Leveraging Student Engagement through MS Teams at an Open and Distance E-learning Institution

Abstract

The current paper reports on a study that was conducted at the University of South Africa (UNISA) in 2021. The study involved three cohorts of undergraduate students (n = 20, n = 12 and n = 18), where each cohort participated in one of the virtual sessions offered on MS Teams as part of their modules’ virtual classes. Employing a case study research design, the study used the interactions students had on MS Teams through messages in each session to determine how such messages served as indicators of student engagement. Four student engagement dimensions, namely emotional, behavioral, cognitive and academic engagement, were the focus of this study. Two of the findings of this study are: (a) only few students dominated the messages posted during the three live virtual sessions; and (b) cognitive and emotional engagement dimensions were the two predominant dimensions of student engagement. The paper ends with the implications and recommendations.