Advances in computer mediated communication technologies have sparked and continue to facilitate the proliferation of online courses, degree programs, and educational institutions. Leading the way with these advances has been the use of asynchronous discussion forums. However merely setting up a discussion forum does not always ensure quality participation and interaction. The way the course is managed has an impact on the participation as well. This paper compares the difference in course management over four study periods and discusses the resulting consequences on the participation and achievement of the students. This paper also investigates the quality of interaction as perceived by fully online students. The main benefits of this research are that it provides a guideline regarding what course management factors can make the difference in online participation in fully online courses, and how the quality of interaction can be designed.

The rapid advancement of fully online courses has made education accessible from “anywhere” and “anytime”. One of the major success factors of online courses is effective student - content interaction - which defines how students interact with the content in the fully online learning environment. However, there appears to have been little research published about the relationship of content to course design and consequent outcomes for students. In this article, we report on our research on the investigation of factors that affect student - content interaction in fully online computing courses. We have conducted our research through surveys and used a grounded theoretic approach for data analysis. Our results identify the factors that are perceived by students as critical in ensuring effective student - content interaction in fully online computing courses.