A case study of Seamless Online Learning Integrated Discussion

Discussion learning activity has been one of the very important learning strategies in the current domain of learning and teaching. So far, there are studies conducted by scholars that separately focus on synchronous or asynchronous discussions; however, due to the advantages and limitations of both approaches, the integrated system which combines the synchronous discussion of MSN Messenger with the asynchronous discussion of the Facebook community was designed and developed in this study. The system posts messages of synchronous discussion from MSN Messenger on the asynchronous interface of Facebook community, and the asynchronous discussion of Facebook is sent to the synchronous interface of MSN Messenger as well. Therefore, we called our proposed system as Seamless Online Learning Integrated Discussion (SOLID). In this case study, the exploratory evaluation of Seamless Online Learning Integrated Discussion were conducted, and from the case study preliminarily focusing on the utilization of systems and discussion activities, it is found that the students would alternatively choose a proper discussion tool to use at appropriate time rather than alternate use the tools. In the discussion process, the students could choose proper tools timely in the phases of "addressed hypothesis, the definitions and clarifications of questions selections", "possible answers of proposed solutions", and "organized procedures and conclusions". On the other hand, the students did not have in depth discussion only at the phase of "aspects of comparison, discussion, and analysis of the tools". Discussions and recommendations are given within this case study according to the findings.