Effects of online teaching presence on students' interactions and collaborative knowledge construction

Abstract This study analysed the instructors' teaching presence of three courses conducted by an instructor to explore the effects of the instructors' online teaching presence on students' interactions and collaborative knowledge constructions. Content analysis, social network analysis, and lag sequential analysis were used to explore the mechanism of teaching presence on students' interactions and collaborative knowledge construction. Results demonstrate that the design and organization, as well as facilitating discourse, can facilitate students' interaction, reduce the number of peripheral students, and facilitate students' collaborative knowledge construction, especially in the knowledge sharing, discovery, discussion, and application, whereas direct instruction has positive effects on teachers' centrality and negative effects on knowledge negotiation and testing. The result can give the instructors some guidance on online teaching practices.