Online Environments Entailing a Different Way of Working - Essay Example

Online Environments Entail a Different Way of Working and Studying Online environments require and encourage a different way of working and studying.They provide users with flexible access to online material. They can access the virtual classroom at any time and from anywhere. Thus, such environments create singular classrooms where the participants can enhance their knowledge without being bound by time and space. In order to promote the participation of users and to promote their interest in learning, it is essential to design the learning materials with care1. In the late Twentieth Century, education was characterised by the use of Internet – based technologies. The proliferation and sophistication of the Internet makes it possible to establish online learning and instruction domains that can be accessed by learners belonging to various age groups, irrespective of their gender. Thus the Internet has evolved into a pedagogical tool, through which education can be imparted to learners. Online learning constitutes a education that is challenging, in comparison to conventional classroom learning. This type of education requires the use of computers as the delivery vehicle. Consequently, students who are desirous of learning online must possess the skills to operate computers and they must be familiar with computer technologies2. The significant characteristic of this computerized learning medium is interactivity. This characteristic enables the users of computers to modify, change and manipulate the on screen objects. The software programmes are designed to allow such manipulations by the users. Computers that are connected to the internet provide users with an opportunity to communicate with other users across the world. Moreover, the developers and researchers of computer – based education are chiefly concerned with three major aspects involved in interactivity. First, support provided for online learning courses. Secondly, the opportunity of interaction with the content and learning material available online and lastly, the ability of the learners to access, manipulate, synthesise and communicate content information3. The other factors of concern include interaction with instructors, the ability of participants to communicate with tutors and receive their comments and observations, and interaction with other online learners. All these factors promote the development of an active learning community. The traditional classrooms have a well established teacher – student relationship. The students feel the presence of the teacher and there will be a face – to – face interaction between them. Immediacy is the psychological distance between communicators and in traditional classrooms there will be lesser teacher immediacy behaviours. Researchers in the educational field have found that the verbal and non – verbal immediacy behaviours reduce the psychological distance between the teacher and the students. Verbal immediacy behaviours include praising of students, soliciting viewpoints of students, humour, self-disclosure etc. In the case of non – verbal immediacy, physical proximity of the teacher, touch, eye contact, facial expressions and gestures are the behaviours. The learning capability of students increases if the psychological distance between teacher and students is lessened4. Research has clearly indicated that the interaction between the student and instructor plays a key role in learning. This is equally important for online environments, and researchers consider the internet as an asynchronous media. There will be scant affective communications and the internet lacks the social presence of the participants in online environments. There is no physical representation of either students or instructors in the online courses. Some researchers, who had considerable experience in online teaching and learning, oppose these finding and argue that computer – mediated communication is hyper – personal and not just impersonal. Furthermore, the students in computer – mediated communications establish their social presence online, through their identities in the online communities. Their social presence can be experienced through their verbal immediacy behaviours in those communities such as chatting and posting ideas5. Online learning in a multicultural environment poses problems. It is important to identify the common ground if the developed and developing economies interact with each other. The common ground will generally be technology and cultural practices. The latter is very important and it includes learning styles, language, and the communication abilities of the user. In the past, geographical boundaries had played a key role between two nations and there was no common ground. However, the communications revolution completely changed this scenario due to the invention of the internet. Subsequently, the internet had virtually removed geographical boundaries and created a global community. There are global learning environments. Learning in this global environment requires the sensitivity to cater to the varied needs of different learners from different nations. Their learning styles and other strategies also vary. Thus developing and designing the online learning under this new global environment demands high level of skill and it is a challenging task6. The instructor is required to design the teaching material with utmost care and to provide adequate guidance and support to the online learners. The students are required to submit timely feedback to the instructor. Similarly the instructor must review the feedback sent by the students and modify the course contents accordingly. This whole process will ensure that online courses remain robust and enjoyable with the learning community7. As the internet becomes more sophisticated, the parameters for learning have been eroded. The internet has changed the direction of learning courses, time and location of the learners. The traditional classroom concept is changed. Web based learning is becoming more popular and the modern schools are seriously considering the transformation into online courses. Students can learn from anywhere and at any time. High level of teaching standards and increased learning capabilities are required to build an authentic and comprehensive online learning environment. The organisational management must provide support for the learners. This integration of utopian learning and technology would materialise higher achievements and high profile standards, and has the capacity to emerge as the most powerful educational theory or hypothesis. Online learners will have to transform themselves into self – regulated learners; and they must possess curiosity and an inquiring nature8. Online environments provide several benefits to their users. However, online learning demands greater commitment and more resources. Furthermore, online learning must be undertaken in the correct manner. The materials made available in online environments must be principally designed to promote the learning abilities of the users. Online learning material must be in a proper form and should be restricted to the context of learning. Moreover, learners should be invariably provided with the required support9. Experts claim that the online learning environment must provide high quality and authentic learning materials to their students. This is because students access online classrooms from various environments, such as workplaces and homes. Moreover, the online virtual classrooms must be highly interactive with their students and there should be a high level of collaboration10. There are several definitions available to describe online learning, which makes it difficult to develop a generalised definition. It is most usually referred to as e-learning or internet learning. Some terms describe it as distributed learning, networked learning, tele –learning, virtual learning, computer – assisted learning and web – based learning. These definitions denote that there exists a distance between the student or learner and the tutor or instructor. The learner accesses the study materials through the internet and for this the learner must have adequate technical skills, like operating the computer, in order to interact with the tutor or other students. Online learning has several definitions in the literature, which explain the diversity of online learning, its concepts and the associated technologies. According to Carliner, online learning can be educational material that can be accessed through a computer11. In the opinion of Khan, online instruction is a novel and innovative possibility, which utilizes the web as a medium and delivers instructions to the recipients at a distance12. Online learning can be described as the presentation and delivery of the learning materials over the internet. The target of online learning is the distant learner and its ultimate goal is to adapt the learning process. As such, the internet is the medium for the online learning. Learners access the material through the internet and interact with the tutor or other online learners. The online environment has to perforce provide the necessary support to the learner during the learning process. This would encourage learners to enhance their knowledge13. Computer – mediated communication or CMC methods and processes have gained widespread acceptance among their users. The sophistication of internet technologies has made it simpler to host such CMC environments on the Web. Considerable skill is employed at present, in these environments, in addition to theoretical concepts. Online learning environments have also evolved and become sophisticated, and they can be treated as social – relational systems that are run and accessed by individual players in the online environment14. All individual participants are networked by the communication technologies in these online environments. This connectivity provides opportunities for interaction between learners, tutors, experts on the subjects and the supporting staff of this environment. Thus, the chief characteristic of the online learning environments is interpersonal interaction. Similarly, mediation is the fundamental consideration in the experiences of online learners with regard to online learning. The newer networked technologies mediate between participants in their exchanges of communication. Hence, the experiences of the participants mainly depend on the media employed by them for interaction. Furthermore, the networked communication technologies introduce social and psychological distances between the participants in those mediated interactions. Therefore, communication and interaction provided by the online environments differ from the real interaction between humans. It is a totally different experience than human to human interaction15. Students who develop the ability of learning as a natural process would no longer need the guidance and support of instructors. Such students can attain them through the internet. School websites serve as effective and organised online learning environment for the students. It also provides the response to the requirements of the school. The school website represents the virtual organisational character which would serve the administrative requirements of the schools such as establishment of relationships with local, regional and national education system; organisational management of teaching staff; establishment of contact with parents of the students and with the community. The school would create a virtual educational hub through its website. However, the website cannot be linked to the achievement of high teaching standards and high level of achievements by students. A website cannot raise such paradigms. There is a vast difference between the existence of a school website and the web based learning environment16. The world has evolved into a global village and this trend is attributed to the development of prosperity, initiative and creativity. Uniformity is the new concept, which requires the accomplishment of standards of information that are predetermined and other necessary skills. Uniformity is the fundamental requirement of the global village, and the other important concept is uniqueness, which guarantees personal response to the behavioural tendencies and capabilities of groups or individuals. Uniqueness ensures cultural and ethical individualism, enables the learners to express their feelings and themselves, and encourages them to function in a supportive environment. Thus the school website effectively provides the solution for these two trends17. There are a wide range of challenges and requirements involved in the shift from conventional education to web – based learning. Not only the instructors, but also the learners are the subjects of these challenges. In the virtual classroom there is no personal interaction with other learners or instructors, as is present in real time classrooms. In the absence of physical presence, the online instructor cannot effectively supervise learners and cannot control the attendance of students in the virtual world. Online learners interact with the computer and not with other learners18. In the absence of a social natural outlet, the students cannot share their feelings and would be under isolation; and in most cases, isolation is the main cause for attrition. In order to avoid this problem, students must be constantly encouraged to develop relationships with other online learners and to support each other. The other aspect of the virtual community is that the student participates both socially and academically. If the learner fails to participate actively in online discussion and other activities, then it can be construed that the learner does not exist in the community and is not a part of the same. However, this is not the case with the traditional classrooms. Even though the student is passive in all activities, he is still visible and physically present. Thus, other students feel his presence in the real classroom. Learners must make concrete efforts to share feelings and they must communicate with other members of their learning community. Only then can the learner be deemed to exist in the community19. Accordingly, it can be concluded that online environments necessitate a different manner of studying and working. Furthermore, these environments entail not only the academic but also the social participation of students in virtual communities. List of references Abraham Rotem. 2007. The School Website as a Virtual Learning Environment. 04 July 2008. http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/3c/f4/a6.pdf Benjamin Keherwald, May 2008. Understanding social presence in text-based online learning environments. Distance Education. Vol. 29, Issue 1, P 89-106 (AN 31937568) Carliner, S. 1999. Overview of online learning. Amherst, MA: Human Resource Development Press Cole, R. A. 2000. Issues in Web-based pedagogy: A critical primer. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Khan, B. 1997. Web-based instruction: What is it and why is it? In B. H. Khan (Ed.), Web-based instruction pp. 5-18. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications. Kleinman, Sharon. January 2005. Strategies for Encouraging Active Learning, Interaction, and Academic Integrity in Online Courses. Communication Teacher, Vol. 19 Issue 1, p13-18, 6p; (AN 16266726) Mohamed Ally, 2004. Foundations of Educational Theory for Online Learning. 03 July 2008. http://cde.athabascau.ca/online_book/ch1.html Melanie Misanchuk. Building community in an online learning environment: communication, cooperation and collaboration. 04 July 2008. http://frank.mtsu.edu/~itconf/proceed01/19.html Ring, G., & Mathieux, G. 2002, February. The key components of quality learning. Paper presented at the ASTD Techknowledge 2002 Conference, Las Vegas. Rossett, A. 2002. Waking in the night and thinking about e-learning. In A. Rossett (Ed.), The ASTD e-learning handbook. pp. 3-18. New York: McGraw-Hill. Seung Youn (Yonnie) Chyung, 2007. Age and Gender differences in Online behavior, Self – Efficacy, and Academic Performance. Quarterly Review of Distance Education. Vol. 8, Issue 3; P 213-222. (AN 31703800) Swan, Karen. May 2002. Building Learning Communities in Online Courses: the importance of interaction. Education, Communication & Information, Vol. 2 Issue 1, p23-49, 27p; (AN 7175599) Treuhaft, Jack D. March 2000. Global Online Learning Among Asia-Pacific Economies: lessons learned. Journal of Educational Media, Vol. 25 Issue 1, p51-55, 5p; (AN 3323114) Read More