Online learning lacks personal touch
Came across the following via Stephen Downes, where he refers to to a response from Clive Shepherd. Neilsen first suggests:
I continue to believe in the linear, author-driven narrative for educational purposes. I just don’t believe the Web is optimal for delivering this experience. Instead, let’s praise old narrative forms like books and sitting around a flickering campfire — or its modern day counterpart, the PowerPoint projector — which have been around for 500 and 32,000 years, respectively.
I continue to write books, and I continue to develop training seminars, because I believe these media are best for deep learning of new concepts.
To which Stephen remarks:
I think learning happens through numerous media, including web posts (which is why Nielsen writes his online column in the first place). And I think that people continue to write books and develop training seminars because that’s where the money is, not because that’s what produces the best learning.
And finally, Shepherd’s (partial) comments:
Interesting. Of course we don’t know exactly what Jakob has in mind when he talks about e-learning - traditional, self-paced instruction? live online learning using web conferencing software? collaborative distance learning? informal learning using web 2.0 technologies? If we assume he means the former - what we used to call CBT - then that gives a starting point for a critique of his assertion. Jakob’s key idea here is that ‘deep learning’ is a lean-back experience, best accomplished away from a computer, whereas most web activity is a lean-forward experience, which is designed to meet the individual’s immediate goals in the way that they see fit.
I come at this issue as someone who has developed a few very rudimentary e-learning courses in the corporate world, who now works as a web user experience lead at a post-secondary institution, and who is likely to be doing a Master’s degree soon, with a significant component delivered via distance and online.
I think what Neilsen is trying to say is that the web is not the ideal environment for the level of immersion necessary for significant learning and that his ‘just in time’ metaphor is apt. I don’t think, though, that it’s necessarily about having an author-driven narrative. Regardless of any social media capabilities you can enable to make online learning better, you will never get the engagement of sitting in a room with peers and a capable instructor.
I also think that the medium may not be capable of delivering a full degree without some face time, but is great for snippets and individual courses of certain kinds. For one thing the feedback mechanisms for students, while improving all the time, are no match for the back and forth engagement of students and instructor. Forums, comments, message boards, email, IM, chats …. they’ll all good but lack immediacy in most cases, and body language subtleties in all cases.
Truth be told I’m not sure I ever want the medium to improve to the point where it’s as good as face-to-face.