Attitudes and Opinions of Students on Video Conference Based Distance Education

Abstract

Today, technology plays a significant role in innovations in educational settings and these are caused many changes in delivering education with the increasing of student needs. Developments in the line with information and communication technologies led to emergence of the concept of distance education (İşman, 2005; Akça, 2006; Simonson et al., 2006). Many different features within the distance education serve variety of methods to communicate between student and teacher that were in different places. New technologies create opportunities for learning and offer a variety of tools for accessing data. One of these technologies is video conferencing. Videoconferencing is defined as interactive and synchronous voice, video and data transfer conducted between two or more points via communication lines (Gough, 2006). This system reduces the cost of education by connecting students and teachers who are in different locations. With real-time audio and video communication possibilities offered by videoconferencing systems allow individuals face-to-face interaction in different locations (Kaya ve Önder, 2002; Bates, 2005; Martin, 2005; Townes-Young and Ewing, 2005; Gillies, 2008). Videoconferencing serves significant advantages as ensuring two-way audio and video transmission (Chapman, 1996), describes these systems as one of the best presentation method of distance learning. In literature many studies were revealed effectiveness of video conference systems (Knipe and Lee, 2002; Gillies, 2008; Woods; 2005; Parlakkılıç, 2007; Doggett, 2008; Karal, Çebi and Turgut, 2011; Çandarlı and Yüksel, 2012). In addition to these researches, determining
attitudes towards videoconferencing systems in adaption and acceptance process is an important stage in order to implement videoconferencing systems effectively. The present study examines undergraduate students’ attitudes and perceptions of video conference based distance education lecture. “What are the undergraduate students’ attitudes and perceptions of video conference-based lecture via distance education?” is the study’s main question. Up to this main research question sub research questions were investigated: “What are the students’ attitudes towards distance education?”, “Do students’ attitudes towards distance education differ in terms of gender?”, “What are the opinions of students about distance education after taking a video conference-based lecture?” In this study “case study” based research design was used in order to in order to investigate undergraduate students’ attitudes and perceptions towards video conference based distance education. This research was conducted with 41 student that are enrolled an undergraduate sociology program at a small university in northeastern part of Turkey in fall semester of 2010–2011. The context of this study is a “Introduction to Philosophy-I” course instructed through videoconferencing. Data was collected through administering two data
collection tool. Firstly in order to investigate students’ attitudes towards distance education by “Distance Learning Attitude Scale (DLAS)”. Prospective elementary teachers’ responses to the questionnaire were statistically analyzed according to their gender via SPSS 17 oftware. The mean (x) and standard division (ss) scores were computed for each attribution. In the study independent t-test analysis based on p=0.05 significance level were used to clarify the significance of the differences on means. Secondly, in order to investigate students’ perceptions towards distance learning, an “Opinion Determination Form (ODF)” conducted to them including a question as “What are your perceptions on video conference based distance education? Explain in details” and students were asked to write down their thoughts on the question. Analyzing via content analysis to students’ reflections up to the question sub-themes were created. Related with sub-themes, students’ views were presented directly without changing the main idea as pseudonyms (such as: S-1, S-2,…) in order to keep their identity anonymous. According to findings, students’ average scores from DLAS were found as x=2,658. This score shows that undergraduate students’ attitudes towards distance learning are at unstable level. These attitude scores from DLAS weren’t differ in terms of their gender level (xboy=2,73;x girl=2,596; t=-1,05; p>0,05). Even if there wasn’t seen any significant difference between students’ attitudes in terms of their gender levels, male students demonstrate more positive attitude rather than female ones. In terms of students’ perceptions, although there was a more intensive negative thoughts positive thoughts were revealed.

Keywords

• Distance education
• video conference
• attitude
• student views

Video Konferans Tabanlı Uzaktan Eğitime İlişkin Öğrenci Tutumları ve Görüşleri

Abstract

Bu çalışmanın amacı, video konferans tabanlı uzaktan eğitim etkinlikleri ile öğrenim görmekte olan öğrencilerin uzaktan eğitime yönelik tutum ve görüşlerini belirlemektir. Araştırma, 2010–2011 akademik yılı güz döneminde, Artvin Çoruh Üniversitesi Fen Edebiyat Fakültesi Sosyoloji Bölümündeki “Felsefeye Giriş-I” dersi kapsamında öğrenim gören 41 öğrenci ile yürütülmüştür. Özel durum çalışması yönteminin benimsendiği bu araştırmada, veri toplama aracı olarak Uzaktan Eğitime Yönelik Tutum Ölçeği (UEYTÖ) kullanılmış olup video konferans tabanlı uzaktan
eğitim uygulamasıyla ilgili öğrenci görüşlerini belirlemek üzere görüş belirleme formundan faydalanılmıştır. Uygulanan ölçekten elde edilen verilerin analizi sonucu, öğrencilerin uzaktan eğitime yönelik tutumunun kararsız düzeyde olduğu tespit edilmiştir. Gerçekleştirilen uygulamanın sonunda öğrenciler, alana yönelik farklı öğreticilerle tanışma imkanına sahip olunmasını video konferans tabanlı uzaktan eğitim sisteminin olumlu bir özelliği olarak nitelendirmiştir. Video konferans sisteminde yaşanan teknik problemlerin, ders anlatımları sürecinde öğretici-öğrenci arasında iletişim kurulmasında engel teşkil ettiğini belirten öğrenciler, öğreticiyle yüz yüze ortamda bulunmama ve buna bağlı olarak derse motive olamama şeklinde bir takım olumsuz düşünce içerisinde oldukları ortaya çıkarılmıştır. 

Keywords

• Uzaktan eğitim
• video konferans
• tutum
• öğrenci görüşleri

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