The document discusses social presence in online learning. It begins by defining online learning and social presence. It then summarizes the Community of Inquiry model, which is widely used to measure quality in online learning. The model consists of three presences - social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence. Social presence refers to projecting oneself as a "real person" through online communication. Studies have linked social presence to positive student outcomes. The document discusses ways to stimulate social presence, such as using humor, video and audio, and collaborative projects. It also addresses assessing social presence using the Community of Inquiry framework and applying the model in teacher education.

1. Lake Como School of Advanced Studies, 23-
27 August 2021
Terry Anderson, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus
Athabasca University
terrya@athabascau.ca

2. Online learning
sucks
I love online
learning
Online learning
is boring
Online teaching
used to be better

3. Online Learning Defined By:
 Technology and applications
 Time - self-paced, synchronous,
asynchronous
 Quality and preparedness
 Students’ and teachers’ net literacy
 Age of students
 Pedagogy
 SOCIAL PRESENCE

4. Early definitions of Social
Presence
 Cues filtered out and deficit theories

5. Development of Asynchronous and
Text based educational models
 Cues filtered in:
 Text allows users to more directly project their chosen
type of presence
 Asynchronous and time shifting
 Emoticons
 video and audio

6. Community of Inquiry
 Most widely cited model in online learning
 Used as heuristic to guide teachers and learning
designers
 Used by researchers to measure quality iof onoine
learning
 1999 article Critical inquiry in a text-based
environment: Computer conferencing in higher
education cited 7,141 times by researchers (Google
Scholar Aug. 2021)

7. The COI is a Model
 A model is a simplified description of complex
interactions
 Graphically Shows critical components
 Shows relationships amongst these components
 Leads to elaboration and explication

9. The Community of inquiry is:
“A gestalt view of interacting and interlocking
teaching and technology philosophies ….. fostering
both difference and connectivity across e-learning
communities of research and practice.”
Parchoma, G. (2011). Toward diversity in
researching teaching and technology philosophies-
in-practice in e-learning communities.

10. Value of Community
• Generates commitment and belonging
• Building block for future friendships and social capital
• Builds inclusiveness, cultural awareness and appreciation
• Diverse viewpoints enrich problem solving
• Reduces trauma of social isolation in Covid times
• Motivating

11. Community of Inquiry Model
Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000).
Critical inquiry in a text-based environment:
computer conferencing in higher education.
The Internet and Higher Education, 2 (2-3), 87-
105

13. COI Overview

14. Social Presence
• SOCIAL PRESENCE WAS DEFINED 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”

15. “SOCIAL PRESENCE HAS BEEN CONSISTENTLY LINKED TO NUMEROUS
POSITIVE OUTCOMES.
• recent meta-analytic evidence from Richardson et al. (2017) shows
that when online students perceive greater social presence within
their online classrooms, they experience greater satisfaction (ρ = .56)
and perceived learning (ρ = .51).
• social presence fosters intentions to take future online courses (Reio
& Crim, 2013),
• persistence (e.g., Berger & Milem, 1999),
• motivation to participate (Mazzolini & Maddison, 2007),
• student performance (e.g., Hughes, et al 2008).”
Andel, S. A., et al. (2020). Do social features help in video-centric online learning platforms?
A presence perspective. Computers in Human Behavior, 106505.

16. CohesiveBehaviours Vocatives
Addresses orrefers to the group using inclusive pronouns
Phatics, salutations
Interactive Behaviours Continuing a thread
Quoting from others’ messages.
Referring explicitly to others’ messages.
Asking questions
Complimenting, expressing appreciation
Expressing agreement
Affective Behaviours Expression of emotions
Useof humor
Self-disclosure
Social Presence Indicators

17. Wake Up Activity!!!!
 Use the question box to type in an activity or
technology that you are thinking of using (or
have used) to stimulate social presence at the
beginning of an education class.

18. Chickering and Gamson’s (1987) widely cited
“Seven Principles of Good Practice for Undergraduate
Education,”
1. Student-teacher contact,
2. Cooperation among students,
3. Active learning,
4. Prompt feedback,
5. Time on task,
6. Communicate high expectations,
7. Respect diverse ways of learning,
Good Practices in Undergraduate Education

19. it's not what you have
but what you do with it
Kreilns et al (2021) list 29 different definitions of
social presence
Differentiate sociability (as a medium attribute)
from social space (as a group attribute).
Kreijns, K., Xu, K. & Weidlich, J. Social Presence: Conceptualization and Measurement. Educ Psychol Rev (2021).
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-021-09623-8

20. Collaborative Work builds
Social Presence
 Helps students develop their personal networks
 Teaches soft skills, interpersonal and social skills
 Improves learning product quality
 Enhances students’ net skill and literacy
 BUT:
 Is often time consuming
 Students fear ‘social loafing’
 Creates dependencies (time, tech) that students must
overcome themselves

21. Technologies to Enhance Social
Presence
 Web Conferencing
 Video/audio discussion
 Video sharing – Flip Grid
 Profiles

22. Asynchronous student comments in video

23. Perusall.com
Building Community in Asynchronous Online Higher Education Courses Through Collaborative Annotation
B Adams, NS Wilson - Journal of Educational Technology Systems, 2020

24. Stimulating Social Presence
Teacher:
Humour
Personal revelations
Emoticons
Video
Audio and/or video
feedback
Personnel messages
Profile
Student:
Profiles
‘Question of the day’
Peer introductions
Collaborative projects
Asynch user comments
alongside video
Contextualize the idea or
theory to their real-life context
See also great list of activities at https://oneheglobal.org/equity-unbo

25. Fiock, H. (2020). Designing a community of inquiry in online courses. IRRODL 21(1), 135-15

26. Why only three presences?
Autonomy Presence?
Teacher social presence

27. Applying the COI - Best Practice –
Teacher education
 “Teacher Educator Technology Competencies- (TETCs)”
PD Program are guided through an iterative, five-step
process:
 1. Pose an instructional Problem
 2. Analyze Your Practice
 3. Consider Tools of Enhancing Your Practice
 4. Create New Approaches
 5. Share Your New Ideas and Revise.
Foulger, T. S., Graziano, K. J., Schmidt-Crawford, D., & Slykhuis, D. A. (2017).
Teacher educator technology competencies. Journal of Technology and Teacher
Education, 25(4), 413-448.

28. Assessing COI in action
 “when participants study TETC 7 … they use the
Community of Inquiry frame-work developed by
Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000) to evaluate an
online experience in their course. Then they revise the
experience by applying the social, cognitive, and
teaching presences as defined by the framework”.
 Foulger, T. S., Graziano, K. J., Schmidt-Crawford, D., & Slykhuis,
D. A. (2017). Teacher educator technology
competencies. Journal of Technology and Teacher
Education, 25(4), 413-448.

29. Generations of Distance
Education Pedagogy
Educational
Paradigm
Social
Presence
Outcomes Teacher
Presence
Instructivist low prescribed Sage on Stage
Constructivist high collaborative Guide on Side
Complexivist high emergent Fellow
Traveler
Dron and Anderson, 2022

30. Social Presence with a Machine?
 Chatbots
 “a relational AI instructor leads
to more favorable perceptions
about an AI instructor-based
education is because of one’s
social presence of an AI
instructor.”
David Westerman, Autumn P. Edwards, Chad Edwards, Zhenyang Luo &
Patric R. Spence (2020) I-It, I-Thou, I-Robot: The Perceived Humanness
of AI in Human-Machine Communication, Communication
Jihyun Kim, Kelly Merrill Jr., Kun Xu & Deanna D. Sellnow (2021)
I Like My Relational Machine Teacher: An AI Instructor’s
Communication Styles and Social Presence in Online Education,
International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction,

31. Chatbots and Social Presence
and Consumer Behaviours
Toader, D.-C., Boca, G., Toader, R., Măcelaru, M., Toader, C., Ighian, D., & Rădulescu, A. T. (2019). The
Effect of Social Presence and Chatbot Errors on Trust. Sustainability, 12(1), 256. MDPI AG. Retrieved from
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/su12010256

32. Teaching presence
in a Life Long Learning Era
 Learners of today “used to work for someone else, but
will increasingly work for themselves and instead of
serving as functionaries in the achievement of purposes
set by others, they will increasingly set purposes for
themselves”
Richard Sampson, 2005
 Does the COI model lead to and sanction teacher
dependency?

33. COI meets Social Media
 How much does social presence increase in
synchronous activities?
 Does adding voice (audioconferencing) graphics (web
conferencing), pictures (video), virtual environment
(immersion) significantly increase social presence?
 Are the resulting limitations on access worth social and
pedagogical gains?
 When is too much social presence damaging?

34. Using COI when ‘learning in
the wild’
 CPOI used to code Reddit and Twitter threads with
informal learners.
 Eight point coding scheme extends and expands the
popular COI model and coding scheme
 added a potentially affective component (negative,
positive or neutral explanation and positive or negative
socializing) to the COI codes
Haythornthwaite, C., Kumar, P., Gruzd, A., Gilbert, S.,
Valle, M. E. del, & Paulin, D. (2018). Learning in the wild:
Coding for learning and practice on Reddit. Learning,
Media and Technology, 43(3), 219–235.

35. P Timonen, H Ruokamo - Journal of Pacific Rim
Psychology, 2021

36. P Timonen, H Ruokamo - Journal of Pacific Rim
Psychology, 2021

37. Your Net
Presence -
an Essential Skill
Goodier, S., & Czerniewicz, L. (2013). Academics’ online presence: A
four-step guide to taking control of your visibility. University of
Capetown.

38. Social Presence and Social
Media
 In order for teachers to ‘know the real person’ their net
presence can be very useful
 Social media adds motivation, scale, sharing to
traditional institutional systems
 How to use social media in formal education?

39. Wake-Up Question Two
In the textbox or via voice:
How can you use social media to
enhance your and your students’
social presence?

40. http://communitiesofinquiry.com/

41. Conclusions
• COI most widely quoted heuristic and research theory
in online learning
• Simple model capable of guiding, but not restraining
teaching and curriculum development
• Developed for an online context
• Does it speak to learning in your course contexts?
• Is it a useful tool for education development and
research?
Terry Anderson terrya@athabascau.ca
Blog: virtualcanuck.ca

42. Your comments and
Questions MOST welcomed!!