Online Education: Analysis of Interaction and Knowledge Building Patterns Among Foreign Language Teachers

In this article we discuss findings from a case-study related to the distance education of teachers of Italian as a second/foreign language. This case-study has examined interactions among teachers during their discussions in a web-forum exploiting the model of content analysis proposed in the Practical Inquiry Model by Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2001). The results of the content analysis of emerging themes using descriptive data and qualitative data analysis by, allows us to put forward additional remarks on planning, evaluating and managing an online education course for language teachers, focusing in particular on the role of on-line tutors and their training. Furthermore, the methodology we have adopted may shed light on new analytical tools coming from this work