Chat Transcripts: Once the Chat is Over, is it Really Over? Free

What happens in the chat room doesn’t have to stay in the chat room. Yes, you are probably thinking that some chats are better off forgotten. Tried it, didn’t work. Yet, there are times when there takes place some really intense and productive discussions; why let it stay at that? Once it’s over, does it really have to be over? First of all, most chat rooms record the session in chat logs, which makes the conversion available for later perusal by the instructor or anyone having access to these logs. Why not take advantage of this fact, and use the chat rooms for further elaborations to assist the students in having a better experience, and as supplemental instructional material. When the instructors are serious about their topics, they use whatever means to encourage active participation, and chat rooms have an important place within computer-mediated communications. Taking this communication tool to another level is this article’s focus. When a coordinated chat is planned with students, some interesting ideas can be exchanged. As the instructor, you and your students may come up with some ideas that are worth saving and revisiting or highlighting. The chat transcript holds the key.

Although distance education or online learning environments laud the “anytime, anywhere” motto, there seems to be an overwhelming tendency among students to prefer a direct active interaction between the student and the teacher and the material being discussed. This reinforces the idea that more synchronous activities should be part of the overall learning experience. In reality, most distance education is done in an asynchronous setting, with mixed results of learning success. There is ample evidence that online learning has a better chance for success if teachers interact in synchronous communication activities (Swan, 2001). Studies show that interactivity must be bidirectional to be most effective. Moreover, whenever instructors participate in live online discussions, it leads to building a sense of community, and the learning outcome is superior to the one lacking the simultaneous feedback. It has often been documented that students are more motivated when they perceive a teacher’s presence online (Curda & Curda, 2003).

Online courses, done properly, incorporate active participation by the instructor; “good instructors use adaptive behaviors such as pacing of instruction, personalized questioning and feedback and alternative explanations and sequencing to meet the needs of the learners” (McNeil, Robin, & Miller, 2000, p. 701).

A major question that arises when planning a chat room session is one of time and feasibility. Coordinating the time students will simultaneously be logged on is often problematic. It is possible to do this, but more often than not, some students cannot make the session because of circumstances beyond their control. With a chat room transcript, students would have a chance to view the interaction later, even if they had to miss the live chat session. What this entails, and what this article proposes, would be a remedy to ameliorate the lack of participation of some students because of unforeseen or unfortunate reasons. Not only will students who were present and participating be able to revisit the discussion and have available relevant feedback, but those students who were not present will get the chance to at least see the transcript and, hopefully, get some insight into what took place. Thus, the entire specific online course community benefits.

Within chat rooms, the opportunity to use inquiry-based dialogue seems to be applicable. Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000) write that critical thinking or inquiry is part of a “holistic multi-phased process” that involves a “triggering event,” and that “learning how to think is embedded in what to think; that is, it is domain-specific and context-dependent” (p. 98). In the case of a chat session discussion, the triggering event one supposes would be that of the teacher posing a question related to a chosen topic, but it might also be a response provoking additional topic-related discussions.

The instructor must provide a focus; when students work collaboratively, having a focus makes students work together in building understanding between each other. Also, having a focus will make it easier for the instructor to lead the discussion (Veerman, Andriessen, & Kanselaar, 2000) and keep it on track. The instructor’s feedback, as it pertains to the transcript, will provide a personalized interaction with students. This will at least give students the perception of having the instructor providing and establishing a presence online and actively interacting with the students, which is very important in developing a community of learners within distance education (Northrup, 2002).

If chat room discussion sessions are to be used to help build knowledge and, more importantly, understanding, then it is important they incorporate a sense of contribution. Shortly after a chat room discussion has taken place, the instructor will revisit the transcript, highlighting what is important, while de-emphasizing the irrelevant inputs or responses by subduing the text that did not effectively contribute to the understanding. The author recommends that the less important transcript text be changed to a gray or lighter color, and possibly even be made slightly smaller in size. Conversely, the important text could instead be emphasized by making it brighter, bolder, or larger, so that nonparticipating students with little time would at least read over the main parts of the transcripts. Additionally, feedback juxtaposed to the transcript could be added, which would provide substantive and/or supporting comments praising ideas, suggestions, or comments that were relevant and made the discussion better. Also, instructors could at this point include their own instructions to specific students, give directions for further study or research, and/or provide links to related sources, and so forth.

An important feature of discussions and knowledge building is that “participants in learning communities need simultaneous access to the work of others to provide comparative models and opportunities to appropriate ideas more advanced than they might think of on their own” (Scardamalia & Bereiter, 1993, p. 4).

The discussions guided or initiated by the teacher would follow a set methodology, which would encompass the discussion itself, followed by teacher analysis of the transcript/ chat log, thereby revisiting the discussion (constructing learning material from said transcript) and providing feedback juxtaposed to the highlighted transcript. There are several benefits of doing and posting a postchat-analysis, for using chat rooms more productively and, hopefully, for providing a better educational value.

There are five logistical components to the proposed chat room discussions with asynchronous feedback: planning the discussion session; having the discussion; analyzing the chat log/transcript, with the instructor adding feedback; posting the chat log/transcript with instructions for students to revisit; having a follow-up session.

There must be certain steps implemented for the discussion to be effective, and planning the discussion beforehand might seem an obvious thing, but without it, the discussion will be a fruitless activity. Therefore, the instructor has to decide what will be discussed, and the following are some suggestions pertaining to the role of the instructor.

• The instructor must decide what topic to initiate within the planned chat room session.

• Announce well in advance the session time and the topic to be discussed.

• Limit participation to a selected few who are available or interested in the topic. (It is suggested not to have all students participate in every chat session.)

• The instructor would be logged into the chat room a few minutes before the students.

Some suggested guidelines that will make the discussion more effective, and to prevent any confusion or waste of time, are:

• Students should announce their presence when logging in to the chat room.

• Direct students to refrain from chatting about irrelevant or non-topic-related issues.

• Require students to do some readings about the topic before the session, thus ensuring that at least some students will have some prior knowledge and be able to contribute meaningfully and knowledgeably. Examples of this could include: read a chapter in a textbook, peruse a Web site or Web page, view a video, interact with or use any material that might be relevant to the topic to be discussed, etc.

• It is suggested for the first session (if the instructor knows for a fact that many of the selected students have no experience in chat room sessions used for topic discussions), to make it a session on what to expect: what is and is not acceptable. This might be beneficial in order to prevent—and, if necessary, correct—any potential or real-time problems.

While the discussion takes place, look out for the following or try to stay within these guidelines. Also realize that each discussion has a different flavor or personality, so be attentive to the mood and direction that the discussion is taking and persist in having the students be aware of what is appropriate, which can be mentioned within, and be reinforced after, the discussion, within the chat log transcript.

• Start the discussion with reiterating the topic, briefly reminding the students that they will be required to follow the guidelines and proper etiquette.

• Use inquiry-based questions to make students think about the topic.

• Control the direction of the discussion.

• The instructor must be the last person in the chat room at the end (to prevent questionable interactions between students).

Before posting the chat room session’s transcript, it has to be modified, enhanced, or have key points of the discussion further elaborated. Here are a few instructional methods that help in making the transcript useful.

• Subdue/negatively highlight the unimportant or nontopic comments or inputs from the chat transcript by converting the text into a subdued grayed out color, only slightly visible.

• Select the relevant and important comments and responses and make them bold, possibly even increasing the font size, for visual cue emphasis.

• Make a template with a table that has two columns; a copy of the transcript will be pasted into the left column and marked up, while juxtaposed on the right column will be any feedback (which might include praise for an insightful comment, positive reinforcement for good critical thinking, making suggestions for alternative views to think about, placing hyperlinks for additional study, giving directions for specific, if not all, students, making assignments to specific or all students, etc.) (see Figure 1).

Posting the transcript along with feedback is the next step. This not only makes available the instructor’s further elaborations on those students participating, and the instructor’s own elaborations of anything else, but also makes everything available for those who were not in the discussion to begin with, for reasons already explained.

The instructor should post the transcript at a designated URL link or within a page that is part of the online course, thus only enrolled students can have access.

The instructor should also send out an e-mail informing students of the posted transcript and have them visit the page, made easier by just clicking on the URL.

Students should follow instructions, if any, dealing with the discussion/transcript. For example, ask students to prepare any questions regarding the transcript to be discussed in a follow-up session, pose questions about the transcript topic, and make it into an assignment that will be counted as a grade, etc.

If there is to be a follow-up session, make an announcement of when it will be held and who is expected to participate. If a new discussion is to take place, then follow the same guidelines mentioned above.

Having a follow-up discussion could be beneficial, if it turns out that the first discussion contributed to students’ studies and learning, and this is the opportunity to practice this instructional methodology and improve its use.

• Revisit the previous discussion topic.

• Ask for constructive criticism or feedback from students.

• Let students ask questions related to the transcript and the feedback.

Students expect the instructor to be a presence within online courses because most, if not all, courseware provides the chat room communication tool, so why not use this? Be aware that since chat room session logs are saved, they can become available for others, such as administrators, to see or use, when it becomes necessary. Why not prevent any misuse or misinterpretation, if you use this tool within your online course? Use it to guide, to teach, to elaborate, and to make students realize that what they say can be important and can lend to the overall learning process. Although initially it might seem that this instructional strategy is slightly more time consuming (only a few chats are recommended during a course), the author believes that it will be worthwhile to pursue this course of instruction in order to maximize the benefit of chat room discussion sessions and enhance meaningful and gainful participation.