Online Social Learning Model

Nurul Izzanie binti Adnan Department of Educational Sciences, Mathematics and

Creative Multimedia Faculty of Education

Universiti Teknologi Malaysia 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia

nurulizzanie@gmail.com

Zaidatun Tasir Department of Educational Sciences, Mathematics and

Creative Multimedia Faculty of Education

Universiti Teknologi Malaysia 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia

zaidatun@gmail.com

Abstract— Social learning theory by Bandura [1] focuses on the environment, behavior, and one’s psychological process of learning. Although [1] gave detailed explanation on these elements in his theory, some adjustments need to be done for online learning medium where the environment, behavior, and psychological processes might be far different from the face-to-face learning. O’Reilly and Morgan [2] raised the issue regarding the need of flexible new models, methods and strategies for online assessment and instruction and the lack of alternative pedagogical frameworks based on traditional and face-to-face instructions will result in practices that perhaps did not address the characteristics and possibilities of the online medium. Furthermore, most researches in online social learning focused on the elements of social learning theory separately where no such model or framework has been developed. Therefore, there is a need of social learning model for online learning among university’s students. The purpose of this study is to formulate online social learning model based on three main factors, which are social learning environment for online learning preferred by students, students’ social presence in online learning, and students’ psychological process through online learning. To formulate the model, this study will investigate is there any correlation between social learning environment, social presence and students’ psychological process through online learning. In this study, online social learning environment involves the students’ interaction in the e-Learning system. Social presence is defined as the ability of participants in a community to project themselves, socially and emotionally, as real people through a medium of communication [3]. In this research, online social presence means student’s perceptions of being in and belonging in an online course. Students’ psychological process of learning involves thinking, remembering, problem solving and reasoning. All of these processes occur in students’ mind through online learning. This research uses the quantitative research design. A case study research design has been used in this study, which is descriptive based design using survey method. The survey method is a study that has to involve collecting data at a certain period of time which is usually uses questionnaires as the main instrument in the study. In this research, the

researcher will use 149 undergraduates’ students as a sample out of the whole population of 220 students. The sample size determination is based on the Krejcie and Morgan’s table for determining sample size. Based on the table, the minimum total sample size has a higher level of trust, which is 95 percent. Thus, by applying the formula, the total size of the samples, which is 149 students is not much different from the total sample set by Krejcie and Morgan in their table. The sample size set by Krejcie and Morgan for the population of 220 persons is 132. This study will be carried out at one of Malaysian universities. The total population is 220 students. Researcher has been acknowledged that the respondents already have an experience in using e-learning system before. Analysis for this study will be divided into four parts, which included background of the respondents, preferences towards online social learning environment, online social presence, and students’ psychological process through online learning. For the purpose of gathering information, the appropriate instruments, which meet the objectives of the study, need to be developed. The questionnaire will be used to obtain quantitative data. These questionnaire items were adopted from Constructivist Online Learning Environment Survey (COLLES) developed by Taylor and Maor [4]. Meanwhile, the questionnaire items on online social presence were adopted from previous studies by Yen and Tu [5] and items related to students’ psychological process through online learning were taken from previous studies by Sahin and Sahin [6] looking at the students’ psychological process through online learning that focused on the problem solving. The quantitative data, which is based on the questionnaire will be analyzed via descriptive analysis using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). Descriptive statistics in analyzing questionnaire data, which include the frequency, percentage of each individual item, overall mean and standard deviation, will be used as to represent the data in a form that can be understood. To answer the research question on whether there is any correlation between social learning environment, online social presence and students’ psychological process through online learning, researcher will use Spearman Correlation analysis in SPSS. Based on the research finding of online social learning environment, online social presence and

2014 International Conference on Teaching and Learning in Computing and Engineering

978-1-4799-3592-5/14 $31.00 © 2014 IEEE

DOI 10.1109/LaTiCE.2014.33

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students’ psychological process through online learning, a suggested online social learning model will be formulated using the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) through AMOS. SEM is a method which is designed to analyze the quantitative data. SEM uses a testing model to investigate the causal relationships between variables in the research. The researcher hopes that this model will be considered by educators in the teaching and learning process through social online learning. With the development of the model, educators are expected to have higher understanding on how to use social online learning (e-Learning, social networking site and etc.) to maximize learning process among university’s students. Keywords – online social learning model; online learning environment; social presence; psychological process;

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors would like to thank the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and Ministry of Education (MoE) Malaysia for their support in making this project possible. This work was supported by the Research University Grant [R.J130000.7831.4F116] initiated by MoE.

REFERENCES [1] Bandura, A. (1977). Social Learning Theory. New York: General

Learning Press. [2] O’Reilly, M. and Morgan, C (1999) Online Assessment: Creating

Communities And Opportunities. In Computer Assisted Assessment in Higher Education. Brown, S.; Race, P. and Bull, J. (Eds) Staff and Educational Development Series. Kogan Page: London.

[3] Garrison, D. R., and T. Anderson. (2003). e-learning in the 21st Century: A Framework for Research and Practice. New York: Routledge Falmer.

[4] Taylor, P. and Maor, D. (2000). Assessing the Efficacy of Online Teaching with the Constructivist Online Learning Environment Survey.

[5] Yen, C., and Tu, C. (2011). A Multiple-Group Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Scores for Online Presence: Do They Measure the Same Thing Across Cultural Groups? Educational Computing Research, 44(2), 219–242.

[6] Sahin, N., and Sahin, N.H. (1993). Psychometric Properties of the Problem Solving Inventory in a Group of Turkish University Students. Turkey: Middle East Technical University, Department of Psychology. Vol. 17, No. 4.

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