Using Social Media to Improve Student-Instructor Communication in an Onlinef Learning Environment

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Author(s): Rong Guo (Richard College of Business, University of West Georgia, Carrollton, GA, USA), Yide Shen (Rohrer College of Business, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ, USA)and Lei Li (College of Computing and Software Engineering, Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw, GA, USA)
Copyright: 2018
Volume: 14
Issue: 1
Pages: 11
Source title: International Journal of Information and Communication Technology Education (IJICTE)
Editor(s)-in-Chief: David D. Carbonara (Duquesne University, USA)
DOI: 10.4018/IJICTE.2018010103

Keywords: Distance Education / Education / Educational Technologies / Information Science Reference

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Abstract

The lack of effective faculty-student interaction has been identified as a main contributor to the high dropout rate in online education. For this paper, the authors conducted an empirical study using a social networking tool, specifically Facebook, to improve student-instructor communication and student performance in an online learning environment. They recruited three sections of an introductory IT course at a public university and divided them into two groups: (1) a treatment group where Facebook was used as an additional communication tool and (2) a control group where the course setting wasn't changed. The authors surveyed the participants' opinions on the use of Facebook in the treatment group, and collected participants' academic performance data for both the treatment and control groups. Their research findings show that the use of Facebook as a supplemental communication method can help an instructor better reach out to students, reduce a course's failure rate, and improve student course performance.

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Using Social Media to Improve Student-Instructor Communication in an Onlinef Learning Environment

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