Book Report 3: Vignare, Literature Review of ALN Online/Blended Learning Research

Long time no post, I know... the conclusion of summer school, a training consultant gig and a few end-of-month personal commitments derailed things a bit, but now your faithful blended learning explorer is back in the game... presenting a summary of Chapter 3 from Picciano and Dziuban's edited volume Blended Learning: Research Perspectives.

Vignare, Karen. "Review of Literature Blended Learning: Using ALN to Change the Classroom -- Will It Work?" Blended Learning: Research Perspectives. Eds. Anthony G. Picciano and Charles D. Dziuban, eds. Needham, MA: Sloan-C, 2007. Print. 37-63

In this installment, I summarize Karen Vignare's literature review of studies that have examined the use of online asynchronous learning networks (ALN) in fully online and blended learning environments. This chapter is pretty darned helpful, not only in synthesizing a bunch of work done before the publication of this 2007 volume, but also in framing that discussion in terms of the Sloan-Consortium's Five Pillars of quality education. This framework seems promising in order to identify the key concerns of faculty and institutional constituencies, both in thinking strategically about adopting blended learning resources and in determining how to assess pilot efforts for continuing quality improvement. My wife, a one-time Certified Quality Engineer, would perhaps be pleased (or bemused) to hear me talking like this.

The emphasis on ALN as a mode of online blended learning (see the list of pedagogical strategies below from the chapter's able 1) also makes me wonder whether the approach I'm considering -- online mini-lectures and quizzes, followed up by more intensive in-class collaborative critical analysis and discussion exercises -- is the best way to go. Clearly, my approach emphasizes the face-to-face venue as the primary location for student/student and student/faculty engagement of the course knowledge, which might be more appropriate for our student population and college culture than the models put in place by larger institutions with a student population more in line with the averages Vignare describes. I must admit some surprise in the finding that 75% of all higher ed students are aged 25 and up (although this includes graduate and professional programs, as well as community colleges, etc.), and that surprise is reminding me that any of the stuff in this literature needs to be considered, in part, in terms of how we at Augustana (a small, residential liberal arts college) differ from the institutional cultures and needs described in this research literature.

In any event, enjoy the summary after the jump.


Chap. 3: “Review of the Literature on Blended Learning” – Vignare, Karen (37-63)

• Vignare’s review focuses on the use of online asynchronous learning networks (ALN) in higher education, and uses Sloan-C’s Five Pillars framework as a basis for establishing benchmarks to assess educational quality – the goal is to examine approaches to blended learning that enables “scalability to achieve capacity and breadth” (40) in cost-effective learning resources.

• learning effectiveness
• faculty satisfaction
• student satisfaction
• access
• cost effectiveness and institutional commitment

• “blended learning” defined using Sloan-C’s two-part definition:

1. Blended courses integrate online with face to face instruction in a planned pedagogically valuable manner; and
2. Do not just combine but trade-off face to face time with online activity (or vice versa) (38).

• In the current blended learning research literature,

• Benefits: can improve academic success for students, faculty are satisfied if they receive needed training and support, and is viewed by many researchers as potentially transformative for higher education
• Potential problem: a recent experiment indicates fully online ALN is more effective than blended learning regarding student cognitive presence; responses = focus needs to be on learner-centered design and “more highly interactive technologies” (39)

• 75% of all higher ed students are “non-traditional”, aged 25+, and this population tends to be more receptive to online and blended learning

• Students can succeed, but they need access to the online technology, and they need to understand the pedagogical purpose of using the technology

Learning Effectiveness (40-44)

• Meta-analyses find that online ed is as good or better than face to face instruction “when instructor involvement, interaction, content studied, learner capabilities, and the right mix of human interaction and technology are combined” (41)

• The evidence is pretty clear on effectiveness of fully online ALNs, but the blended learning research is less developed and more ambiguous

• Re: student retention: fully online ALN not as effective as face to face instruction… but far more ALN programs are offered at associate’s degree institutions with lower graduation rates anyway, so this evidence isn’t determinative

• Re: course-level assessment: the comparative evidence isn’t clear on course completion; blended learning environments can be more effective than face to face, but there are some big differences between disciplines; on grades and test scores the results are similar – some studies say blended is best, some say fully online is best

• Re: learning environment: weak but positive results from blended learning – in one study, students perceive more learning, but actual gains are slight, not statistically significant

• McCombs and Valiki (2005) use the APA’s learner-centered framework, which organizes 14 principles into 4 domains: cognitive and meta-cognitive, motivational and affective, developmental and social, and individual differences (APA’s definition of “learner-centeredness” and 14 principles delineated on pp. 42-43)
• these principles are consistent with good design principles for ALN… and since instructional design experts favor a behaviorist approach to learning, while ALN experts favor a constructionist approach, it appears that blended ALN strategies can structure online learning to tap into the principles of both theoretical approaches; that said, some content areas are more amenable to some online strategies

Faculty Satisfaction (44-48)

• “factors include administrative and technical support, quality control, institutional rewards, research opportunities, access to new populations of students and participation in interactive learning communities” (44); faculty satisfaction is “tied to two things: choice and preparedness” (44)

• instructional support and provision of preparation time lead to satisfaction
• evidence of student impact lead to satisfaction
• no significant difference between fully online and blended learning on faculty satisfaction

• support mechanisms are key, due to faculty’s other time-consuming tasks, in order to get them to try new pedagogical approaches

• faculty learn new teaching methodologies “to deliver good instruction” (44), so understanding whether “blended learning will support better student outcomes” (45) is critical

• Table 1: Blended Learning Pedagogies (45) lists the types of ALN approaches that have been examined in the literature

• Case studies
• Small group
• Discussion / critical thinking
• Self-assessment
• Simulation
• Role playing
• Debate
• Learn by doing
• Tutoring support

• Faculty instructional support centers are needed to instruct in pedagogical techniques, not just in use of software and other tools

• How to provide faulty time and incentives to use? Traditionally release time and extra pay have been the model, but large-scale distance learning institutions have started moving to providing faculty with the time to meet with other faculty and instructional design personnel in order to develop [although this doesn’t seem like a model well-suited to faculty at traditional residential, face-to-face institutions]

• There is some evidence that adopting blended learning can provide faculty with some flexible time to move into scholarly work, and use of blended learning opens up some SoTL opportunities; however, what is key in this area is for tenure and promotion committees to recognize and reward the time and effort spent by faculty to develop and implement new blended learning pedagogies and courses

• Faculty have the desire to improve teaching effectiveness, but this outcome requires support for using technology and for pedagogical sharing between colleagues

• Faculty ownership of course design and control is also important; to maximize quality, building structures to enable faculty to share in the processes of course design and implementation are possible ad desirable; some large distance learning institutions use a central administration model that enables all faculty who teach a given course to use the ALN; however, these courses involve a longer and more difficult start-up time, and faculty control of the process is eliminated. This model is not often used, and is not spreading.

Student Satisfaction (48-51)

• “involves student services, technology infrastructure and support, interaction with faculty and other students, learning community and course/learning outcomes which match or exceed expectations” (48)

• implication is we need to prepare students for online learning, build a sense of community, provide access, and support the learning environment
• extensive student survey data indicate that we can achieve high levels of satisfaction with online and blended learning, so the key questions are how are they satisfied, and what measures should be used? Student engagement (NSSE) and student use of services are becoming more common here.

• Re: student preparation: communication is key (e.g., letting students know in advance when classes are blended); need “clear instructions…about the online technologies needed to participate” (49); knowing how time will be spent is important, especially for non-traditional students; students who experience blended learning start to form critical opinions about what kinds of activities are the best use of online and face-to-face time

• Re: online student services? Not much blended learning research involves the question of whether and how to make student services (e.g., student learning assistance centers) available online or not; it seems to depend on the student population involved and their particular needs and preferences

• Re: community: students need to feel a part of a learning community (e.g., open in-person community areas, chat and discussion boards, online student peer mentors)

• Re: tech infrastructure support: a tricky line to draw – when is it pedagogical support that requires instructor involvement, and when is it technological support that IT should handle?; students tend to select an online option for convenience, but later report that they value interactions, learning effectiveness and “the ability to control what they learn” (51); younger students perceive faculty to be less responsive when technology is used… so students can succeed academically, but have different expectations about tech and interactions with faculty

Access (51-53)

• “includes technical, academic and administrative services (infrastructure), learning resources, pre-course access and readiness, appropriate program information, and program and course variety” (51)

• usually addressed at an institutional level, but needs a national conversation

• support for students with disabilities needs to be addressed: “universal design”, or “the process of pre-designing instruction so that it meets the needs of all learners” (51-52) needs to be part of the blended learning instructional planning process; need to consider classroom communication as part of this mix – blended learning can be a good access solution, especially for Deaf and hard-of-hearing students

• there is little evidence available on access issues regarding “learning resources, student readiness or course and program offerings” (53)

Cost Effectiveness and Institutional Commitment (53-55)

• this is the least researched pillar, but it is a crucial point for making the case for developing implementing blended learning with ALN resources

• “includes issues like institutional commitment as evidenced through infrastructure, marketing, business strategies, scalability and partnerships… [to] meet cost effective standards” (53)

• CMS has 80% penetration in higher education, so the question isn’t whether to use, but “whether it is maximized” (53)

• 2 reasons for pursuing online learning: increase educational access, increase educational quality

• access motives (largely for non-traditional students) have been the key driver for most institutions; access and quality goals aren’t mutually exclusive, but the decision start point (“for on-campus or outreach”) informs the institution’s business model (54)

• ALN can be cost-effective; most case study evidence on best practices comes from institutions “that were self-funded” and those who started implementing ALN to increase student access (54); there has been less study of places who started implementing ALN to improve quality

• Accountability is important… evidence on successful programs that realized effective results and cost savings indicate a need to demonstrate a return on investment… quality as well as enrollment numbers

Conclusions and Recommendations:

• More blended learning research is needed, especially on the “faculty satisfaction, student satisfaction and access pillars” (56)

• Researchers believe that blended learning “will have greater (more widespread) impact than fully online ALN” in “cost effectiveness and sustainable improvement and greater adoption of learner-centered instruction” (56)

• “Technology support, pedagogical support, and faculty time to plan and execute and exchange ideas with other faculty will be critical for success” (56).

• Existing technology is generally all that is needed; the key is “institutional support on pedagogical techniques” (56)

• Need more research work “on the multiple institution level” and “meta-analyses on the case study research” (56)