Introduction
Since the last decade, the support to all forms of learning Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) exert has expanded significantly. Opportunity to learn anytime, anywhere and to communicate as well as collaborate virtually across countries are the benefits of e-learning. Moreover E-learning offers more flexible learning opportunities to pre-service teachers. It also facilitates in tracking pre-service teachers progress and activities, besides providing opportunities to create new and innovative learning environments.
In fact E-Learning is the modern model of education which can transfer information from classical text books to an electronic medium. This uses network technology to design, manage, select, deliver and extend classical learning (Taleb Ahmad, 2006). Besides, Basha, Saleem and Dhavachelvan (2010) added that compared with classical learning system, e-learning has fulfilled the thirst of knowledge for the learner without depending on location, time and age. Meanwhile Hedberg (2003) asserted a well designed e-learning gives learners the chance to attain greater understanding of their own experiences compared to those stay in the classroom expecting that knowledge will be provided to them. In this regard, E-Learning has become an important channel for education and has a promising future in teaching and learning.
One of the elements in E-learning is discussion board, which has become an important element in every classroom management system that broadens teaching beyond the traditional campus classroom. According to Levine S. J (2007), the growing number of literature reviews on discussion board attest that online discussion plays an utmost important role in creating the educational experience dynamic and powerful.
For Wheeler (2009) Web 3.0 will not only promotes collaborative learning that is more, besides it will enable learners to come closer to anyplace and anytime in the pitch of learning. He also added that web 3.0 could provide intelligent solutions to web searching, organization of content and document management. According to Daly (2009) the Semantic Web or Web 3.0 provides learners the chance of having a richness of related content delivered to their desktop computer without plainly identifying or requesting for it. Kurilovas, Kubilinskiene, & Dagiene (2014) also added that Web 3.0 referred as much appropriate method to personalise learning objects and virtual learning environments. Hence, E-learning facilitators can make use of this rich content to elevate learning experience, permit them to deliver engaging and relevant courses.
1.1 Background of Research
According to Law and Wong (2003), the biggest challenge faced by education in knowledge society is not how to effectively assist learners gain a defined set of skills and knowledge, but to assist learns on how to manage, work creatively with ideas and how they contribute to the creation of new knowledge. On the same premise, Scardamalia (2002) stated that education and practice have to go through a revolution to become “idea-centred” from being “activity-centred,” and more to collaborative learning from being independent learning. This is to ensure learners can start on a knowledge building trajectory from early age to prepare themselves for the challenges ahead. Discussions can create the opportunity for the students to exchange ideas, explore dissonance of view points, negotiate meanings and construct knowledge with each other (Dunlap, 2005; Hew & Cheung, 2012).
Cheong and Cheung (2008) and De Leng et. al (2009) agreed that online discussion board to be one of the most effective instructional environments to engage learners in knowledge construction. In support, Shellens and Valcke (2006) pointed out that the level of knowledge construction of participants were generally higher when there were more discussion activities involved.
According to Garrison et al., (2001) integrating online discussion boards will enhance learning in completely online, hybrid, or Web environments where there are evidences to surmise that online discussions help students and lecturers to challenge, reform and synthesize their current views of knowledge through in-depth communication with other learners. Cheung and Hew (2005) and Hamid, Waycott, Kurnia & Chang (2015) mentioned in their studies that an asynchronous online discussion forum has the possibility to enhance teaching and learning experiences of traditional classroom environment. Broadly online discussions in educational contexts have been used for a variety of tasks, such as group problem-solving, case-based learning, information exchange, team collaborative projects, discussions with experts, peer discussion groups, journal reflections, debates, and role plays (Bonk, 2004 ; Jetton, 2004; Rahman, Yasin, Amir & Embi, 2011).
According to (Jetton 2004; Brookfield & Preskill, 2012) an online discussion is a useful tool for teacher education in that it provides a vehicle for collaboration and opportunities to understand issues from multiple perspectives. She also suggests cultivating a social presence in discussion forums and adopting a more facilitative role to encourage participant interactions. There are evidences shows that the composed messages by students in asynchronous discussions involve longer solutions for problem-solving and comprise deeper reflections than synchronous or face-to-face discussions (Hara et al., 2000). This apart, researchers have noted that students spend more time to read, craft, reflect on their responses and attain related information when composing messages in this environment (O’Neill et al., 2006; Wang & Woo 2007). Besides, it is broadly agreed that online discussion allow students learn and support each other both inside and outside the classroom (Brown & Duguid, 1996; Rovai et al., 2004).
According to Jonassen (2000) asynchronous communication forum such as the online discussion board provides numerous structures for discussion and engages reflective thinking. He added that in the constructivist learning environment, reflective thinking is viewed as an important component. Having multiple tools and social network features, online discussion environments permit learners to construct and deliver their knowledge through self-organized and self-managed discussion topics, conversations and content (Mott, 2010).
1.2 Problem Statement
Currently, the Institute of Teacher Education (ITE) Ipoh Campus is using myClass Online as a Learning Management System (LMS). This system was built using Moodle, which is an open source web application to create LMS. Institut Pendidikan Guru Kampus Ipoh (IPGKI) has been using this system since 2005. Lecturers in the department of Educational Technology are expected to use myClass Online as a platform for their subject, Technology in Teaching and Learning (EDU 3105), which is partly subjected to an online environment. In this subject assessment consists of assignment (30%), presentation (10%) and final exam (60%).
The following data was obtained from the administrator of myClass Online to examine usage of forum for discussion in terms of number of postings. The number of posts in each group is as shown in table1.1.
The number of postings among pre service teachers increased from 2010 onwards and one of the reasons for this growth is that the entire institute was equipped with wireless network. Nevertheless, the average posting still remained below 2 postings per pre-service teachers in one semester. Based on the data above, there seems to be a lack of participation in the discussion activity. Pre-service teachers’ anticipation and how to encourage participation are extremely important components related to interaction and building effective online communities.
A preliminary study based on informal interviews with lecturers and pre service teachers show that the design of the current discussion board is not helping pre-service teachers to engage in online discussion as shown in figure 1.1. Sarasvathi, Kayalvily, Yogeswaran& Narasimha (2009) found online discussion board are not really useful and helpful to the students because of the content designs didn’t facilitate their learning. They added that the content materials being used currently needs more refinements based on instructional strategies and evaluation. The design of the discussion board is not very inspiring. Duffy et al., (1998) argued that appropriately designed online discussion board can facilitate interaction between the instructor and learners and among the learners themselves. According to Duffy et al., (1998) and Harasim et al., (1995) cited in Yang (2007), the use of well-organized and well-facilitated discussions within structured online forums is the component needed in higher education to achieve the larger instructional goals.
Chen and Hung (2002, p. 279) argue that the effectiveness of online discussion boards can be improved through technological support for “personalized knowledge representation” and the use of “idea artifacts to facilitate internalization of learners’ collective knowledge into personalized knowledge.” In this regard Norton and Hathaway (2008) explored two online discussion board in a teacher education programme and found that even though teachers and student are satisfied to share ideas they express frustration with the lack of learner control and their reliance on peers on the system.
Observations and analysis on discussion track revealed that most of the activities in myClass Online were merely on exchanging reading and course material among lecturers and students’. In other words the greatest challenge education faces in a knowledge society is not how to effectively assist learners to gain a defined set of knowledge and skills, where else in assisting learners to learn how to manage, work creatively with ideas and to contribute to the creation of new knowledge (Law & Wong, 2003). Liu et al. (2008) empirical research has found that students’ discussions through online forums are often limited. The discussions seem to resemble mere questions and answers session where students only replied to their course mates’ online queries, rather than moving onto higher-level knowledge construction (Cheung and Hew 2006). The results of Angeli et al. (2003) study showed that students largely exchange personal experiences and displayed little evidence of reflective thinking in online discussions. Apart from that, the interaction time in class is limited which in turn constrained pre-service teachers’ participation and contributions of thoughts in traditional classroom environment. Thus, in traditional classroom discussion outcomes appear to be superficial, having less impact on pre-service teacher’s knowledge construction.
Schellens et al., (2005) discovered that the levels of knowledge construction were significantly lower since the tasks for discussion were too complex. Guan et al., (2006) in their related past study reported that the discussion content was off-topic, online posting rates were low and lacked coherent structure on the corresponding messages and participants prefer not to read every posting before they reply. On the other hand Mazzolini and Maddison (2003) noted that instructors used some facilitation techniques such as questioning, are mostly considered in a form of assessment by the students, thus making the students to hesitate in voicing their opinions.
Additionally Breslin et al. (2009) proclaimed, present online-community sites are isolated from one another. He further added that diverse discussions might hold complementary knowledge and parts of the answer a person is searching for. However, people participating in one discussion cannot readily retrieve information about their related discussions elsewhere. As numerous Social Web sites, communities and services come online, the lack of inter operation among these data silos or “stovepipes” becomes obvious (Bojars et al., 2008).
Although many researchers have explored students’ perceptions on online discussions, strategies that students use for their discussions and instructor roles, there are few studies relating to how best to encourage students to effectively engage in online discussions (Ajayi, 2009; Biesenbach-Lucas, 2003; Birch & Volkov, 2005; Cheung & Hew, 2010; Wu & Hiltz, 2004) Drawing on this analysis, it is important to design new online discussion platforms where in pre-service teachers can be helped to actively engage and participate in online discussion activities. Apart from that online discussion can also help pre service teachers by providing forum rich with valuable discussion to construct knowledge as well as enhance reflective thinking level.
1.3 Research Objectives
The objectives of this research are to:
1. Design an online discussion board integrating Semantic Web Technologies.
2. Investigate the effects of integrating Semantic versus non-semantic web technologies in online discussion board on learners’ learning engagement, reflective thinking and knowledge construction.
3. Investigate the effects of integrating semantic versus non-semantic web technologies in online discussion board on learners’ learning engagement, knowledge construction and reflective thinking with varying cognitive styles.
4. To investigate the relationship between learners learning engagement and reflective thinking who are using an online discussion board with semantic web technologies as compared to the non-semantic web technologies.
1.4 Research Questions
The following are research questions of this study:
1 a) Is there any significant difference in pre-service teachers learning engagement between those who use Online Discussion Board with Semantic Web Technologies (ODBSWT) compared to non-semantic web technologies?
b) Is there any significant difference in pre-service teachers ability to construct knowledge between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
c) Is there any significant difference in pre-service teachers reflective thinking level between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
2 a) Is there any significant difference in experiential pre-service teachers learning engagement between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
b) Is there any significant difference in experiential pre-service teachers’ ability to construct knowledge between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
c) Is there any significant difference in experiential pre-service teachers reflective thinking level between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
3 a) Is there any significant difference in rational pre-service teachers learning engagement between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
b) Is there any significant difference in rational pre-service teachers ability to construct knowledge between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
c) Is there any significant difference in rational pre-service teachers reflective thinking level between those who use ODBSWT as compared to non-semantic web technologies?
Ques 4 n 5
1.5 Research Hypotheses
The level of significance, α, used in this study will be set to 0.05. The hypotheses of this study in correspondence to the research questions are as follows:
Ho1.1 There is no significant difference in pre-service teachers learning engagement between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies?
Ho1.2 There is no significant difference in pre-service teachers ability to construct knowledge between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho1.3 There is no significant difference in pre-service teachers reflective thinking level between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho2.1 There is no significant difference in experiential thinking style pre-service teachers learning engagement between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho2.2 There is no significant difference in experiential thinking style pre-service teachers ability to construct knowledge between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho2.3 There is no significant difference in experiential thinking style pre-service teachers reflective thinking level between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho3.1 There is no significant difference in rational thinking style pre-service teachers learning engagement between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho3.2 There is no significant difference in rational thinking style pre-service teachers ability to construct knowledge between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho3.3 There is no significant difference in rational pre-service teachers reflective thinking level between those who use ODBSWT compared to non-semantic web technologies.
Ho4 There is no significant relationship between learning engagement and reflective thinking level among students’ who use online discussion board with semantic web technologies
Ho5 There is no significant relationship between learning engagement and reflective thinking level among students’ who use online discussion board with non-semantic web technologies
Several advantages have been cited for using online discussions, such as flexible and convenient access; participation by those reluctant to speak in face-to-face settings; before posting have more time to think-through more structured and in-depth responses; exposure to multiple perspectives; and increases higher-order thinking by assisting students to make connections and become better at questioning, critiquing and analyzing (Christopher et al., 2004; Ferdig & Roehler, 2004; Mitchem et al., (2008). Online discussions provide opportunities for discussion to assist pre service teachers to reflect on their beliefs, influence on teaching practices, and their implications for teaching.
The Semantic Web provides a generic infrastructure for integration, interchange and creative reuse of structured data that can help pre service teachers to cross certain the boundaries that Web 2.0 is facing (Bernes 2001). Integrating semantic web technology with social network features allow participants to keep updated on latest postings without need to visit the actual discussion pages. Social networking sites are online platforms that permit users to connect with others to engage in online social activities. In other words the Semantic Web targets collaborative development (Miller, 2003)
Moreover, semantic technology will provide additional guidance and recommendations to learners. The learners will spend less time in searching and more time on observing, thinking and participating to construct knowledge. Through using Semantic Web technologies, an interconnection of Web 2.0 content can direct to many interesting possibilities on individual as well in community level (Bojars, et al., 2006)
1.7 The Theoretical Framework
Taking into account the purpose of this research and the questions posed, it seems appropriate to encapsulate this study with theoretical framework that culminates theories of Social Constructivism (Vygotsky, 1978), Engagement Theories (Kearsley & Shneiderman, 1999) and Connectivism Theories (Siemens, 2006) integrated in Online Discussion Board with Semantic Web Technologies as shown in Figure 1.1. It is important to have a theoretical framework as this will help the researcher to review the philosophies, assumptions, underlying theories and methodological techniques of a study.
1.7.1 Social Constructivism
Constructivist learning theories state that individuals make sense of their world by experiencing things and reflecting on those experiences. Vygotsky (1978) in his theory of social constructivism believed that all learning was the result of social interaction and not simply the result of assimilation and accommodation of new information by learners. He posited that language and culture provided the structure for people to experience, communicate, and understand reality.
Luebeck and Bice (2005) claimed that factors that contribute to conceptual change include motivation, learning strategies, epistemological beliefs, attitudes, and social interaction with peers. They stated that such factors can be observed in online setting if participants are encouraged to reflect in writing their own reactions and thought processes, and to respond thoughtfully to the comments of others.
For Fosnot (1996) social constructivism as an educational theory construes learning as an interpretive, recursive, building process by active learners interacting with the physical and social world.
1.7.2 Engagement Theory
Engagement is a theoretical construct evident in the literature as an important condition of significant learning. The concept of engaged learning has roots in well-established and researched learning constructs such as interest (Dewey, 1916), effort (Meece & Blumenfeld, 1988), motivation (Pintrich & De Groot, 1990; Skinner & Belmont, 1993), and time on task (Lentz, 1998). Bulger, Mayer & Almeroth (2006) characterised engaged learning as possessing high levels of active learner participation designed into the plan for learning.
With the Emerging Technologies in Engaged Learning, Hung et al., (2006) described active learning as learners take their own responsibility in learning during which they are actively developing thinking/learning strategies and constantly generating new ideas and refining it through their communication with others.
1.7.3 Connectivism
Connectivism a learning theory contextualized in a digital era characterised by the influence of technology in the field of education (Siemens, 2004). In connectivism, the early stage for learning take place when knowledge is actuated through the process of a learner connecting to and feeding information into a learning community. In relation Siemens (2004) stated, that a community is the clustering of similar areas of interest that permits for communication, sharing, dialoguing, and thinking together.
Connectivism emphasize that two important skills that contribute to learning are the capability to request for current information and the capability to filter secondary and extraneous information. Siemens (2008) stated the capacity to know is more important than what is actually known.
1.8 The Research Framework
This study is designs to examine the effects of online discussion board with semantic technology and non-semantic technology (independent variable) on pre service teachers learning engagement, knowledge construction and reflective thinking (dependent variable). The style that is rational and experiential learners will be used as moderator variables to investigate the effects on the dependent variable after the treatment. The design of this study will employ a quasi-experimental post-test only design with factorial design 2×2.
1.9 Limitations of the Study
This study aims to investigate the effects of integrating semantic web technologies in discussion board to enhance learning engagement, knowledge construction and reflective thinking among learners’ of varying cognitive styles. The sample of this study consists of second year undergraduate student in one of the Institute of Teacher Education (ITE) these opting for Technology in Teaching and Learning (EDU 3105).
This study has the following limitations:
1. The samples for this study involve pre-service teachers from only one ITE in Malaysia hence, the results cannot be generalised to represent other ITE.
2. The study is limited to the subject of Technology in Teaching and Learning (EDU 3105) the results therefore cannot be generalised to represent other courses or subjects.
3. The experiment involves pre-service teachers, hence the results cannot be generalised to represent in service teachers.
1.10 Operational Definitions
Semantic Web Technologies
The semantic web is a space understandable and navigable by human and software agents. Semantic web adds structured definition and organization to the navigational data of the current web, based on formalized ontology’s and controlled vocabularies through semantic links to one another. Based on E-Learning perspective, it helps learners in querying, processing, locating, accessing and assessing learning resources throughout a distributed heterogeneous network. In this study web 3.0 also will be indicated by the terms semantic web.
Online Discussion Board
Online discussions are the exchange of messages through networked computers among two or more people for the purpose of achieving some goal(s) or discussing a topic of mutual interest (Goldenberg, 2002; Gunawardena, Lowe, & Anderson, 1997; Moore & Marra, 2005; Romiszowski & Mason, 2004). The messages, also called postings – as in “post a message on the board” – may be exchanged in real-time (synchronous) or with delayed response time (asynchronous) communications. In this study, asynchronous, text-based communications in a web-based threaded discussion forum is indicated by the terms online discussions board.
Ontology
Ontology describes formally a domain of discourse. Normally, ontology comprises of a finite list of terms and the relationships between these terms. The terms denote important concepts (classes of objects) of the domain.
Learner Engagement
In this study, is defined through behaviour, affect and cognition. The behavioural dimension sees engagement in terms of participation, evident through actions that may lead to visible outcomes. The affective dimension relates to the commitment, enthusiasm that inform their actions. Finally, the engagement in the cognitive sense require students to think through tasks in ways that have meaning and hold interest (Murray et al., 2004). In this study the terms such as participation, commitment, interaction, active learning, retention will be indicated by the terms learner engagement
Knowledge Construction
The process of knowledge construction relates to the extent to which instructors assist students to investigate, understand and determine how the implicit cultural assumptions, frames of references, perspectives and biases within a discipline influence the method knowledge is constructed within it (Banks 2002). In this study terms such as knowledge creation and knowledge building, will be indicated by the term knowledge construction.
Reflective Thinking
Dewey (1933) called reflection a type of thinking that consists in turning a subject over in the thought and giving it serious reflection. According to Kember et al. (2000) reflective thinking described as the student’s capability to understand, analyze and interpret the situations from several perspectives and comes with guiding principles.
Cognitive Styles
Ausburn and Ausburn (1978) defined cognitive styles as the “psychological dimensions which represent the consistencies in an individual’s manner of gaining and processing information”. According to Messick (1984), cognitive style deals with the manner that people prefer to make sense out of their world by gathering, analyzing, evaluating and interpreting data. Jonassen & Grabowski (1993) mentioned these styles are thought to remain consistent preferences throughout life. In this study experiential and rational learners will be indicated by the term of cognitive styles.
1.11 Summary
This chapter discussed the background of the study, the research objectives and their significance for the learners as well as the education environment and the scope of the study. This helps to provide better understanding about this research.