ARTICLE SUMMARY OF:
ELEMENTS OF EFFECTIVE E-LEARNING
Three Design Methods to Minimize Side Effects of Online Courses
Dusti Howell
December 1, 2005
Instructor: Paul Kim
EDUC 391:
Web-Based Technologies in Teaching and Learning
By: Phuong Pham
ELEMENTS OF EFFECTIVE E-LEARNING
Summary of Article 4: Phuong Pham
The paper discusses the negative effects of computer in education and the three design
methods to minimize side effects of online courses. The author based on some key
findings as follows:
Todd Oppenheimer's article "The Computer Delusion' (1997) state that there is no good
evidence that using computers significantly improves teaching and learning.
The front page of the New York Times published the finding of Carnegie Mellon
researchers in her three-year study funded with $ 1.5 million, stating that the longer a
person spends online, the more sad, lonely, and depressed he or she becomes (Kraut et al.
1998). The reason was that the more time learners spend online, the less time they
interactive with family members and friends.
Comparisons have been made between correspondence courses and radio courses, telnet
courses and television courses and traditional lecture courses and online courses reveal
that there was no significant difference (Russell 1999).
Learning only happens when students "do." not when they listen passively to a lecture
(Rosenfield 2000: Unext 2000).
The author stated two approaches to improve online learning through project based
activities and building course activities around real world or theoretical problem. To
minimize the negative effect of student isolation, the author initiated three ways: using
visual and audio elements to create bio graphical pages that briefly encapsulate each
individual in an interesting way; grouping students together when they study the same
degree online; establishing online clubs based on interests to facilitate students’
communication.
The author suggests minimizing the number of dropouts by individualizing courses.
Insufficient time is a main reason for people to dropout from online courses. To minimize
the dropouts, courses are created in the way that allows student registering for a course at
any time, to have a flexible deadlines and support students for 24 hours. The author
advised that degree programs should be collecting and developing online-accessible data
based on personalization information and learning style including visual or auditory
preferences.
.
I did not agree with the author about her finding that there is no difference between
online course and the traditional class one. She and some researchers failed to recognize
the interactive feature of the computer based course and online course that make them
distinguishable from previous technologies used in education such as radio, television.
Obviously, the preceding technologies such as radio, television, and computer-based courses were designed with the same course content and the same information delivery
method in which students passively receive information. Online courses that were text
based are more likely e-books. All courses, therefore, have the same result. Perhaps,
when the article was written, computer technology software is not advanced enough to
create the online courses that enhance students’ engagements and interactivity. I also did
not think that creating graphical bio, grouping students studying same degree and
establishing online club can minimize students’ isolation because students may not have
time to join online clubs and it is hard to group students with diverse graphical locations.
One way to minimize students’ isolation is to create more teamwork course projects
because they enhance students’ communication with each other. In addition, webcam
chat can be incorporate in the contact channel of the course so that teachers and students
are able to see visually each other.