Distance education

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

1 Distance Education
2 Types of distance education courses
3 Origins
4 Methods
5 Delivery systems
6 Testing and evaluation
7 References
8 See also
9 External links

[edit] Distance Education

Distance Education is a field of expertise exploring situations in which the learner and the teacher are separated in time, space or both. Desmond Keegan, (1956) defined as key characteristics of this field:

• The separation of the teacher from the learner(s)
• The use of technical media
• The influence of an educational organization
Other authors (Gayol, 1999) have added as key atributes:
•The emphasis on the design of educational materials
• The central role conferred to learners in the educational process
The lack of immediacy between instructor and student has a profound impact in the educational transactions, in the design of materials and in the organization of the teaching/learning process (Moore and Kearsley, 2005).

Garrison (1993) states that the "raison d’ être” of distance education is the concern for access, anytime, anywhere (in Keegan, Ed., 1993). In fact, among the earliest documented programs are those organized in Berlin by Charles Toussaint and Gustav Lagenscheidt to teach languages by correspondence in Berlin, Germany, in 1856; in Cambridge, Great Britain, James Stuart and Robert Moulton extended the benefits of knowledge through university extension; in the United States, in 1873, Anna Ticknor created the Society to Encourage Studies at Home, and bishop Joseph H. Vincent and later on William Rainer Harper, worked for at Chautauqua's Summer Institutes combining religious and secular education (Watkins and Wright, 1991)

As Marshall McLuhan stated in his most famous sentence: "the medium is the message", research in distance education consistently proves that the attributes of the medium alter the teaching/learning process. For this reason, distance educators have paid a lot of attention to these attributes. The technologies used to mediate in the teaching/learning situation are classified in four groups: printed, audio, video and electronic, according to the following structure:

• Printed Correspondence education. books, study guides, texts and other pinted materials.
• Audio Broadcast radio, telephone, audiocassete, audioconference
• Video Broadcast and cable TV, Satellite, Videoconference, Recorded Video (Casettes, DvDs)
• Electronic Computer mediated communication, mobile learning

These media in turn are subclassified as synchronous (real time) and asynchronous (deferred time), that means that the communication between the student and the facilitator of learning occurs live or in diferred time. Synchronous media are audioconference videoconference, and some forms of satellite combined with phone calls. Asynchronous media are recorded audio, recorded video, radio, TV and some satellite delivery.

A second subclassification refers to one-way or two-way delivery. One way delivery includes radio, TV, one way satellite and podcast). In this case, the originating site provides all the content and the receiving site is mainly passive. Two-way delivery considers audioconferencing, videoconferencing, chat, videostream. In this case, real time communication is enabled by technology and instructors take advantage of the of background knowledge of the participants to enrich the learning environment.

Finally, a third subclassification focuses on human-to-human interaction: one-to-one (such as correspondence); one-to-many (such as radio and TV; and many-to-many (such as computers). With the advance of multimedia. robotics and artificial intelligence, we may consider to expand this classification to human-machine-interaction, in which avatars and intelligent agents assume part of the responsibility of the instructor which so far it has been demonstrated essential to ensure quality of distance education (Sloan-C Foundation)

Generations of Distance Education (Garrison, 1990)

FIRST GENERATION
Correspondence education, educational extension, home studies
SECOND GENERATION
Teleconferencing- telephone - radio - Audioconference - Educational TV - Satellite - Videoconferencing
THIRD GENERATION
Computer Mediated Communication - Online learning - Web Based training - Virtual education - Cyberspace education - Distributed learning - Asychronous learning - Mobile learning - Serious games - Multimedia - DVDs-Web Based Training

[edit] Types of distance education courses

Correspondence conducted through regular mail
Internet conducted either synchronously or asynchronously
Telecourse/Broadcast where content is delivered via radio or television
CD-ROM where the student interacts with computer content stored on a CD-ROM
PocketPC/Mobile Learning where the student accesses course content stored on a mobile device or through a wireless server

[edit] Origins

Modern distance education has been around at least since Isaac Pitman taught shorthand in Great Britain via correspondence in the 1840s. ^[1] Since “the development of the postal service in the 19th century. Commercial correspondence colleges provided distance education to students across the country.” Computers and the Internet have only made distance learning easier, just as it has for many other day-to-day tasks. ^[2]

One of the oldest distance education universities is the University of South Africa, which has been offering Correspondence Education courses since 1946. The largest distance education university in the United Kingdom is the Open University founded 1969. In Germany the FernUniversität in Hagen was founded 1974. There are now many similar institutions around the world, often with the name Open University (in English or in the local language), and these are listed below.

There are many private and public, non-profit and for-profit institutions offering courses and degree programs through distance education. Levels of accreditation vary; some institutions offering distance education in the United States have received little outside oversight, and some may be fraudulent diploma mills. In many other jurisdictions, an institution may not use the term "University" without accreditation and authorisation, normally by the national government.

In the twentieth century, radio, television, and the Internet have all been used to further distance education.

[edit] Methods

In Distance Education, students may not be required to be present in a classroom, but that also may be a question of option. As for an electronic classroom or Virtual Learning Environment, it may or not be a part of a distance education set up. Electronic classrooms can be both on campus, and off campus. We would call such institutions as using a 'flexible' delivery mode.

Distance Education may also use all forms of technology, from print to the computer. This range will include radio, television, audio video conferencing, computer aided instruction, e-learning/on-line learning et al. (E-learning/online-learning are largely synonymous). A distinction is also made between open learning and distance learning. To clarify our thinking we can say that 'open' education is the system in which the student is free to choose the time and place, but distance education is a teaching methodology used when the student and teacher are separated by time and place. Thus it follows that not all open-learning institutions use distance education and not all organizations that use distance education are open learning institutions. Indeed there are many cases in which students are in traditional classrooms, connected via a video-conferencing link to a teacher in a distant classroom. This method is typical in geographically dispersed institutions. Conversely, the term virtual university is sometimes used to describe an open-learning institution that uses the Internet to create an imaginary university environment, in which the students, faculty, and staff can communicate and share information at any time, regardless of location.

Distance Education has traversed four to five 'generations' of technology in its history. These are print, audio/video broadcasting, audio/video teleconferencing, computer aided instruction, e-learning/ online-learning, computer broadcasting/webcasting etc. Yet the radio remains a very viable form, especially in the developing nations, because of its reach. In India the FM Channel is very popular and is being used by universities, to broadcast educational programs of variety on areas such as teacher education, rural development, programs in agriculture for farmers, science education, creative writing, mass communication, in addition to traditional courses in liberal arts, science and business administration. The increasing popularity of the iPod, PocketPC and Smart Phone has provided an additional medium for the distribution of distance education content, and some professors now allow students to listen or even watch video of a course as a Podcast ^[3]. Some colleges have been working with the U.S. military to distribute entire course content on a PocketPC to deployed personell. ^[4].

Some educational institutions are integrating distance and on-campus students in college courses. Some courses allow distance students to watch on-campus class meetings live via online streaming video, and display real-time comments from distance students on an online chat board displayed during the lecture, making it possible for real-time discussion between on and off-campus students. In at least one instance, an online course has been run entirely in a 3D virtual world through the popular online community Second Life ^[5]. This approach has also been used in conjunction with on-campus class meetings, making the separation between distance and on-campus students increasingly insignificant.

In short then, though a range of technology presupposes a distance education 'inventory' it is technological appropriateness and connectivity, such as computer, or for that matter electrical connectivity that should be considered, when we think of the world as a whole, while fitting in technological applications to distance education.

[edit] Delivery systems

Older models of distance education utilized regular mail to send written material, videos, audiotapes, and CD-ROMs or other media storage format (e.g. SD card or CompactFlash cards) to the student and to turn in the exercises. Today's distance education course makes use of E-mail, the Web, and video conferencing over broadband network connections for both wired physical locations and wireless mobile learning. In some countries, the material is supplemented by television and radio programming. To compete with the conventional sector, course material must be of very high quality and completeness, and will use modern technologies such as educational animation.

Full time or part-time study is possible, but most students choose part-time study. Research study is possible as well. Distance education is offered at all levels, but is most frequently an option for university-level studies. A form of educational program which is similar to this but which requires some amount of presence during the year is a low-residency program.

Distance education programs are sometimes called correspondence courses, an older term that originated in nineteenth-century vocational education programs that were conducted through postal mail. This term has been largely replaced by distance education, and expanded to encompass more sophisticated technologies and delivery methods. The first subject taught by correspondence was the Pitman Shorthand, a tool of stenography. Primary and secondary education programs were also widely available by correspondence, usually for children living in remote areas.

[edit] Testing and evaluation

Distance education has had trouble since its conception with the testing of material. The delivery is fairly straightforward, which makes sure it is available to the student and he or she can read it at their leisure. The problem arises when the student is required to complete assignments and testing. Whether quizzes, tests, or examinations; Online courses have had difficulty controlling cheating because of the lack of teacher control. In a classroom situation the teacher can monitor students and visually uphold a level of integrity consistent with the institutions reputation. With distance education the student can be removed from supervision completely. Some schools, such the University of Maryland University College, address integrity issues concerning testing by requiring students to take examinations in a proctored setting.^[6]

Assignments have adapted by becoming larger, longer, and more thorough so as to test for knowledge by forcing the student to research the subject and prove they have done the work. Quizzes are a popular form of testing knowledge and many courses go by the honor system regarding cheating. Even if the student is checking questions in the textbook or online, there may be an enforced time limit or the quiz may be worth so little in the overall mark that it becomes inconsequential. Exams and bigger tests are harder to regulate. Obviously the mark-oriented students cannot be trusted with their own marks. In smaller tests a professor may employ another computer program to keep all other programs from running on the computer reducing the possibility of help from the Internet.

Used in combination with invigilators, a pre-arranged supervisor trusted with over-looking big tests and examinations may be used to increase security. Many Midterms and Final examinations are held at a common location so that professors can supervise directly. Many of these examinations are still on the computer in which case the same program blocking software can be used. When the Internet became a popular medium for distance education many websites were founded offering secure exam software and packages to help professors manage their students more effectively.

[edit] References

1. Garrison, Randy (1985). "Three generations of technological innovation in distance education". 'Distance Education=: 235-41=.

2. Gayol, Yolanda (1990). "Exploring the quality of educational design of international vitual graduate programs: A new model of evaluation", Unpublished doctoral dissertation, State College, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University. UMI number 9940854.

3. Keegan, Desmond (1990). "Foundations of distance education: Frameworks for the future", First, London: Routledge.

4. Watkins, Barbara; Wright (1991). The foundations of American distance education: A century of collegiate correspondence study, First, Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Co.. ISBN 0-8403-7101-2.

^ Moore, Michael G.; Greg Kearsley (2005). Distance Education: A Systems View, Second, Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. ISBN 0-534-50688-7.
^ Gold, L & Maitland, C (1999). What's the difference? A review of contemporary research on the effectiveness of distance learning in higher education. [Electronic version.] Washington, DC: NEA.
^ iTunes U, Retrieved February 9th 2007
^ Defense Activity For Non-Traditonal Education Support, DANTES Retrieved February 27th 2007
^ Education in a Virtual World, Harvard University Extension School, Retrieved February 9th 2007
^ Faculty and Distance Education Services (FDES). School of Undergraduate Studies, University of Maryland University College. Retrieved December 14, 2006.