This book is an investigation into the role which social presence and identity play in online learning environments. Scholars across disciplines have grappled with the questions of what it means for a person to be and to interact online. In the context of online learning, these questions reflect specific concerns related to how well people can learn in a setting limited to mediated interactions and lacking various communication cues. For example, how can a teacher and students come to know each other if they cannot see each other? How can they effectively understand and communicate with each other if they are separated by space and, in many instances, time? These concerns are related to social presence and identity, both of which are complex, multi-faceted, and closely interrelated constructs. The chapters in this book consider how online learning has developed and changed over time in terms of technology, pedagogy, and familiarity. Collectively these chapters show the diverse ways that educational researchers have explored social presence and identity. They also highlight some of the nuanced concerns online educators might have in these areas. This book was originally published as a special issue of Distance Education.

The use of media to create and maintain a public presence has become a ubiquitous aspect of daily life. Such interactions should be used to enhance other aspects of life that have become heavily technology-driven, such as education. Enhancing Social Presence in Online Learning Environments is a critical scholarly publication that explores the different perspectives of public latency and the creation of electronic educational formats that mimic the experience of traditional classrooms. Featuring a wide range of coverage on topics that include active learning, teacher authority, and computer-mediated communication, this publication is geared toward educators, professionals, school administrators, researchers, and practitioners in the field of education.

Published in Association with 2020 AECT Division of Distance Learning Book AwardSocial presence continues to emerge as a key factor for successful online and blended learning experiences. It is commonly described as the degree to which online participants feel connected to one another. Understanding social presence—with its critical connections to community-building, retention, and learning outcomes—allows faculty and instructional designers to better support and engage students. This volume, Social Presence in Online Learning, addresses the evolution of social presence with three distinct perspectives, outlines the relevant research, and focuses on practical strategies that can immediately impact the teaching and learning experience. These strategies include creating connections to build community, applying content to authentic situations, integrating a careful mix of tools and media, leveraging reflective and interactive opportunities, providing early and continuous feedback, designing with assessment in mind, and encouraging change in small increments. Because student satisfaction and motivation plays a key role in retention rates and because increased social presence often leads to enriched learning experiences, it is advantageous to mindfully integrate social presence into learning environments.Social Presence in Online Learning brings together eminent scholars in the field to distinguish among three different perspectives of social presence and to address how these viewpoints immediately inform practice. This important volume: • Provides an overview of the evolution of social presence, key findings from social presence research, and practical strategies that can improve the online and blended learning experience• Differentiates three distinct perspectives on social presence and explains the ideas and models that inform these perspectives• Explores specific ways in which social presence relates to course satisfaction, retention, and outcomes• Offers practical implications and ready-to-use techniques that are applicable to multiple disciplines• Introduces current research on social presence by prominent researchers in the field with direct inferences to the practice of online and blended learning • Looks at future directions for social presenceSocial Presence in Online Learning is appropriate for practitioners, researchers and academics involved in any level of online learning program design, course design, instruction, support, and leadership as well as for graduate students studying educational technology, technology-enhanced learning, and online and blended learning. It brings together multiple perspectives on social presence from the most influential scholars in the field to help shape the future of online and blended learning.

As face-to-face interaction between student and instructor is not present in online learning environments, it is increasingly important to understand how to establish and maintain social presence in online learning. Student-Teacher Interaction in Online Learning Environments provides successful strategies and procedures for developing policies to bring about an awareness of the practices that enhance online learning. This reference book provides building blocks to help improve the outcome of online coursework and discusses social presence to help improve performance, interaction, and a sense of community for all participants in an online arena. This book is of essential use to online educators, administrators, researchers, and students.

Modern technology has enhanced many aspects of life, including classroom education. By offering virtual learning experiences, educational systems can become more efficient and effective at teaching the student population. The Handbook of Research on Collaborative Teaching Practice in Virtual Learning Environments highlights program developments in the realm of digital worlds in educational settings. Featuring pedagogical methods and topics relating to cooperative learning, hands-on curriculum, and meta-cognitive dimensions, this publication is a critical reference source for pre-service and in-service teachers, school administrators, higher education faculty, and researchers interested in virtual reality incorporation in the classroom.

How can we improve support for teachers as they negotiate the pathways into the profession? This books highlights how strong networks of connections with other teachers and with resources have been shown to make a big difference. Online learning networks are one way to help pre-service and early career teachers to foster these connections and the greater community of teachers has an interest in helping new teachers to enter the profession. New technologies have allowed teachers to be connected anywhere, anytime; this book discusses principles for the design and implementation of learning networks that can use this connectivity to improve support for beginning teachers. It addresses foundational principles of types of teacher communities (online and offline), types of knowledge relevant to beginning teachers, the idea of presence within a network and methodologies for studying and nurturing communities of teachers, providing recent examples of each.

In the current educational environment, there has been a shift towards online learning as a replacement for the traditional in-person classroom experience. With this new environment comes new technologies, benefits, and challenges for providing courses to students through an entirely digital environment. With this shift comes the necessary research on how to utilize these online courses and how to develop effective online educational materials that fit student needs and encourage student learning, motivation, and success. The optimization of these online tools requires a deeper look into curriculum, instructional design, teaching techniques, and new models for student assessment and evaluation. Information on how to create valuable online course content, engaging lesson plans for the digital space, and meaningful student activities online are only a few of many current topics of interest for promoting student achievement through online learning. The Research Anthology on Developing Effective Online Learning Courses provides multiple perspectives on how to develop engaging and effective online learning courses in the wake of the rapid digitalization of education. This book includes topics focused on online learners, online course content, effective online instruction strategies, and instructional design for the online environment. This reference work is ideal for curriculum developers, instructional designers, IT consultants, deans, chairs, teachers, administrators, academicians, researchers, and students interested in the latest research on how to create online learning courses that promote student success.

WINNER OF THE 2019 OUTSTANDING BOOK AWARD FROM AECT'S DIVISION OF DISTANCE EDUCATION! As online courses and digital learning enable more people from more places to learn together, it is crucial for instructional design to incorporate diverse cultural perspectives. Culturally Inclusive Instructional Design provides a framework for thinking about culture in digital learning, offering insight into how to build inclusive online communities that encourage reflection and growth, regardless of content domain. Chapters cover the foundation, components, and implementation of the authors’ Wisdom Communities (WisCom) framework, which enables learners from global backgrounds to experience long-lasting, transformative learning through real-world problem-solving. This book is a timely, resourceful guide to building truly collaborative, inquiry-based online learning experiences.

The coronavirus pandemic mandated unexpected 'instant transitions' to remote learning and accelerated student demand for online courses. As a result, colleges and universities in the U.S. and around the world began and have continued to expand their online courses and degree programs. The online learning industry is projected to pass $370 billion by 2026 and one third of post-secondary school administrators indicate they will continue to offer both remote and online course options even after their campuses completely resume offering in-person, face-to-face courses. Students have demonstrated there is an increased demand for online courses as well. A national survey of 1,413 students, registered at U.S. higher education institutions in fall 2020 and spring 2021, said their experiences with learning remotely during the pandemic left them with a positive attitude toward online and hybrid courses. This increased interest calls attention to the need for more scholarly examination of online teaching and learning.

This handbook draws together international perspectives on technology and its application to language teaching and learning, written and edited by leading scholars in the field. It meets the increasing demand for pedagogically-informed online language instruction, which is particularly important in the context of the effects that the Covid-19 pandemic has had on the education sector on a global scale, as well as exploring language learning in informal and non-formal contexts. With contributions from5 continents and over 20 countries, including Australia, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Japan, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, the UK and the USA, the book offers a thorough overview of the main influential theories and explores technology tools, approaches to research, and applications to practice. Carefully curated, this is an innovative and exciting volume for students, teachers, researchers and lecturers in language education.