The Future of E-learning

According to the report "The Worldwide Market for Self-paced elearning Products and Services: 2009-2014 Forecast and Analysis" by Ambient Insight, it is found that:

1. In 2009, e-learning reached a dollar volume of $ 27.1 billion, and by 2014, e-learning will reach $ 49.6 billion, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.8 % over five years. The dollar figures in the research included expenditures in five categories of electronic learning technologies: packaged content, custom content development services, learning platform and tool hosting services, authoring software and tools, and installed learning platforms.

2. North America is the largest region for eletronic learning, the growth is being driven by academic institutions, both preK-12 and higher education. The largest expenditures for packaged content in 2009 were made by the preK-12 and higher education buyers, which accounted for 43 % of all North America purchases. the higher education segment will be the largest buyer by the end of the forecast period driven by the robust expansion of online programs in both non-profit and for-profit institutions.

3. North America will continue to be the largest e-learning market for the next five years while Asia, with a "breathtaking" five-year CAGR of 33.5 %, will edge out Western Europe by 2014 to take the No.2 slot.

4. In higher education, particularly in career and vocational programs, the current economic situation is helping to fuel the growth. For-profit institutions are dominating online education, owing partly to this trend.

5. In preK-12, growth is being fueled by the proliferation of online virtual schools that are part of state and local education systems and online charter schools that operate independent of these systems in many cases. Both are helping preK-12 experience a 17 % CAGR over the five years.

6. The United States is unique in the world, even in North America, in the organization of its online preK-12 programs:

-The virtual school and the cyber charter school phenomenon is a distinct US trend.

-Virtual schools in the US are administered by the school systems and many offer full time programs to students.

-In 2009, there were over 200,000 students enrolled in virtual schools in the US.

-Many virtual schools in the US purchase content and services from commercial "education management", and the trend of purchasing growth rates are impressive. For example, from 2008 to 2009, K12's purchasing grew by 35 %.

-There are over 185,000 children in the US enrolled in cyber charter schools in 2009, and by 2014, 1.5 million US children will be taking online class in cyber charter schools.

In conclusion, e-learning appears to grow more rapidly in the future, because it mainly takes the form of online learning that tends to increase more in the educational system in the near future.

Ref:http://campustechnology.com/Articles/2010/03/03/The-Future-of-E-Learning-Is-More-Growth.aspx?Page=3

The advantages and disadvantages of e-learning

E-learning can provide more obvious advantages for using in this present-day. However, there are some disadvantages occur when we consider e-learning in the opposite side.

Advantages of e-learning

1. Flexibility and convenience: students can access an e-learning course anywhere, anytime and learn as much as they need.

2. Travel costs and savings: there are no travel costs for bringing remote students to a centralized place.

3. Ease of updating information: it is very easy to change the information, because the changes are made on the servers storing the program or courseware.

4. Inexpensive worldwide distribution: there is no need for a separate distribution mechanism and internet is widely available to use for e-learning nowadays.

5. Increase of number of students without demands on extension of teaching capacities: students are able to proceed through a program at their own places and instructors are not held by geographic boundaries.

6. A possibility of exploitation of new forms of communication: an e-learning course gives students to have opportunities to share experiences among students as well as between students and instructors.

Disadvantages of e-learning

1. Bandwidth limitations: long waits for download that can affect the ease of the learning process.

2. Loss of human contact: students only move towards more computer usage for an e-learning course.

3. Too static: the level of interactivity in the e-learning course is often too limited.

4. Not all courses are delivered well by computer: some learning topics are not best served by computer based learning and require a more personal touch.

5. Progress of e-learnong quality: the quality of many e-learning courses are still not better than many years ago. Because focus is often on how to develop a lot of courses and not on how to improve the quality of learning.

6. Confusion about technology: as e-learning is delivered to students via a computer using internet technologies, some students who lack of ICT skills may have the problems in this type of learning.

Ref: http://www.namahn.com/resources/documents/note-e-learning.pdf

http://www.e-learnmedia.sk/en/main.php?menu=102

E-learning tools

When thinking of e-learning tools today, it is very clear that there are many tools include to use in e-learning courses beside computers that always use to take online classes. In other words, e-learning tools nowadays include many advanced technology tools that are using in this type of learning. These are some of e-learning tools that are popular to use today.

1. Blogs: a form of personal journal written online.

2. E-mail or text message: exchange messages or communicate with other students or teachers.

3. Chat and instant messaging: allow teachers and students to carry on a text-based conversation in real time.

4. Discussion forums or discussion boards: discuss the topics being studied with teachers and other students in the class.

5. Podcasts: audio files containing voice recordings that can be downloaded to students' PADs, smartphones or MP3 players, and video recordings that can be downloaded to students' iPods or smartphones to review anywhere and anytime.

In conclusion, now is the era of mobile technology. So mobile technology is became a part of e-learning. This is very useful to help e-learning more interesting nowadays.

Ref: http://communication.howstuffworks.com/elearning12.htm

http://www.horton.com/toolslists.aspx?CatName=Collaboration

Strengths and weaknesses of using e-learning in the past

Overview of using e-learning in the past, we found that there are some strengths and weaknesses that can be considered to 2 aspects.

1. Strengths of using e-learning in the past. These include:

- E-learning enable students to use a wide range of sources than learning in traditional ways of teaching.

- E-learning tools create learning communities where students can study topics and learn skills that nobody in practice is able to teach them.

- E-learning teaches students to become more aware of the need for source criticism.

- E-learning enhances libraries, archives and collections to make their materials available to the publics.

- Students learn ICT skills by using e-learning technologies.

2. Weaknesses of using e-learning in the past. These include:

- There is a chronic shortage of intermediaries transferring pedagogical ideas into technical solutions.

- There is little appreciation of the possibilities offered by e-learning. Because of this, e-learning courses tend to resemble classroom teaching.

- E-learning courses are not easy to stand, since they tend to demand the constant involvement of a tutor.

- Available digital materials is still rather limited, so the demands of all courses do not meet.

- Lack of standardized technology limits transferability and the re-use of courses.

Ref: http://ehlee.utu.fi/Introduction_TOC.pdf

The history of e-learning

When we disscuss the begining of e-learning, it is necessary to refer to the history of distance learning. Because a brief look at it will give more clear about the origin of e-learning.

The concept of distance learning predates the computer area by almost 100 years.

In 1840's, in England, distance learning used mail for communication. It was the best way at that time, and because of the postal service improvements, this type of learning became more popular in the early part of the last century.

In the late 1950's, television and radio were the technologies that added to use for this type of learning. However, these tools still lacked of ability for two-way communication between instructors and learners. So these tools still did not good enough for this type of learning.

During the early 1980's, experimentation with online bill-board system (BBS) and e-mail were brought to help distance learning more effectively. These technology tools provided a framwork for online learning that is still used nowadays.

In the early 1990's, the term "e-learning" was coined. It specifically referred to include the internet technology or other interactive or electronic media to use in distance learning to enable true two ways communication.

In this present-day, there are many high technologies can be used in e-learning, for example, internet technology, multimedia and packaged software programs. Therefore, using e-learning in education world now tends to increase rapidly because of its useful and convenience.

Ref: http://apps.hct.ac.ae/ewb2005/2005/ewb_newsletter_04_10.pdf

http://ezinearticles.com/?A-Brief-History-of-E-learning-and-Distance-Education&id=496460

What are the types of e-learning?

Since e-learning is the term generally used to refer to using electronic-enhanced learning, or in other words, e-learning is not the only term used to refer to using computer-enhanced learning. E-learning can be classified into 3 types by using the criteria time and distance.

1. Asynchronous e-learning: communication does not occur at the same time and uses technology tools such as blogs, discussion boards, and e-mail for activities. The main idea of this e-learning type is learners exchange the ideas or information independently from the other learners involvement at the same time.

2. Synchronous e-learning: communication occurs at the same time and uses technology tools such as chat, audio or video conferencing for learners' participation activities. The main idea of this e-learning type is every learner joins participation in activities at the same time. Additionally, instructors and learners do not meet physically, but using these technology tools for communication instantly.

3. E-learning of blended learning: combines e-learning tools with an actual traditional classroom to guarantee maximum effectiveness. The main idea of this e-learning type is using only e-learning is not to make sure a learner has actually completed a course, and learners' gaining the benefits of interaction with the others are essential. Moreover, face-to-face interaction is the good way to help learners get more social learning than using only online learning.

Ref: http://www.namahn.com/resources/documents/note-e-learning.pdf

What is e-learning?

Electronic learning that is shortly said e-learning, is one of the new, modern forms of education now. There are many definitions available of e-learning, but I present here only a few of them to gain some understanding about it.
Definition of e-learning:
1. E-learning is the learning or education program by electronic means.
2. E-learning covers a wide set of applications and processes such as web-based learning, computer-based learning, virtual classrooms and digital collaboration. It includes the delivery of content via the internet, intranet/extranet, audio and videotape, satellite broadcast, interactive TV and CD-ROM.
3. The main characters of e-learning is delivery of the digital content.
According to these definitions, it can be concluded that e-learning can involve a greater variety of device than online learning that involves only using the internet and intranet. Or in other words, e-learning courses can consist of multimedia presentations, video and audio sequences, etc.

Ref: http://derekstockley.com.au/eindex1.html

http://www.namahn.com/resources/documents/note-e-learning.pdf

http://www.chengzhi.net/english/index.htm