(REFLECTIONS ON MODULE 3 AND 4.)
COMMUNITY OF ENQUIRY IN A BLENDED-LEARNING CLASSROOM.
Community of enquiry framework is a system of engagement in a teaching and learning activities that ensures an active participation of all participants which engenders learning. The idea is to make teaching and learning process an experiential activity for all participants through enquiries into solving a problem.
The community of inquiry is a concept first introduced by early pragmatist philosophers C.S.Peirce and John Dewey, concerning the nature of knowledge formation and the process of scientific inquiry. However, C.S. Peirce originally restricted the concept to the community of scientists. John Dewey broadened the scope of the concept, applying it to the educational setting (Lipman 2003). The key elements in community of enquiry is Teaching presence, Social presence and Cognitive presence.
In this post we shall examine how to implement the elements of community of enquiry into blended learning platforms.
TEACHING PRESENCE.
Any learning platform must have a seasoned teacher who should plan a lesson, execute the lesson, evaluate the lesson and reteach if need be. Here the teacher is a facilitator that sets the goals, direction, and climate for community interaction. Nkwocha P.C. (2014) recommend that teacher should be flexible in this kind of atmosphere however, he/she should be sure to stick to the context. Teaching presence entails that a teacher needs to drop an enquiry on the table that will arouse further enquiries.
SOCIAL PRESENCE.
The participants in this community must all be active participants, each of them setting the climate for further enquiries that will engender supportive discussions. Hence Garrison D. R., Anderson T. & Archer W (2000)
define social presence as the ability of participants in a community of inquiry to project
themselves socially and emotionally, as “real” people (i.e., their full personality), through
the medium of communication being used.
COGNITIVE PRESENCE.
Here every one is expected to bring in some measures of knowledge, ideas, and contemplations for a discussion that will be supportive and relevant, through interactions that will engender learning. However, Parker R. (2009) observed that one of the problems signposted in the literature on learning communities concerns the fears participants might have due to lack of confidence and experience.
BLENDED LEARNING.
In a blended learning platform, the teacher should pre-inform the students on what to read so as to be equipped for class discussion through some asynchronous platform like canvas, google classroom, and any other media that is GDPR compliance.
The class section should also have various digital tools; zoom, white board, woo clap, and other tools that can enable on-campus and online participation of cognitive sharing, social interaction and quality teaching. The combination of the three elements should engender educational experience. However, the expense of technology, inadequate training, technological issues, the need to adapt content for blended learning, decreased motivation, and weakened relationships between students and teachers have been predictably identified as part of the challenges with blended learning which might have adverse effect to the elements of community of enquiry.
REFFERENCE
Garrison D. R., Anderson T. & Archer W (2000) Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education. University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada https://mau.instructure.com/courses/11869/files/1817324? wrap=1
Lipman, M. (2003). Thinking in Education. (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Nkwocha P.C. (2014) Perspectives in teaching methodologies. (3rd ed.) Lagos. Blue print and press.
Parker R. (2009). A learning community approach to doctoral education in the socialsciencesRachel ParkerTeaching in Higher EducationVol. 14, No. 1, February 2009, 4354