Technology,Time,and Space or What Does it Mean to Be Present? A Study of the Culture of a Distance Education Class

Abstract

Qualitative research methods were used to analyze a three-hour (48 contact hours) distance education course. Analysis suggests that strong teaching skills and classroom management skills were necessary to conduct the course. Far-site independence of movement, talk, and turn taking required special give and take between students and the instructor. Modifications of ordinary class behavior on the part of students and the instructor were noted. In addition, the ramifications of separation by time and space between instructors and students were discussed. Technologies allow communication across time and space but this separation becomes an artifact of some emerging technologies. Is separation in time and space a problematic phenomenon? An important question may be: What, if anything, does it mean to be physically present?

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Lincoln

Y. S.

Guba

, Naturalistic Inquiry, Sage Publications, Beverly Hills, California, 1985.

Strauss

Corbin

, Basics of Qualitative Research, Sage Publications, Newbury Park, California, 1990.

Patton

M. Q.

, Qualitative Evaluation and Research Methods (2nd Edition), Sage Publications, Newbury Park, California, 1990.

Miles

M. B.

Huberman

A. M.

, Qualitative Data Analysis (2nd Edition), Sage Publications, Newbury Park, California, 1994.

Polanyi

, The Tacit Dimension, Doubleday and Company, Gloucester, Massachusetts, 1966.

Goffman

, Frame Analysis, Harper Colophon Books, New York, 1974.

Altheide

D. L.

, Creating Reality, Sage Publications, Beverly Hills, California, 1976.

Fleming

Levy

, Instructional Method Design (2nd Edition), Educational Technology Publications, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1992.

Leiter

, A Primer on Ethnomethodology, Oxford University Press, New York, 1980.

10.

Greene

, Reflection and Passion in Teaching, Journal of Curriculum and Supervision, 2, pp. 68–81, 1986.

11.

Taylor

W. D.

Swartz

J. D.

, The Emerging Knowledge Crisis in Instruction Technology, in Preparing Educators with Essential Media Competencies, Shorey

M. E.

Evans

A. D.

(eds.), The Ohio State Educational Library/Media Association, Columbus, Ohio, pp 141–152, 1988.

12.

Anyon

, Social Class and School Knowledge, Curriculum Inquiry, 11, pp. 3–41, 1981.

13.

Rorty

, Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1994.

14.

Miller

D. L.

, George Herbert Meade: Self, Language and the World, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois, 1973.

15.

Dewey

, Types of Thinking, Philosophical Library, New York, 1984.

16.

Bazin

, What is Cinema? Gray

(selected and trans.), University of California Press, Berkeley, California, 1967.

17.

Lewis

C. S.

, The Abolition of Man, in Philosophy and Technology: Readings in the Philosophical Problems of Technology, Mitcham

Mackey

(eds.), The Free Press, New York, 1983.

18.

Brown

, Learning from Education at the Open University, British Journal of Educational Technology, 13:3, pp. 217–236, 1982.

19.

Stoll

, Silicon Snake Oil, Anchor Books, Doubleday, New York, 1996.

20.

Lewis

C. S.

, Surprised by Joy, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York, 1955.

21.

Bateson

, Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity, Bantam Books, New York, 1979.

22.

Hall

E. T.

, Beyond Culture, Anchor Books, Garden City, New York, 1977.

23.

Hall

E. T.

, The Hidden Dimension, Anchor Books, Garden City, New York, 1969.

24.

Bruner

, Acts of Meaning, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1990.