Presented by OLENA GOROSHKO (KHARKIV, UKRAINE)

1. Presented by OLENA GOROSHKO(KHARKIV, UKRAINE) GENDER ASPECTS OF DISTANCE EDUCATION

2. Common Research Questions in Distance Education: • Is technology-assisted distant teaching as effective as traditional face-to-face (FTF) teaching? • What factors determine the most effective mix of technology in a given distant teaching situation? • What are the characteristics of effective distant students and teachers? • How important is teacher-student and student-student interaction in the distance education process and in what form (s) can this interaction most effectively take place? • What are the characteristics of effective learning environments since distant classrooms reflect a rich diversity of social backgrounds (ethnicity, race, gender, age, social status etc.) which students bring to the virtual classroom? (Potapova, Shigina 2003: 94-95)

3. Distance versus Traditional Education: • Achievement on various tests tends to be higher for distant as opposed to traditional students (Souder 1993), yet no significant difference in positive attitudes toward course material is apparent between distant and traditional education (Martin, Rainey 1993). • FTF learning is perceived to be better organized and more clearly presented than distance education (Egan et al. 1991). • The organization and reflection needed to effectively teach at a distance often improves traditional teaching skills. • Future research should focus on the critical factor in determining student achievement: the design of learning itself (Whittington 1987).

4. Impact of DL on Education: DL is transforming education. It provides opportunities for learning anytime, anywhere. It provides access to a wealth of resources and new forms of communication and virtual communities.

5. Common Themes in DL: The first of the these themes, is concerned with the pedagogy of DL, and in particular the development of effective models for implementation, mechanisms for embedding the understandings gained from learning theory into the design of learning technologies and their use in learning and teaching.

6. Common Themes in DL: The second area is research into the underpinning technology of DL, including the development of the technical architecture to support different forms of learning and teaching, different mechanisms of monitoring and tracking activity online, exploration of the nature of different types of virtual presence, context sensitive, mobile and smart technologies and the hardware and software requirements.

7. Common Themes in DL: The third area researches issues which arise at organizational level, including effective strategies for integrating online courses within existing systems, development of organizational knowledge, new methods and processes for developing a learning organization and for the seamless linking of different information processes and systems (E-Learning: The Hype and the Reality by Conole, G.,2004).

8. Common Research DL Problems: • Interdisciplinarity and in particular the notion of multiple voices. This is concerned with how different research perspectives influence the area and also how problems in the practice of different disciplines differ in the adoption and use of learning technologies. • Access and inclusion, which includes issues around the widening participation agenda, equity, access to technologies, barriers to inclusion and issues around the nature and extent of the digital divide. • Change and in particular understanding its relationship to learning technologies. This is also concerned with motivational issues as well as exploring the drivers and rationale for change and the consequences and impact. This theme also addressed the strategies for managing and enabling change and mechanisms for implementation.

9. Common Research DL Problems: • Convergenceand interoperability, which includes exploration of different forms of convergence (technological, pedagogical, organizational, sectors, institutions, etc). This also considers issues associated with scalability and globalization and the underpinning standards needed to support interoperability. • Interactivity and social interaction and in particular the multimodal and social dimensions of interactivities. This explores the interactivity of different tools and the nature of the medium. It also considers interactivity at different levels of organizations and the ways in which boundaries and functional groupings have blurred as a consequence of new technologies. Finally it considers the potential of technologies in terms of enhancing communication and collaboration and in building new communities and networks. • Politicsis a very strong theme that runs across all learning technology research. This in part relates to the over hyping which occurs leading to an over expectation of what is possible, is in part down to different local agendas and infighting and partly arises from a recognition of the major changes and impact that technologies can have (Ibid).

10. Framework of DL research covers the following areas: • Approach to DL - How do we develop an approach (methods, terminology, models, etc) to provide precise, accurate and complete representation of the end to end e-learning domain? • Metrics- How do we develop an appropriate set of metrics to describe aspects of DL? • User requirements - How can we develop appropriate models, processes and techniques for gathering and understanding user requirements? • Evaluation - How do we design and build systems with inherent monitoring, feedback, evaluation and control? • Understanding the learning process- How do we develop appropriate metrics and models to characterize the learning and social practices of individuals and groups in learning situations and how do we characterize educational materials and contexts in ways which will relate to those aspects?

11. Framework of DL Research covers the following areas: • Understanding the learner- How can we develop better methods for understanding what learners are really doing online? • Pedagogical models and practice -What is the gap between the potential in the pedagogical models and what is being done in practice? • Capturing experience - How do we capture experience in a way that we build it back into design and implementation? • Ideas and practice- What is the gap between teachers' expression of their teaching ideas and values and how these are operationalized and translated into practice? • Intended and actual use - What is the gap between the intended uses and actual uses of online content in the context of socio-cultural differences and diversity? • Reuse- What are the success and failure factors for reuse of materials? • Assessment - Is there a gap between what we think we are testing and what we are actually testing? (Carusi, Conole et al., 2004)

12. WHY ARE LEARNERS SUCCESSFUL? • are voluntarily seeking further education; • have strong post-secondary education goals with expectations for higher grades (Schlosser, Anderson 1994); • are highly motivated, self-disciplined and older; • are willing to initiate requests to tutors for assistance; • possess a more serious attitude toward the courses and employment in a field where career advances can be readily achieved through academic upgrading in a distance education environment (Ross, Powell 1990); • have previously completed a college degree (Bernt, Bugbee 1993).

13. Distance Learning in Ukraine: Internet in Ukraine has just begun its development and attracts more and more sociologists, psychologists and educational experts. Modern Ukrainian Internet requires increasing number of educational, library and IT resources. Also great attention should be paid to improving the information being located in Internet.

14. Legislature Basis of DL in Ukraine • THE LAW OF NATIONAL INFORMATIZATION PROGRAM OF UKRAINE (http://www.space.com.ua/gateway/pravo_new.nsf/0/2390b17eeed2178fc2256ced0063b402?OpenDocument ); • REGULATIONS ABOUT DISTANCE EDUCATION,September 23, 2003 (http://www.agronmc.com.ua/doc3.htm ); • PROGRAM OF DISTANCE EDUCATION SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT for 2004-2006.

15. Specific Ukrainian Situation: • Wish of DL developers in Ukraine to receive material awards quickly and without many efforts (for example, mixing DL with instruction by correspondence). Without trying positive features of Distance Learning and without doing anything good to instruction by correspondence it is dangerous to discredit of the very idea of distance learning by similar tendencies. • Insufficient development of technical basis of DL (for example, difference in the level of students’ interaction). • Insufficient methodological preparation of DL developers (for example, low level of technology, technical methods and learning process organization which make the distance learning process inefficient). • Teacher-centered approach prevails both in Ukrainian FTF and DL Education.

16. At present time in Ukraine there are three main centers, being connected with distance learning development in: • Lviv (Distance Learning Institute, National University “Lviv Politechnic”), • Kyiv (Distance Learning Center, National Academy of State Management of the President of Ukraine) • Kharkiv (National Technical University “Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute”).

17. DISTANCE LEARNING IN NATIONAL TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY “KHARKIV POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE” • NTU “KhPI” ( http://www.kpi.kharkov.ua ) is engaged in distance learning since 1997, having 8-years experience in distance courses creation and supporting distance learning process. • NTU “KhPI” has more than 50 distance courses (http://dl.kpi.kharkov.ua), being developed by lecturers of the University, implements actively distance learning technologies into the process of University entrants, students and teachers preparation.

18. DL IN NATIONAL TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY “KHARKIV POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE” • One of the first organizations, being created in NTU “KhPI” for the distance learning development in 1997 was Research Laboratory of Distance Education (http://dl.kpi.kharkov.ua/techn/rle), which developed a Virtual Learning Environment “Web-Class KhPI”. The Laboratory pays a lot of attention to methodological side of distance learning, creation of DL instructions for University lecturers, leading trainings, seminars in DL for NTU “KhPI” lecturers and other lecturers of Ukraine. • Many departments of NTU “KhPI” have their own distance courses, which are widely used in the learning process. One of such departments is the Cross-Cultural Communication and Modern Languages Department (http://users.kpi.kharkov.ua/ccfl/techn/gor/default.asp ), which, in spite of the young age, already has 6 distance courses, where the newest methods of teaching modern languages with the help of Information and Communication Technologies are used. • NTU “KhPI” is one of the leaders in Distance Education development in Ukraine, being a member of Distance Learning Academy (http://www.uapa-dlc.org.ua/ado/), taking part in Ukrainian and International Conferences in Distance Learning, collaborating with many European and American organizations.

19. MAIN OBJECTIVES: • to make gender-based ideologies explicit so that our national education will be reformed in a way to eliminate gender-biases and so that a more gender-friendly learning environment is created. • to raise awareness of how language, learning styles and strategies shaped our understanding of the social world, our relationships to each other and our social identities (i.e. to raise awareness of the constitutive nature of discourse).

20. LEARNING STYLEhas been defined as “overall patterns that give general direction to learning behavior” (Oxford) Learning styles must be: • analytic v. global; • visual v. auditory; • hands-on v. tactile/kinesthetic; • cooperative v. separate; • reflective v. impulsive.

21. Paths of Knowing: Separate Knowers: • are concerned with controlling or mastering their environment; • adopt a highly critical and adversarial stance when disagreeing with another; • force a choice if there appears to be opposing views of the truth; • are independent; • are wary of collaborative learning; • use analytical thinking styles; • look for logic and consistency as signposts of truth; • prefer to keep their thoughts and feelings separate.

22. Paths of Knowing: Connected Knowers: • are concerned about remaining connected to others and to the environment; • adopt a narrative or descriptive stance when disagreeing; • search for a way to incorporate the ideas of others in the big picture; • are interdependent; • prefer collaborative learning; • use holistic thinking styles; • test for truth by using believability measures; • are better able to integrate their thoughts and feelings during learning tasks.

23. Male Style of Discourse: • Strong, forceful assertions • Self-promotion • Presuppositions • Rhetorical questions, abstract examples • Authoritative orientation, ownership of ideas • Challenges others, competitive, adversarial • Humor/sarcasm/mild profanity/sexual innuendo • Directness • Task-orientation • Control of cross-gender conversations

24. Female Style of Discourse : Attenuated assertions, consensual • Apologies • Approbation • Explicit justifications • Concrete examples (often from experience) • Questions seeking answers • Personableness • Supports others, cooperative • May employ some features of male language in order to be taken seriously

25. Theoretical Background of Research: • Focus on activity as a basic unit for the analysis; • Talk and genderco-vary; • Community of Practice Theorywhich focuses on the constructive practices of a group – especially mutual engagement of learning a jointly negotiated practice of gender rather than presupposing gender differences as a starting point. This approach emphasizes the learning and mutability in gendered linguistic displays across groups. The notion of shared activity presents the core item in this theory.

26. DATA CONCERNING GENDER-DIFFERENTIATION IN LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: • While there are quiet pupils of both sexes the more outspoken pupils tend to be boys. • Boys also tend to 'stand out' more than girls. Michelle Stanworth (1983) notes that teachers initially found some girls 'hard to place’. Boys also referred to a 'faceless' bunch of girls. • Boys are generally more assertive than girls. For instance, a US study of whole-class talk (Sadker and Sadker, 1985) found boys were eight times more likely than girls to speak out.

27. DATA CONCERNING GENDER-DIFFERENTIATION IN LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: • Girls and boys tend to sit separately; in group work, pupils usually elect to work in single-sex rather than mixed-sex groups. • When they have the choice girls and boys often discuss or write about gender-typed topics. • Boys are often openly disparaging towards girls. • In practical subjects, such as science, boys hog the resources. • In practical subjects girls 'fetch and carry' for boys and do much of the cleaning up, collecting books and so on.

28. DATA CONCERNING GENDER-DIFFERENTIATION IN LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: • Boys occupy, and are allowed to occupy, more space, outside—for example, in play areas. • Teachers often make distinctions between girls and boys – for disciplinary or administrative reasons or to motivate pupils to do things. • Teachers give more attention to boys than to girls. • Topics and materials for discussion are often chosen to maintain boys’ interests.

29. DATA CONCERNING GENDER-DIFFERENTIATION IN LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: • Teachers tend not to perceive disparities between the numbers of contributions from girls and boys. Sadker and Sadker (1985) showed US teachers a video of classroom talk in which boys made three times as many contributions as girls — but teachers believed the girls had talked more. • Teachers accept certain behavior (such as calling out) from boys not from girls. • Female teachers may themselves be subject to harassment from male pupils. • 'Disaffected' girls tend to opt out quietly at the back of the class whereas disaffected boys make trouble. (Swann 1993).

30. STUDENTS’ PROFILE: • Adult professionals studying for PhD’s degrees (English for Academic Purposes) and for adults’ non-degree programs (English for Special Purposes) in NTU “KhPI”; • Over the age of 23; • Science and engineering, management and economics background; • Career-orientated and highly motivated; • Russian and Ukrainian mother tongues; • Gender (Males – 50 / Females - 50).

31. Material: • Online messages posted in course e-mails and forum; • Thread of online chats; • Questionnaire in the form of course evaluation. See the site: (http://dl.kpi.kharkov.ua)

32. Research Objects: • Participation Barriers (dispositional, situational, institutional); • Communication Patterns; • Learning Styles (cooperative/separate).

33. RESEARCH METHODS: Institutional Barriers Questionnaire: • “What can you tell about the pace of learning?” (5 variants of answer given) • “Was it difficult for you to combine your learning with your full-time activity?” (5 variants of answer given) Situational Barriers Questionnaire: “What kind of difficulties did you experience during learning? • technical (restrictions in access to computer; unfriendly learning space, lack of computer skills) • format of instruction • lack of time • etc. Dispositional Barriersis researched on: • frequency of on-line messages • replies to messages • initiation of discussions • number of replicas in chats • participation in forum • etc.

34. LEARNING STYLES: • Connected Style:places emphasis on relationships, is empathetic in nature, and exposes preferences to learn in an environment where cooperation is stressed rather than competition. • Separate Style: demonstrates a separate, autonomous, certain, abstract character or exhibits a controlling nature

35. Research Methods for Communication Patterns: (categories used for data analysis of gender gap): • Containing “I" • Containing  CAPPED words • Concerns about grades • Concerns about fast pace • Average number of words per message • Average number of sentences per message, etc.

36. Results: • males posted more messages than female students; • either male or female online students posted a question, more females responded than males; • the content of male messages often had a tone of certainty. Males sent 76.7% of all messages that had a tone of certainty; • most male messages were also shorter than female messages (the exception were jokes). The body of these messages doesn’t contain any references to self, personal experiences, or family, nor had any additional words other than statements.

37. Results of Learning Style Study: • female students place emphasis on relationships, are empathetic in nature, and prefer to learn in an environment, where cooperation is stressed rather than competition; • female messages did not contain the tone of certainty male messages exhibited. Instead the content was often empathetic. In contrast to male messages, female messages were tempered with polite words acknowledging the original sender. For example, many female students attempted to modify their responses when they disagreed with a previous message by slightly agreeing at the start of their response; • female messages contained the niceties people often use when they care about relationships • similar to FTF female students, women online preferred to learn in a connected manner because data patterns suggested that cooperation was used as a learning tool. For example, more females than males asked questions. Female students asked for help from other students on such things as course assignments, tips on getting through the program, saving time and money on getting textbooks, and obtaining grades. Female students are seemed to prefer learning from other students rather than going through formal channels for information.

38. In conclusion, findings showed gender differences for online students indicating males prefer to learn in a separate manner while female students prefer to learn in a more connected style.

39. Results on Participation and Dispositional Barriers: • For women who lack basic technical skills (knowledge of software, etc.) the institutional barriers are much higher. • Also women worried much more about the pace of distant teaching, which became a serious situational barrier for them. • Dispositional barriers for online males were lower because their self-perception and attitudes were higher.

40. Summary: Similar to traditional learning environments, female distant-learning students had high institutional, situational, and dispositional participation barriers. These were much higher than those for males. When lack of technical skills, fears about distance education, and lower confidence about the nature of the medium of CMC are combined with these barriers, findings suggest participation barriers might be even higher for CMC-based distance education female students than female students in FTF learning environment.

41. Comparative Paradigm: • Women were not so silenced in local context; • There were fewer jokes. Sexual jokes were minimal (it doesn’t pertain a local academic discourse at all); • Dispositional and situational barriers (concerning computer skills, access to computers, etc.) were much higher for Ukrainian female students.

42. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: • To create an environment which provides equal opportunity for both the separated male and connected female learning styles. • To develop programs that provide alternative tracks or instructional sequences depending on identified learner needs and preferences. • The tutor in distance education environment must act as a facilitator who constantly looks for ways for students to build a sense of community. • Small-group instruction must become a common teaching strategy for distance education.

43. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: • take into account not only the organizational contextual factors, but also the gender of the students; • students should be informed of the acceptable etiquette of the online environment; • polite conversation should be the norm.Males seem to dominate the online learning environment the same as in FTF environments and tend to exhibit higher confidence levels. However, in the online environment male domination could literally last for days. To combat this training should be provided on how to encourage females to post messages while asking males to subside if they notice a pattern of male domination.

44. Practices which could be implemented to lower participation barrier are: • to use special procedures (orientation classes) for the technical aspects of learning at a distance; • a strong technical support of learning; • procedures that weigh carefully the use of short-term courses using CMC-based technology must be developed. • optimal learning time is often achieved through the use of courses of longer duration.

45. Thank you for attention!!! And everybody who is engaged in DL constantly must remember that all technologies may create only opportunities for doing things in new and different ways, but only people can actually harness these possibilities…