Asynchronous and Synchronous Communication and Activities in Online Education

If the course has been designed to be user (student) centered, rather than teacher centered, your role primarily will be to guide learners in creating meaning from course materials. They may do this by working alone on some assignments, but more often by sharing ideas and discovering connections among ideas through collaborative learning. Group activities, such as discussions and simulations, allow learners to collaborate within the course structure. However, individual and group activities should take place within an online course.

Both asynchronous and synchronous communication and activities are important in an online class. You will use both types of communication to build a learning community. As well, a group of learners with different preferences and styles should find a variety of individual and team activities and assignments. In this way, each learner should have at least one type of activity that matches his or her preferred learning style or method of communication.

Asynchronous communication and activities take place outside of real time. For example, a learner sends you an e-mail message. You later read and respond to the message. There is a time lag between the time the learner sent the message and you replied, even if the lag time is short. Bulletin board messages can be added at any time and read at your and the learners’ leisure; you do not read someone else’s message as it is being created, and you can take as much time as you need to respond to the post. Asynchronous activities take place whenever learners have the time to complete them. For example, viewing videos linked to the course site, reading a textbook, and writing a paper are all asynchronous activities.

In contrast, synchronous, or real-time, communication takes place like a conversation. If your class uses only writing-based tools to communicate, the only synchronous communication possible is a chat session. Everyone gets online in the same chat room and types questions, comments, and responses in real time. Synchronous activities may include chat sessions, whiteboard drawings, and other group interactive work. If your class involves multimedia tools, synchronous communication might involve audio or video feeds to the computer. Some “online” courses require learners and teachers to get together at least once (or sometimes several times) in person, by conference call, or through closed-circuit television links.

Although these examples of synchronous communication take place offline, they may still be important communication tools for distance learners who spend the rest of their time working online. Occasionally, group synchronous activities take place on site, too. For example, lab sessions or proctored testing sessions may require learners to complete activities with other class members in real time.

Learning communities may use chat rooms for discussion, interviews, Q & A sessions, and team work sessions. Community members often prefer realtime communication instead of asynchronous communication for work sessions, although both synchronous and asynchronous communication are used frequently. Location, personal/work schedules, and time zones determine which forum is best for a particular situation or community. Group members also keep in touch through notices and responses tracked on bulletin boards or posted to a community’s Web site, mailing lists, and bulk and individual e-mail.