1. VIRTUAL COMMUNITIES IN WEBTYCHO
Frank Schindler
University of Maryland University College, European Division
Heidelberg, Germany

2. University of Maryland
Online Study since 1992
Leader in the field of E-Learning
2004 Award “Price of Excellence” from
International Council for Open and Distance Education of 142 Countries

3. WebTycho Interactive LMS Web-Based Technology Fully Editable
Supports Problem-Based Learning

4. Problems of Online Education
How to eliminate the feeling of isolation
How to help students to reach their learning goals
How to improve communication

5. Special Study Support
Individual Activities
Group Activities

6. Need for Group Activites
Some class activities must be performed in groups to avoid self-study
Certain balance between individual and group activities needed

7. How to Implement Special Study Support
Need for
Virtual Communities
Their Creation, Management
and Monitoring

8. Means to Implement Special Study Support
Electronic Study Materials
Discussion Forums
Video Conferences
Chat

9. Individual Activities
Paper/Electronic Study Materials
Web-Based Conferences
Online assignments
Online Tests (Exams)

10. Group Activities Study Groups Collaborative Projects/Documents
Online Exams

11. Examples of Virtual Communities
Web-Based Conferences
Web-Based Study Groups
Chat

12. Web-Based Conferencing
Created by teacher
A set of sample tasks posted online
Students are to discuss them online
Verbal Evaluation

13. Web-Based Conferencing…
Should be mandatory
Necessity of Their Proper Scheduling
Participation counted toward the final grade

14. Web-Based Conferencing…
Assumptions
Weekly schedule followed on time
Students do their independent readings
Policy on plagiarism needed

15. Study Groups Created by teacher Students can ask and answer questions
Can be marked if needed
Can be mandatory/optional

16. E-Mail Limited Number of Participants
Good for Online Teachers to Exchange Ideas
Some Limited Teacher/Student Communication desirable

17. Chat Good tool instead of conventional office-hours
Limited Number of Participants
Time-Zone sensitive

18. Examples of Study Groups
Cybercafe
Group Projects
Online Assignments
Online Exams
Chat

19. Management of Conferences
Teacher
Monitors happening in the conference
Comments responses of students
Changes status of conference from
read & write to read-only mode

20. Managent of Study Groups
Teacher
Monitors actions in the study group
Answers some questions if needed
Changes status of study group

21. Advantages of Virtual Communities
Psychological support for students
Creation of personal, social relations
Feeling to be part of a community
Avoiding communication bottleneck
Speed and art of bi-directional communication
Reduction of grading work for teacher

22. Advantages of Virtual Communities…
Provide a way to steer and manage online course
Allow better course administration
Allow to exchange ideas among teachers
Allow online testing

23. Disadvantages of Virtual Communities
Limiting factor is number of participants
Mode (Synchronuous vs. Asynchronuous)
Hard to mark (grade)

24. Conclusion
Lack of functioning virtual communities in virtual classroom means something is wrong
Better management and integration of virtual communities in online learning needed

25. Od jesene 2004 Frank Schindler Katedra aplikovanej informatiky a
výpočtovej techniky, FEI STU
Iľkovičová 3
Bratislava