Module 1 assignment

Most research reports use instructor assigned grades as a measure of student success. This will have
independent instructors grade written assignments for two course sections, taught by the same
instructor, one online and one f2f. We will see how those grades compare to the instructor assigned
courses.
1. Your research question (this is different than a question you would ask in say an interview)...what is
your overall question that you would want to answer based on your research? Page 9 in the book should
help and the figures on pages 10 and 11.
Is the quality of work and grading consistent between online courses and f2f courses?
2. Will your study be qualitative or quantitative? It can't be mixed, remember.
Quantitative: Grades of student work by the course instructor and by independent instructors
3. Which design will you use?
This will be a nonexperimental research design. One instructor will teach two sections of one
course during the same semester: one section will be an online course and the other an f2f course.
Students will allowed to enroll in either section. We will have multiple independent educators grading
student writing from both the online and f2f courses and see how well those grades correlate to the
instructor-assigned grades.
4. Give a research problem statement. Pages 32-34
It is common for research reports to use instructor assigned grades as a measure of student
success when studying online courses and traditional face-to-face courses. The purpose of this study is
to determine if educators have different expectations of online students and if they grade student work
different in an online course as opposed to a traditional f2f course. This work attempts to investigate
whether instructors are more or less lenient when it comes to grading online course work.

Module 2 Assignment
1. Literature - You will need to find 7-10 research articles to be used in a literature review for your final
paper. Conduct a search for your articles, get copies of your articles and finally summarize and analyze
your articles (the steps in figure 3.1 on page 62 of the book, basically).
Submit an annotated bibliography of your articles. You need to summarize each article (step 5 on page
73 can help) and submit the bibliographic information in APA format for each article (page 81 can help).

References
Barker, K. (2007). E-learning Quality Standards for Consumer Protection and Consumer Confidence: A
Canadian Case Study in E-learning Quality Assurance. Journal Of Educational Technology & Society,
10(2), 109-119.
Broady-Ortmann, C. (2002). Teachers' Perceptions of a Professional Development Distance Learning
Course: A Qualitative Case Study. Journal Of Research On Technology In Education (International Society
For Technology In Education), 35(1), 107.
Harris, D. M. (2012). Varying Teacher Expectations and Standards: Curriculum Differentiation in the Age
of Standards-Based Reform. Education & Urban Society, 44(2), 128-150.
doi:10.1177/0013124511431568
Lee, J., & Busch, P. (2005). Factors Related to Instructors' Willingness to Participate in Distance
Education. Journal Of Educational Research, 99(2), 109-115.
Lpez Soblechero, M., Gonzlez Gaya, C., & Hernndez Ramrez, J. (2014). A Comparative Study of
Classroom and Online Distance Modes of Official Vocational Education and Training. Plos ONE, 9(5), 1-9.
doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0096052
MAJOR, C. (2010). Do Virtual Professors Dream of Electric Students? University Faculty Experiences with
Online Distance Education. Teachers College Record, 112(8), 2154-2208.
Tabata, L., & Johnsrud, L. (2008). The Impact of Faculty Attitudes Toward Technology, Distance
Education, and Innovation. Research In Higher Education, 49(7), 625-646. doi:10.1007/s11162-008-
9094-7
Trotter, A. (2008). Voluntary Online-Teaching Standards Come Amid Concerns Over Quality. Education
Week, 27(26), 1-15.
Wickersham, L. E., & McElhany, J. A. (2010). BRIDGING THE DIVIDE Reconciling Administrator and Faculty
Concerns Regarding Online Education. Quarterly Review Of Distance Education, 11(1), 1-12.
Wyss, V., Freedman, D., & Siebert, C. (2014). The Development of a Discussion Rubric for Online
Courses: Standardizing Expectations of Graduate Students in Online Scholarly Discussions. Techtrends:
Linking Research & Practice To Improve Learning, 58(2), 99-107. doi:10.1007/s11528-014-0741-x

2. Sample - You will need to choose how you will sample (chapter 4). State your sample and the
rationale for why you chose this way of sampling based on your topic.
I am having difficulty getting myself to realize that my sample will be the instructors, and not the
students or the online courses, that I will be selected. There are two sample groups that I will need to
choose. The first is that of the instructors (who teach a course with an online section and a traditional
face-to-face section) to be called Instructors. The second is that of the graders (a second set of
instructors who re-grade the assignments without knowing which ones were from the online course or
the f2f course) to be called Graders.
I will use Cluster Sampling for Instructors selecting naturally occurring groups. I will randomly choose
schools, and then choose individual instructors within Community Colleges that meet the criterion for
Instructors.
Im not sure if Ive selected the appropriate name for the type of sampling, but I will use Purposeful
Sampling for the Graders group so that they are matched to the Instructors for subject, age, and years of
teaching experience.
3. Method - Choose your data collection method(s) (chapter 6). How will you collect data? You should
find an existing instrument and tweak it somehow for your paper. Hint: dissertations also may have
collection methods given in appendices...do you know how to find them in our library? Note: This may
change a bit once we get to the "design" part and Module 3.
Each instructor and Grader will be given a grading rubric for the assignments and papers. The rubric
that I will use will be similar to the rubric covered in the article I used for the article critique, just altered
slightly.
The data that will be collected is in the form of grades for assignments and final papers. These will be
collected from questionnaires given to each of the Instructors and the Graders with unique identifiers
for each student and spaces for grades for each of their assignments.