Is my instructor there for me? A study of reflective practice and student perceptions of online teaching presenc

As online education continues to expand, colleges are demanding faculty to keep up with the pace and add new online classes. Oftentimes, online instructors rush the course creation process by focusing more on the course content than creating a sense of human presence in the virtual online community of learners. It was theorized that by simply placing content on a website and expecting students to learn without guided facilitation of reflective practice activities was not the most effective way to invoke critical thinking skills in students. The research question was "Is there a statistically significant difference between students' perceptions regarding the perceived levels of online teaching presence for an instructor who assigns reflective practice activities (lead-in prompts) and an instructor who does not assign reflective practice activities?" The study was a correlational study conducted at a small Northern California community college. Five sections of online courses received the intervention of a reflective lead-in prompt activity within the public discussion area of Blackboard, and four control- group sections did not. The study specifically investigated the students' perceived levels of online teaching presence after being asked to reflect upon their learning during the course. The study helped to bridge the gap in knowledge regarding college students' perceptions about an online instructor that used reflective practice activities in online courses and a relationship to an online instructor's teaching presence. It was confirmed that students in the online classes where there were reflective practice activities, the perceived levels of an online instructor's teaching presence was statistically significantly higher compared to students in the classes where there were no reflective activities.