Charlotte N. Gunawardena

University of New Mexico | UNM · Organization, Information, & Learning Sciences Program

Gunawardena et al.’s (1997) Interaction Analysis Model (IAM) is one of the most frequently employed frameworks to guide the qualitative analysis of social construction of knowledge online. However, qualitative analysis is time consuming, and precludes immediate feedback to revise online courses while being delivered. To expedite analysis with a lar...

Analyzing how participants learn from each other during online forums on discussion boards or social media platforms is often challenging. One of the predominant methods of analyzing such learning is through qualitative content analysis or interaction analysis. The Interaction Analysis Model (IAM), developed by Gunawardena, Lowe and Anderson which...

Co authored with Casey Frechette and Ludmila Layne, Culturally Inclusive Instructional Design provides a framework for thinking about culture in digital learning, offering insight into how to build inclusive online communities that encourage reflection and growth, regardless of content domain. Chapters cover the foundation, components, and implemen...

This research paper discusses the accomplishments, issues, and challenges experienced by Open University of Sri Lanka (OUSL) academics when offering the first cross-border professional development online course to train online tutors and mentors. The course was delivered exclusively online and facilitated by OUSL academics and e-mentors from the US...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate how university academics from three different cultural and linguistic backgrounds perceived their own cultural context and how it influences on online learning. Design/methodology/approach The views of 30 faculty members from Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Mauritius who engaged in a six-week professiona...

The article proposes a modified Design-Based Research (DBR) framework which accommodates the various socio-cultural factors that emerged in the longitudinal PA-HELP research study at Central University College (CUC) in Ghana, Africa. A transnational team of stakeholders from Ghana, Canada, and the USA collaborated on the development, implementation...

The paper offers practical recommendations on the implementation of a mobile learning project in a cross-cultural setting. This summary of lessons learned includes a brief account of barriers experienced in the first twelve months of the longitudinal PAHELP study in Ghana, Africa, and replicable solutions which emerged from the close collaboration...

This study was conducted at colleges in three countries (United States, Venezuela, and Spain) and across three academic disciplines (engineering, education, and business), to examine how experienced faculty define competencies for their discipline, and design instructional interaction for online courses. A qualitative research design employing in-d...

This paper discusses the results of a tutor mentor development program that utilized a community building model to train online tutors and mentors in higher education institutions and professional organizations in Sri Lanka. Based on WisCom; an instructional design model for developing online wisdom communities, this tutor mentor development progra...

This study explores factors that predict learner satisfaction and transfer of learning in an online educational program at a multinational corporation, established to improve organizational learning by providing training in technical skills. A mixed-methods design was used, selecting both quantitative methods (utilizing survey research) and qualita...

A study of university nursing students tested the effect of computer conference designs and advance organizers on critical thinking skills. Critical thinking, although not significantly different between three conference groups, was evident for groups in all three conference designs. Those conferences designed to facilitate critical inquiry showed...

This study examines cross‐cultural interpretations of icons and images drawn from US academic websites. Participants from Morocco, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and the USA responded to an online questionnaire containing 18 icons and images representing online functions and information types common on US academic websites. Participants supplied meanings for i...

This paper proposes a theoretical framework as a foundation for building online communities of practice when a suite of social networking applications referred to as collective intelligence tools are utilized to develop a product or solutions to a problem. Drawing on recent developments in Web 2.0 tools, research on communities of practice and rele...

This study examines cross-cultural interpretations of icons and images drawn from US academic websites. Participants from Morocco, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and the USA responded to an online questionnaire containing 18 icons and images representing online functions and information types common on US academic websites. Participants supplied meanings for i...

The estimated prevalence of clinically significant psychiatric and somatic symptoms in adults >1 year after the 2004 Asian tsunami is unknown. To estimate the prevalence of psychiatric and somatic symptoms and impairment in Sri Lanka 20-21 months after the 2004 Asian tsunami, and to assess coping strategies used by tsunami-affected individuals that...

Although research supports the use of telecommunications in distance education, the more important question ‘how best to use telecommunications in a given situation’ has largely eluded researchers. This is due to the failure to link questions generated by the problems of practice with the theoretical constructs contributing to the understanding of...

We discuss the development of an instructional design model, WisCom (Wisdom Communities), based on socio‐constructivist and sociocultural learning philosophies and distance education principles for the development of online wisdom communities, and the application and evaluation of the model in an online graduate course in the USA. The WisCom model...

This paper reports the results of a study which examined differences in perceptions of the meaning of icons and images drawn from US academic web sites. To provide a cross-cultural perspective, the study was conducted in the USA at the University of New Mexico; in Morocco at Al-Akhawayn University in Ifrane; and in Nawala, Nugegoda at the Open Univ...

Our pervasive adoption of CMC in higher education has far outpaced our understanding of the nature of CMC and, accordingly, how this medium should best be used to promote higher‐order learning (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, American Journal of Distance Education, 15(1), 7–23, 2001). Therefore, this study examined the relationship between peer inter...

THIS PAPER discusses the development of a new instructional design model based on socioconstructivist learning theories and distance education principles for the design of online wisdom communities and the efficacy of the model drawing on evaluation results from its implementation in Fall 2002. The model, Final Outcome Centered Around Learner (FOCA...

By using content analysis techniques to compare social construction of knowledge in online dialogues to concept maps generated to synthesize this knowledge construction, this study showed that concept maps are an effective tool to synthesize knowledge construction in online conferences. This finding was also supported by self-reported data in a mod...

This study tested the Adult Distance Study through Computer Conferencing (ADSCC) model developed by D. Eastmond (1994) to determine if learner readiness, online features, and computer mediated communication (CMC)-related learning approaches are associated with learner satisfaction in an academic computer conference. Participants were 50 students fr...

Employing survey and focus group data, this study examined if there are differences in perception of online group process and development between participants in Mexico and the United States of America (USA). Survey data indicated significant differences in perception for the Norming and Performing stages of group development. The groups also diffe...

This study tested the Adult Distance Study Through Computer Conferencing (ADSCC) model developed by Eastmond (1994), to determine if learner readiness, online features, and CMC‐related learning approaches are associated with learner satisfaction in an academic computer conference. All three variables were correlated with learner satisfaction and on...

The United States Department of Education Star Schools grant program funds innovative projects applying distance technology in education. One such grant resulting in the de-velopment of two instructional programs for elementary grades, Elementary German and Geonauts. Each of these projects featured a series of one-way video, two-way audio broadcast...

This study attempts to find appropriate interaction analysis/content analysis techniques that assist in examining the negotiation of meaning and co-construction of knowledge in collaborative learning environments facilitated by computer conferencing. The authors review strengths and shortcomings of existing interaction analysis techniques and propo...

Based on the GlobalEd inter‐university computer conference, this study examined how effective “social presence” is as a predictor of overall learner satisfaction in a text‐based medium. The stepwise regression analysis converged on a three‐predictor model revealing that social presence (the degree to which a person is perceived as “real” in mediate...

This study presented an analysis of learning styles of a sample of Sri Lankan Open University students using the LSI. Results indicate that the program of study is more likely to influence learning style than gender. It could also be assumed that the older students who were employed specifically in the PGDE program were influenced by the type of em...

This paper examines research on social presence theory and the implications for analyzing interaction, communication, collaborative learning, and the social context of computer-mediated communication (CMC). Two studies that examined whether social presence is largely an attribute of the communication medium or users' perception of the medium are di...

Most treatments of the concept of interaction in distance education have been based on Moore's (1989) discussion of three types of interaction: learner‐content, learner‐instructor, and learner‐learner. However, these previous discussions have failed to consider the interaction that occurs between the learner and the technologies used to deliver ins...

The interaction of adult learning styles and the media, methods of instruction, and group functioning in a distance learning class using audiographics and computer-mediated communication was studied and compared with similar interaction in non-equivalent traditional classes. One graduate class in theory and practice of distance education, taught at...

This study evaluates the Oklahoma Televised Instruction System, through an analysis of the student support services to include the resources available to the learner, the communications process characterized by the coordination services provided among the on-campus and distance sites, and the communication process characterized by the mechanical an...

Analysis of five biology and five biochemistry professional journal articles' use of the English present perfect tense revealed that both disciplines used the tense most frequently in the introduction and discussion sections, typically conveying the meaning of a past experience with current relevance. (CB)