The article primarily focuses on the disruptive aspect of read-only participants in an online learning community setting. The research problem is based on the fact that a student’s online visibility affects their performance, which inevitably influences the outcome of courses. There are two main research questions where the first one addresses whether online participation has a relationship with successful course completion and learning. The second element focuses on the correlation between learning community and participation. The methodology was comprised of both qualitative and quantitative approaches, which is also referred to as a mixed methodological framework. The former utilized ATLAS.ti software to gather valuable data on examination essays, online quizzes, discussion posts, and blog postings (Nagel et al., 2009). The quantitative component used the LMS tracking tool, which calculated the instances of relies and postings.
The findings of the study illustrate the proper correlations between the overall performance and outcome. For example, five key elements, such as logins, posts, reply ratio, collaboration, and feedback percentage, were highly predictive of the grade group within the online classroom (Nagel et al., 2009). In other words, the degree of a student’s participation in the given activities determined whether they will fail, pass or be distinctive. The authors also discussed the implications of the research, which derives several conclusions from the gathered data. Low online visibility of a student can be attributed to a read-only approach, lack of contribution, technical problems, and absence of any reason. An online course can be completed only if there is active participation. The researchers additionally suggest rotating group members, encouraging the submission of high-quality postings, grading individual contributions in a group project, and communicating login frequency.
References
Nagel, L., Blignaut, A. S., & Cronjé, J. C. (2009). Read-only participants: A case for student communication in online classes. Interactive Learning Environments, 17(1), 37-51. Web.