Liam Rourke

This paper presents a tool developed for the purpose of assessing teaching presence in online courses that make use of computer conferencing, and preliminary results from the use of this tool. The method of analysis is based on Garrison, Anderson, and Archer’s model of critical thinking and practical inquiry in a computer conferencing context. The concept of teaching presence is constitutively defined as having three categories – design and organization, facilitating discourse, and direct instruction. Indicators that we search for in the computer conference transcripts identify each category. Pilot testing of the instrument reveals interesting differences in the extent and type of teaching presence found in different graduate level online courses.

Instructional media such as computer conferencing engender
\nhigh levels of student-student and student-teacher interaction;
\n
\naffectively into a community of inquiry. A template for assessing
\nsocial presence in computer conferencing is presented through
\ncontent analysis of conferencing transcripts. To facilitate explication of the scheme and subsequent replication of this
\nstudy, selections of coded transcripts are included, along with
\ninterrater reliability figures. The article concludes with a
\ndiscussion of the implications and benefits of assessing social
\npresence for instructors, for instructors, conference moderators, and
\nresearchers.

Abstract. This paper discusses the potential and the methodological challenges of analyzing computer conference transcripts using quantitative content analysis. The paper is divided into six sections, which discuss: criteria for content analysis, research designs, types of content, units of analysis, ethical issues, and software to aid analysis. The discussion is supported with a survey of 19 commonly referenced studies published during the last decade. The paper is designed to assist researchers in using content analysis to further the understanding of teaching and learning using computer conferencing. SCENARIO Professor Jones has just completed her first university course delivered entirely on-line. The 13-week semester class has left Jones in a state of mild exhaustion. However, the course is finished, the marks have been assigned, and now, thinks Jones, time for some reflection, analysis and perhaps a publishable paper. Jones smiles, confident in the knowledge that the complete transcript of messages exchanged during the course has been captured in machine-readable format. She feels that this accessible data will confirm her hypothesis that students in the on-line