The ebb and flow of online learning

Past research has suggested that Csikszentmihalyi's flow theory describes a state that should be supportive of a student's learning. This paper reports on research that uses the constructs of flow to explore learning in an online environment. An experiment was carried out in which students worked through a learning sequence in the physics domain that had varying degrees of interactivity. Their interactions and flow states were monitored throughout the learning task. The experimental data suggest that flow can be more usefully regarded as a process rather than just an overall state. This process is represented by flow-paths that plot each student's progress through challenge-skill space. Some flow patterns are identified that relate to the learning outcomes of the students. While there is some conflict between this process representation and outcome measures for flow, this flow-path portrayal has provided fresh insights into students' interactions in online learning environments.