, the design of the online community must be community-centered, inclusive, & accessible (Maloney-Krichmar, Abras, & Preece, 2002).

  • Through frequent interactions & low-stress opportunities for co-construction of knowledge, students’ will be given a voice (Mezirow, 1997).

Zaretta Hammond Explains The Importance of

Culturally Responsive Teaching

Giving students a voice through a community-centered course design (will promote a culturally responsive learning environment in online courses (Gay, 2000; Ladson-Billings,1995; Maloney-Krichmar, Abras, & Preece, 2002).

Culturally responsive teaching environment:

  • instructors acknowledge students’ cultures, provide an inclusive & equitable learning environment,

  • use culturally and linguistically diverse teaching strategies consistently (Gay, 2000)

Gloria Hammond (2014) added that culturally responsive teaching can be used to bridge achievement and performance gaps amongst culturally diverse students by focusing on the cognitive effects of a culturally inclusive learning environment.

When online learning environments are perceived by students as inclusive, collaborative, & culturally responsive instructors diminish student stress levels & begin establishing an environment of trust.

The ultimate goal will be information processing ease, higher concept retention, and higher achievement in the online course.

Culturally responsive teaching & community-centered course design will promote equal opportunities for student visibility & help lessen student isolation in online courses (Liu et al., 2007)

References

Bronfenbrenner, U. (1986). Alienation and the four worlds of childhood. The Phi Delta Kappan, 67(6), 430-436.

Bruner, J. (2009). Culture, mind, and education. In Contemporary theories of learning (pp. 167-176). Routledge.

Chickering, A. W., & Ehrmann, S. C. (1996). Implementing the seven principles: Technology as lever. AAHE bulletin, 49, 3-6.

Cohen, L. (2007). Social scholarship on the rise. Retrieved October, 7, 2008.

Facts | Pasco-Hernando State College. (2021). PHSC. Retrieved December 14, 2021, from https://phsc.edu/about/facts

Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (1999). Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2-3), 87-105. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1096-7516(00)00016-6

Gay, G. (2002). Preparing for culturally responsive teaching. Journal of teacher education, 53(2), 106-116.

Greenhow, C. (2009). Social scholarship: Applying social networking technologies to research practices. Knowledge Quest, 37(4), 42.

Hasani, L. M., Santoso, H. B., & Junus, K. (2022). Designing Asynchronous Online Discussion Forum Interface and Interaction Based on the Community of Inquiry Framework. International Review of Research in Open & Distance Learning, 23(2), 191–213. https://doi.org/10.19173/irrodl.v23i2.6016

Hammond, Z. (2014). Culturally responsive teaching and the brain: Promoting authentic engagement and rigor among culturally and linguistically diverse students. Corwin Press.

Jiang, W. (2017). Interdependence of roles, role rotation, and sense of community in an online course. Distance Education, 38(1), 84-105.

Joseph

Ladson‐Billings, G. (1995). But that's just good teaching! The case for culturally relevant pedagogy. Theory into practice, 34(3), 159-165.

Liu, X., Magjuka, R., Bonk, C., & Lee, S. (2007). Does sense of community matter? An examination of participants’ perceptions of building learning communities in online courses. Quarterly Review of Distance Education, 8, 9–24

Maloney-Krichmar, D., Abras, C., & Preece, J. (2002, June). Revitalizing an online community. In IEEE 2002 International Symposium on Technology and Society (ISTAS'02). Social Implications of Information and Communication Technology. Proceedings (Cat. No. 02CH37293) (pp. 13-19). IEEE.

Marshall, S. J., & Marshall, S. J. (2018). Internal and external stakeholders in higher education. Shaping the University of the Future: Using technology to catalyse change in university learning and teaching, 77-102.

Vygotsky, L. S., & Cole, M. (1978). Mind in society: Development of higher psychological processes. Harvard university press.

Wink, J. (2005). Critical pedagogy: Notes from the real world.