According to George Siemens, a shift toward the triple helix model of education of universities, government, and business “form a strand of interaction to provide and to equip students for this online environment.” We must bridge the gap of comfort so that students will take to online education; their positive experiences with taking online courses and using online communication technologies will fuel the continuing growth of online education.
Over the last several years, I have grown increasingly familiar with online communications technologies through conducting WebEx seminars for student services and instructor training, course developer training, and just regular conference calls in which I interact with my colleagues from all across the country. Communications tools, such as Skype, oovoo, Windows Live, iVisit, and many others are becoming popular tools in the business world. eCollege, for example, has even added Elluminate features to its course management system to enable students to interact with each other, using video, desktop sharing features, and other software sharing capabilities. Blackboard is integrating wikis, blogs, and many other features into its course management system as well. Video conferencing is no longer the purview of business environments. Blogs, wikis, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, RSS feeds and many other communication technologies are increasingly relevant to modern community building.
A few years ago, I met Jeff Borden, Senior Director of Teaching & Learning for eCollege. He has an interesting blog post called “No Internet Allowed” at the following blogsite: http://blog.ecollege.com/WordPress/. There are quite a few other interesting blogs that examine other trends in educational technology at this site as well. In reflecting on Borden’s experiences at a university computer lab, I couldn’t help but recognize similar experiences. It seems strange in some ways that educators seem often to lag behind popular culture and business practices. No wonder students are bored in school; everything is so low tech.
Here is another interesting site that I came across related to this blog topic:
http://www.masternewmedia.org/teaching-skills-what-21st-century-educators-need-to-learn-to-survive/
The educator for the 21st century world must adapt to a very new virtual world that will continue to change the way that we work, play, learn and communicate.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
What is the future of distance education?
What is the future of distance education?
In the “Equivalency Theory” and “Distance Education: The Next Generation” videos, Simonson contends that distance education is not identical to face-to-face instruction, but that it is equivalent to it. Simonson defines distance education as formal education in which the learning group is separated by geography and potentially time. According to Simonson, distance education must provide the same learning outcomes of any traditional face-to-face classroom with equivalent learning experiences to meet those outcomes.
In reflecting on the role of distance education in the future, Simonson contends that distance education will not replace traditional educational institutions, but be does insist that distance education is nearing what he calls critical mass in that it has become widely accepted and needs to be nourished. More importantly, distance education offers significant motivational, accessibility, and return on investment to traditional classrooms for the institutions, instructors, and students.
In “The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web,” Moller, Huett, Foshay, and Coleman examines the concepts of needs assessment and return on investment as it relates to distance education, suggesting that many businesses that use online training do so because it is cheaper than traditional training methods, and that in fact, there is a need for better assessment capabilities for distance education training overall, since there is still some question about the merits of online training. The authors insist that there is a danger that poorly constructed distance education materials will stigmatize distance education as a whole, since learners are not able to tell the difference between high quality e-learning and poor quality content and delivery, and there are currently inadequate tools for assessing the quality of online training.
The authors suggest that “In examining the potential of web-based learning, the focus must contain capabilities not possible or at least highly impractical
in a traditional classroom,” which seems to agree with Simonson’s view that there needs to be an equivalency tests when comparing face-to-face classrooms with online courses. The authors further suggest that instructional designers of online curriculum must come to understand “how learners interact with the various e-learning instructional models and the contexts in which they do so.”
The authors state, “Many contemporary approaches assert that while most traditional instruction does well to control and to manage the educational experience, it does little to maximize, and may even inhibit, natural human learning abilities (Marshall, 1997),” suggesting that distance education standards may someday come to define standards for all learning environments.
So, what is the future of distance education?
There is real promise in distance education for aiding instructional designers, corporate trainers, and online educational institutions in providing truly significant learning experiences. I agree with Moller, Huett, Foshay, and Coleman’s cautions that “much of real promise is buried under the hyperbole of a quick fix, much like a TV commercial that makes exaggerated claims of losing weight while one sleeps.” Distance education has great potential, but those designing, delivering, teaching, and taking online courses must stop comparing online courses to face-to-face classrooms, since such a comparison is an illusion. Online education must be an outcomes-based, assessment-based, learner-centered, connective experience. The potential for online education lies not just in the convenience and motivation inherent in online courses; it is instead more relevant that online courses have the potential to create true educational standards while providing individualized interactive learning experiences for students. We as distance educators must be examining how and why students interact with technology and online learning modules.
I agree with Simonson that technologies will be integrated into all learning experiences and expect the traditional institution of today to vanish as we know it. Existing communication technologies have changed the way that we interact with each other, and the Internet is rapidly becoming a blend of the distance and local communities of the future. As traditional institutions adopt these technologies and integrate them into what they do, the face of the institution will become virtual worlds unto themselves.
Laureate education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2008). Principles of distance education: Equivalency theory. [Motion Picture].Baltimore, MD: Laureate Education, Inc.
Laureate education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Principles of distance education: Distance Education: The Next Generation. [Motion Picture].Baltimore, MD: Laureate Education, Inc.
Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Huett, J. (2008, May/June). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 1: Training and development). TechTrends, 52(3), 70-75.
Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Huett, J. (2008, May/June). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 2: Higher education). TechTrends, 52(4), 66-70.
Huett, J., Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Coleman, C. (2008, September/October). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 3: K12). TechTrends, 52(5). 63-67.
In the “Equivalency Theory” and “Distance Education: The Next Generation” videos, Simonson contends that distance education is not identical to face-to-face instruction, but that it is equivalent to it. Simonson defines distance education as formal education in which the learning group is separated by geography and potentially time. According to Simonson, distance education must provide the same learning outcomes of any traditional face-to-face classroom with equivalent learning experiences to meet those outcomes.
In reflecting on the role of distance education in the future, Simonson contends that distance education will not replace traditional educational institutions, but be does insist that distance education is nearing what he calls critical mass in that it has become widely accepted and needs to be nourished. More importantly, distance education offers significant motivational, accessibility, and return on investment to traditional classrooms for the institutions, instructors, and students.
In “The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web,” Moller, Huett, Foshay, and Coleman examines the concepts of needs assessment and return on investment as it relates to distance education, suggesting that many businesses that use online training do so because it is cheaper than traditional training methods, and that in fact, there is a need for better assessment capabilities for distance education training overall, since there is still some question about the merits of online training. The authors insist that there is a danger that poorly constructed distance education materials will stigmatize distance education as a whole, since learners are not able to tell the difference between high quality e-learning and poor quality content and delivery, and there are currently inadequate tools for assessing the quality of online training.
The authors suggest that “In examining the potential of web-based learning, the focus must contain capabilities not possible or at least highly impractical
in a traditional classroom,” which seems to agree with Simonson’s view that there needs to be an equivalency tests when comparing face-to-face classrooms with online courses. The authors further suggest that instructional designers of online curriculum must come to understand “how learners interact with the various e-learning instructional models and the contexts in which they do so.”
The authors state, “Many contemporary approaches assert that while most traditional instruction does well to control and to manage the educational experience, it does little to maximize, and may even inhibit, natural human learning abilities (Marshall, 1997),” suggesting that distance education standards may someday come to define standards for all learning environments.
So, what is the future of distance education?
There is real promise in distance education for aiding instructional designers, corporate trainers, and online educational institutions in providing truly significant learning experiences. I agree with Moller, Huett, Foshay, and Coleman’s cautions that “much of real promise is buried under the hyperbole of a quick fix, much like a TV commercial that makes exaggerated claims of losing weight while one sleeps.” Distance education has great potential, but those designing, delivering, teaching, and taking online courses must stop comparing online courses to face-to-face classrooms, since such a comparison is an illusion. Online education must be an outcomes-based, assessment-based, learner-centered, connective experience. The potential for online education lies not just in the convenience and motivation inherent in online courses; it is instead more relevant that online courses have the potential to create true educational standards while providing individualized interactive learning experiences for students. We as distance educators must be examining how and why students interact with technology and online learning modules.
I agree with Simonson that technologies will be integrated into all learning experiences and expect the traditional institution of today to vanish as we know it. Existing communication technologies have changed the way that we interact with each other, and the Internet is rapidly becoming a blend of the distance and local communities of the future. As traditional institutions adopt these technologies and integrate them into what they do, the face of the institution will become virtual worlds unto themselves.
Laureate education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2008). Principles of distance education: Equivalency theory. [Motion Picture].Baltimore, MD: Laureate Education, Inc.
Laureate education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Principles of distance education: Distance Education: The Next Generation. [Motion Picture].Baltimore, MD: Laureate Education, Inc.
Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Huett, J. (2008, May/June). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 1: Training and development). TechTrends, 52(3), 70-75.
Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Huett, J. (2008, May/June). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 2: Higher education). TechTrends, 52(4), 66-70.
Huett, J., Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Coleman, C. (2008, September/October). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 3: K12). TechTrends, 52(5). 63-67.
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