ARE E-TUTORIALS ANTI-INTELLECTUAL?

by

Catherine Doherty
University of Queensland, Ipswich.

 

Abstract

The paper will reflect on the use of bulletin boards as sites and space for the equivalent of tutorial discussion, drawing on the experiences of a tutorial group based at Ipswich in the Graduate Entry Bachelor of Education. E-mail discussion environments have their own set of social practices, for those who are members of such communities. These bulletin board tutorials were a first experience of such for many of the students and the tutor. By importing practices and expectations from the traditional tutorial setting, some of us were often confronted with tensions between the playfulness of email discourse as displayed by the experienced e-mail chatters, and what would be considered appropriate in a face-to-face tutorial. There was also tension arising from the hybrid nature of email "talk". This paper will explore these issues using Halliday's concepts of textual field, tenor and mode, (Halliday, 1985), then derive some working conclusions on how to maximise the advantages of the electronic medium .

 

Introduction

This paper is definitely a case of reflection on practice - i.e. the practice came first. I confidently jumped into the new environment of electronic bulletin board discussion. However, despite being experienced and confident in a teaching/tutoring role, I found I was confronted, disappointed and frustrated about what happened in my electronic tutorial. I was disappointed about the toilet humour and bad language that cropped up repeatedly; I was frustrated by the tongue in cheek banter that trivialised the issues under discussion; and I was offended by some of the reactionary attitudes expressed. Not usually prudish by nature, I was surprised by the strength of my reaction to some of the postings. I later turned to the literature to help me reflect on what ensued and to try to make sense of it all. With the benefit of hindsight, I can see my concern was in part justified and in other ways misplaced.

My question is, "Are e-tutorials anti-intellectual?" In other words, is there something in the electronic medium that works against scholarly discussion of theoretical issues. Are we embracing a neutral technology that we can shape to our traditional purposes and discourses, or does the medium mediate the discourse - does it shape what happens? I don't want to be a tradeswoman that blames her tools, and quite happily take responsibility along with the group for what happened, but I am interested in whether there are aspects of electronic communication that act to magnify certain elements.

In this paper, I'll outline the context and the issues arising in the 'practice' I was involved in, then turn to what the literature has to say about electronic discourse and social roles in electronic environments. I'll typify the literature into the optimistic and the pessimistic schools of thought, and then review what happened in my e-tutorial - planned and otherwise - in light of this distinction. Finally, I venture a few generalised conclusions that will guide my future practice as a tutor in these environments, and which you also might find useful.

 

Context

My tutorial group were 18 boisterous graduate entry Bachelor of Education students at the Ipswich campus of UQ - pre-service teachers, very early in their four semester course. The group consisted of 6 females and 12 males, the vast majority of whom were mature-age students, with work and "real life" experience between their first degrees and this study. This meant that any semblance of uniformity that could be hoped for or assumed in an undergraduate group would not apply here. We suffered some attrition over the life of t he course, but interestingly the three who left the tutorial group, continued to participate in the bulletin board discussion for a while.

UQ Ipswich encourages the use of web-based teaching technologies as part of its vision and charter. As a teaching team, we were mindful of possible variations in technological literacy in the student group, and as a strategy consciously staged students' engagement with these technologies provided through WebCT. The year-long subject commenced in the traditional format of face-to-face lectures and tutorials. In what I'll term Stage 1, email and bulletin board functions were introduced in training sessions, then used as an adjunct to the traditional forums. Students were encouraged to "play" with the bulletin board, to ensure they could access and participate in the e-tutorial space. Tutor support was available to ensure access. This mode of discussion continued for 10 weeks, including six weeks of teaching practicum with students off campus. On their return from prac, the e-tutorials entered a new stage, replacing one of their two weekly contact hours, and were subject to assessment in terms of contribution and participation. As you can see, the group were well-known to each other, and as the WebCT software identifies the writer for each posting, the oft-cited "anonymity" of electronic communication did not apply in this context.

Stage 1 involved 141 student postings. The course coordinator and myself as tutor posted some kick off questions at intervals to prompt discussion, but only 34 of the student postings were on these tasks, or related topics. A further 5 postings started new threads of discussion related to the course matter. 18 postings were related to negotiating the bulletin board or about course administration. A staggering 82 involved inter-student communication - negotiating meetings, tossing jokes around, some light-hearted badgering and so forth. (Note: some postings served a number of purposes).

In terms of style, 21 postings by 6 participants were what I would term playful, poking fun, or making a spoof of the discussion topic. There were another 18 postings by 4 participants that I found offensive in their choice of language, subject matter, or the attitude conveyed. In retrospect, I honestly don't think that they were intended to offend, but in this context and at the time, I did take offence and thought the material or manner highly inappropriate. At the outset, and on a number of occasions throughout the period, the students' attention was brought to the university's code of internet practice, but this did not have any obvious effect, except for subsequent playful allusions to the "net police".

In terms of participation, 3 students did not post anything at all, 2 of whom were new to computers - so despite our best intentions, our "play" period did not really serve the ones who needed it the most. Otherwise frequencies of posting ranged from 2 to 42, (mode = 3) with 12 participants contributing between 2 and 11, and three other individuals contributing in turn 19, 20 and 42 items.

Stage 2 was a different matter. Assessment considerations impinged, so of the total 129 postings, 99 were on-task (who says extrinsic motivation doesn't work!), with 2 other postings initiating substantial new threads. Only 4 were about bulletin board and administrative procedures. 31 postings dealt with inter-student communication. 13 were playful in nature and at the time, I found 7 offensive. One individual was responsible for the majority of both the playful and the offensive postings. One of the previously silent students still did not post anything to the bulletin board during this stage. Of the other 15 students remaining at this stage, participation ranged from 1 to 24 postings (mode = 1). 8 students increased their number of postings as compared to Stage 1.

 

TABLE 1 - Frequency of student postings by purpose and style

Nature of postings	Stage One - "play" Frequency (%)	Stage Two - assessable Frequency (%)
Purpose:
On task	34    (24%)	99     (77%)
Initiates a new course-related thread	5     (3.5%)	2     (1.5%)
Inter-student matters	82    (58%)	31    (24%)
Administrative matters and bulletin board operation	18    (13%)	4     (3%)
Style:
Playful	21    (15%)	13    (10%)
Offensive	18    (13%)	7     (5.5%)
Total student postings:	141*	129*
Number of participants:	18	16

*postings could display more than one purpose or style.

Beyond what happened on the bulletin board, it should also be reported that two students independently expressed their distaste for the nature of the bulletin board's discourse - which suggests that I wasn't the only one being offended. One student took offence at the attitudes being expressed, and composed a strongly worded reply, but lost heart and decided not to post it - the public declaration was considered too permanent, or perhaps too confrontational within a known group. The other student basically withdrew from the forum, voting with silence. On another occasion, a student who had comfortably posted inter-student communications in Stage 1 expressed a disabling reluctance to post task-oriented responses for fear of the group judging its merit.

In their anonymous course evaluations (TEVAL), the student group displayed mixed feelings about the usefulness of the bulletin board for tutorials:

I found the bulletin boards useful in the subject:

Strongly agree	Agree	Uncertain	Disagree	Strongly Disagree
9%	18%	36%	18%	18%

 

Literature

Halliday's systemic functional linguistics positions texts in their cultural context. The context will predispose participants to use certain designated genre appropriate to the setting. The genre will be realised in linguistic choices about field (the content area), tenor (the relationship between text participants) and mode (the medium of communication). The postings that I found confronting were basically challenging what I thought would have been shared assumptions about suitable wordings for:

• * the field (e.g. no swearing, talking about school teacher and students in an objective professional manner);
• the tenor (e.g. some degree of decorum, mutual respect and serious application, given that I was present as a teacher and they were acting as students); and
• the mode ( i.e. written - or is it?).

As a novice, I was basically importing the game rules from a face-to-face tutorial into the new electronic mode, and hoping that a bit of an academic writing/discussion style might surface as well, given that we were typing our responses, and could take time to muster our thoughts. I was completely overlooking the fact that electronic communication is an emerging mode of its own, and that the social context of e-communication, for those who are members of that culture, reconfigures what is appropriate genre, with different expectations for field and tenor choices. The fact that the practices are social constructions by those who participate in those forums creates the possibility of an outsider being unaware of what is taken-for-granted by insiders.

Electronic communication has been termed a hybrid (Snyder, 1997) - drawing from both spoken and written language forms. Moran and Hawisher ( 1997, p.80) liken email to a baby which resembles the parents, speech and writing, in part but in their synthesis creates new ways and new spaces. Snyder suggests that "these technologies alter how language, both written and visual, is produced, processed and used." (1997, XX) In particular, email is distinguished by its ease of retrieval, its speed, the absence of para-linguistic cues, and its asynchronicity. These assets come with decreased security, and some interesting conflicts between:

• its seemingly ephemeral, fleeting nature (like speech) with the fixity of print;
• its illusion of intimacy with its possibility of being endlessly "forwarded";
• its sense of communal "warmth" and the geographical distances or anonymity possible;
• its playful informality and spontaneity (like speech) and its decontextualised audience.

As one's tone of voice doesn't carry in cyberspace, new print conventions such as 'emoticons' and smileys have evolved to overcome these constraints (Moran and Hawisher, 1997, p.90).

In e-tutorials, we have created yet another hybrid - the formal institutional purpose, requirements and configuration of the tutorial group, imposed on this informal, playful, and intimate medium. Yates (cited in Moran and Hawisher, 1997, p. 95) describes how email text is unique in its high proportion of modal auxiliary usage (may, might, could, should...) and its high proportion of first and second person. This suggests that it could be an ideal environment for tentative exploration of ideas as hoped for in tutorial discussion. Case studies of electronic tutorials tend to promote optimistic descriptions of what the medium can offer, whilst acknowledging that are some problems in the transition.

When it comes to educational applications, the optimistic school of thought sees email as an inclusive learning environment. It is considered to "free" students from the stress of classroom, increase their freedom of expression, reduce anxiety as responses can be prepared in one's own timeframe, and facilitate closer relations within the student group as it encourages greater honesty (Beauvois, 1995; Lowry et al., 1994). In her study of bulletin board usage in foreign language courses, Beauvois also highlights the "decentralised", student-driven nature of bulletin board discussion, a real advantage when communication in the target language per se is the goal. Her study also supported the optimists' common prediction that shy students "marginalised" in face-to-face classes are more likely to contribute in electronic discussion (for example Miller 1994). Morrison (1992) also asserts that computer conferencing "encourages comments from all students based upon levels of ideas rather than type of personality." (p.45) Email is seen to enhance access to course learning as people can log on when convenient to them, and not be tied to timetabled contact hours. Morrison further advocates computer conferencing as a way to practice the collaborative decision-making skills desired in the workplace

On the other hand, the same literature also acknowledges that the medium of electronic communication poses some problems. First and most obviously, computer literacy and the absence of technical assistance could be limiting factors (Lowry et al., 1994). Secondly, groups tend to favour short postings for technical reasons (Lowry et al., 1994), which could favour the superficial over more complex arguments. The environment also creates its own anxieties:

The participants were acutely conscious of the fact that they were exposing themselves to others - to the degree that extra caution was required. (Morrison, 1992, p.46)

Miller (1994) approached her study of communication patterns in her electronic tutorial at University of Minnesota as an inquiry into intercultural communication, in recognition that the medium does not and should not simply equate with what happens in traditional tutorials. She describes successful and unsuccessful experiences, students who go missing in good weather, students who adopt the role of class clown, and more disturbing, the general avoidance of overt disagreement when conflict arose. Difference of opinion was typically handled with the verbalisation of partial agreement or humorous deflection to protect inter-personal relations. She flags the use of humour and sarcasm as problematic in this environment as "authors must overcome their reliance on non-textual cues to indicate the statement is not to be taken seriously." (p. 10)

To return to Halliday's distinction between field, tenor and mode, it is obvious from this literature that the electronic mode is a powerful variable to consider. Though a newcomer, it brings its own kind of hybrid vigour into the equation, and can substantially affect the linguistic register used. Those who are 'socialised' into the discourse of open email, chat rooms, and bulletin boards, will draw on this knowledge of how things are done in an electronic environment. As experienced operators, they may be prolific contributors, at least at the outset, when the tone of group discussion is set. If this is not effective or appropriate in e-tutorials, the challenge is to create a new conducive culture for that particular purpose and context.

 

Revisiting my E-Tutorial

Reviewing these cases, I could recognise many of the positive and negative qualities they describe. To understand what happened in my e-tutorials, I now realise:

• The cultural setting of a university tutorial (i.e. the field and tenor expectations) for me made the linguistic behaviour inappropriate. This was in conflict with the conoscenti's culture of bulletin board discussion, for whom the electronic mode changed those boundaries. In the electronic context, communication is not teacher centred - I'm not at the centre, issuing turn-taking rights. It would be a stilted discussion if I did so. The forum offered space for students to talk to students - so the tenor reflected these relationships rather then the teacher/student tenor I was expecting. What's more, on the bulletin board, I could "hear" what would be muttered as an aside in the face-to-face tutorial. I was privy to exchanges that weren't intended for me. I now realise that I can treat the inter-student postings as I would chats in the back row.
• There remains the problem that some students were excluded and offended by the informal style. The volume of the contributions in this style by the dominant participants set the tone to an extent. As a tutor, I would not have tolerated this imbalance in participation rate in a face-to-face tutorial. Interestingly, some of the more reticent students made reference to people "clogging up the space", so were obviously aware of the dominant participants dominating. While a few students were assertive enough to attempt refuting the provocative tongue in cheek arguments in the second stage, others voted with their silence, creating a false sense of complicity. This is similar to Miller's (1994) observation of students avoiding overt disagreement. In future, I would try to involve the students in chairing or mediating the discussion, open windows for disagreement, flag any obvious imbalance, fish for counter-arguments and invite silent individuals into the debate.
• Given the marked change in tenor and field choices when assessment impinged in Stage 2, I would support assessment of e-tutorial participation. Assessment could reinforce the academic purpose of the discussion, and could help resolve some of the tensions and contradictions in the setting.
• The "tone of voice" issue will remain a challenge. Am I hearing sarcasm, cynicism, self-deprecation or tongue in cheek wit? As Miller (1994) suggests, authors take a risk with humour. WebCT does not offer that many clues - only capitals in terms of format tools. Experienced e-mailers in my group used emoticons, non-alphanumeric characters to designate swearing, and extended spelling to mimic voice stress. One answer would be to introduce all participants to such chat-room aids, and encourage clues [e.g. a wink ;-) ] to reduce the risk of being misinterpreted. Miller's interpretation of the class clown (1994, p. 7) also helped me re-construe the persistence of one student to continue with playful and offensive postings. In her case study she suggests this was a way of the student being able to pose provocative but legitimate questions to the group for exploration, without having to own the attitude they purport. The reactionary attitudes that I found confronting did in part goad the group to consider and reject these extreme views. My attempts to quell this discussion probably truncated a valuable exchange. In an anonymous TEVAL course evaluation, one student expressed exactly that opinion:

  "Attempts to censor language and comments on the bulletin board should be avoided. Even 'unprofessional' language can make a contribution. The terms responsible language and responsible usage inhibit expression and while this may seem at odds with school language, it is NOT school. We are all adults and should be able to communicate as such. If the university feels that it is acceptable to reduce our contact hours, it should expect us to formulate our own systems of interaction unencumbered by moralistic rules and regulations. After all some of the perceived 'inadequate' contributions stimulated the most debate"

• E-tutorials add a vibrant new space to the traditional university instructional modes, where students can own the discussion. The student quoted above obviously feels ownership of the space and process. They can start their own lines of enquiry, share experiences and insights, and offer mutual support. They add value to courses such as ours where students are immersed in dispersed off-campus experiences, such as teaching practicum, by retaining a dynamic link with staff and each other. In our second stage, I also feel that the task-related postings acted as model responses for less confident students. Captured in print as opposed to speech, students could benefit from each other's contributions and see how it's done. In traditional university modes, students rarely benefit from each other's achievements in assessment tasks.

 

Conclusion

We are in a stage of transition here, and this is just a snapshot case study of one moment in a process. Electronic environments are the new frontier. Having been in school for the conversion from imperial to metric measures, and from old to new currencies, I can testify that a lot of energy goes into these transition periods, but future generations don't have to suffer learning the conversion equations. Hopefully, keyboarding skills will soon be second nature to our new school graduates, and the use of electronic means of communication will be naturalised, and unremarkable. The 'clash of cultures' and any problematic fit thus created may be transitory phenomena.

However, those of us here now must make the transition. I can recognise stages in my own growing comfort and ease with e-communication. Firstly, the earnest and self-conscious careful novice composer, then my growing familiarity with the conventions and increased risk taking, to now a second nature immediacy. Our students will be experiencing various stages, but sharing the same space. It has to be a productive space for all. So to answer my questions, whether e-tutorials are anti-intellectual, my answer is, "It depends."

 

References:

Beauvois, M. (1995). E-talk: attitudes and motivation in computer-assisted classroom discussion. Computers and the Humanities, 28(3), 177-190.

Halliday, M. A. K. (1985) An Introduction to Functional Grammar. London: Edward Arnold

Lowry, M., P. Koneman, R. Osman-Jouchoux, and B. Wilson (1994). Electronic discussion groups: using e-mail as an instructional strategy. Tech Trends, 39(2), 22-24.

Miller, L. (1994) "Computer-based comunication and the creation of group identity" or "Questions we could be asking about group interaction via computer." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Speech Communication Association.

Moran, C. and G. Hawisher (1997). The rhetorics and languages of electronic mail. In I. Snyder (Ed.), Page to Screen: Taking Literacy into the Electronic Era. (pp. 80 - 101) St Leonards, NSW: Allen and Unwin.

Morrison, J. (1992). The computer conference: adaptive problem-solving within a spontaneous Technological Framework. Educational Technology, 32(12), 45-47.

Snyder, I. (Ed.). (1997). Page to Screen: Taking Literacy into the Electronic Era. St Leonards, NSW: Allen and Unwin.

 

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