Students' experiences of online critical discourse

This qualitative case study illustrates barriers to informal argumentation and reasoned debate, i.e., critical discourse, in online forums. The case is the computer conference of a 15-week, graduate-level humanities course offered entirely at a distance. Twelve students, all with families and careers, were enrolled in the course. We read all of their messages as they posted them, and we interviewed five of the students several times during the course. They provided three insights into our observation that the forums contained little critical discourse: 1) They did not orient to the conference as a forum for critical discourse, and worse, they had competing orientations; 2) they perceived critiques as personal attacks; and 3) they realized early on that critical discourse was a bothersome means to obtain their participation marks. Certain elements may ease some of these difficulties, including 1) well-structured learning activities with clearly defined roles for teachers and students, and 2) a method of assessing students' participation that reflects the time and effort required to engage in critical discourse.