INSTRCUTOR SOCIAL PRESENCE: A NEGLECTED COMPONENT OF THE COMMUNITY OF INQUIRY

Abstract

The Community of Inquiry framework posits that a meaningful educational experience consists of teaching presence, social presence, and cognitive presence. Garrison, Anderson, and Archer intentionally labeled the act of direct instruction, facilitating discourse, and designing instruction as teaching presence instead of teacher presence. This was largely due to the fact that teachers are not the only one’s who engage in “teaching” activities in online courses. This nomenclature also supports the belief that ideal educational experiences are centered on learners and not teachers. As ideal as this is, it fails to highlight the unique role teachers play in online courses. There is an effective teacher behind every successful online course. Students are particularly interested in their teacher’s social presence (which we refer to as instructor social presence). We posit that the Community of Inquiry framework does not clearly articulate or validate this important aspect of communities of inquiry. Here we describe what instructor social presence is, explain its importance, highlight its role in the community of inquiry framework, and summarize research others have conducted on instructor social presence.