A comparative study on student perceptions of face-to-face learning and online learning

Abstract

This study was conducted to understand students' perceptions of the effectiveness of online and face-to-face learning for a graduate course. 93 Phd students who took the course of Planning And Assessment In Education on the basis of face-to-face learning and 76 Phd students who took the same course on online basis at Anadolu University in Turkey were requested to state their views about the course in terms of 7 different points by marking the options of 7 statements prepared for this purpose. The findings revealed that the teaching method they followed was effective with the rates ranging from 50,6% to 72% for face-to-face students and from 45% to 65% for online students. The responses given to three statements revealed that face-to-face learning was significantly more effective than online learning, and the responses given to one statement showed that the latter was significantly more effective than the former (p<.05). For the other three statements, there were no significant differences between effecitivenes of the two teaching methods. The online learners (online 1 students) who held the discussions in WebCT chat rooms and took technical support via e-mail and those (online 2 students) who took such services in Macromedia Breeze Virtual Classes agreed, with the rates ranging from 38,2% to 71%, that the teaching method they followed was effective. The relationships between the perceptions of the online learners and the ways they used the services stated above were not significant (p>.05).