Sara Bosley and David Young (2006: 357) remark that "LtW is designed for people who are in work and wish to study part-time for a full HE award or credit towards one". Their paper considers the two-way, one-to-one online dialogue between student and tutor. They mention the following five-category method of content analysis:
- Participative - this category consider the number of messages and exchange of statements
- Social - these are unrelated statements to the formal content, but necessary greetings and include expressions of feelings
- Interactive - these are chained messages with regard to the contributions of other
- Cognitive - this category comprise those knowledge related online learning processes such as asking questions, drawing inferences and presenting hypotheses
- Meta-cognitive - these are skills and knowledge pertaining to the learning process itself
Bosley and Young (356) further present four online tutor roles, namely:
- Pedagogical - this roles involves questioning and feedback or advice
- Managerial - such as the coordination of assignments
- Social - spicing with humour, offering empathy and meta-cognition interactions
- Technical - this role entail user assistance
In addition to these online tutor roles Bosley and Young mention the importance of motivation, the facilitating of group interaction and encouraging online participation. They observe that there are five stages through which an online group need to progress in order to achieve a high-level of learning:
- central are access and motivation of learners
- socialisation online
- information
- knowledge construction
- development
Fostering of a culture of enquiry is a important aspect of e-teaching. Little and Whitelock (in Bosley & Young) mention technical, administrative, organisational, supportive, encouraging and community-building roles.
Bosley and Young also highlight two key components of LtW, namely individual leaning contracting (ILC) and work-based projects.
Source
Bosley, S. & Young, D. 2006. Online learning dialogues in learning through work. The Journal of Workplace Learning, 18(6), 355-366
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