This paper posits that a sense of belonging is integral to an online community of learners. It overviews how an online teacher education program can facilitate social presence, nurture belonging, and support equitable access and participation, particularly among learner groups excluded from on-campus belonging and programming. This qualitative case study indicate the power that digital technologies can have in facilitating social presence and a sense of belonging in an OCL. This study identifies the importance of several factors in this. Firstly, the importance of pedagogical understandings that digital technologies have different affordances in nurturing an OCL, and secondly, that each participant had a different perspective on the affordances of each digital technology in their usefulness for fostering social presence and a sense of belonging.
Archard, S.J. (2014). Feeling connected: A sense of belonging and social presence in an online community of learners. International Journal of Cyber Ethics in Education, 3(2), 16-28. http://dx.doi.org/10.4018/ijcee.2014040102
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