The Ability of College Students to Think Critically as Displayed in Online Discussion

The researcher employed the framework of Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2001) to report the ability of college students to think critically, as displayed in a blended learning strategy that combines discussion in a setting face-to-face with communication through computers, and to explore the impact of class discussion on the outcomes of perceived cognitive and social learning. Twenty-six students, with an intermediate level of English proficiency, participated in this eight-week study. Transcripts of messages among students in the discussion board were analyzed and a questionnaire was administrated at the end of the course to ask students about how they perceived the effect of online discussions on their learning and class interaction. The results show that the distribution of messages into cognitive presence categories is similar to that found previously: most messages belonged to the explorative category with a few integration messages, and few triggering events containing no solution messages. Students engaged in interaction and critical thinking, and demonstrated more profound thinking during discussion inside their class than outside. With regard to perceived learning outcomes of students resulting from blended learning, most students agreed that significant cognitive benefits can be gained from discussions via a computer. Learning outcomes of both social and cognitive nature included sharing views and understanding various perspectives. Students reported that they had more opportunities to work together in a learning community. 此研究採用2001年Garrison、Anderson和Archer的架構，來描述大學生批判性思考的能力，該能力是指結合了面對面討論、以及電腦上溝通的混成學習策略；並且探討課堂討論對於認知與社會互動學習結果的影響。26名英語中級程度的學生參與此為期8週的研究。資料分析包括學生們在討論版上的訊息，以及在課堂的最後所進行的一份問卷，此問卷旨在詢問學生們如何看待線上討論，對其學習及課堂互動的影響。研究結果顯示認知領域的討論訊息與以前所發現的結果類似：大部分的訊息是屬於含有一些整合訊息的探究類型，以及極少數訊息是有關於沒有任何解決方式的觸發事件。就致力於互動行為以及批判性的思考來說，學生們在課堂內比起在課堂外，更能在討論中表現出充分的思考。至於混成學習的結果，大部分的學生贊同透過線上討論能獲得認知上顯著的成長；而關於社會互動以及認知上的學習結果包括了不同觀點的分享與理解。學生們表示在學習社群中，他/她們更有機會一起學習了。