Exploring Opportunities in e-Learning

It is certainly my belief that any educational institution stands to enjoy a wide variety of advantages associated with distance learning. Distance learning will allow courses to run that could not otherwise be offered owing to a lack of student demand. For example, a school would not usually tie up a classroom for three students if there was another course that could run in that same classroom with twelve students. However, a web-based course is ideal for smaller groups, and does not require the use of a classroom at all. In addition, school's will often be unable to offer courses, even courses that experience a relatively strong demand, due to scheduling conflicts. However, the online learning environment does not necessarily require teachers and students to meet in real time, and therefore will not be susceptible to the traditional conflicts that often plague course administrators. Web-based courses should hold a great deal of appeal for students who tend to be visual learners, as the web is easily enriched with colour, images, motion, video, etc. Finally, I have certainly found that my web-based and distance courses appeal to students who are self-starters and enjoy working ahead. The online learning environment is far more structured and organized than a conventional classroom environment. Thus, it allows, if not encourages, students to work as far ahead on course material as their time and ability will allow.

However, make no mistake, the Internet is not a superior learning environment to a conventional classroom. At the moment, bandwidth limitations still make typing the most practical medium for real-time interaction - and typing is far slower and far more demanding than talking. After an hour or two of typing in a chat room, both the students and the teacher feel physically and mentally drained. Also, the real-time online environment (i.e. chat room) cannot practically accommodate more than five or six students. If a course were to exceed that number then the chat would invariably become muddled and incomprehensible. Sadly, a distance course with more than ten students would not likely serve as an equitable alternative to a conventional classroom course. I enjoy teaching my distance course in the summer, but I certainly do come to appreciate my classroom.

At the moment, I think the courses that stand to benefit the most from online learning are courses that can take the most advantage of the web's inherent strengths. Thus, courses that are highly visual, highly structured, offer a great deal of content, build linkages between various concepts, and explore issues or concepts which stem from the outside world will stand to benefit the most from online learning. Now, if one were to consider this list, one might not tend to think of french (auditory learning), english (dependant upon reading large amounts of text, discussion, as well as exploration of feelings and personal perception) or history courses (text, discussion, etc.). But one might in fact think of geography (pictures, maps, definitions, calculations, exploration of places and people from around the world, etc.), economics (graphs, tables, definitions, principles, formulas, exploration of government agencies, private enterprise, etc.), and even science (diagrams, pictures, formulas, tables, definitions, principles, and exploration of natural phenomenon, etc.). French, english and history would stand to suffer from the inherent limitations of the online environment, while benefiting rather little in terms of potential advantages. Whereas geography, economics, and science would realize enough advantages to compensate for the internet's present limitations.

Please bear in mind that the comments I make above are only relevant to our current state of technology. As time goes on, bandwidth will increase and software applications will improve, allowing more courses to take advantage of the opportunities offered by distance education. Basically, the challenge presented to any educator who wishes to explore online teaching will be to consider the ways in which they can utilize the current strengths of the Internet, while minimizing any limitations associated with the online learning environment.