They focus group energy, they permit real-time interaction (which can help develop group cohesion, especially for those less familiar with media-based learning) and, most importantly, they provide a familiar instructional environment that mimic many positive features found in the traditional classroom environment (i.e., synchronicity, verbal rather than text-based interaction, instructor presence, whiteboard presentation facilities, hand-raising for turn-taking, public and private messaging capabilities).

The CREST+ model, a model for writing effective online discussion questions, covers the cognitive nature of the question, the reading basis, any experiential possibility, style and type of question, and finally ways to structure a good question.  This model encourages students to participate in online forum discussions, provides a template for new online faculty to use in creating effective discussion questions, and promotes a higher level processing of the material.

The CREST+ model covers the cognitive nature of the question [C], the reading basis [R], any experiential [E] possibility, style and type of question [ST] , and finally ways to structure a good question [+]. 

<li>encourages contact between students and faculty,</li><li>develops reciprocity and cooperation among students,</li><li>encourages active learning,</li><li>gives prompt feedback,</li><li>emphasizes time on task,</li><li>communicates high expectations, and</li><li>respects diverse talents and ways of learning.</li>

Students perceived the course as having the most impact on their critical thinking skills, with 87% rating the course as extremely or very useful in developing these capabilities

Overall, 79% of respondents felt that this totally online course was extremely or very useful in fostering student interaction, a principle of effective teaching that students often fear will be lacking in their online courses (Bullen 1998; Ward 1998).

A technical report from a University of Houston <a target="_blank" href="http://grants.hhp.coe.uh.edu/%7Eclayne/HHPPage/main.html">Department of Health and Human Performance</a> researcher finds that students in a hybrid class that incorporated instructional technology with in-class lectures scored a letter grade higher on average than their counterparts who took the same class in a more traditional format.

Because computer mediated communications is language (specifically, written word) dependant, it is subject to the constraints of low/high context cultural patterns <a href="#morse46">[46]</a>. As indicated earlier, the role of language is to carry meaning, and interpretation is an integral part of culture. Language is one means of establishing context among participants of a particular culture group. In low context cultures, language must be specific and well defined, to provide the contextual definition in which to interpret the communication. On the other hand, in a high context culture language may be vague, lacking the specificity of the low context culture, as the environment within which communication takes place clarifies the specific meaning of language <a href="#morse36">[36,</a> <a href="#morse41">41]</a>. Thus language plays a key role in the communication process. A key issue determining the success of computer mediated communication is the encoding/decoding by which that communication is done. Given that computer-mediated communication is a textual (electronic) rather than a visual (face-to-face) medium, meaning must be carried by the language itself rather than relying on the environmental context as the means of communication and/or interpretation. Given this relationship, because the language of communication is English, low context communication is presumed, thus perhaps disadvantaging those whose cultural background relies on high context communication.

Interestingly, low context participants concentrate on the participation environment, while high context participants concentrate on their individual work/effort and/or skills in the discussion.

Noticeably however, the responses indicate that cultural background directly influences the priority of perceived benefits received and challenges posed from the same asynchronous communication network. The perceptions are based on learning patterns which are developed as part of a participants’ ethnic/cultural development, and are potentially challenged by participation in an asynchronous communication network, which of itself is implicitly culturally based. Further, high context participants in an asynchronously delivered seminar, while assured of higher quality participation through an offline ability to infer meaning through low context communications, are at least initially more likely to be disadvantaged by technology differences as well as the communications norms implicit in their cultural background.

The meta-analysis findings do not support simply putting an existing course online, but they do support redesigning instruction to incorporate additional learning opportunities online.