Critically Analyzing the Online Classroom: Blackboard, Moodle, Canvas, and the Pedagogy They Produce
Abstract
Working from the crossroads of critical pedagogy and software studies, this study analyzes the means by which teaching technologies—in particular the popular learning management systems (LMS) Blackboard, Moodle, and Canvas—support a transmission model of education at the expense of critical learning goals. I assess the effect of LMSs on critical aims via four key critical pedagogy concepts: the banking system, student/teacher contradiction, dialogue, and problem-posing. From software studies, I employ the notion of affordances—what program functions are and are not made available to users—to observe how LMSs naturalize the transmission model. Rather than present a deterministic look at teaching technology, this study calls for closer examination of these tools in order to rework teaching technologies toward critical ends.
DOI
10.31446/JCP.2021.1.05
Author ORCID Identifier
J. D. Swerzenski: 0000-0003-3490-529X
Recommended Citation
Swerzenski, J. D. (2021). Critically analyzing the online classroom: Blackboard, Moodle, Canvas, and the pedagogy they produce. Journal of Communication Pedagogy, 4, 51-69. https://doi.org/10.31446/JCP.2021.1.05
Included in
Communication Technology and New Media Commons, Critical and Cultural Studies Commons, Educational Technology Commons, Higher Education and Teaching Commons, Instructional Media Design Commons, Online and Distance Education Commons, Other Communication Commons
