Outcome 5a: Apply the Community of Inquiry framework to set the stage for a collaborative and supportive environment in your online class.

Community of Inquiry

Elements

Online students can easily feel disconnected. The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework created by Rourke, Anderson, & Garrison (2000) helps online instructors create online communities. The CoI is comprised of three essential elements: social presence, teaching presence, and cognitive presence.

Social Presence: The ability of learners to project their personal characteristics into the community of inquiry, thereby presenting themselves as "real people."
Teaching Presence: The design, facilitation, and direction of cognitive and social processes for the purpose of realizing personally meaningful and educationally worthwhile learning outcomes.
Cognitive Presence: The extent to which the participants in any particular configuration of a community of inquiry are able to construct meaning through sustained communication.

You can also read Garrison, Anderson,& Archer's (2000) foundational article Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education for more detailed information.

CoI Framework

This visual representation of the CoI Framework illustrates the interconnectedness of the CoI Elements.

CoI FrameworkCoI Framework by Michael Hagen (as cited in Garrison, Cleveland-Innes, & Vaughan, 2000)

Alternatively, there is an interactive version on the CoI website.

Instructor Presence at UNL

Dr. Sriyani Tidball created this brief introductory video for her face-to-face class, but the same principles apply in an online context. In the video she expresses expectations of her students and sets a constructive tone to welcome her students to the class.

For more information about developing an online community, read the Instructor Presence literature review.

References

Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000). Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education. Internet and Higher Education, 2(2–3), 87–105. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1096-7516(00)00016-6
Garrison, D. R., Cleveland-Innes, M., & Vaughan, N. (2000). COI framework. Retrieved October 10, 2018, from https://coi.athabascau.ca/coi-model/