Interculturality in Online Learning: Instructor and Student Accommodations

Gulnara Sadykova,Carla Meskill

doi:10.24059/olj.v23i1.1418

Abstract

As more distance education courses broaden their reach across borders, the chances of online classes being multicultural are high. This means that more often students may find themselves in courses designed for and by a host culture that differs from their own regarding its approach to teaching and learning. Compounding the difficulties inherent in a novel cultural environment and its unfamiliar forms of academic discourse are challenges represented by the medium itself. This year-long case study examines the experiences and reflections of a Chinese graduate student and her U.S. instructor; specifically the accommodations both made to mediate differences and mitigate these challenges. Analyses suggest that when both parties take differences into account and exercise thoughtful accommodations relative to both the challenges of the online medium and language socialization, positive learning experiences can result.

Highlights

As more distance education courses broaden their reach across borders, the chances of online classes being multicultural are high
Contemporary online MOOCs and courses are rarely monocultural and present a number of potential challenges. We first discuss those challenges in terms of the online medium, and in terms of the specific challenges attendant to the academic socialization of students whose home language and culture differ from that of the instructor and course, as is the situation in our case study
This study examines the experience of one graduate student who was once a Confucian learner but who socialized into the Socratic context of an online U.S graduate course and beyond

Summary

Introduction

As more distance education courses broaden their reach across borders, the chances of online classes being multicultural are high. Contemporary online MOOCs and courses are rarely monocultural and present a number of potential challenges We first discuss those challenges in terms of the online medium, and in terms of the specific challenges attendant to the academic socialization of students whose home language and culture differ from that of the instructor and course, as is the situation in our case study. Both students and their instructors come to instructional venues with a set of expectations as to what instruction should look like. Having individuals from differing cultures communicate online can result in cultural contestation with fewer mediational means (e.g., a nonverbal, physical context) to mitigate misunderstandings (see, for example, O’Dowd, 2003; Ware & Kramsch, 2005; Warschauer, 2002)

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Conclusion