Introduction To Online Learning

Online learning has roots in the institution of distance education, which goes back at least 100 years to the early correspondence courses. With the introduction of the Internet and the World Wide Web, the prospective for getting learner around the world increased to a great extent, and today’s online learning offers rich educational resources in multiple media and the capability to support both real-time and asynchronous communication between instructors and learners as well as among different learners. Institutions of higher education and corporate training were quick to adopt online learning.

Online learning has become popular because of its potential for providing more flexible access to content and instruction at any time, from any place. Frequently, the focus entails (a) increasing the availability of learning experiences for learners who cannot or choose not to attend traditional face-to-face offerings, (b) assembling and disseminating instructional content more cost-efficiently, or (c) enabling instructors to handle more students while maintaining learning outcome quality that is equivalent to that of comparable face-to-face instruction.

Different technology applications are used to support different models of online learning. One class of online learning models uses asynchronous communication tools (e.g., e-mail, threaded discussion boards, newsgroups) to allow users to contribute at their convenience. Synchronous technologies (e.g., webcasting, chat rooms, desktop audio/video technology) are used to approximate face-to-face teaching strategies such as delivering lectures and holding meetings with groups of students. Earlier online programs tended to implement one model or the other. More recent applications tend to combine multiple forms of synchronous and asynchronous online interactions as well as occasional face-to-face interactions.

In addition, online learning offerings are being designed to enhance the quality of learning experiences and outcomes. One common conjecture is that learning a complex body of knowledge effectively requires a community of learners (Bransford, Brown and Cocking 1999; Riel and Polin 2004; Schwen and Hara 2004; Vrasidas and Glass 2004) and that online technologies can be used to expand and support such communities. Another conjecture is that asynchronous discourse is inherently self-reflective and therefore more conducive to deep learning than is synchronous discourse (Harlen and Doubler 2004; Hiltz and Goldman 2005; Jaffee et al. 2006).

Modern online learning applications take advantage of a wide range of Web resources, including multimedia, Web-based applications, and new collaboration technologies that are a far cry from the televised broadcasts and videoconferencing that characterized earlier generations of distance education. Moreover, interest in hybrid approaches that blend in-class and online activities is increasing. Today`s online learning includes offerings that run the gamut from conventional didactic lectures or textbook-like information delivered over the Web to Internet-based collaborative role-playing in social simulations and highly interactive multiplayer strategy games