Synchronous vs. Asynchronous
Chat can provide a relaxed atmosphere for learning. Chat can make it easier for you to learn about your participants, build relationships, and foster a sense of community. Ideas in chat are a little less polished… but often the live dynamic and interaction help generate ideas or a spark of innovation.
Level of Formality
Synchronous chat is generally less formal than discussion forums. This informality is a benefit of this medium, not something to be avoided. It gives you a chance to converse with your students and get to know them better, as well as to show a bit more of your personality and individual voice.
Chats with the entire class, led by you, will necessarily be a little more formal than small group chats. In a large group meeting in a physical classroom, we often have people raise their hands to avoid people talking over one another. If you met with three or four people face to face, would you expect the group to raise their hands though? Probably not. With a small group, you don’t need the formal convention to keep people from talking at the same time. Chat is similar; in a larger group, you may need more formality to make sure everyone has a chance to share. In a smaller group, all of the members can be responsible for listening and speaking at appropriate times.
What does this informality mean, in practical terms? For starters, it means it’s OK for you to use :) and LOL in chat. In fact, you (and participants) are encouraged to use acronyms and other nonverbal expressions. They help provide nuance that can otherwise be hard to express in a text-only environment where you don’t have body language and tone of voice to help you convey your intent. It’s also expected that the occasional typo is going to slip in; after all, the conversation can go pretty quickly and no one has spell check.
The ideas in chat are likely to be a little less polished than what you might post to a forum or blog, and that’s OK too. Chat is great for brainstorming and sharing ideas quickly, but discussion forums can be better for deep reflection.
In this informal and fast-moving atmosphere it's still important to remember that what you say reflects on you as a professional. Humor can be great in chat, but always be careful about how it could come across to the person on the other end. It can be harder to recognize or interpret a joke in text than in face to face.
Chat Archives
Although chat is synchronous, Sakai's chat also archives all conversations. (Check your LMS' chat tool to see if archives will be available.) Archives let participants review the conversations for their own learning as well as allowing you to review chats for grading purposes. Chat, in this respect, has both benefits of synchronous and asynchronous learning. Chi Thai, an associate professor at The University of Georgia, records synchronous learning "...so that students who have trouble following along in real time can go back and review the material on-demand, from home. 'Real-time collaboration doesn't only have to benefit students in the present,' he claims. 'Once students use technology to work together synchronously, it's great to know they can call upon that very same content asynchronously as well, to review the material'" (Villano, 2008).
Chats for Learning
Chat can be used for several purposes in online learning:
- office hours
- small group conversations
- off the cuff situations, similar to instant messaging
- active/real-time practice, including role playing or practicing communication skills