Introduction

Defining Classroom Environment

For our paper, we will focus on 3 different types of classroom environment, which are  in-person, correspondence, and distance education.
As has already been shown in Chickering & Gamson (1987) as well as Graham et al. (2000), the principles that make up good education practices are the same, regardless of mode (i.e., distance education or in-person), rather it is the instructor’s approach to pedagogy that makes each of these principles effective in each mode (Bernard et al. 2004). Therefore, we assert that the fundamental principles of good instruction do not change when modes change; however, they do require a different pedagogical approach to in order to achieve them in each mode.
Therefore, the driving question of this framework is: How can we conceptualize and generalize the process of creating a course grounded in the principles of good practice regardless of it’s mode? Our framework considers four major classroom interactions across three overarching dynamics that should be considered when creating a course in any mode.
Most instructors have good intentions when creating online courses, however the strategies that should be utilized to make them effective are not easy to identify (Graham et al. 2000). One such concern is that utilizing some strategies that work during in-person synchronous instruction don’t translate well to the online environment (such as peer-to-peer interaction) and can cause both the instructor and students to spend too much time managing it, thus adding additional stressors to the course (Graham et al. 2000).