Does the discussion help? The impact of a formally assessed online discussion on final student results

Authors: Palmer, Stuart; Holt, Dale1; Bray, Sharyn2

Source: British Journal of Educational Technology, Volume 39, Number 5, September 2008 , pp. 847-858(12)

Publisher: Blackwell Publishing

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Abstract:

While there is agreement that participation in online asynchronous discussions can enhance student learning, it has also been identified that there is a need to investigate the impact of participation in online discussions on student course performance. This paper presents a case study based on an undergraduate engineering management unit employing a formally assessed online discussion area. It was observed that while many students read a significant number of discussion postings, generally, the posting of new and reply messages occurred at the minimum level required to qualify for the assignment marks. Based on correlation and multiple regression analysis, it was observed that two variables were significantly related to a student's final unit mark—prior academic ability and the number of new postings made to the online discussion. Each new posting contributed three times as much to the final unit mark as its nominal assessment value, suggesting that the work in preparing their new discussion postings assisted students in the completion of a range of assessable tasks for the unit. The number of postings read was not significantly correlated with the final unit mark, suggesting that passive lurking in this online discussion did not significantly contribute to student learning outcomes.

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00780.x

Affiliations: 1: Institute of Teaching and Learning at Deakin University in Australia 2: School of Engineering and Information Technology at Deakin University in Australia

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