Tutorial: Using Chat Rooms in Instruction
Why some people like chat...
Here are a few possible reasons:
- Chat room participants feel like they are talking with an actual rather than virtual person
- Chat room participants' report and feedback is usually more immediate
- There is more anonymity in terms of user class, race, etc., which sometimes results in a larger number of responses from a greater number of students
- Some chat systems allow participants to take on an avatar, i.e., fictional persona; thus, participants can become and take on the attributes of fantasy characters
Problems with Using Chat rooms in instruction:
In a chat room, the responses are posted in the order that they are received. The visual, linear display of the chat makes it difficult to facilitate or follow a line of thought in a discussion.
Note in the example below, the student's response to the teacher's initial question doesn't appear directly after the teacher's question. Rather, it appears further down in the chat talk. This happened because other students posted their comments and responses to the chat room before the student posted his question or response to the teacher's initial query. As a result, both teachers and students have to sift through the "chatter" in order to locate any responses to their own queries. Also, as the number of students in a chat room increases, the more difficult it becomes to facilitate or participate in a discussion. Thus, a teacher who intends to LEAD a discussion in a chat room will likely be challenged to keep the discussion on topic. Some researchers suggest limiting the total number of participants in a chat room to no more than 10 participants. Teachers who want to meet with more than 10 students at a time can set up additional chat rooms and simply move between rooms to take part in discussions. This, however, may create additional course management problems because the students cannot always see what is being said in chat rooms other than the one in which they are participating, requiring the teacher to repeat what he/she has already said earlier in another chat room.
A second problem with the use of chat rooms in instruction has more to do with the qualitative nature of student responses. Student responses tend to be rapid, short blurbs or bursts rather than thoughtful answers. If you are looking for careful, crafted responses from your students, then chat rooms may not be the best choice. Chat rooms may encourage participation, but you may also end up with only chatter.
A third problem with the use of chat, or CMC in general, has to do with the inequality between males and females in terms of the frequency of use. As in the traditional classroom, keep an eye on who's participating making sure that ALL students have an opportunity to present their ideas and points of view.
A fourth problem with the use of chat is the fact that chat is a synchronous medium of communication. In other words, chat participants must be logged into the chat room in REAL TIME in order to communicate with each other. This is contrary to one the primary reasons that students enroll in online or distance education courses, i.e., more flexible time periods for participation.
Better Instructional Uses of Chat rooms:
Some uses of chat rooms that lend themselves better to instructional activities are brainstorming, role playing, and introductions which can be used to help students get acquainted. Also, discussion topics in which the students are likely to have an opinion or position PRIOR to the discussion may also be a more appropriate use.
Recording Chat room activity:
Depending upon the chat room system, students and/or teachers can use their computer mice to copy the "talk" and save it in a word processing document. Also, some chat systems have a transcription feature so that all student and teacher talk is recorded. Ask your chat system administrator to see if this feature is available.Requiring Student Participation:
Because of the synchronous nature of chat rooms, teachers should be aware that poor typists or poor writers may be at a disadvantage when using chat rooms. Even when transcriptions are available, it is laborious to locate and count individual student responses.
Tutorial Activity:Log on to a PUBLIC chat room of your choice with a friend. Try to have a meaningful, discussion with your friend while ignoring the other chat dialogues/discussions that are also ensuing. Beware that in some public chat rooms, participants' chatter is sometimes lude, rude, and sleezy. Ignore them, while taking note of how the chatter flows! The busier the chat room is, the more difficult it becomes to have a discussion.
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