Chapter 8: Discussion of Research Question Two and Research Question Three
2. LITERATURE REVIEW 1 Introduction
2.9 Comparison of Academic Performance of Distance Learners and On- Campus Students Campus Students
A few studies have discovered statistically significant differences in student outcomes based on delivery type (Faux & Black-Hughes, 2000; Paden, 2006; Shoenfeld-Tacher, McConnel, &
Graham, 2001). Paden found a statistically significant difference in student performance between online and conventional courses. Faux and Black-Hughes conducted research into student performance between different delivery modes of a social work course and found that a statistically significant difference existed between post-test scores by delivery mode. Extra investigation showed that students in the online segment did not perform as well as students in the traditional section. Russell et al. (2008) reported in a comparative study of distance learning and on-campus face-to-face students in health informatics. They found that there were no significant differences between the two, based on GPA scores.
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Barakzai (2003) examined two distance course formats when contrasted to traditional face-to-face course design concerning their adequacy on students’ accomplishment and fulfilment. A multiple- choice exam based on the objectives of the course was used to compare the achievement of the students featuring in the three groups. The Likert scale was used to compare students’ satisfaction in the three groups. The outcome of this study showed that the achievement scores of the online group were significantly higher than the other two groups, followed by the achievement scores of the videotape and workbook group, then the traditional group with lowest achievement scores. The analysis of data obtained from a satisfaction questionnaire showed that there was no significant difference between the levels of satisfaction of the three groups, although the level of the online group satisfaction was higher than the other two groups. The scholars investigated the correlation between academic performance of students and satisfaction. The result indicated that there was no correlation between these variables. In contrast to the above study, the present study did not set out to compare traditional and distance education but to examine the relationship between e- learning and academic performance of distance e-learners.
El-Deghaidy and Nouby (2008) conducted research to investigate the effectiveness of blended e- learning cooperative method as compared to face-to-face lectures on the achievement and attitudes of pre-service teaching programme students who took a science teaching methods course at the school of education at Suez Canal University in Egypt. The study sample was chosen randomly from pre-service teaching students in their third year. The sample comprised 26, of whom 12 biology students constituted the control group, while the remaining 14 chemistry and physics students constituted the experimental group. The experimental group was exposed to the course through a website designed based on the ADDIE model (analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation) by the researchers using the FrontPage software program. The control group was exposed to the same course through the traditional method of teaching. Post- test achievement and attitude scale was utilised to examine the differences between the two groups in terms of achievement and the attitude. The result of the study showed significant differences between the two groups in favour of the experimental group.
Lim (2002) compared the level of learning and learning application of three groups of undergraduate students who took a course in human resource development at Midwestern University. The three groups were taught the course by three different strategies (classroom, WBI
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and satellite-based instruction). Eight students were instructed using WBI, six students by satellite- based instruction and five students through normal classroom instruction. A five-point Likert scale was utilised to survey the level of learning and learning application. The outcomes demonstrated a high perceived level of learning in all of the three groups where the mean score was 4.04 and the mean score of the three groups in terms of the frequently applied learning was 3.89. With respect to the differences between the three groups in terms of the two dependent variables, the outcomes demonstrated that there were no significant differences between them in terms of perceived level of learning and application.
Kekkonen-Moneta and Moneta (2002) compared the effectiveness of e-learning and face-to-face lectures on students’ learning outcomes involving a course of introductory computing at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. The study compared three groups, one lecture group and two online groups. The lecture group involved 105 students. One online group involved 180 students, while the other featured 129 students. The students’ learning outcomes were tested through midterm and final examinations. The mean scores of learning outcomes regarding factual learning were higher in the traditional group compared to e-learning groups, and yet the difference was not significant. The mean scores of learning outcomes regarding applied-conceptual learning were significantly higher in the traditional group in the midterm exam though significantly lower in the final exam compared to online groups. This led the researchers to conclude that the online format could be deemed as effective as the traditional format regarding the students’ learning outcomes. This study is a survey research which focuses on the academic performance of distance e-learners who are fully on e-learning, unlike the above study that concentrated on distance e- learners that engaged in both lecture and online groups.
Johnson et al. (2000) researched the adequacy of an online course on the learning results of undergraduate students who took the instructional design course for human resource development experts at Midwestern University as compared to a face-to-face course. Nineteen students were involved in each group. The results of this study indicated that face-to-face group satisfaction was significantly more positive regarding instructor and course quality, course interaction and support.
There were no distinctions in the levels of fulfilment among the group regarding course structure, while the fulfilment of the online group with respect to department backing was significantly more positive. With respect to the learning results variables, the outcomes showed that the mean of the
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education packages designed by the face-to-face group was higher than the online group, but not significant. The course graduates were for the most part equivalent for both groups. The analysis of the self-assessment instrument indicated that the face-to-face group was significantly more comfortable in the following tasks: preparing a learner analysis, preparing a content analysis, writing goal statements and writing terminal objectives. The online group was essentially more pleasant in distinguishing the different ISD models. The general results demonstrated that the level of fulfilment of the face-to-face group appeared to be slightly more positive than that of the online group, while there was no difference between both groups as far as learning results were concerned.
Carswell et al. (2000) compared the impact of e-learning techniques and traditional strategy on the learning results and experience of undergraduate students who undertook a fundamentals of computing course at the Open University in the UK. The study sample comprised 132 students, 59 students in the Internet study group, and 73 students in the conventional study group. Continuous assessment was utilised to analyse the learning results of both groups. The students’ experiences of both groups were compared through various tools including the distribution of a questionnaire at the beginning and the end of the course, learning style questionnaire, tutorial, and marked assignments. The outcomes of the study showed that there was no significant difference in the learning outcomes between the two groups. The utilisation of an online technique expands learning background and Internet experience more than traditional methods.
Alsete and Beutell (2004) reported a significant positive relationship between undergraduate GPA and grades obtained in online courses. Bearden, Robinson and Deis (2002) found that students with lower GPAs did not perform as well as traditional on-campus students with the same GPA in a dental hygiene nutrition course.
There are many studies comparing the academic performance of distance learning students to the academic performance of students under a traditional on-campus environment (Bernard et al., 2004). Bernard et al. (2004) observed that this kind of comparative research has kept on expanding despite the fact that there are conspicuous voices inside the field that have expressed that there has been sufficient similar research on distance learning. Bernard et al. (2004) argued that comparative research is useful because distance learning is growing at an exceptional rate. Researchers have compared the academic performance of distance learning students to that of traditional on-campus
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students in healthcare education (Beadern, Robinson, & Deis, 2002; Duffy, Gilbert, Kennedy, &
Kwong, 2002; Jedlicka, Brown, Bunch, & Jaffe, 2002). Some researchers (Beadern, Robinson, &
Deis, 2002; Jedlicka et al., 2002) reported that there was no significant difference in test scores between distance learning students and traditional on-campus students. Gallagher, Dobrosielski- Vergona, Wingard and Williams (2005) and Duffy et al. (2002) demonstrated that distance learning students outperformed their on-campus counterparts on academic evaluations. The researcher observed that the above authors failed to report in their academic comparisons, whether the factors that influence academic performance of traditional on-campus students also influence the academic performance of distance learners. This is a research gap that the present study set out to fill.
Naidr, Adla, Janda, Feberová and Hladiková (2004) found that health information administration students that were enrolled in a medical informatics course via distance learning retained as much of the material as students in traditional classrooms. Gallagher et al. (2005) found that the retention rates for dental hygiene students were higher for those in web-based courses as compared to those in traditional courses. The academic performance, retention rates, student perceptions, faculty perceptions, and various educational technologies have all been studied in distance healthcare education. Bearden et al. (2002) compared dental hygiene students enrolled in an online nutrition course to those that had received the nutrition course on-campus. The researchers compared the two groups by examining the distance and on-campus students’ scores on nutrition questions on the National Board Dental Hygiene Examination (NBDHE). Bearden et al. found that there was no significant difference in the nutrition NBDHE questions between the two groups.
Collins and Pascarella (2003) conducted research that compared three groups of students enrolled in a firefighting tactics and strategy course. They utilised an experimental and quasi-experimental design to investigate whether students enrolled in a two-way interactive course would perform as well as students in the traditional on-campus face-to-face course. They also compared students that had self-selected the telecourse. The researchers found that the self-selected telecourse group performed better than the two randomised groups. The randomised telecourse and on-campus group participants performed equally on both the pre-test and post-test. Collins and Pascarella concluded that researchers that attempt to compare self-chosen distance learners to their on- campus counterparts may have distorted their findings due to the significant differences in the
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groups with which they began. This group of self-chosen learners scored two standard deviations above the randomised groups on the pre-test; they had more postsecondary credits, and previous fire science credits. More of the self-chosen learners were trained as emergency medical professionals and more were certified firefighters. These variables led to a self-selected group with more experience and knowledge than the two randomly formed groups.
Bernard et al. (2004) reported that those students in distance education had slightly higher overall achievement than those in customary classrooms. They found that achievement was higher for those students in an asynchronous learning environment instead of those in an asynchronous learning environment. Students in a synchronous distance setting preferred traditional classroom instruction more than those students in an asynchronous setting. The retention rate was lower in the asynchronous setting as opposed to the synchronous distance education setting (Bernard et al., 2004). Allen et al. (2004) carried out a meta-analysis of more than 500 manuscripts. They showed comparable results to at similar finding by Bernard et al. (2004), that students in distance education courses performed slightly better than those in on-campus courses. In contrast to the Bernard et al.
(2004) discoveries, Allen et al. (2004) found that there was no difference in student performance between the synchronous and asynchronous learning situations. Oye et al. (2012) found that students in higher educational institutions engaged in e-learning performed better than those in face-to-face courses. Holley (2002) found that students who participated in online/e-learning scored higher grades than students who studied using the traditional approach. Lumadi (2013) concluded that e-learning has a significant influence on the performance of students, as student teachers taught using e-learning reliably performed better than student-teachers taught using the customary technique.
Healthcare education was identified as one content variable in a meta-analysis performed by Zhao, Lei, Yan, Lai and Tan (2005). This meta-analysis was performed on 51 journal articles and the authors concentrated their examination on past distance education studies to investigate how different variables of the distance education research influenced learning outcomes reported in the research. The variables that were determined by the authors to have a possible influence on the outcomes of distance education studies were the publication year, instructor as an author, instructor involvement, status of the instructor, teacher training for teaching distance education courses, content area, instructional level of the student, interaction type between students and teacher and
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the media used. In summary, the researchers found that there was no distinction in outcomes between distance and face-to-face instruction. Olmsted (2002) concentrated his study conducted in the USA on five consecutive classes of dental hygiene students to determine how they performed on the national board examinations. A total of 115 distance students were compared to 105 conventional on-campus students. The researcher found there was no critical distinction in scores on the national board examination, core curriculum courses and final GPAs between the two groups of students. The researcher also found that there was a strong correlation for both distance learning and on-campus students between GPA scores and national board examination scores.
The majority of the above studies were carried out in advanced countries that have sophisticated technology and where the usage of ICT for educational purposes has been in existence for a long time. But the present study was carried out in Nigeria, where technology is in its infancy.
Specifically, the study is interested in determining the influence of e-learning on the academic performance of distance e-learners at NOUN. Also, this study differs from the above studies because the study is not comparing the academic performance of distance learners with on-campus students but critically analyses the effect of e-learning on academic performance of distance e- learners.
It is pertinent, therefore, to have a clear understanding of what determines academic performance of distance e-learners. It is on this ground that this study intends to focus on the influence of these factors on academic performance of distance e-learners.