ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY Bergstrand, K. & Savage, V. (2013).

The Chalkboard Versus the Avatar: Comparing the Effectiveness of Online and In-Class Courses. Teaching Sociology, 41 (3), 294-305. The authors use teacher-course evaluations collected and published online by a Southwest university to compare the online to in-class courses and the effectiveness each has on students within each course. Within the study, a second set of models is used to test the hypothesis that the perceived effectiveness of online courses depends on the skill set of the individual instructor. Within their findings, there is a interaction between the instructors average in-class teaching effectiveness and course format. In addition, the studys findings support the idea that instructors who have an average teaching effectiveness have students who feel like they have learned minimally within their course experience.

Driscoll, A., Hunt, A.N., & Jicha, K. (2012). Can Online Courses Deliver In-Class Results?: A Comparison of Student Performance and Satisfaction in an Online versus a Face-to-Face introductory Sociology Course. Teaching Sociology, 40 (4), 304-331. The authors use a quasi-experiment design due to their inability to randomly assign/match students to the different study groups. The authors test the hypothesis whether student performance and satisfaction intrinsically differ across online and classroom settings. They find that there is no real significance between online and classroom setting as it relates to students performance; however, the findings show that design pedagogy does have an effect on the instructor within each course. The authors state with a well designed teaching format, online courses are just as effective as face-toface courses. Garton, E.M., Holloway, K.C., & Wegner, S.B. (1999). The Effects of Internet-Based Instruction on Student Learning. Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks, 3 (2), 98-106. The authors investigate the question if delivery methods of online learning is addressed in an effective manner, would there be a distinct difference in student achievement. Within the study, two groups were used by the authors (experimental and controlled) which consisted of educators who were currently employed as classroom teachers. The findings of the study showed no significant difference in students scores when compared to those who attended classroom lectures on the particular campus. In addition, the authors promote the philosophical shift of mindset where students are seen as workers and

teachers are seen as coaches. Furthermore, instructors are seen as the main catalyst of students overall perception of the quality of the course and the amount of information gained from an online course.