Edu Online Information

The internet makes education more accessible and more affordable for anyone wanting to upgrade their education. Online education sites abound in number, quality, intensity and affordablilty. For those looking to continue their education, the internet offers the best distance learning program opportunity.

Instructors provide the information needed to learn a subject. Students learn the material. In traditional, on campus venues, students and instructional staff interact face to face. What if an instructor was able to provide their hard won expertise and guidance without the classroom located at a traditional learning facility? The student could get their instructional materials, listen to their instructors, and even take tests, all without the benefit of the classroom? The internet provides all of the benefits of the educational process.

Students learn when they physically go to a university or college. Students travel to learn. Students have to pay money to learn and, in many cases, pay for dormatory and other fees. They also join fraternities and sororities. This gets to be a little expensive, especially for those who cannot afford it. Wouldn’t it be great if you could get an education and not have to pay for all those exteraneous items? The internet offers the chance to engage in an educational process without the distractions. The education process takes place via two-way written, electronic, or other media forms. The internet comes with all the media forms necessary to transmit and receive various material needed to continue your education through an online distance learning program.

When students enroll in an on-campus program, they register, obtain living quarters, eat at the university dining hall, even socialize in the closed system that is offered. Campus life can be a wonderful experience for students. It is the time when they become thinking adults. They chose a career they are interested in. They meet new friends, some of which they may even end up going to work with, starting a new venture with, or spending the rest of their lives with. It is a remarkable experience.Those of us who are pursuing continued education from an established home may have already had many of the experiences of on-campus life and all of it’s excitement. An online distance learning program that offers all of the characteristics of the traditional closed system where we can officially enroll in courses offered by colleges and universities, and engage in the systematic teaching activity or curriculum without the distractions of campus life, is the highest priority.

Believe it or not, there is a point reached in life where priorities are clarified and become the most important venture. There is more to life than spending all of your time at a fraternity or sorority. A distance learning program gives you the opportunity to complete this venture called “education”.

With the rise of faster internet connections and new technology, many students are now moving away from the classroom and are instead learning English online. This can be done through free software such as Skype or similar platforms, which allows the tutor and student to connect in real time. These platforms have many advantages for English learners wanting to improve their English.

Online English courses allow students to look around and choose the tutor and course suited to them. The number of courses and tutors online gives the learner more choices when deciding what course to take. Taking traditional classes limit options and many students don’t even have access to a local language school or tutor. Whether the learner wants to improve their spoken, general or written English, it is possible to find the right tutor or course for them.

The time of the course is obviously an important factor for every learner. Online lessons allow students to request a time that suits them. This is especially beneficial for learners who have busy schedules. Having the ability to choose the time of the lessons means that students can learn when they are most relaxed, something that is very important when learning a language.

Traditional classrooms can sometimes make students feel nervous when speaking. But when a student is in the comfort of their own home they feel more open and confident. Learning this way also makes the student speak more, especially in one to one English lessons, because body language is restricted when using software such as Skype. This is great for spoken English and general interaction in lessons.

The sound quality of online classes is also superior to traditional classes. This is because computer speakers and microphones allow students to clearly hear what the teacher is saying and vice versa. This clarity means that the tutor can pick up on even the most subtle of pronunciation mistakes. Online courses also encourage the student to practice their written English. The Skype chat function makes it easy for the student to type English words and phrases into the chat box, with the tutor giving instant feedback.

Online classes also give learners more exposure to different methods of learning. The tutor is able to research different resources and use them in the online class, or send them as preparation or homework. This includes grammar guides, videos, newspaper articles, short stories, audio files, quizzes and more.

The learning management system used in the e-learning environment has been able to raise the level of education in many countries due to a rapid increase in the Internet and mobile usage, a catalyst in the growth of e-learning. The Internet has become affordable even for people in the remote areas, credit lies to the wireless internet and telecom companies, for removing the communication barriers.

Governments are also supporting e-learning with initiatives to endorse and adopt it for mass education. Conventionally, governments used only the classroom mode of training for imparting mass education; like communicating government policies, educating the audience about social cause, etc. This created government jobs. However, it failed due to the vast geographical areas and widespread learners and educators with different schedules and time zones. The technology became advanced and television, radio, etc., came into picture for educating masses. The content could be broadcasted to large masses at the same time. But television and radio also could not be accessed at all times due to various hurdles.

Since the past few years, governments have aggressively adopted e-learning software for education. With the technological advancement, it has become possible to deliver digitized education anytime and anywhere. Learning management system, tablet, iPad, and mobile phone, have already set a new revolution to the e-learning industry. The software due to its responsive design enables to access the content on multiple devices because it can adjust to the size of the device screen automatically.

Some of the e-learning initiatives taken by the governments are:

• India: Government of India has launched National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT) and National Program on Technology Enhanced Learning – to leverage the potential of ICT in the dissemination of video and web-based course content. It has also launched Sakshat, the world’s most inexpensive tablet (priced at around INR 1,500). The effort is part of the NMEICT scheme that aims to connect 25,000 colleges and 400 universities in the country in an e-learning program through the Sakshat portal. Digital India initiative will bring advancement in the education and corporate learning sectors. India has become the largest market for e-learning after the US, with an expectation to receive an enhancement from the government’s 1.13 trillion Rupees, Digital India initiative, says a recent report by the UK-India Business Council.
• Saudi Arabia: The Saudi Government has unified national e-learning strategy to bridge the gap between the National ICT Plan and unilateral developments to encourage e-learning in Saudi Arabia at schools, colleges, and vocational training centers. New upcoming universities will focus on e-learning and will make their entire curriculum with these materials.
• Malaysia: Malaysian government has boosted e-learning through projects like Malaysian smart school, MySchoolNet, K-Perak e-learning cluster project, etc.
• Australia: Flexible learning framework in Australia was successful in content development, and was involved in commonwealth and state governments working with vocational training and education sector. The Australasian Council on e-learning includes all the New Zealand universities and the University of the South Pacific. This initiative has led to a set of e-learning benchmark guidelines.
• U.S and Canada: There is e-learning software for Department of public health, Los Angeles, which has e-courses on various topics. US government has dedicated strategies to support and enhance e-learning content development.

To conclude, the availability of low-cost PCs, mobiles, tablets, etc., and the increasing presence of broadband, particularly in rural areas have compelled the governments to boost the country’s e-learning industry. The vision of making education accessible to anyone, anytime, anywhere is appealing to the students, corporate world and population as a whole.

The word “method” implies a scientific approach, which, in relation to the e-learning industry, has not always been fair so far.

The matter is not so much in the youth of the sphere, but in its constant evolution and the emergence of new forms.

Therefore, for the description of the approaches in e-learning, it is better to use the usual words as “type”, “variety”, or the word from the sphere of art – “genre”.

Genres, which are just methods of e-learning, help to describe the variety of e-learning materials using understandable words.

Overview of e-learning methods – what genre to choose?

The methods divide e-learning into groups by a primary way of supplying/perception of the information material. Each type may also include other elements, just like in movies: action films contain elements of comedy, thriller and horror. We distinguish the following types of e-learning:

1) Textual (“to read”). They are historically the first and up to the present day the most common. They are books, which differ from their paper relatives by comfort of navigation, interactivity and ability to be updated without republishing. They can be:

• Completely textual – the text is split into paragraphs and has hypertext navigation. It is better never to use such type;

• Illustrated – also known as “text + image”. Depending on how the “pictures” are processed they can be “a little bit better than textual” (which is still poor) up to textual courses with diagrams, illustrations, comics and interactive inserts, the most common today;

• Wrapper for the video – if each slide in a textual course contains a video with test tasks after it, it is considered the wrapper, not a textual course, and should be evaluated according to video standards.

2) Video (“to watch”). The courses in simple forms are easy to make (just to videotape a presentation given by an expert), so the method is popular in e-learning. Complex, more elaborated forms prevail in courses on personnel management, as well as in advertising, image-building and ideologically directed projects. They include, as follows:

· Video lectures – despite the simplicity of the format, they contain illustrations and diagrams to support the speech of the lecturer;

· Video of augmented reality which is similar to a lecture, but more saturated and “polished”. The presenter, against a green screen, works for a viewer (not the audience), and the script includes the interaction of the real world and computer graphics;

· Educational video contains training scenes involving actors. The script resembles a short film, there arise some issues related to the production, such as facilities for filming, props, makeup, transportation, crew catering. As a rule, these large-scale projects refer to courses on interpersonal disciplines (negotiations, mentoring, work with clients, etc.).

3) Games and simulations (“to do”). This genre is also very diverse. However, one thing in the method is common – that is “placing into circumstances” (realistic or fictional) and stating the problem, that must be solved according to the situational rules. This genre includes the following:

• Software operation simulator, which is the simplest simulator that shows how to operate the program. They are very popular for training the personnel in operation of corporate databases or specific company software;

• Process modeling is complex business models, packaged in online form. They can have game graphics or “technical” form of numbers and charts. Their task is to check the understanding of some process using a definite example with specified parameters;

• Involving games are the so-called relatives of entertaining games. Involving games use the elements of competition to arouse the students’ active interest to understand the game’s plot or mechanics and through this interest to reinforce the required knowledge. Such games are common in “ideological” and courses on processes.

Thus, there are numerous e-learning methods to solve any problems. In case the learning task can be solved by the combination of several methods, you can safely use all the genres, because such combination lacks the technical constraints.

There is also the fourth possible genre, which is very rarely used in corporate training:

4) Audio courses (“to listen”). Audio courses are very specific. Technically, it is a dictated educational text of good quality and in an easy to listen form. Such materials can be useful, but initially they are intended for using outside the workplace (on the way somewhere or at home). Audio courses stand separately from the traditional system of corporate training via LMS’s, as there is a risk of materials leakage, due to which companies do not demand them.

The advantages and disadvantages of different methods of e-learning

There are no fundamental flaws in the genres, as the success of any learning material depends on the quality of realization and the audiences. Different materials may be more or less suitable for one or another genre, for example, a video course on working with clients will be better than any instructional text. At the same time, the business process is better shown in the diagrams than when described with words. So when choosing a method, better consider the possible specificity.

Choosing a wrong format is an unpleasant, but not a critical situation: well-prepared material in any format will be useful to listeners and will fulfil the objectives of learning. More harmful is the reverse situation when boring, low-quality training course in any format does not teach the audience but gives them a bad impression about the company training system.