Personalized Learning and Intelligent Tutoring Systems

http://www.engineeringchallenges.org/cms/8996/9127.aspx


Advance personalized learning




Instruction can be individualized based on learning styles, speeds, and interests to make learning more reliable.



Email ThisPrint ThisFor years, researchers have debated whether phonics or whole-word recognition is the best way to teach children how to read. Various experts can be found who will advocate one approach or the other.

Ask an astute first-grade teacher, though, and the answer is likely to be that it depends on the kid. Some pupils respond more favorably to the whole-word approach; others learn faster with phonics. Young brains (and older brains, for that matter) are not all alike. Learning is personal.

Throughout the educational system, teaching has traditionally followed a one-size-fits-all approach to learning, with a single set of instructions provided identically to everybody in a given class, regardless of differences in aptitude or interest. Similar inflexibility has persisted in adult education programs that ignore differences in age, cultural background, occupation, and level of motivation.

In recent years, a growing appreciation of individual preferences and aptitudes has led toward more “personalized learning,” in which instruction is tailored to a student’s individual needs. Personal learning approaches range from modules that students can master at their own pace to computer programs designed to match the way it presents content with a learner’s personality.

Why is personalized learning useful?

Some learners are highly self-motivated and self-driven, learning best by exploring a realm of knowledge on their own or at least with very little guidance. Other learners prefer some coaching and a more structured approach; they are typically self-motivated when the subject matter appeals to their interests. Still another type is more often motivated by external rewards and may learn best with step-by-step instruction. Some may resist learning altogether and have little motivation or interest in achieving goals established by others.

These general categorizations provide a base for developing personalized instruction, but truly personalized learning could be even more subtly individualized. Within the basic types of learners, some prefer to learn by example, others by finding answers to questions, and others by solving problems on their own. Under different conditions, people might even switch their preferences, preferring examples in some contexts but questions in others.

Not surprisingly, many efforts to take this into account make use of computerized instruction, often in the classroom or via the Internet. Among the many projects attempting to meet the personalized education challenge are “intelligent” Web-based education systems, development of “recommender” systems that guide individual learning using Web-based resources, and creation of algorithms that adjust recommendations to the abilities of the student.

What personalized learning systems are available now?

Web-based education systems are already common. Systems have been designed for storing instructional content, delivering it to students, and facilitating the interaction between instructors and learners. Multimedia modules of information can provide text, audio, video, animation, or static graphics in any order suitable for the student.

The delivery of instructional material is an important part of personalized learning. For example, different sequences are used in intelligent tutoring systems to deliver content tailored for each individual. Aspects of this approach may include the use of pre-assessments to gauge an individual’s most effective learning habits. The information collected can then be used to modify the sequence of material presented.

Many methods for optimizing the order of presentation have been explored. One novel approach, used in other fields to solve complex problems, is the mathematical method known as the genetic algorithm (so named because of its similarity to evolutionary natural selection). It eliminates unsuccessful presentation sequences and modifies successful ones for a new round of tests, in which the least successful are again eliminated and the best are modified once more.

While some personalized learning methods apply to education in general, other systems may be designed for specific learning problems, such as a recommender system for mastering a second language.

Recommender systems are widely encountered on the Web — search engines that fail to find a particular term often recommend alternatives, for instance, and pages that sell books or music will suggest additional purchases based on what someone has already bought. But such systems have not yet been developed extensively for education.

A particular recommender system for learning English as a second language helps find the reading lessons most suited to motivating an individual learner. In this system, students’ errors and learning weaknesses are tracked, and the students can rate the lessons that they are given. Data on weaknesses and interest are then used to generate a lesson tailored to the individual.

What can engineering do to improve learning?

Ongoing research in neuroscience is providing new insights into the intricacies of neural processes underlying learning, offering clues to further refine individualized instruction. Given the diversity of individual preferences, and the complexity of each human brain, developing teaching methods that optimize learning is a major challenge for the software engineers of the future.

Engineers will have roles in most aspects of these complex problems, though the solutions will require contributions of people from many disciplines. Further challenges await as advances in neuroscience and medical measurement technology probe the very foundations of learning in the brain. Mastery of these processes in advanced software could make learning more reliable. New research may even provide the path to something like immediate knowledge acquisition, as when a character named Trinity in the movie "The Matrix" learns to fly a helicopter through an instant download to her brain. Knowledge transfers of such complexity may not become commonplace in the 21st century, but a movie with such scenes may no longer be viewed as so far-fetched.



References

Canales, A. et al. 2007. Adaptive and intelligent Web-based education system: Towards an integral architecture and framework. Expert Systems with Applications 33(4): 1076-1089. DOI: 10.1016/j.eswa.2006.08.034

Hsu, M.H. 2008. A personalized English learning recommender system for ESL students. Expert Systems with Applications 34(1): 683-688.

Huang, M.J. et al. 2007. Constructing a personalized e-learning system based on genetic algorithm and case-based reasoning approach. Expert Systems with Applications 33(3): 551-564. DOI: 10.1016/j.eswa.2006.05.019

Liu, J., C.K. Wong, and K.K. Hui. 2003. An Adaptive User Interface Based on Personalized Learning. IEEE Intelligent Systems 18(2): 52-57. DOI: 10.1109/MIS.2003.1193657

Margaret Martinez, M. 2002. What is Personalized Learning? The e Learning Developers’ Journal May 7: 1-7.

Feeds 101

http://www.google.com/support/feedburner/bin/answer.py?answer=79408


Feed 101Print


What are feeds? I see "RSS", "XML", and "Atom" out there, but I don't know how I might use these links when I find them.

Feeds are a way for websites large and small to distribute their content well beyond just visitors using browsers. Feeds permit subscription to regular updates, delivered automatically via a web portal, news reader, or in some cases good old email. Feeds also make it possible for site content to be packaged into "widgets," "gadgets," mobile devices, and other bite-sized technologies that make it possible to display blogs, podcasts, and major news/sports/weather/whatever headlines just about anywhere.



What Does This Mean?

You may recognize the universal feed icon or these "chicklets" from your favorite websites, blogs, and podcasts. These icons represent content in any format - text, audio or video - to which you can subscribe and read/watch/listen using a feed reader. What's that?



Why is This a Good Thing?

Technology evolution in online publishing has made it really easy to not only publish regular updates to web-based content, but also keep track of a large number of your favorite websites or blogs, without having to remember to check each site manually or clutter your email inbox. You can now streamline your online experience by subscribing to specific content feeds and aggregating this information in one place to be read when you're ready.



Consumer Bottom Line: Subscribing to feeds makes it possible to review a large amount of online content in a very short time.

Publisher Bottom Line: Feeds permit instant distribution of content and the ability to make it "subscribable."

Advertiser Bottom Line: Advertising in feeds overcomes many of the shortcomings that traditional marketing channels encounter including spam filters, delayed distribution, search engine rankings, and general inbox noise.

Who publishes feeds?

Most of the biggest names on the web offer content feeds including USATODAY.com, BBC News Headlines, ABCNews, CNET, Yahoo!, Amazon.com (including a podcast!), and many more. Google publishes feeds as part of many of our services; for example, you can get a feed of new items for any search you make in Google News. In addition, hundreds of thousands of bloggers, podcasters, and videobloggers publish feeds to keep themselves better connected to their readers, listeners, admirers, and critics. Apple, through its iTunes Music Store, offers tens of thousands of audio and video podcasts for download, each of which is powered by a feed.



How do I read feeds?

If you want to browse and subscribe to feeds, you have many choices. Today, there are more than 2,000 different feed reading applications, also known as "news aggregators" (for text, mostly) or "podcatchers" (for podcasts). There are even readers that work exclusively on mobile devices.



Some require a small purchase price but are tops for ease-of-use and ship with dozens of feeds pre-loaded so you can explore the feed "universe" right away. Free readers are available as well; a search for "Feed reader" or "Feed aggregator" at popular search sites will yield many results. A handful of popular feed readers are listed at the bottom of this page.



A typical interface for a feed reader will display your feeds and the number of new (unread) entries within each of those feeds. You can also organize your feeds into categories and even clip and save your favorite entries (with certain applications).



If you prefer, you can use an online, web-based service to track and manage feeds. Online services give you the advantage of being able to access your feed updates anywhere you can find a web browser. Also, upgrades and new features are added automatically.



Show me what a typical feed reader looks like.

How can I publish my own feeds?

If you have a website, blog, audio/video content, or even photos, you can offer a feed of your content as an option. If you are using a popular blogging platform or publishing tool like TypePad, Wordpress, or Blogger, you likely publish a feed automatically. Even other non-blogging sites like social photo-sharing service Flickr offer feeds of content you produce that others can retrieve. There are also tools on the market that can help transform traditional web content into the right format for distribution.



FeedBurner's services allow publishers who already have a feed to improve their understanding of and relationship with their audience. Once you have a working feed, run it through FeedBurner and realize a whole new set of benefits.



Learn more about FeedBurner's services for blogs, podcasts and commercial publications.

And finally, some technical backstory...

The new method for easily distributing online content is often called a web feed and the technical format that makes it possible is called RSS, which stands for Really Simple Syndication, Rich Site Summary, and/or Rockdale, Sandow, and Southern (Railroad) if you trust the good folks at AcronymFinder.com. RSS is based on XML, a widely used standard for textual information exchange between applications on the Internet. RSS feeds can be viewed as plain text files, but they're really designed for computer-to-computer communication.



We should point out that RSS is just one standard for expressing feeds as XML. Another well-known choice is Atom. Both formats have their boosters, and it doesn't appear that consolidation toward a single standard is imminent. However, most feed subscribers simply want fresh content and don't care at all about the underlying protocol. (FeedBurner helps publishers avoid this quandary with our SmartFeed service, which makes any feed format readable on any subscriber device.)



Resources:

Feed-Related Backgrounders

CNN: Welcome to the 'new' Web, same as the 'old' Web

Mark Pilgrim at XML.com

Wired Magazine: Aggregators Attack Info Overload

MediaThink: RSS: The Next Big Thing Online (an introduction to RSS implications for business)

BBC News

Wikipedia

Popular Feed Readers

Applications

NewsGator - FeedDemon 2.0

(Windows, more info)

NewsGator - Inbox for Microsoft Outlook

(Windows)

NewsGator - NetNewsWire

(OS X)

Firefox

(via "Live Bookmarks" feature)

Safari

(feed support in the Apple OS X native browser)

Pulp Fiction

(OS X)

Online Services

Google Reader

NewsGator

(Online)

My Yahoo!

Bloglines

Pageflakes

Netvibes

Podcast Readers

iTunes

Juice

Doppler

FireAnt

Computational Intelligence: Natural Information Processing

http://www.coe.org.mt/seminars-a-courses/95-seminar-on-computational-intelligence-natural-information-processing


The IEEE Malta Section, in collaboration with the Chamber of Engineers, is pleased to announce a short course under its Professional Development Program.




"Computational Intelligence: Natural Information Processing" developed by Leonid Perlovsky and sponsored by the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society.



This course covers the rapidly evolving field of Computational Intelligence and focuses on the current understanding of the fundamental principles of working the mind, their computational implementations, and practical applications. This course covers mind mechanisms, including concepts, emotions, instincts, behavior, language, cognition, understanding, thinking, intuitions, conscious and unconscious, abilities for formation of symbols and aesthetic feelings. Computational techniques are given for these mechanisms and abilities.



The goal of this course is to provide a basic mathematical understanding of the working of the mind. Its secondary goal is to demonstrate practical applications of these mechanisms for pattern recognition, tracking, fusion, search engines, and for integrated systems combining sensor signals and communication data. Lastly, this course will outline future research directions. Historical and current difficulties in developing intelligent systems (IS) and applications will be discussed along with how the mind and new computational techniques overcome these difficulties. By the end of this course, learners will be familiar with several general applications addressed by IS, computational difficulties encountered over fifty years, and basic novel approaches to overcoming these difficulties.



After completing this course you should be able to develop an understanding of:



•Cognition

•Modeling Field Theory (MFT) of cognition

•Integration of cognition and language

•Cognitive algorithms for engineering applications

•Introduction to a theory of the mind

•Future research directions



The course will be held at the Chamber of Engineers premises in Gzira on Thursday 30th April at 18:00 and will have a duration of a little more than one hour. Refreshments will be served after the meeting.



IEEE Expert Now selects the best IEEE educational courses and tutorials from conferences and workshops around the world. The material is delivered in a series of engaging and highly interactive, one-hour online learning courses, these courses have been developed by recognized experts in a wide range of engineering and research technologies.



Dr Ing. Carl James Debono will be available to answer any questions and discuss the topic

VSD e-learning Development

http://www.vsdonline.com/solutions/performance-improvement/e-learning

Learning itself has become a competitive advantage

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Anytime+anyplace+learning.+(eLearning).-a094264960


Anytime anyplace learning. (eLearning).

Engagement in professional online learning: a situative analysis of media professionals who did not make it.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Engagement+in+professional+online+learning%3a+a+situative+analysis+of...-a0159594391





The relationship between national culture and the usability of an e-learning system.


http://www.thefreelibrary.com/The+relationship+between+national+culture+and+the+usability+of+an...-a0159594392


The purpose of this study was to investigate possible relationships between national culture and the usability How easy something is to use. Both software and Web sites can be tested for usability. Considering how difficult applications are to use and Web sites are to navigate, one would wish that more designers took this seriously. See user interface and usability lab. of an e-learning system. The theoretical frameworks that were used to guide this study were Hofstede's (1980) cultural dimensions Cultural dimensions are the mostly psychological dimensions, or value constructs, which can be used to describe a specific culture. These are often used in Intercultural communication-/Cross-cultural communication-based research.




See also: Edward T. , and Nielson's (1993)usability attributes. The sample for this study was composed of 24 international students from 11 different countries attending a large Midwest university in the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. . This sample was selected for this study because they represented the various cultural dimensions being studied, had spent their formative formative /for·ma·tive/ (for´mah-tiv) concerned in the origination and development of an organism, part, or tissue. years in their home country, and were not advanced computer users.

Free magazines anf Periodicals

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Science+and+Technology-p1+Electronics

Note how one mag can be catewgorized in several ways..

Developing an Infrastructure for Online Learning

http://cde.athabascau.ca/online_book/ch4.html#two


Part 2:


Infrastructure and Support for Content Development

A PDF of this chapter

About the author

Home page

Give feedback

E-mail a friend

Overall Structure

and Organization

The Components of an Online Learning System

Related Issues

Change Management

Conclusion

ReferencesChapter 4



Developing an Infrastructure

for Online Learning



Alan Davis

Athabasca University



Introduction

In 1995, distance learners at Athabasca University (AU) were surveyed about their access to and use of computers in their learning. About 25% of those surveyed responded to the effect that they had access to a computer and to the Internet. Interested staff members considered this proportion high enough to push ahead with all sorts of computer-based learning initiatives. By 2002, the number of students with access to the World Wide Web had grown to 93%, and the pioneers were smugly standing by watching their colleagues reinvent “the online learning wheel” (Athabasca University, 2002a). It was planned that, by 2003, as a result of the implementation of an e-learning plan, AU would officially be an “online” institution (Athabasca University, 2002b). As is the case with many other institutions and organizations, much has changed in a very short time.



Online learning is now becoming ubiquitous at all levels of education, in all institutions of learning, and in the workplace. Distance education has been at the vanguard of these developments, but campus-based students are also mixing and matching their classroom and online learning in all sorts of often unanticipated ways.



Building the infrastructure for online learning requires that many factors be considered, so it is difficult to provide a straightforward checklist or recipe to follow. All educational endeavors are systems, made up of various interconnected components. In traditional universities and colleges, teachers can be unaware of all the complexities involved, but in distance education, understanding how the entire system of course development and delivery occurs, and how these systems link to services and other components are vital aspects of ensuring effectiveness and quality.



Scientists often classify systems as “ideal” versus “non-ideal” (more commonly understood as “real”). If we apply this concept here, we can define the ideal, and then look at the deviations from ideality that manifest themselves in the real (Lu, 2002).



The ideal online learning and teaching system is one that is developed from scratch, without restriction on costs and staffing, and uninhibited by resistance to change from previous practices. A real system, however, is one where any or all of the following deviations from the ideal occur: limited resources, legacy systems that have loyal advocates, key staff who must be retrained, unworkable policies and practices that you never knew existed, inadequate governance processes, administrative systems that might or might not be made to work with the new systems, etc. Furthermore, after these deviations from the ideal are factored in, curricula, online learning technologies and approaches evolve all the time, and therefore any real system must also be able to change constantly.



In this paper, therefore, the key aspects of an ideal online learning infrastructure are described and then adjusted for real situations, and some ideas are presented on how subsequent and inevitable change can be managed.



Basic Thinking

Any system is built in a context, and for any online learning endeavor, each discipline, department, faculty, institution, or company will have a mandate, a mission, specific goals, and values that have to be considered when planning and designing an ideal system. For a real system, even at this conceptual level, there will be many other internal and external environmental factors, such as competing priorities, budget constraints, professional group requirements, and so on. All of these factors must be well understood and accounted for at the outset.



All teaching and learning systems should be built on two foundations: the needs of the intended students, and the learning outcomes of the course or program (i.e., the knowledge, skills, and attributes that students want). An ideal online learning system will be based on a plan that flows from a full understanding of these two fundamentals.



An understanding of the technological background of the intended students is crucial, including their expectations, their financial and other resources, their access to the Web or other online networks, their bandwidth limitations, and any other pertinent information about their preparedness and ability to participate equally and fully in the learning experience. In reality, of course, such a complete picture is rarely available, and a judgment call must be made on how much the system employs technologies that we know the students are familiar with and have access to, versus those that are new and unfamiliar, but are expected to become widely available. A good example is the extent to which distance students have access to high-speed connectivity. Since this access is expanding, an organization might choose to use a system that requires high bandwidth, and to provide alternative access to the online learning components (e.g., by CD-ROM) to the declining number not yet served by high speed systems. Considerations of student demographics and other factors would, of course, affect the timing of such a decision.



The clear identification of the learning outcomes of a course, a program, or a training event of any kind is useful in many ways: in the design of a learning assessment system, in determining the degree of prior learning considered necessary, and in measuring the quality of the offering. In applied and professional fields, describing the intent of the educational experience in terms of the knowledge, skills, and attributes expected of a successful completer is fairly routine, and a curriculum and associated teaching and learning system can be devised and cross-referenced with those ends clearly in mind.



In academic fields (the “real” world in this context), such outcomes are not often so well or explicitly stated. For example, all programs claim to develop critical thinking skills, but few define those skills, identify what taxonomy is used to determine the extent of their achievement, or discuss exactly how the content and program design link to them. If the ability to work in groups is an outcome, or the ability to undertake independent research from a wide range of resources, or the ability to make critical analyses of case studies, then these goals will drive the design and functionality of the online learning system needed to deliver that curriculum. Having comprehensive and clearly stated learning outcomes, and a curriculum and associated teaching approaches that are designed to meet these outcomes, makes the task of building the ideal online learning system much easier. If well-expressed learning outcomes are not available, at least some understanding of, and linking with, good principles of teaching and learning should be in place (Chickering & Ehrmann, 1996).



Closely related to these two foundations (intended students and learning outcomes) is the size and scalability of the online learning system. Whether the program is to be delivered to a well-defined and selected cohort of students once a year, or is to be made available to all comers (as driven by mandate or a business plan predicated on growth) will have a strong impact on how the system is designed.



The real situation, of course, is much less rational. Online learning initiatives often spring from the experimentation of an individual educator or a small group of educators and technologists who sometimes have no clear idea of what benefit (if any) the experiment will bring to the learning experience, but who are well intentioned nonetheless. The addition of a new functionality, new content, or a new tool sometimes does not add value and is ignored by students, but in other cases, a simple enhancement can reap great educational and other rewards for all concerned, and sometimes in unanticipated ways. The degree to which an organization (department, faculty, company, or institution) wants to foster and allow experimentation, versus keeping tight control over a single online learning system, will be driven by its mission, mandate, core values, and financial resources. There are interesting case studies of how institutions have adopted various strategies, intentionally or not, along this centralization/decentralization spectrum [see International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 1(2) (2001)]. The decision is a very important one, however, because it will determine how the online learning system is to be designed, developed, resourced, and governed.



Even where the student market is well understood and learning outcomes are clearly defined or prescribed, the implementation of online learning often involves a good deal of trial and error. With the best information and intentions, the results and experience rarely meet expectations, and thus the ability to adapt and refine the online learning system is crucial.



Overall Structure and Organization

top

The ideal case is based upon a good understanding of an institution or company's core business and values, of the nature of the intended student market, and of the needs of the curriculum. This understanding is expressed through the learning outcomes of the program to be developed and delivered. On this basis, an overall online learning framework can be developed. This framework will show the organization of the various components of the proposed system, and will facilitate the development of a fairly complete business plan for the endeavor. Figure 4-1 and the subsequent discussion describe one such framework for a post-secondary institution.





Figure 4-1.

An online learning system framework.



Ideally, the learning outcomes (i) are translated into course content, resources and an approach to the teaching and learning process that will enable a student to achieve those outcomes. Once these basic parameters have been thought through, the courseware development team (ii) will share the responsibility of translating the theory and intentions into courseware and online learning functions to be delivered by the learning management system (LMS) (iii), which interfaces with the library and other digital resources (iv), related services (v), and the student information system (SIS) (vi) through a secure server (vii) that can authenticate the student login.



From the students' point of view, they will connect to the LMS and the related services through a user-friendly users' portal (viii), so that, with a single login, they can have access to their courses and can be linked to all related resources and services.



Finally, to ensure ongoing improvement, an evaluation process for the effectiveness of the system, based on achievement of the learning outcomes and students' feedback is in place, in the form of an independent quality assessment process (ix), which also feeds back into the development cycle.



Aspects of the online learning infrastructure are discussed below; however, to conclude this section on overall organization, the general relationships, particularly among the units responsible for information technology support, should be considered.



Paul (1990) raised a number of important issues about the incorporation of technology into learning systems, many of which we still grapple with. Two in particular are intertwined and are pertinent here.



The first is the relationship between academic and administrative computing, that is, whether or not these two information technology functions should be connected, and in either case, how they can interface with each other. This relationship is a significant aspect of the centralization/decentralization issue. Although the normal structure is to have the functions separated, and often reporting through different executive officers, the online learning staff and systems need a lot of support and maintenance from the central administrative computing unit, as do key service areas, such as student registration, the library, and other learning resources.



The second and related issue is that of centralization versus decentralization of control. Normally, the administrative computing units prefer a more centralized system to avoid duplication, ensure security, and minimize the divergence of approaches and the subsequent complexity of support. Those involved in the design and delivery of educational programming prefer a more decentralized approach, with more freedom to innovate and to choose platforms and applications that suit their specific needs and preferences. Of even greater possible political consequence is the deep desire for academic values and needs to have priority over those of the central administrative unit.



In an ideal case, it should not matter how such units are organized or linked, because the overall goals and values of the institution or company would govern people's behavior and attitudes, and everyone would accommodate each other's needs, responsibilities, and functions. In the real world of online learning, conflicting priorities and approaches quickly arise, and clear statements of roles and responsibilities, processes, and policies must be established to help balance the relative need for control/centralization and freedom/decentralization.



The Components of an Online Learning System

The Development of Courseware

top

Even in the initial stages of thinking about the development of an online learning program, it is wise to involve all those who are likely to be involved at any stage. To foster such involvement, the sponsors of the program can prepare a preliminary proposal laying out the objectives of the program, the intended student market, and the proposed online learning approach. This strategy gives the service units a chance to comment on matters that will affect them, and for fellow educators to comment on the proposed content and pedagogy. The proposal should also identify the composition of the development and delivery teams that will be established to undertake the project. The nature of these teams can vary widely. The smallest “team” would be a single person, the content expert, who is also the educator, and who is also well trained to use a comprehensive Web learning platform that is already fully supported by the institution or company. This individual would just need routine support from areas such as copyright and the library. A complex team, however, involves a project manager as well as content experts, educators, instructional designers, editors, visual designers, multimedia designers, programmers, systems staff, etc., who undertake the design of a course that needs new online learning functions, connects uniquely to the other systems, and involves the creation of new multimedia digital learning objects. In either case, the preliminary proposal must provide sufficient information for all concerned to understand what their probable roles and responsibilities will be, and what direct and indirect costs are involved.



For those familiar with formal project management processes and techniques, this detailed discussion of the proposal and the project team will seem redundant, but it is surprising, in academe especially, how little attention is paid to this process. Much of it is just common sense, common courtesy, and good planning. However, depending on the size and scope of the task, some basic understanding and application of the principles of project management are also needed for online learning courseware development. The roles of team members can vary widely, but the types of positions, and the general roles they play in the team, are described further in Chapter 7 of this volume.



The Learning Management System

Another key decision to be made at the development phase is the choice of LMS. The first question to be considered in this decision is whether to use imported proprietary software or to develop an in-house system, which may or may not also be based on freely available, imported open-source software.



Many very good and comprehensive proprietary packages are available; some come as an add-on to the SIS, and others can be interfaced with the system. Staff can be oriented to and updated on the software's development and functionality at training events, conferences, and meetings. Assessing which of the available proprietary options is the best fit for the needs of a particular online learning system can be an onerous task, and choices must be carefully considered, and are often made with the help of an independent evaluation source (see, for example, Edutools, 2001).



For the in-house system, many free, open-source solutions are available, which can emulate the functionality of the proprietary systems, and can be adapted in any manner needed. This approach, however, might require more initial development and different skill sets among staff to ensure the robustness of the system, to provide a higher level of on-going technical support, to prepare documentation and training, and to interface with other systems as necessary.



In the ideal case, the choice of LMS is based on the needs of the course, without consideration of costs, the availability of qualified staff, or any requirement to use existing systems. The real case, however, is often more complicated: either one is constrained to a single solution based on previous institutional or company decisions (which some would think of as ideal), or the choice is limited (as it should be) by practicalities such as the costs of adopting yet another proprietary LMS, or the human resource and other implications of building or adapting an open-source LMS. Each new solution adds considerable pressure on back-end systems, especially services such as the technical helpdesk, and the need to adapt to a new LMS can have a negative impact on a student's learning experience. Finally, there is a lock-in factor: the costs of changing systems can be very high, and, although much effort is being made to develop standards for online learning that will improve interoperability and reusability of online content, the promise has not yet been met.



Library and Digital Resources

Linking the course or program LMS to the necessary online resources is a key element of any online system. Institutional and public libraries have been leaders in the development of systems and protocols to acquire and share resources. Many now have electronic gateways to their own holdings, to those housed elsewhere, to digital databases of journals, magazines, and government publications (including much in the way of full-text materials), and to specially developed supplementary databases of materials selected for a particular course. In addition, learning objects will be increasingly accessible through in-house and external digital repositories.



These components are discussed in greater detail in Chapter 14, but the key point in developing the infrastructure for online learning is that the availability of such online resources should be ensured, or at least anticipated, so that the courseware is developed accordingly, the LMS is appropriately configured, and any access that the student may require is enabled.



Learner Services

In online learning, most attention is always paid to the courseware and delivery platform. However, those who have worked in various forms of distributed learning for any length of time know only too well the vital importance of the non-academic learner supports that are needed to ensure student success and satisfaction. Depending on the enterprise involved, such supports would include technical help, educational advising, various forms of counseling, services for learners with special needs, and so on (see Chapter 15). In an ideal online learning system, these aspects would be given equal priority with and would be developed in conjunction with the curriculum. In the real situation, it is likely that such services already exist, and must be converted and enhanced for online learning, and provided with the ability to adapt and change as new options appear and learner expectations change.



Interface with the Student Information System

Ideally, the LMS is linked to the SIS in such a manner that the right student is automatically in the right course at the right time, and that all the right student information is easily available to the right instructor and any other authorized person. This strategy avoids the need to input student names into the LMS, with the associated errors and waste of time. The instructor should be able to manipulate the student data as needed for the course (e.g., submitting and editing final marks), and to contact the students as a group, in sub-groups and individually.



All this requires clever and robust programming in the LMS, a server to authenticate student log-ins and ensure a secure interface with the SIS, and some appropriate programming in the SIS itself. This is where an integrated SIS/LMS system might seem attractive if one is building an online learning system from scratch. In many real situations, there will be more than one LMS, each of which needs to be interfaced to the SIS, and any or all of which might be composed of proprietary, imported, or home-built systems.



The Users' Portal

As in most sophisticated online enterprises (travel, banking, shopping, etc.), the nature of the portal provided to the user (and indeed to staff in various ways) is important. Ideally, the portal should allow the learner, with one secure login, to access everything that is of interest to them: the LMS (and from there, other essential links), their grades and other applicable documentation on their student file, and related learner services and accounts. It will also allow them to customize their portal Web page to be a unique interface, showing their own preferences, and allowing them to link easily with other learners and staff, related services, and the student association.



Quality Assessment

Most institutions and organizations will have a unit dedicated to providing a thorough and independent evaluation of any enterprise as part of the routine process of quality assurance and improvement. Ideally, the development of an e-learning system should include a plan for the independent evaluation of all aspects of the system, and especially of the degree to which it enables or enhances the achievement of the stated learning outcomes (primarily in the opinion of its users). Furthermore, such an evaluation would also provide information on the return on investment of the system, especially the unanticipated or unseen costs of implementation on back-end systems, staff attitudes, and infrastructure.



In the real situation, where a variety of systems could be in place, the tendency will be for each group to undertake its own research, which can often be biased (intentionally or not) and difficult to compare with that of other groups unless a strict, common framework is in place. Even if only one system exists, larger corporate pressures might be applied to ensure that a project is “doomed to succeed.”



Quality assessment is an aspect of online learning in which a strong and centralized approach is preferred. The type, scope, and framework of evaluation must be independent and structured if the results are to lead to real improvements in systems, and to appropriate decisions about whether to scrap them or to build on them with new resources (see Chapter 16).



Related Issues

top

Many institutions and organizations that have shifted their core business to an online environment have noticed both predicted and unanticipated effects on all aspects of their enterprise. For online learning, some of these effects are straightforward and can be factored in early on, with systematic updates.



Back-end hardware (servers, switches, etc.) and connectivity will need to be estimated in the beginning, and then adjusted routinely as the number of users grows, the system evolves, and standards and expectations for “up-time” increase (usually to 24 hours a day, 7 days a week).



Policies related to access to servers, to security, and to the use of the online learning system need to be in place, and must balance the need for stability and security with the need to innovate (Kotter, 1996).



Technical help and helpdesk support must be in place, possibly linked to a training, orientation, and documentation function that provides support to students and staff. Since this function can be spread between the core information service units and the teaching units, clear mandates and lines of responsibility must be in place to avoid duplication of effort or gaps in support.



A host of human resource issues must be addressed. Some of them are tied to collective agreement and employment contract terms and conditions, especially those related to the service standards and expectations (which go beyond the normal working day), and to the automatic flexibility that online learning provides, not only to the student, but also to the staff in terms of the place and time of work. New policies may be needed on attendance and on standards for being in touch with the central office for administrative matters.



Another human resource issue is the constantly shifting nature of the work that staff undertake. Many of those working in online learning have had dated training, or no official training whatever, but have learned and adapted successfully to new approaches and new technologies. There are many stories of staff who entered organizations at a junior level and worked their way into key roles in online learning quite unexpectedly, as the organization's needs and their abilities evolved. Traditional approaches to hiring, appointment, promotions, position classification, access to training and professional development, etc., must be adapted to maximize the opportunity to invest in and reward staff in such a dynamic environment, and to avoid exploiting staff who might be working well above the level for which they are paid. The long-term sustainability of the online learning system will depend to a large extent on how this new human resource environment is addressed. The online learning system itself should inspire new kinds of flexible training for staff, with inter- and intra-institutional support groups and learning communities, information links, etc.



Finally, the process for decision making and resource allocation related to online learning must be carefully considered. If new committees are to be established to provide recommendations on directions and investments, care must be taken to balance the discussion between those who know and understand a lot (but might champion one approach), central and decentralized technical staff (who directly support the online system and who often want more freedom), the central administration (who likely do not know as much, but are accountable for the success and effectiveness of the system), and the users (teachers and learners). The role of independent and thorough evaluation becomes very important in this process.



Change Management

top

Any credible educational endeavor is dynamic in nature, responding to new knowledge, understandings, and approaches to the disciplines, to new employment market needs, to changing student demographics, and so on. In a traditional campus or classroom environment, the expectation is that the teachers and curriculum developers will ensure this “currency,” and the same is true in online systems. However, in the online system, change is more complicated, because any change in content or approach can have a wide impact on a number of aspects of the system. Because online learning technologies evolve as quickly, and often as unexpectedly, as do the curriculum, students' expectations and connectivity, etc., the ability to manage change effectively is important.



Assuming that the organization as whole respects and encourages change in such systems, there still remains the matter of how it is to be managed within the context of online learning. The first issue is one of balance: between constant change every time an idea or product comes into view (and so frustrating those affected, including students), and sticking with a system (for administrative ease and staff convenience) long after it has been superseded by better, proven systems.



The degree of centralization or decentralization of the system (or systems) also drives the change process. To what extent will some units be free to explore and try new systems, and to what extent should those lagging behind be forced to update their approaches? Because they relate to core aspects of an organization's business and culture, such questions can only be answered in that context, but the following dimensions of an online system infrastructure would appear to be key factors in handling change well.



Leadership

As in any organizational issue, effective change starts with leadership. Having the right attitude toward change and its importance and value is essential. Change should be embraced, and not seen to be just another headache to be dealt with. Kotter (1996) gives a concise explanation of why change is inevitable and crucial in modern business, and provides specific ideas on how change can be led.



Scouting Reports

Some staff must be assigned the tasks of looking for emerging trends and ideas in online learning systems, and of providing a place for others to feed information they come across. These scouting reports need to be compiled and shared.



Governance

A governance body is needed that not only deals with current issues related to online systems, but also provides a forum for discussion of emerging trends, organizes meetings and events for sharing and demonstration of new ideas, and revisits the vision for the online learning system regularly (perhaps once every year or two). [Note that the vision should be detailed enough to allow affected managers to adjust plans and budgets in the context of the organization's regular cycle.] The terms of reference and reporting relationship of the governance body should be commensurate with the importance of online learning to the organization.



The membership of such a body can be difficult to determine. The first impulse is to include those most intimately involved in online systems—the technical experts and educational technology champions—and their opinions are, of course, valuable. However, a more important criterion for membership is the individual's willingness to consider a wide variety of alternatives, and not stubbornly to defend their own preferred approach. In addition, users of the online systems, such as neophyte teachers, students, and user-support staff, will provide an important balance to discussions that otherwise can degenerate into purely technical banter. Finally, this body should be chaired by the highest possible level of relevant management.



Communication

The governance body must establish a process whereby developments and ideas in online education are regularly broadcast internally through newsletters and other forums, and, where appropriate, externally through journals and conferences. In any communication between the governance body and the users' community, simplicity of language is important. Furthermore, such communications must give users the opportunity to provide input to the governance body, and that body must be seen to be responding to the input; for example, by explaining seeming inconsistencies of approach.



Pilot Projects and Evaluation

An important dimension of change is the use of pilot projects for new developments. Of course, the impacts of such projects must be evaluated before the developments proceed to wider adoption. The governance body could provide the approval for such pilots, and could have a pool of resources to allocate to approved projects. Evaluation of the pilots should be conducted at arm's length, and the results should be widely shared. In this way, the organization can receive the fullest benefit from the pilots, and the process of innovation can be seen to be open and effective.



Resources for Change

As implied above, new ideas and approaches must be fostered, not just by words, but also by financial and in-kind resources, and they need to be coordinated by an open and widely representative governance body. The intention would be to balance the need for some control over innovation, which can diverge rapidly if separate units are left to their own devices, and the need constantly to explore and innovate in anticipation of broader change. For the employees, a balance must be struck between recognition for contributions to innovation and to ongoing operations.



Conclusion

top

In developing an infrastructure that supports excellence in online learning, the issues to be addressed are almost all the same as for any post-secondary educational enterprise: a clear understanding of the goals of the curriculum and of the characteristics and needs of the intended students; and a healthy working environment, with committed staff, where implementation can proceed, and where constant change is understood to be the norm. Within these general areas, there are, of course, a host of technical, procedural, and policy decisions to be made, but online learning is now mature enough that such decisions need not be made haphazardly: plenty of research and information is available, and there are many successful examples of online learning systems to learn from (see International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 1(2) (2001)). In contrast to those who were in the vanguard of this exciting educational development, new contributors can focus on getting the basic principles and goals in order before proceeding to implementation. Ultimately, as is any educational system, online learning is fundamentally a human endeavor, with the technology available to support the agreed upon principles and goals, not vice versa.



References

top

Athabasca University (2002a). Student Academic Services 2002. Retrieved April 27, 2004, from http://intra.athabascau.ca/reports/student_satisf_

acad_services_2002.doc



Athabasca University. (2002b). Education Plan. Retrieved April 27, 2004, from http://intra.athabascau.ca/reports/edplan_0ct4_02.doc



Chickering, A., & Ehrmann, S. C. (1996, October). Implementing the seven principles: Technology as lever. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 49(2), 3-6. Retrieved April 27, 2004, from

http://www.tltgroup.org/programs/seven.html



Edutools. (2001). Course Management Systems. (2002). Retrieved April 27, 2004, from the Western Cooperative for Educational Telecommunications Web site: http://www.edutools.info/course/index

.jsp



International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 1(2) (2001). Retrieved April 27, 2004, from http://www.irrodl.org/content/

v1.2/index.html



Kotter, J. P. (1996). Leading change. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.



Lu, M. (2002). SparkNotes studyguide on ideal gases. Retrieved April 27, 2004, from the Barnes and Noble Learning Network Web site:

http://www.sparknotes.com/chemistry/gases/ideal



Paul, R. H. (1990). Open learning and open management: Leadership and integrity in distance education. New York: Nichols Publishing.

Distance Learning Promise or Threat?

http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/feenberg/TELE3.HTM


Distance Learning: Promise or Threat?


Andrew Feenberg



My Adventures in Distance Learning

Once the stepchild of the academy, distance learning is finally taken seriously. But not in precisely the way early innovators like myself had hoped. It is not faculty who are in the forefront of the movement to network education. Instead politicians, university administrations and computer and telecommunications companies have decided there is money in it. But proposals for a radical "retooling" of the university emanating from these sources are guaranteed to provoke instant faculty hostility.



Today I find myself in the paradoxical position of defending my own understanding of distance learning against both its foes on the faculty and its advocates in the administration.



In 1981 I worked on the design team that created the first online educational program. This was the School of Management and Strategic Studies at the Western Behavioral Sciences Institute in La Jolla, California. The School offered courses taught by humanistic social scientists addressing major issues, such as globalization, environmentalism, urban planning, philosophy of technology, and so on. For nearly ten years, I helped with the operation of the School, trained teachers, and myself taught courses in it.



At the time online education was essentially untried. The equipment was expensive and primitive. We used Apple IIE's with 48K of memory and 300 baud modems. (Multiply by 1000 and 100 respectively to get current averages.) The complexity of basic computer operations in those days was such that it took a full page of printed instructions just to connect. A variant of email called computer conferencing was the only available electronic mediation.



Computer conferencing was suited to our application since it facilitated the sort of many-to-many communication that goes on in the classroom, but no one knew how to use it for education. None of us had ever been a student in an online class or seen one in operation, and we did not know the answers to the most elementary pedagogical questions, such as how to start a class, how long or short messages should be, and how often the teacher should sign on and respond to the students.



We soon discovered that computer conferencing was not very useful for delivering lectures, and of course it could not support any graphical contents, even the simple drawings teachers like to scribble on the blackboard. But these limitations led us to explore a Socratic pedagogy based on virtual classroom discussion that proved quite successful.



The school grew to include over 150 students in 26 countries around the world. It pioneered many of the features of online education taken for granted today. These include typical teacher and student roles and relationships, techniques for organizing discussion in a virtual classroom, ways of combining aspects of technical moderating and educational leadership, the use of informal chatting and "café" conferences, specialized client-server software, and and so on.



Other experiments soon benefited from our example and added their own contributions. Among the earliest were online classes at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, The New School for Social Research, The University of Arizona, Tucson, The Ontario Institute for the Study of Education, and the Open University in England.



These experiments were all championed by enthusiastic professors who involved their students in an adventure on the frontiers of technology. At first growth was slow, but in the last ten years online education has attracted much attention and seems well on its way to becoming a standard feature of the modern university. I am proud to have had a role in this development.



Consider, then, my surprise when I heard rumours last year that something called online education was coming to my university, San Diego State University, under the sponsorship of Microsoft, Hughes Aircraft, Fujitsu, and MCI! This initiative, called CETI, was supposed to build a $300 million information infrastructure to support virtual learning on our multi-campus system. Our classrooms and dorms were to be hardwired to the internet; we were to have video conferencing, various computer based teaching aids, electronic distance learning, and production facilities for marketable prepackaged courses to be sold by the CETI consortium for a profit.



CETI was opposed, sometimes violently, by most faculty and students. There were two main objections. First, both teachers and students doubted the educational value of networking, and second, some faculty members were upset by the commercial goal of CETI, the delivery of higher education through the market outside the context of a university community. What was once a daring faculty innovation had come to be perceived as a big business takeover of the campus.



I am no more enthusiastic about trading an academic job for one at Microsoft than the next faculty member, but this unqualified rejection of online education contradicts our experience at the Western Behavioral Sciences Institute. There the virtual classroom was a place of intense intellectual and human interaction.



Literally hundreds of highly intelligent comments were contributed to our computer conferences each month by both students and teachers. The quality of these online discussions surpasses anything I have been able to stimulate in my face-to-face classroom. As CETI became a common topic of discussion on my campus, I wondered why my colleagues did not share my interest in this innovative medium.



My puzzlement was soon to end. Our new systemwide Chancellor, Dr. Charles Reed, was due for a get acquainted visit. As he was leaving I finally had a chance to ask him the question that most bothered me: What is the pedagogical model that has guided CETI? The Chancellor looked at me as though I'd laid an egg, and said, "We've got the engineering plan. It's up to you faculty to figure out what to do with it." And off he went: subject closed!



Would you build a house this way or design a new kind of car or refrigerator? Surely it is important to find out how the thing is going to be used before committing a lot of resources to a specific plan or design. Yet this was not at all the order in which our Chancellor understood the process. Why not? I would guess it is because he did not conceive of the technology of online education as a system, including novel pedagogical challenges, but as an infrastructure, an "information superhighway," down which we faculty were invited to drive. And just as drivers are not consulted about how to build the roads, so faculty were not much involved in designing the educational superhighway.



But this overworked metaphor is altogether inappropriate. In the case of educational computing, the choice of infrastructure will largely determine the applications. If corporations rather than faculty are consulted about this choice, the outcome will be entirely different from the ideal of educational community to which faculty are attached by their culture and traditions. The ambition of CETI to make and market computer and video based courses illustrated that difference.



The CETI story has a significant ending. Public outcry against it grew gradually as faculty and students protested on campus, in the newspapers, and before legislative committees. Legal and financial questions were raised about mixing public and private assets, and finally the companies pulled out one by one. The initiative collapsed and will now be replaced by a more modest plan paid for out of public monies, as is proper. The faculty will shed no tears over having to wait a bit longer for their first ride on the electronic infobahn.



Education and Economics

CETI teaches an important lesson about the different ways in which most administrators and faculty understand distance learning and its technology. I will try to sketch what I take to be these different perspectives. Of course generalizations such as those I am about to formulate do not apply universally, but it is a fact that the distance learning debate polarizes around two hostile positions that usually correspond to the different roles of administration and faculty.



For too many administrators the big issues are not educational. The fiscal implications of electronic distance learning are what is interesting to them. Aministrators hope to use new technology to finesse the coming crisis in higher education spending, and to accomodate exploding enrollments of young people and returning students. Innovations like video conferencing and automated online education will make it possible to improve quality through the use of "star" professors while cutting costs of delivery. Students in virtual classrooms need no new parking structures. What is more, courses can be packaged and marketed, generating a continuous revenue stream without further investment.



But can new technology accomplish the existing educational mission for larger numbers at a discount? Two main solutions have been proposed during the current wave of enthusiasm for distance learning.



Video conferencing allows a professor to address a large numer of students in remote locations. Live interaction can be supported by a two-way video feed. The physical presence of teachers and students in the classroom can be reproduced electronically at some cost but more students can be served without expanding existing campuses.



Automation offers a more radical solution with large start up costs but promising far greater savings in the long run. In an automated system, the teacher's physical presence in the classroom is reproduced on CD ROM or made available over the Internet. Exciting computer based graphical materials can replace dull textbooks. Research on the Internet can replace hours spent in libraries. Testing and grading can be done online. Even essay tests can be graded by powerful programs for textual analysis.



The key to automation is to separate out informational "content" from "process." A small number of well paid "content experts" will work as "star" performers, while the delivery process is deskilled so that inexpensive tutors can handle interaction with students. In a really low cost solution, discussion can be replaced by automated exercises. Eventually it will be possible to dispense with campuses altogether. Students will pick out courses at an educational equivalent of Blockbuster and "do" college at home without ever meeting a faculty member or fellow student.



Is this for real? Unfortunately many people think it is. Coopers and Lybrand have published a white paper in which they claim that 25 packaged courses can take care of half of community college and 35% of four year college enrollments. They are convinced that students will learn just as much if not more, and they will be free to study at their own pace. In educational terms, nothing fundamental will change except cost and convenience, those two favorite selling points marketers like to emphasize.



It's quite a vision, but few faculty buy it. Where administrators see educational "content" as the constant and economics as the variable, faculty see education as the variable and economics as the constant.



Most faculty cannot imagine simply reproducing the learning experience of a face-to-face classroom online. Distance learning, like it or not, will be a paradigm change, a change, many faculty fear, for the worse. Faculty skepticism is of course due in part to resistance to innovation and fear of change, as administrators charge. But they are, after all, the professionals and know something about the difficulties and opportunities of conventional classroom teaching. They have reasons to doubt that an item by item electronic replacement of their classroom is possible.



Faculty consistently anticipate specific losses with respect to face-to-face teaching in an electronic classroom. How, they ask, can one duplicate the learning experience of a highly interactive classroom on an electronic network, and how can one reproduce the wealth of informal human contacts that add so much to education on a campus? How can the intense moments of human interaction which mark our memories and our lives ever occur in a sterile electronic environment experienced in the isolation of the home? Students confirm what faculty suspect, that they are poor TV performers, that it is boring to watch them on the little screen. And both faculty and students complain that computer programs that are supposed to replace specific teaching tasks, such as guiding students through exercises, are often difficult to use or even incomprehensible.



On the other hand, faculty detect continuity in administration enthusiasm for cost-cutting at the expense of traditional educational roles and values. Between 1970 and 1995, the number of full-time faculty increased by about half, while over the same period part-time faculty grew by two and one half times. If the trend continues, part-timers will overtake full-timers on college campuses in three years. At community colleges, they are already in the majority. This worrying trend parallels the growth of the nontraditional or returning student population, which now constitutes the majority of students in higher education.



These students require different course schedules than the traditional ones to which faculty are attached. Largely because of this, adult education has developed outside the standard academic departments and procedures under direct administrative control. As a result, a vast parallel system of higher education has emerged in which faculty have low status and little power. Since it serves adult learners, precisely the students most likely to be open to distance learning, this parallel system has a free hand to experiment even if traditional universities resist.



These trends set a precedent for adminstration strategies. A straight route down the information superhighway leads from the deprofessionalization to the deskilling of higher education. The replacement of full time by part-time faculty is merely the opening act in the plan to replace the faculty as such by CD ROMs. A new economic model of education is being sold under the guise of a new technological model. This is the route to what David Noble calls "digital diploma mills." Understandably, this is not a route many faculty wish to travel.



The Question of Distance Learning Technology

I believe there are two closely linked problems here. First, the source of innovation has shifted from faculty to administration; and second, the nature of the innovation has shifted as well, from text to video based communication. In what follows I will attempt to explain this linkage between actors and their preferred technological designs.



When faculty were lonely champions of the new distance learning technologies, their primary goal was pedagogical success. They had few resources and relied on inexpensive technologies such as email. They were engaged through their vocation as teachers, their commitment to finding new and exciting ways to transmit knowledge and culture. Their principal allies were students interested in playing with computers, and occasionally companies willing to donate equipment. This was a world of tentative experiments in which the stakes were small and near term expectations low.



The present administration dominated phase of the development of distance learning is very different. Now it's all about efficiency and, ultimately, money. And there is plenty of it for high tech approaches to education, if not to staff the French department. Contrary to the popular impression that the academic world is poor, universities in fact spend about $200 billion a year in the US. That is 34 times the revenue of the movie business according to the calculations of Christopher Oberg from whom I draw these figures. Administrators command these resources and corporations know it.



Huge sums are involved in the purchase of elaborate networks. Corporations are major players and find a ready audience for their most expensive technologies among adminstrators, all too easily dazzled by the sales pitch for video-conferencing, automated learning, and the Internet. Big investments in technology today are supposed to pay off in savings on facilities and salaries tomorrow, although the details remain fuzzy. Pedagogical objectives take the back seat to prestige and budgetary ones. Faculty and students are not allies but obstacles to be swept along by the inevitable momentum of progress.



The shift from faculty to administration centered innovation is more than a shift in actors and their allies. It is also a shift in what might be called spontaneous philosophies of technology. By this I mean that administrators typically have a different vision of technology and what it can accomplish than faculty.



Perhaps this is due to the influence of corporations. Salesmen seem often to have the ear of administrators in a way faculty do not, and they use their access to sell not just devices but also the content/process distinction which gives plausibility to their claim to be able to revolutionize something called educational "delivery" without much attention to faculty needs. The faculty already know how to teach and the technology is there to "deliver" the existing classroom experience online. From the standpoint of this dubious doctrine, it seems natural to suggest that new tools be used simply to reproduce the classroom experience or better still, to automate its elements and deliver it as a package.



The aim of reproducing or automating the classroom feeds directly into a preference for video, which seems to offer the closest equivalent to the classroom experience. If administrators believe that, they may buy these expensive tools in the expectation that faculty will be able simply to pick them up and use them. This is naive, even from a business standpoint. But in fact universities do not seem anxious to make the enormous expenditures on adaptation and training that typically accompany the acquisition of complex new computer systems in the business world. A perverse fascination with capital investment seems to be involved.



Faculty, when they actually engage with the new teaching technology, sense immediately that it is not mature, that electronics is not there yet as a ready tool. In the actual experience of online education, technology is not a predefined thing at all, but an environment, an empty space faculty must inhabit and enliven. They have a craft relation to the technologies rather than a development strategy. They try to get the feel of it and figure out how to animate it.



This difference is reflected in different technological emphases. Live video, with its complicated and intimidating apparatus, holds little attraction for either teachers or students. While it would be nice to be a "star" professor in an automated virtual class, most faculty do not aspire to that exalted status. To the extent that they are interested at all today, most faculty appreciate the graphical capabilities of computers in a different connection, as aids to presenting information and exercises in computer labs. But these applications are better compared to textbooks than to classrooms; they are supplements to, rather than replacements for, classroom teaching.



Although neither video conferencing nor automated learning have caught on with faculty, there is a long history of enthusiasm among at least a small group of them for interactive text based applications such as computer conferencing. These experiences go back to a time when there were no more elaborate alternatives; it is widely assumed that the introduction of image and sound renders earlier approaches obsolete. But perhaps that is a mistake. The latest equipment is not always the best for the task. Could it be that our earliest experiences with computer conferencing were not merely constrained by the primitive equipment then available, but also revealed the essence of electronically mediated education? I believe this to be the case. Even after all these years the exciting online pedagogical experiences still involve human interactions and for the most part these continue to be text based.



But here is the rub: interactive text based applications lack the pizazz of video alternatives and cannot promise automation, nor can they be packaged and sold. On the contrary, they are labor intensive and will probably not cut costs very much. Hence the lack of interest from corporations and administrators, and the gradual eclipse of these technological options by far more expensive ones. But unlike the fancy alternatives, interactive text based systems actually accomplish legitimate pedagogical objectives faculty can recognize and respect. There are good reasons for this.



Considered as an environment, the world of online interaction has properties that determine its appropriate use. Just as a concert hall is a space appropriate for different activities than a living room, so the electronically mediated spaces of computer networks are also suited to specific activities. It would of course be possible to conduct a class in a restaurant, or dine on a basketball court, but the results would likely be disappointing. Similar abuse of the online environment will also yield disappointing outcomes. But this is precisely what happens when we try to reproduce a face-to-face classroom online or on CD ROM.



The basic fact about computer networks is scarcity of bandwidth. Even with all the recent advances, we are far from being able to reproduce the actual experience of human proximity in space. Indeed, it is hard to imagine in what that would consist. What kind of network would make it possible to bump into someone on the way into class and make a new friend, to carry on a heated discussion after the end of the hour, to catch the professor's eye and exchange an instantaneous glance in which boredom or alertness is tacitly expressed?



On the other hand, we have a well established method for communicating in a narrow bandwidth. It's called writing. And we have a rich experience of using writing to overcome the limitations of bandwidth. Writing is thus not a poor substitute for physical presence and speech, but another fundamental medium of expression with its own properties and powers. It is not impersonal, as is sometimes supposed. We know how to present ourselves as persons through writing; this is what correspondence is all about. Nor is it harder to write about ideas than to talk about them; most people can formulate difficult ideas more easily in written form than in speech in front of an audience.



These considerations on writing hold the key to online education. The online environment is essentially a space for written interaction. This is its limitation and also its potential. Electronic networks should be appropriated by educational institutions with this in mind, and not turned into poor copies of the face-to-face classroom which they can never adequately reproduce.



While interactive writing is the basic medium of expression on networks, in recent years we have learned to enhance the network experience with sound and image, and that is a good thing. But writing is the basic medium of online expression, the skeleton around which other technologies and experiences must be organized to build a viable learning environment.



In online education as in the classroom, we must be careful to distinguish the basic medium from the enhancements and not to confuse their roles. Speech is the basic medium in the classroom, and we supplement it with labs, movies, slides, text books, computer demonstrations, and so on. Similar, enhancements to the written medium are possible on networks. But confusing the medium with the supplementary enhancements leads to the pedagogical absurdity of teacherless education.



To replace online written interaction with the enhancements makes no more sense than to replace the teacher in the face-to-face classroom with labs, movies, slides, text books, and computer demonstrations. That was tried with educational television and computer-aided instruction long ago with no success.



What does this say about the ambition to replace campuses with virtual universities? Large markets for distance learning will undoubtedly emerge, and this will be a blessing for many students who cannot attend college classes. But if we cut higher education loose from the the traditional university and its values, the blessing will turn into a disaster. The best way to maintain the connection is through insuring that distance learning is "delivered" not just by CD ROMs, but by living teachers, fully qualified to teach and interested in doing so online.



Then prepackaged materials will be seen to replace not the teacher as a mentor and guide but the lecture and the textbook. Interaction with the professor will continue to be the centerpiece of education, no matter what the medium. And of course for most people that interaction will continue to take place on campus if they have the means and the mobility to attend a college.



There is some evidence that students share this view despite the marketing hype for distance learning. In its first weeks, after $9.5 million in expenditures, the Western Governors University had only 10 enrollments. This disappointing start for a major initiative in online education may have been due in part to embarrassing technical difficulties, but it also signals that, whatever its usefulness, distance learning is unlikely to be the panacea claimed by its commercial promoters.



Conclusions

Let me summarize now the conclusions I draw from these reflections.



First, administrators and businessmen should forget the idea that distance learning systems based on videoconferencing or CD ROMs and star professors will replace face-to-face classroom education. The dream of automating the educational process has failed so often in the past that there is little reason to take it seriously on this, the nth round.



Second, politicians need to be realistic about the future costs of higher education. Distance learning is not going to be a cheap replacement for campuses. Some other solution to the parking problem will have to be found. The campus experience will remain in demand for the foreseeable future.



Third, the overselling of foolish ideas about technology should not be allowed to discredit the whole field of online education. We as faculty need to get beyond defensive contempt for this significant educational innovation and look at specific designs with legitimate pedagogical objectives in mind.



Fourth, the educational technologists themselves need to continue to work creatively with faculty and students to devise truly viable applications that fulfill real needs. There are good reasons for sticking with interactive text based systems systems and supplementing them with visual and other online resources, rather than attempting to duplicate face-to-face education online. The design challenge of improving the original text based systems is well worth pursuing.



Fifth, we must give serious thought to the implications of student diversity. The influx of returning students over the past 15 years has had major benefits for many people who missed the opportunity to finish their schooling in adolescence. New educational formats have been developed that work better for them than the traditional residential college teaching schedule. But these innovations have gone along with a devastating deprofessionalization that has gutted the occupation of university professor of security and respect for approximately half of all current faculty. The idea that distance learning can now deskill the already half deprofessionalized profession is so obnoxious that I can see why many faculty believe its advocates should be run off the campuses.



However, negativism is not enough. The failure of the faculties to demand the right and privilege of teaching returning students, to innovate new formats appropriate to their needs, and to exercise control of their education has led to the current situation. The systematic rejection of online education will not stop further deprofessionalization. The dream of automation under cover of which this process will go forward deserves criticism, of course, but that should not become an alibi for ignoring real dangers and opportunities. The faculty must accept the responsibility now for shaping distance learning, and in the process, it should also attempt to reclaim ground lost in the development of programs for returning students.



References

Farber, Jerry (1998). "The Third Circle: On Education and Distance Learning," Sociological Perspectives, Vol. 41, No. 4, 1998.



Feenberg, Andrew (1987). "Computer Conferencing and the Humanities," Instructional Science, 16.



Feenberg, Andrew (1993). "Building a Global Network: The WBSI Experience," in L. Harasim, ed., Global Networks: Computerizing the International Community, MIT Press.



Harasim, Linda, S. R. Hiltz, L. Teles, and M. Turoff (1995). Learning Networks: A Field Guide to Teaching and Learning Online. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.



Noble, David (1998). "Digital Diploma Mills: The Automation of Higher Education." Digital Diploma Mills Conference, Harvey Mudd College.



Oberg, Christopher (1998). "The Price of Information Technology in the Future of Higher Education." Digital Diploma Mills Conference, Harvey Mudd College.





Back to my main page.

Genes 2 Cognition

http://www.g2conline.org/

MERLOT

http://voices.merlot.org/group/merlot101/forum/topics/merlot-101-spring-2009-week-2-1

MERLOT is unique in that many teaching materials are peer reviewed by content experts. Please use the Browse function to get a "hit list" of materials in your discipline. As discussed today, "the cream rises to the top," so the highest rated materials appear first on your hit list.




Select one of the materials in your discipline and read the Peer Review (just click on the Peer Review link). After reading the Peer Review, answer the following questions:



1. Is this material something you would use in your class? Why or why not?

2. How beneficial was the Peer Review to your decision? Why or why not?

3. Please comment on MERLOT Peer Reviews in general.

4. Did you think about making a Member Comment?

About Us

MERLOT is a leading edge, user-centered, searchable collection of peer reviewed and selected higher education, online learning materials, catalogued by registered members and a set of faculty development support services. MERLOT's vision is to be a premiere online community where faculty, staff, and students from around the world share their learning materials and pedagogy.





MERLOT's strategic goal is to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning by increasing the quantity and quality of peer reviewed online learning materials that can be easily incorporated into faculty designed courses.



MERLOT’s activities are based on the creative collaboration and support of Individual Members,

Institutional Partners, Corporate Partners and Editorial Boards.





Integral to MERLOT’s continuing development of faculty development support services are its:



• Building and sustaining online academic communities



• Online teaching and learning initiatives



• Building, organizing, reviewing, and developing applications of online teaching-learning materials





MERLOT maintains its currency through ongoing and continuing communication with its worldwide supporters in a variety of ways, including the annual MERLOT International Conference, the Journal of Online Learning and Teaching (JOLT), member publications, news, and our new Voices website to enable MERLOT users to communication with others.

Essentail 7 free downloads for any PC!

http://cnettv.cnet.com/seven-essential-free-software-apps-new-pc/9742-1_53-50079170.html?tag=nl.e758

Structure of the Open University (UK)

Professors - Tutors

Are they really interested in online degrees?

Italy's International Telematic University (Didactic Cyberspace)

http://www.uninettunouniversity.net/e/main.asp?id=040001010000000001000000010300000000

Dear Student of the International Telematic UNINETTUNO,




this document has been drawn up by your tutors in the hope that your path to learning and professional growth will prove in an engaging and enyoyable experience that will be enriched on a daily basis with new stimuli and contents.



The primeobjective of our university is to facilitate access to knowledge for all citizens of the world, without space or time limitations.



This goal is pursued through the carrying out of adidactic model, which has been developed through years of research in the field by Prof. Maria Amata Garito, full professor of "Technologies of Education and Learning", Psychology Faculty, at the University of Rome "La Sapienza", Rector of the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO and Director of Network Nettuno.



The present guidelines are presented in two parts:



•in thefirst part, you will learn how the Learning Process is developed within the didactic model of the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO, in which teaching materials are presented in modules and the didactic activities are carried out in both a traditional and long distance fashion;

•in the second part, you will learn how the Didactic Cyberspace, is laid out. This is where all of the distance learning activities are carried out.

1. The Learning Process

1.1 How the teaching materials are delivered

The didactic approach of the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO does not follow a traditional semester plan. Instead, it unfolds as teaching materials are presented. All of the teaching activities of the Degree Courses at the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO are delivered in modules of a variable duration based on the academic credits of the given course. These are repeated four times each academic year.



Right by your side, to guide you along your study path, there will be two professional figures:



•the Mentor, who is concerned with making you feel at home and offering support for the duration of your degree course. Your mentor will listen to your needs and guarantee optimum conditions for the learning process;

•theTutor, specific for each teaching subject, has the task of facilitating your learning process and communication on the web. Your tutor will provide you with the necessary instruments in order to get the most out of your studies, guiding you up to the final exam.

For each teaching subject the students are divided into classes on the basis of individual profiles that are the result of the Entrance Questionnaire that students fill out at the moment of enrolment. A tutor is assigned to each class, which can contain up to 30 students. This applies to all of the Faculties, with the exception of the Degree Course of the Engineering Faculty where the classes can contain a maximum of 20 students.



During the period of time in which teaching is carried out, your tutor will follow your progress as the didactic activity unfolds, furnishing you with ad hoc learning materials and interacting with you through the available systems of communication. These you will find on theTutor Page of the Didactic Cyberspace.



To earn1 academic credit,remember that according to the rules currently in effect one must carry out 25 hours of activity. These are broken down as follows:



•5 hours of videolessons that you will find in digitalized format in the Video Library of the Didactic Cyberspace; these video lessons will take 10 hours of your time, as we think it is appropriate that you follow each lesson twice;

•10 hours of individual study on texts and exercises that you will find in the Media Library and the Virtual Laboratory of the Didactic Cyberspace;

•5 hours of activity assisted by the Tutor.

For example, if a teaching subject comprises 25 video-lessons (of 1 hour each), you will earn 5 academic credits through:



•50 total hours of viewing of the video lessons (2 hours for each video lesson);

•50 hours of individual study;

•25 hours of activity assisted by the Tutor.



When the teaching subject has been persented in its entirety, exam sessions will be organized.



1.2 Traditional and long distance didactic activities

For each teaching subject, the starting point of your learning process is the viewing of academic video lessons, which are available on the Internet in the Didactic Cyberspace – Video Library Sections – and broadcasted on the satellite channel RAI NETTUNO SAT 1.



The videolessons present the following characteristics:



•modular contents;

•indexing of the themes treated in the lesson;

•bookmark, that is to say a graphic icon representing a link to the learning object.

Each video-lesson is divided into topics and created with a predefined indexing system which allows for flexible use. You can see an entire video lesson in a linear fashion or follow a non-linear itinerary, thus choosing the topics that you wish to study in greater depth along with the connected study materials.



The slide presented by the Video Professor during the video lesson constitute an important support tool for your studies: you can use them as a basis for your notes, a means by which you can create your own network of links between topics and write your personal notebook.



The video lessons, furnished with their relative slides, are enriched with didactic materials known as a learning object, these are signaled during the course of the video lesson by an icon link (bookmark) and are made available in the Didactic Cyberspace of the Internet site.



Such materials can comprise the following:



•books and articles (extracts, study activity sheets, etc.);

•Cd-Rom (or DVD);

•Exercises (with answers);

•Virtual laboratories;

•Annotated bibliographies;

•Annotated site links.



The modular organization of the course contents, the indexing of the topics and the bookmarks allow you to develop multimedia and hyper-textual learning processes, leading to a more personalized study path.



The consultation and study of didactic teaching materials will enable you to prepare yourself more thoroughly through studying in greater depth the various topics introduced in the video lesson and through practical application of the concepts learned.



The television interface through which the video lessons are transmitted is structured in the following way:





The web interface for the transmission of the video lessons is structured in the following way instead:





The didactic model of the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO allows you to integrate the many advantages of the above-mentioned long distance didactic activities with the benefits that only “face to face” contact can guarantee.



The traditional didactic activities are comprised of the following:



•Direct interaction with the professor and tutor, through “face to face” meetings at the main site and at the Technological Centres;

•Practice activities and seminars, with the assistance of professors and tutors;

•Evaluations and exam sessions at the main site and at the technological centres.

1.3. Tutoring activities

In the proposed Educational Psychology model, the student is at the centre of the educational process, guided however by a new figure known as theTelematic Professor-Tutor, who represents a guide as well as a constant presence during your Learning Process.



The Tutor works in close contact with you and his or her activities are aimed at creating a collaborative and helpful context for your path of study and professional growth.



The long distance Tutoring activities can be carried out in two ways:



- in a synchronic manner;

- in a diachronic manner



The On Line Tutoring or Long distance Tutoring is organized into classes of students, with an advanced agenda system that is able to recognize each individual. The Agenda is the instrument used by both the Tutor and the student in order to fix appointments as well as on line and “face to face” meetings. Using the course agenda as a basis, you can also manage your own personal agenda.



1.3.1. Long distance synchronic Tutoring

You can have a dialogue with your Tutor in real time (Synchronic Tutoring) by using the telephone, the chat room, the video-chat room, video and audio-conference systems activated in the Didactic Cyberspace.



The telephone is traditionally considered by the students to be the most direct and simple means of communication with the Tutor. Also the Tutors maintain that conversing via telephone is still valid for carrying out their role as guide and for supporting the learning process.



The audio and video-conference systems facilitate collaborative learning processes and are therefore well-suited to exercises and group work at a distance.



You can carry out this activity on an individual basis as well through the chat rooms and video-chat rooms that enable you to have a dialogue with the Tutors and with the other students in real time, thus creating true virtual encounters.



1.3.2 Diachronic long distance Tutoring

When communication in real time is not necessary, you can activate a Diachronic Tutoring Session through tools such as e mail and discussion forums on the Internet.



Email allows a rapid exchange of information, documents and materials at a distance.



The discussion forums, related to the topics of a given teaching subject, allow you to extend the dialogue and activate a collaborative learning process. This approach is different compared to the audio and video-conference systems, which rely on oral communication. Here the focus is on writing, which gives you the chance to reflect and organize your thoughts regarding the discussion topic and study activity that you are engaged in.



1.3.3 Face-to-face Tutoring

In Traditional Tutoring, the interaction with the tutor is direct, through individual or group meetings at the main site or at University Technological Centres. These involve seminars and moments of discussion.



They are important occasions where you can benefit from your tutors’ elucidations and more detailed information on subjects that have been previously explained and perhaps were not understood during the long distance tutoring sessions.



The Tutor, during these “face to face” meetings, can discover the depth and breadth of your knowledge and identify eventual problems and weak points in your learning. This is all in the interest of making sure you are on the right study path.





2. The Didactic Cyberspace

The fulcrum of didactic activity on the Internet is represented by the WEB macro-area known as the Didactic Cyberspace, which allows those who participate in this learning process to access the areas relating to their area of study.

In the Didactic Cyberspace a learning and developmental process is implemented through a new approach to communicating knowledge.

There are various ways to access the Didactic Cyberspace through login and passwords on the basis of the three different roles of those who participate in the learning process: Professors, Tutors and Students.

The three categories of those who utilize the service can access information linked to each teaching subject. In particular, the Professor and Tutor can modify or substitute didactic materials and add new ones for the duration of the teaching period, while the student has his or her own area where data, information and personal notes can be inserted.

When you enter the Didactic Cyberspace, you can choose your Faculty and your Degree Course.. Then, through the window entitled List of Teaching Subjects, you can access:



- the The Page of the Appointed Teaching Professor

- the Tutor Page

Within these pages you will find the Learning Environments.



2.1 The Appointed Teaching Professor Page

This contains all of the functions of the Appointed Teaching Professor and allows access to the following areas:



•Curriculum vitae;

•Teaching Program;

•Conceptual Map;

•Didactic Material;

•Didactic Planning;

•Exam Guide;

•Exam Calendar;

•Learning Environments;

•Links to the Tutor Pages

The Teaching Programme is stuctured in such a way as to contain:



•The description, objectives and contents of the subject being taught;

•The specification of necessary prerequisites;

•The reference to exercises relative to the video lessons;

•The indexing of textbooks;

•Key words of the subject being taught;

•Indications as to the methodology along with study suggestions for the subject being taught.

The Concept Map for the teaching subject presents the title of each lesson, a listing of the topics within each lesson along with bookmarks that connect the didactic materials (books and articles, CD-ROM, bibliographies, site links, exercises and virtual laboratories) relating to the various topics that are treated.



The Didactic Material is comprised of elements that have been prepared upon in an ad hoc fashion by the Appointed Teaching Professor. These can include articles, study sheets, exercises, CD-ROM/DVDs and slides. Select materials prepared by students during their collaborative studies may be included at the discretion of the Appointed Teaching Professor.



The Didactic Planning section depends on the number of academic credits, as relates to the amount of work the student does. All of the Teaching Subjects of the Degree Courses at the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO are presented as a series of modules that have a predefined duration according to the number of academic credits attributed to the course, as has been illustrated before. In the Didactic Planning section, the Appointed Teaching Professor will indicate the approach and timing as to his or her teaching programme, the parameters regarding academic credits and other information relative to the teaching subject.



The Exam Guide specifies the following:



•How the exam wil be carried out;

•Prerequisites for admission to the exam;

•The way in which you can reserve a place in order to sit the exam;

•Documents that must be presented in order to take the exam;

•The way in which results are communicated;

•The way in which results are recorded.

The Exam Calendar displays the following:



•dates, schedules and places where exams are held;

•the composition of the exam commission.

The didactic activities unfold within the Learning Environments: the Video library, Media library, Virtual Laboratory and Tutoring On Line. For a detailed description of the different environments, please refer to the dedicated paragraph.



The Links to the Tutor Pages allow the appointed Teaching Professor to have at his or her disposal all of the materials, information and tools relative to his or her own subject.



2.1.1 The Functions of the Appointed teaching Professor

The main activities of the Appointed teaching Professor can be summarized as follows:



•structure the teaching programme or update/adapt the existing one;

•invent or revise the conceptual map of the subject being taught;

•furnish didactic materials for in-depth study;

•didactic planning of the subject;

•make the exam guide available;

•coordinate work with the Tutor;

•organize and lead discussion forums on topical themes of particular relevance to his or her subject;

•test the students at the conclusion of each teaching module.

In particular, the Appointed Teaching Professor, collaboration with the Tutor:



•evaluates the topics of the existing lessons and revises them (by reducing them or by integrating new material) if necessary;

•indexes the video-lessons (available on video cassette) for the dvd layout;

•if necessary, entrusts one or more of the Video Professors with the task of recording new video lessons;

•analyses the existing teaching materials in order to select those that he or she still considers to be valid;

•defines the contents and type of teaching materials to be produced ex novo;

•specifies, for all of the video lessons, the count in minutes in order to signal the bookmarks relating to the didactic material.

In the case of recording new video lessons, each Video Professor,, where collaboration with the Tutor is necessary, is mainly occupied with:



•preparing the professorial lesson slides and recording the video lessons;

•indexing his or her own video lessons for the dvd layout;

•completing the conceptual map of the subject being taught, connecting several types of didactic materials for in-depth study to the video lesson topics. These materials can include books and articles, CD-ROMs, bibliographies, site links and exercises;

•specifying, for all of the video lessons, the minute count details in order to signal the bookmarks relative to the didactic materials.

2.2 The Tutor Page

The on line page for each Tutor of the subject being taught will communicate his or her availabilty (dates and schedules) along with contact details (e-mail, telephone and fax number), whilst in addition allowing access to the following areas:



•Curriculum vitae;;

•Teaching Program;

•Conceptual Map;

•Didactic Materials;

•Didactic Planning;

•Agenda;

•Evaluation and Statistics;

•Learning Environments;

•Links to the Page of the Appointed Teaching Professor;

The Program, Conceptual Map and Didactic Planning of the subject being taught are the same documents that can be found on the Appointed Teaching Professor Page.



The Didactic Material is comprised of:



•subjects that have been explained in an ad hoc fashion by the Tutor on the basis of student profiles and on the results of the qualitative evaluations that the Tutor periodically administers to the students;

•a selection, made by the Tutor, of materials developed by students during their activities with the Tutor or with other students during collaborative learning tasks.

The materials developed or selected by the Tutor represent an integral part of the Media Library and of the Virtual Laboratory, and are aimed at a specific class of students.



The Agenda is the tool that the Tutor uses in order to fix appointments and on line meetings, confirm meeting requests made by students and manage his or her personal agenda.

In the area of Evaluation and Statistics the following are made available:



•the tools of quantitative evaluation, or the statistics tracking the activity of the students (at both the individual and aggregate level). This is done in terms of the number of access times and time of use in the Learning environments on the part of the students as well as by tracking the use of the Tutoring On Line tools, number of exercises completed and the mean average of evaluation and self-evaluation;

•the tools of qualitative evaluation, or the evaluation of each student based on evaluation sheets (with open questions and/or exercise), developed by the Tutor in order to monitor the learning progress of the student in his or her class.

The Tutor Page, as with the Appointed teaching Professor Page, allows access to the four Learning Environments: Video Library, Media Library, Virtual Laboratory and Tutoring On Line.



The Tutor Page contains links to the Appointed Teaching Professor Page in order to facilitate navigating the Didactic Cyberspace..



The Appointed teaching Professor and Tutor can know about the composition of their own classes of students and have access to the pages of single students through the List of Teaching Subjects for Degree Courses window.



As stated before, in the Educational Psychology Model of the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO, the student is at the centre of the learning process, which is designed on the basis of his or her needs and created through a high level of interactivity between the Professor, Tutor and Student



The professors’ and the tutors’ knowledge of their students is possible by several diverse means, including the entrance Questionnaire, which is filled out during enrolment, and the frequent virtual and face to face meetings with the Mentors and Tutors during the entire course of study.



Each and every student has at his or her disposal a page, called My student page”, that can be personalized at will in such a way as to allow the student to use the various didactic support materials available to better meet his or her needs. This makes it easier for the student to actively contribute to the collaborative educational process.



Your home page offers the following possibilities:



•to personalize your study itinerary by choosing the teaching activities to follow and making note of the last lesson that you have visited in each pf the chosen teaching subjects;

•verify your progress by checking your self-evaluations as well as those of your Tutor and viewing, for every lesson, which didactic materials you have used, how many times and for how long;

•plan your didactic activities, by mean of an Agenda, in order to view appointments in the Chat Rooms, Forums and Virtual Classrooms set by your Tutors, to insert reminders and request intervention on the part of your Tutors;

•send your didactic materials to your Tutors or to your Appointed Teaching Professor which, if selected, can be published on the site and thus made available to the entire scientific community;

•always have at your disposal your Tutors by accessing the Tutor Page with a simple click.

2.2.1 The functions of the Tutor

Within the didactic model adopted by the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO, the Tutor plays a crucial role, acting as mediator between the participants in the Learning Process, so that a Network of Knowledge Exchange (NEKE) is created.



The tutoring activity represents one of the most significant moments of learning input and requires a high level of interactivity between Tutor and Student. It has been noted that the student learns through the continuous integration of theoretical knowledge (through the professor’s lessons), concepts that are acquired thanks to examples and advice provided by experts (through discussions and comparing ideas in the Forums) and practice in the field (through exercises guided by the Professor and/or Tutor that are offered singularly and personally to the student).



The Tutoring phase is therefore a necessary complement to the lessons of the professor and to the period of self study that follows.



The Tutor is presented as a “planner” for the learning experiences of the students, a consultant and guide to the Learning Process; thus he becomes a member of the learning team, reducing the risk of isolation on the part of the student.



The Tutor has the task of organizing and making available to the students a series of materials and tools. These match the lessons given telematically and, taken altogether, give a precise picture of the individual topics being taught.



As shown in various studies conducted in the field, the role of the Tutor is considered by the learners to be a sort of interface between the student and the teaching subject; his or her activity should be aimed at creating the interactivity between student and professor that is missing in the video-lessons.



In addition, an undeniable characteristic is the quickness of response. This underlines the need of the students to have someone who represents a constant and reliable presence. The contribution of the Tutor will be even more appreciated with the preparation and correction of written exercises in preparation for the exam. In this way, a didactic ‘semi-guided’ itinerary is created, taking the student up to the final exam with a preparation suited to the needs of each and every program.



The tasks of the Tutor at the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO are orientated towards organization, both their own and that of the students.



The tasks geared towards organization consist of the following:



1.Selecting/adapting learning materials:

◦Selecting supplementary learning resources;

◦Organizing the access of the learner to learning resources.

2.Giving an evaluation/some feedback:

◦Regarding the results of the learner and his or her experiences in the program and the course;

◦Regarding the materials and the organizational aspects;

◦Regarding the students’ problems.

The tasks of the Tutor where the learner is concerned are the following:



1.Help the student stay motivated:

◦Actively bring about and maintain motivation;

◦Create an open and positive climate;

◦Help fill the gap in a student’s social needs.

2.Provide help concerning the course contents:

◦Connect the contents to the previous knowledge of the student;

◦Solve problems regarding content;

◦Stimulate the application of the course contents in a professional context.

3.Develop study skills:

◦Promote a critical spirit;

◦Develop learning styles and cognitive strategies;

◦Help the student to self-regulate his or her study and learning;

◦Promote knowledge of contextual factors in learning;

◦Introduce the student to the use of new technology (e-mail, chat rooms, videoconferencing and Internet).

4.Give an evaluation/ feedback

◦Inform the learner about his or her progress;

◦Prepare the learner for exams;

◦Help the learner to develop realistic self-evaluation skills.

To these tasks are added other functions specific to tutoring.



At the beginning of the course, for example, the Tutor:

defines what the learner is to expect from the course;

- verifies previously acquired knowledge;

- offers suggestions and materials to strengthen any weak spots in the student’s preparation and, if necessary, offers training to improve study skills (especially time management).



During the next phase, which begins at the start of the course itself, the Tutor’s role as mediator comes into play. In fact, during the course the Tutor carries out a series of tasks with the precise aim of guiding the various aspects of learning and laying the basis for the exchange of knowledge between the participants in the Learning Process.



These tasks are to:

- enrich the materials of the course and provide access to the learning resources (by creating Internet site links, exercises on the web, etc.);

- identify study problems and find eventual solutions;

- instill specific study skills and improve learning capacity;

- lend support in practice activities;

- “try” the contents of the course;

- give objective and constructive feedback on the results of the learning process in the interest of ensuring success on the part of the student;

- help the student to apply the contents of the course in real life situations;

- instill a spirit of cooperation among the students (functioning in this way as mediator); - monitor (evaluate) performance.



As the teaching modules are presented, the Tutor provides qualitative and quantitative evaluations on the student’s learning so as to constantly monitor the results of the Process of Learning, as well as giving the students personalized support in preparation for the exam at the end of the module.



The quantitative evaluation of the student’s participation is given by the Tutor on the basis of statistics regarding the student’s navigation through the Didactic Cyberspace. These are defined as follows: number of access times throughout the time of use on the part of the student within the Learning Environments, the Tutoring On Line tools, the number of exercises completed and the average of the evaluations/self-evaluations.



In order to integrate this level of monitoring, the Tutor administers evaluation sheets to all the students (preferably with questions and open answers and/or exercises) in order to check and see how well the student has assimilated the contents of the professor’s lessons.



The results of the qualitative and quantitative evaluations constitute the basis for carrying out the aims of the Tutor, namely strengthening the student’s cognitive abilities along with preparing him for the exam.



The Tutor’s offering of supplementary learning materials serves two purposes: on one hand to strengthen any weak spots in the Learning Process of the single student or group of students and on the other hand to satisfy eventual requests for study in greater depth. These materials can be: books and articles (therefore study sheets and projects), CD-ROMs, bibliographical or site link references, exercises and and virtual laboratories.



The Tutor’s role as mediator involves a last phase that coincides with the end of the presentation of teaching materials. Here the Tutor helps the student review the teaching contents and prepare for the exam. The Tutor also asks the student for their evaluation of the teaching itself, thus obtaining valuable feedback on the teaching/training process from the student.



As has been previously stated, the Tutor works in close contact with the students and his/her activity is aimed at creating a collaborative environment characterized by direct support for the students through two complementary approaches: the long distance (synchronic and diachronic) method and the traditional one.



In order to carry out such an important and complex role, the Tutor must possess a combination of abilities. These can be boiled down to five fundamental areas:



•specific ability to control and direct;

•specific professional ability;

•organizational ability;

•communicative and relational abilities;

•pedagogical and didactic abilities.

Naturally the content of the Tutoring activity and the combination of abilities necessary to carry it out will vary based on various factors, including the aims to be reached, the specific needs of the students, the characteristics of the Degree Course, the type of subject beingtaught, etc.



2.3 The Student’s Page

It includes the functions at the students’ disposal and allows access to the following areas:



•Customised didactic planning: this supplies the student with a customized study programme and the didactic activities planning referring to each course. Every student can find the planning of his didactic activities, divided into four didactic periods, on the Internet. The inclusion in the online study classes is structured in such a way as to grant the student the possibility of attending two subjects for each didactic period while being guided by a professor/tutor. The result of the intermediate assessment that can also be checked by each individual student along with the tracking of his Internet-based learning , so allowing admission to the exams Getting through the exams of the attended didactic modules allows getting enrolled and included into the classes of the following courses.

•Learning process check: each individual student can check, for each Internet-based didactic activity, his own self-assessment and compare it with that one given by his tutor. He can check by himself if there are some gaps in his learning and develop new learning strategies with the support of not only the professor/tutor, but also of his own classmates.

•Agenda (planning of didactic activities): This displays the rendezvous fixed by the tutors or by the professor in the Chat-room, Forum and in the Virtual Classroom; it is possible to use the Agenda to include personal memos or ask for the professor/tutor’s support to overcome any learning difficulties. •My lessons on TV today: This displays the video lessons programming schedule being broadcast on the satellite television channel for the subjects being currently delivered.

2.4 The Learning Environments

2.4.1 The Video Library



The Video Library contains the lessons taught by the professor, namely the digitalized video lessons and their relative slides.



The use of the digitalized video lessons allows the student to activate learning processes of a symbolic and reconstructive kind. These are linked to a Classical linear approach to teaching. In addition, the modular layout of the contents and the indexing of topics together with bookmarks help the student to develop a hyper-textual and multimedia approach to the learning process. This results in improved meta-cognitive strategies that lead to a more personalized learning path.



Each video-lesson is created with a predefined indexing system that allows the professor to structure the program according to the topics presented, and then point out the tools that allow the student to study diverse topics in an in-depth fashion. Thus the video lesson is conceptualized as a hyper-textual itinerary



During the Learning Process the bookmarks allow the student to connect various topics presented in the video lesson to learning materials that are found in the Media Library. In this way, the student can find contextual study resources in the form of books, articles, CD-ROMs, bibliographic references, site link references, exercises and virtual laboratories. These give the student the opportunity to combine practical and theoretical study methods in a Learning Process known as learning by doing.



2.4.2 The Media Library



The Media Library contains didactic materials (Learning Objects) connected to the video lessons – for example study sheets, films, images, diagrams, animated material which are all gathered under an Intelligent Bibliographic System.



The elements that make up the Media Library represent in-depth study materials connected to the contents of the video lessons. They can be associated with a topic, a series of topics, an entire video lesson, a series of video lessons or the entire course.



The objects that make up the Media Library are categorized as follows: books and articles, CD-ROMs, bibliographical references and site link references.



The Media Library does not contain the Virtual Laboratories or exercises connected to the video lessons. These are made available (without answers) in the Virtual Laboratory..



The in-depth study materials developed in an ad hoc fashion by the Tutor (or Appointed Teaching Professor) for the students in their class and those study materials sent by students and selected by the Tutor (or Appointed Teaching Professor) are only made available on the Tutor Page (or that of the Appointed Teaching Professor), as they refer to a specific class of students.



2.4.3 The Virtual Laboratory



In the Virtual Laboratory you can check your progress and expand your knowledge thanks to the approach of learning by doing, which is by an on-going Socratic tutoring method which is carried out in two ways: individual and group exercises.



Individual Exercises: You can access the dedicated learning environment and find a series of exercises on the topic being studied. These can be completed on line or down-loaded onto your computer. The exercises made available on line are minus the answers. This way you can check the results with your Tutor later on.



Group Exercises: you can complete an exercise with the help and support of your Tutor or Appointed Teaching Professor, in which case you will have to schedule a laboratory session. The tool used is the Video Chat Room, where the Tutor or Appointed Teaching Professor and the students are connected to one another and can interact.



Other types of Virtual Laboratories can be activated as proposed by the Tutor or Appointed Teaching Professor.



2.4.4 Tutoring On Line



In the learning environment dedicated to Tutoring On Line, which makes available all of the tools necessary for long distance tutoring, you can:



•access collaborative and cooperative learning environments on the web with other students;

•open a Socratic dialogue with your Tutor, which helps and guides the learning process;

•interact in the educational process with other participants from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds, so creating a learning opportunity that is no longer local but global.



http://www.uninettunouniversity.net/e/main.asp?id=040001010000000001000000010300000000

Agreement between EELU and UTIU


A cooperation agreement was signed between the Egyptian E-learning University and the International Telematic University (UNINETTUNO) Italy. The EELU and UTIU jointly realise distance university programs, master programs and highly specialised programs and vocational training programs to deliver double degrees starting with the following university programs:



Economics and Business Management

Telecommunications Engineering

Computer Engineering

Computer and Information Technology

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Engineering Management

Communication Sciences

Law and Internationalisation of Enterprises

The study will be through (the internet,virtual classes ,and video conference systems).



The students will have a double degree recognized by both universities ,and In order to get the double degree , the students have to make a double enrollment, one to the EELU and the other one to the UTIU.



EELU and UTIU will appoint a General Academic Coordinator for each side to assure applying the quality assurance standards according to Egyptian and Italian standards.



Both parties agreed to apply the agreement starting with September 2009.