presence

Community

Creating Presence

“Who we are as social beings drives learning, and the social aspects of learning are the most important. Consequently, those connection points, better known as community, become extremely important in creating a sense of belonging.” (Palloff & Pratt, p. 26)

Researchers in remote/online education emphasize the importance of developing a sense of being there and being together among learners. In F2F classrooms this happens naturally — at least in a physical sense. For remote learners, it requires explicit, intentional effort, and must be integrated into the design of the course and supported by interactions among students and instructor alike.

“From our perspective, a sense of presence is ‘being there’ and ‘being together’ with online learners throughout the learning experience. It looks and feels as if […] the technology is transparent to the learning process. Each learner is ‘there’ and ‘together’ with the instructor and with other learners as well.”

Lehman and Conceição, p. 3

How can we heighten our students’ sense of being there and their willingness to engage in a community of learners?



Based on her experience in teaching Chinese in Spring 2020, Jing Wang (CHI) offers these suggestions for fostering a sense of presence and community in L2 classes:

“Encouraging classroom atmosphere and active interactivity among students are undoubtedly critical not only in helping students improve their language skills, but also in cultivating long-term interest in the learning of a language. When language courses were switched to the remote teaching/learning mode, the lack of face-to-face communication has made establishing the sense of community very challenging.”

Jing Wang (CHI)

References & Resources

Darby, F. and Lang, J. (2019). Building community (Chapter 4, pp. 75-106). Small Online Teaching: Applying Learning Science in Online Classes. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Gunawandera, C. and Zittle, F. (1997). Social presence as a predictor of satisfaction within a computer-mediated conferencing environment. The American Journal of Distance Education, 11(3), 8-26.

Kehrwald, B. (2008). Understanding social presence in text-based online learning environments. Distance Education, 29(1), 89-106.

Lehman, R.M. and Conceição, C.O. (2010). Creating a Sense of Presence in Online Teaching: How to “Be There” for Distance Learners. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Palloff, R. and Pratt, K. (2007). Building Online Learning Communities: Effective Strategies for the Virtual Classrooms (2nd ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.