eng Science and Education Publishing American Journal of Educational Research 2327-6150 2015-02-04 3 2 152 158 10.12691/education-3-2-7 EDUCATION2015327 article Adriana Margarita Pacheco Cortes 1 Elba Patricia Alatorre Rojo 1 Carlos Manuel Pacheco Cortes 1 Daniel Montes Ponce adrianap@cencar.udg.mx 1 Sistema de Universidad Virtual, Universidad de Guadalajara, Guadalajara, Mexico The purpose of this study was to identify the types of participation within the discussion forum activity module through messages posted by alumni enrolled to the Master's Curriculum on Creation and Management of Innovation (MGGI as acronym in Spanish). The forum enabled was named "innovation' and it recorded the discussion activity and classified each of the interactions according to the teaching role, cognitive or social presence (dimension). The research approach was qualitative; we used conversation analysis to identify dimensions which messages are included. Fifteen participating students conformed the sample of analysis, they contributed with 47 messages (units), without assessment intervention (but generic only, not counted). As the first finding, a type of interaction by discussion was identified. The second finding was a communicational network in a Sociogram representation (graph drawing plots the structure of interpersonal relations in a MGGI group situation). The third and last finding was a set of messages classified by dimensions. The alumni discussed to each other about the innovation topic and there was a meaningful construction as well as the expected interactions. http://pubs.sciepub.com/education/3/2/7/education-3-2-7.pdf virtual interaction forum dialoguing knowledge-constructing learning