Dirkin, K: Three Professor Teaching Online

The main proposition of this study was that one‘s beliefs and values about teaching and learning affect how one decides what to teach, how to teach, and how to assess student learning. This focus on beliefs and values helps us understand what an individual teacher brings to the classroom and the lens through which they envision the teaching process. This is referred to as their teaching perspective. Understanding how teaching perspectives affect the online classroom is particularly important because teachers are not only contending with the complexities of classroom life, they are also dealing with new tools for communication and representation. This study used a qualitative with a multiple case study approach. Although each instructor was using the same course management system they all created very different courses. Several key issues emerged highlighting the transactional relationship between teachers and technology. In one case practices had to be re-envisioned to fit within the perceived zone of possibility defined by the tool. In the other two cases the professors repurposed the technology to create representations that were in line with their teaching perspective.