E-Learning: Paradigm Shift in Education

Abstract

Higher education is beginning to change in response to providing educational opportunities to an increasing diverse population of students. A new type of university emerged in the last 25 years which John Daniel (1996) thinks will hold lessons for the renewal of all universities. Called mega-universities since they enroll over 100,000 students each, they provide a powerful response to access and costs. The largest mega-university is the China Central Radio and Television University, with more than 3 million students (Dunn, 2000). Other mega-universities include the British Open University, with 215,000 students, and the University of South Africa, with 120,000 students (Dunn, 2000). Prominent Business gurus have given traditional universities just 30 more. years before dying off (Cunningham et al., 2002). As radical as their predictions may be, it does require colleges and universities to take seriously the changes and challenges that technology will bring to them in the 21st Century. The utilization of educational technology up to this point has given rise to the opportunity and potential of restructuring the educational system to extend the learning environment beyond the four walls of the classroom. In order to integrate technology and education we must first develop our view of the revolution that technology is creating in education, and appropriately incorporate it into the system (Chen et al., 2006). This in turn will influence cultural changes in the education system, and technology is also often assumed to be the catalyst of new pedagogical change towards e-learning. Distance educators have had to redefine their communication skills. They have found that two-way interaction is a critical feature of the educational process. Educators must communicate progress to learners as well as engaging the learners into the e-learning environment. For Distance Education to be successful, high levels of interaction typically need to be present for learners to have a positive attitudes and greater satisfaction. Two-way interactive technologies (e.g., video, audio, audio graphics, and computer conferencing), while capable of providing two-way interactivity, still depend on user skill to successfully bring about interaction in an instructional context. The current distance education literature addresses distance interaction from the learner's perspective. Shea, Motiwalla, and Lewis (2001) conducted a study to investigate the status of distance education (DE) at 68 higher education institutions. The number of DE students continues to grow. This tremendous growth can be attributed, in part, to shrinking budgets and lower local student enrollments at universities. DE via the Internet provides them with a low-cost, flexible option to expand into global markets (Casey, 1998). Distance education can provide a strong interaction between the learner, learner/instructor, and the content as well as other learners. There needs to be a distinct interaction with learners and high technology devices. Hence, the four typical types of interaction for distance learners are: (a) learner-content, (b) learner-instructor, (c) learner-learner, and (d) learner-technology. However, distance instructors develop similar, although relatively different, instructional interactions: (a) instructor-learner, (b) instructor-content, and (c) instructor-technology. These instructional interactions are complex processes; the literature recommends that instructional designers keep them in mind to produce effective, efficient, and quality distance education courses. Transactional distance included the distance that exists in every educational relationship. There has to be a certain amount of structure in distance education that fosters a certain amount of dialogue between the learner and instructor. On the other hand, Social Presence is a strong communication component that reduces isolation between the distant learner and other learners and instructor. …