Myths, Truths and Futures of online learning

Myths, Truths and Futures of Online Learning

Terry Anderson, PhDCentre for Distance Education

Athabasca UniversityOct 4, 2012 Edmonton

Why Online Learning?

• Anywhere/anytime• Just in time• Any medium• Green effects• Cost savings?

– Travel and opportunity costs– Facility savings– Re-use, sharing (OERs)– Lower production costs

• User generated content• Knowledge management• Persistence

Examples

Promotional video for Learnist - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQDEwbgxSOs

Myths

• Online, e-learning (or other forms of distance education) doesn’t work.– 30 years of research revealing no significant

difference (see– “The meta-analysis found that, on average,

students in online learning conditions performed modestly better than those receiving face-to-face instruction” Evaluation of Evidence-Based Practices in Online Learning: A Meta-Analysis and Review of Online Learning Studies. US Government 2009

Myth: Online Learning is All the Same

Myth: Online learning is Harder (or easier)

• There are very hard and very easy courses in both mediated and classroom based

• Many students find different type of learning activities harder and easier

• No two students learn in the exact same ways or speeds

Myth: Development Costs for online are VERY High

• Tremendous number of Open Educational Resources available

• Production costs and values plummeting• Distribution costs approaching zero

The Cost of Content

Tom Corddry, who headed up its multimedia publishing unit, said, “The editors overestimated the way students would say, ‘This has been carefully edited! And is very authoritative! RANDALL STROSS, 2009”

Myth: Online Learning is More expensive for the Deliverer

• Major reductions in capital costs• Allows competitors to enter field quickly• Many canned products and outsourcing

options• Like other businesses, economy of scale is very

important

Myth: Online learning is more expensive for the Student

• Sometimes used to cross subsidize classroom delivery

• Some models surcharge, rather than refund the student for travel, time and opportunity costs.

Myth: Economy of Scale favours E-Learning

• Economy of scale confronts all forms of teaching/learning

• Different models of e-learning have different scalability

Truth: Online Education is a Disruptive Technology

Clayton Christensen

User generated Content

• Wikipedia• Facebook• Linked In• Shashdot - News for nerds, stuff that matters• Learni.st

Truth: Some Students don’t like Online learning

• \s

Kathleen Ross, MDE 2012, Professional Accounts preferencesRank order where 1= Favorite

Online Learning is Coming Here

Sloan Consortium “Going the Distance: Online Education in the United States, 2011“

Tuesday May 08

31% of student take one or more online courses

The Interaction Equivalency Theorem by Anderson (2003)

• Thesis 1. Deep and meaningful formal learning is supported as long as one of the three forms of interaction (learner–teacher; learner-learner; learner–content) is at a high level. The other two may be offered at minimal levels, or even eliminated, without degrading the learning experience.

• Thesis 2. High levels of more than one of these three modes will likely provide a more satisfying educational experience, although these experiences may not be as cost- or time effective as less interactive learning sequences.

　　　　　　Distance Teaching & Learning Conference 2011, Madison, Wisconsin 18

Different Models (generations) of E-Learning pedagogy

• Cognitive Behavioral– Training– Big Data

• Constructivist– Small groups, collaborative Learning

• Connectivist– Building Learning Networks of people plus resources– Creating and Curating– Constructed Network contexts

• Athabasca landing

Future: Harnessing Social Networks for Learning

"Companies are using social learning to drive innovation in their learning organizations," he says. "By allowing users to actively interact and share knowledge, organizations are both empowering users to teach one another and are actively encouraging conversations that organically foster creativity and problem-solving."

The Bersin study also finds that employee development in 2011 averaged 15.3 hours, up from 12.8 hours in 2010, with much of the focus outside of "formal" learning events.

The Corporate Learning Factbook 2012: Benchmarks, Trends and Analysis of the U.S. Training Market,

Knowledge workers learn three to four times more from experience than interaction with bosses, coaches and mentors. And they learn about twice as much from those conversations compared to structured courses and programs.

The shorthand label for this viewpoint is 70:20:10

— 70 percent experiential, 20 percent coaching and 10 percent formal. I

How do we document, archive and re-use that informal interaction??

Athabasca Landing

https://Landing. athabascau.ca

Based on Elgg A LAMP Open Source Platform

http://elgg.org/

• A toolset for sharing– Groups, blogs, wikis, bookmarks, files,

photos, videos, podcasts, events, etc• A toolset for communication

– Microblogs, messaging, commenting, group forums

• A social network– Connecting, following

https://landing.athabascau.ca

What is the Landing?

What is the Landing?

• A Walled Garden with windows– Discretionary access control

• A user-owned space– Everyone equal (including students)

• An AU social space– no ads, no links to vendors, secure,

private

https://landing.athabascau.ca

Pedagogical Rationale

• Supports Beyond the course interaction and integration

• Persistence• Student ownership and control• Cooperative and collaborative opportunities• Guests and alumni• Connectivist pedagogies

https://landing.athabascau.ca

Administrative and Communication Rationale

• Challenges of the Distributed Workplace

• Persistence• User control• Archiving• Custom applications• Sharing within and beyond

Centre/Faculty

https://landing.athabascau.ca

Filling gaps the Landing wayhttps://landing.athabascau.ca

• “There is a tide in the affairs of men which taken in its flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyages of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea we are now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures” William Shakespeare Julius

Caesar Act 4, scene 3, 218–224

Terry Anderson terrya@athabascau.ca

Blog: terrya.edublogs.org

Your comments and questions

most welcomed!