Easy/Early Assumptions

Just a few short years ago (late nineties and early part of this century), the easy assumption for most of us in online learning was that this was a medium primarily for adult learners.

It made sense at the time. After all, most of the early adopters of online learning were those who had been practitioners and scholars of traditional Distance Education, which appealed almost exclusively to adults.

Actually, the fact that early adopters of online learning tended to come from traditional distance education backgrounds has led to some confusion about what online learning is all about, and where it really came from.

Some argue that online learning is just the the most "recent" generation of Distance Education (see Moore & Kearsley, 2005).

Others, however, might suggest that online learning is not just a new generation of distance education, but something born from a different womb.

Traditional Distance Education	Online Learning as practiced by most traditional Higher Ed institutions
...was born from correspondence schools and grew up in the industrial age.	...was born not from DE , but from new information and communication technologies (ICTs) and grew up in the post-industrial age.
...matured in management-dominated, business-oriented institutions.	...is maturing in faculty-dominated, traditional academic cultures.

This is not a huge issue for us here, but it is worth pointing out that the various terms of Distance Education, Distance Learning, Online Learning, and Open and Distance Learning all have their ideological and historical "baggage."

And one of the reasons we have chosen the term "online learning" is to distinguish the discipline from traditional distance eduation, which was (and still is in many cases) primarily associated with the adult learner.

The point is that the new emerging field of online learning should not, really, be thought of as primarily adult education on the internet.

Whatever else it is, the discipline of online teaching and learning is concerned with student-centered learning. And the first task in designing instruction (environments?) for student-centered learning is to be aware of who the virtual student really is.

The selected readings in both Palloff & Pratt and Bender discuss this issue in some detail.

 

There is no "here" here...or is there?

Typically, the practitioners and scholars from traditional DE understood "distance" to be the defining term in distance education; in other words, it was all about distance. Teachers were here, students were there, so we developed materials to deliver to students who were not here.

That was the essential paradigm of distance learning from its print and mail correspondence roots in the 19th century throughout its evolving incarnations of radio and television in the 20th century--developing materials for delivery to people who are "not here."

The new online environment, however, appears to have made "distance" irrelevant and "delivery" almost meaningless.

Once online, does it really matter if the student is in the next office, down the street, or six time zones away?

Once online, do not students and teachers all come to the same place?

As a matter of fact, hasn't our "tool" (the online learning platform) become our new "place?"

This place.

This virtual space.

Where we are "now."

Virtually.

And it is probably true that the varying ways we approach this place is a crucial factor in how we learn in this place and how we teach in this place.

The point here is that when we start thinking of the Online Learning Platform (such as Blackboard) as a place where people come to, instead of a tool we use to deliver to people who are not here, then it becomes easier to start thinking how we can use this environment to design student-centered learning.

In a nutshell, that's the essence of this course--learning how to design environments for student-centered learning.

Notice how Bender (in our reading selections) further examines this whole notion of place and space and suggests how time, distance, and online environments can alter what it means to be in a space.

Do you feel "here" when you are in this class?

 

Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants

Do you speak Digital?

Or do you speak DSL (digital as a second language)?

Much has been written lately about the differences between Digital Native Learners and Digital Immigrant Teachers (Pereknsy, 2001; Jukes, 2005).

A short online article on the Apple.com Web site offers a table based on the research and writings of Perensky and Jukes that contrasts these Digital Native Learners and Digital Immigrant Teachers.

It is reproduced below.

Digital Native Learners	Digital Immigrant Teachers
Prefer receiving information quickly from multiple multimedia sources	Prefer slow and controlled release of information from limited sources.
Prefer parallel processing and multitasking.	Prefer singular processing and single or limited tasking.
Prefer processing pictures, sounds, and video before text.	Prefer to provide text before pictures, sounds, and video.
Prefer random access to hyperlinked multimedia information.	Prefer to provide information linearly, logically, and sequentially.
Prefer to interact/network simultaneously with many others.	Prefer students to work independently rather than network and interact.
Prefer to learn “just-in-time.”	Prefer to teach “just-in-case” (it's on the exam).
Prefer instant gratification and instant rewards.	Prefer deferred gratification and deferred rewards.
Prefer learning that is relevant, instantly useful, and fun	Prefer to teach to the curriculum guide and standardized tests.

The point of the table is not to argue that one is better than the other, but to point how a disconnect between students and teachers can easily happen in this era of digital landscapes and networked communities.

Almost certainly, most of us here in this graduate class are digital immigrants, speaking DSL the best we can. But just as certainly, as the years go by, classes such as this will become increasingly populated by digital natives.

Surely, the line between digital natives and digital immigrants will start to blur.

Surely, digital native learners will become digital native teachers.

What will be the disconnect then?

This Digital Native/Digital Immigrant concept provides an update/alternative to the Virtual Student discussed in both our Pallof & Pratt and Bender readings.

Learning Styles There are entire classes at McDaniel which consider Learning Styles based on Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences. In the readings for this module, Palloff & Pratt's Chapter 3 gives a decent overview of the subject and offers (this is one of the books strengths) practical strategies to address different learning styles in an online classroom.

An Audio MP3 on Learning Styles by Dr. Gallagher

How learners learn is one of the key contexts which should inform any development of online learning theory.

~ ~ ~

REFERENCES

Bates, A.W., & Poole, G. (2003). Effective teaching with technology in higher education:
     Foundations for success . San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Holmberg, B. (2001). Distance education in essence . Oldenberg. BIS.

Jukes, I. (2005). Understanding digital kids (DKS): Teaching & learning in the new digital
     landscape. The InfoSavy Group. Retrieved May 6, 2006 from      http://www.thecommittedsardine.net/infosavvy/education/handouts/it.pdf

Moore, M.G., & Kearsley, G. (2005). Distance education: A systems view (2nd ed.). Belmont,
      California: Thomson Wadsworth.

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon, 9 (5), 1–2. Retrieved
      May 6, 2006 from http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-
      %20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf

Peters, O. (2002). Distance education in transition - New trends and challenges. Oldenburg:
      Bibliotheks- und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg.