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Over the last decade or so, the Internet has made an indelible impact on higher education by enabling the phenomenal growth of online education. Most colleges across the country now offer fully online (asynchronous) courses and more recently blended (synchronous) courses (Gomory 2001, Otte et al. 2006). Asynchronous interactivity is where participants are separated geographically and are not engaged at the same time, as they would in a face-to-face or telephone conversation. Rather, exchanges are mainly by e-mail and there is some elapsed time between message exchanges. In a synchronous format there is a blending of face-to-face and online learning (Mayadas 2006). These modified learning environments created by web-based technologies, not only eliminate barriers of time, space and learning styles, providing increased access to higher education, they challenge our traditional styles of teaching and learning (Swan 2006).
Providing quality learning experiences is the goal and responsibility of all educational programs, assuring student, faculty, and program success. As online education is evolving, new questions are being raised concerning ways to develop effective teaching and learning methods. Recent studies on distant education have shifted from the focus on technology itself to its effects on learners (Hiltz 1997, Sherman 1998, Wegner et al. 1999, Loomis 2000, Shapley 2000, Bangert 2006, Dziuban et al. 2006, Otte et al. 2006). There are four categories of this recent research: interaction, active learning, student perceptions, and learning outcomes. One of the most important aspects of online education is how the student themselves perceive the online learning experience. This study was designed to compare how student perceive their online learning experiences on internet-based environments in a biology course.
Statistical analysis
Standard descriptive statistics were...