The History of Online Learning

Although the concept of online learning seems new to most students, instructors, and the majority of society, the development of online coursework has been in play for many years. First, a brief history of the computing technology in education is required:

• 1930s-1960s: (the exact date is disputed) computing machines are created 
• 1960s: development begins on what would eventually be known as the Internet
• 1970s: some universities begin using computers to assist instruction
• 1980s: the first personal computers become available
• 1990s: the World Wide Web is launched
• 1994: the first online school is established
• 2000s: online learning becomes widespread
• 2020+: education becomes increasingly digitized

"Distance" education existed even long before the times indicated above, as at the time, the technology of "postal services" enabled students to be remotely connected to a teacher. For further understanding of the development of educational methods that date before the timeline that I included, read this article. By both reading the article, and reading the timeline above, it becomes clear the direction in which technology and education are both heading simultaneously. The past century certainly shows the relationship that technology and education share, and can be used as a way to predict the future, and the next decade, of education. As has been stated previously on this blog, it is expected that by 2020, a majority of class will be available digitally.

Even the way learning takes place has changed drastically, and is expected to continue to change. Originally, the Read -> Memorize -> Quiz style learning was considered the only way to "learn" material, and although this style is still used, and arguably effective today, an emphasis on communication, and two-way discussions is becoming a more popular way to learn. One can clearly see how the history of online learning, and the history of learning as a whole, has shape the present day, and how things like social media and new technologies will affect the future of education in the year 2020 and beyond. 

Who Is Using The Internet For Education?

A research conducted by Canada stats, showed that a big portion of adult Canadians are using the internet to get some type of training for educational purposes.

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/81-004-x/2007004/10375-eng.htm#c

The research divided the population into three main groups, this first group are people who went online for some sort of training, education or school related purposes, this groups is about (26%) which is 6.4 million. The second group are all those Canadians that went online but not for education purposes, but for other reasons this is (34%) which is about 8.5 million  Finally the third group are all those Canadians that reported never having accessed internet for personal or non- business reasons which are 7.9 million.

This stats show clearly the massive way in which Canadians are taking advantage of the internet. More than a quarter percent of the adult population was getting online education at the time, this stats were collected in 2005 which is still a pretty big number if we consider the amount of users that keeps on growing every year.

Socioeconomic characteristic 
Education Users 

Average age 
34 years
Sex (% Male) 
50%
Marital status (% Married)
43 %
Education (% university degree)
33 %
Labour force (% employed)
77 %
Family type (% children less than age 18) 
45 %
Location (% urban) 
83 %
Household income greater than $80,000
43 %

This is just to have an idea of what are the kind of people that are more likely to be interested on using the internet for education. This tells us that in fact there is an age factor and that this is being used mostly by young people which could be use to infer that the more young people graduate and the more young people star requiring education the more the online education will increase its demand.

How Students Feel About Online Learning

A research showed that students apparently feel more comfortable taking online classes or at least that's what the study says when it comes to real results where the students had a better performance in terms of average than those who had a face to face (traditional) classes.

This are some of the key findings:http://distancelearn.about.com/od/distancelearning101/tp/Online-Learning-Statistics.htm

1.The mean difference between online and face-to-face conditions across the 51 contrasts is statistically significant

2.Instruction combining online and face-to-face elements had a larger advantage relative to purely face-to-face instruction than did purely online instruction. The mean effect size in studies comparing blended with face-to-face instruction was +0.35. This effect size is larger than that for studies comparing purely online and purely face-to-face conditions, which had an average effect size of +0.14.

3.Few rigorous research studies of the effectiveness of online learning for K–12 students have been published. The systematic search of the research literature found just five experimental or controlled quasi-experimental studies comparing the learning effects of online versus face-to-face instruction for K-12 students. As such, caution is required in generalizing to the K-12 population because the results are for the most part based on studies in other settings (e.g., medical training, higher education).

The stats show that online learning is a more effective way of learning for students, it may not apply in all the areas of study, but the method certainly works. This generation feels much more familiar with the internet and also communicates better using this tool ,since they have developed better this type of communication than any other.

This is where the education is heading, to work with modern tools that are understood by the generations that change their habits day by day.

Are Online Classes the Future of Learning?

Institutions of higher education have increasingly embraced online education, and the number of students enrolled in distance programs is rapidly rising in colleges and universities throughout the United States. In response to these changes in enrollment demands, many states, institutions, and organizations have been working on strategic plans to implement online education. At the same time, misconceptions and myths related to the difficulty of teaching and learning online, technologies available to support online instruction, the support and compensation needed for high-quality instructors, and the needs of online students create challenges for such vision statements and planning documents.

The online education sector grew 13 percent last year and had been growing at about 20 percent in previous years. Nearly one in four students take at least some college courses online, up from one in 10 in 2002. Two million students, most older than the traditional 18-22 year-old undergraduates, take all their courses online and two million more take one or more online course.

Most online course offerings tend toward vocational subjects like business, legal and health care training. Students needing hands-on experience.

There is a link on the online classroom:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nb4EKtQg-XQ

Past and Future of the Classroom

This article is about past and future of the classroom .For example,When it opens in 2002, Westview High School will be the Ferrari of high-tech high schools. It will have a short-range wireless network so students can access the Internet from their laptops anywhere on the school grounds. There will be 400 personal computers for 1,000 students -- with more PCs on the way -- and numerous handheld devices, such as the Palm organizer from Palm Inc. And there will be virtual classrooms, allowing students to log on from home to check assignments and participate in chat-room discussions.

Hudson Public School District, just outside Boston, is a case in point. Sheldon Berman, the district's superintendent, authorized a pilot program using Palm handheld computers in a few classrooms several years ago. Students man their Palms with probes, made by companies such as ImagiWorks Inc., that measure temperature and water acidity so they can test pollution levels at local streams. Back at school, they download their findings onto a computer and analyze the data.

Sensing the trend toward mobility, companies such as Palm and Handspring Inc. are aggressively marketing their handheld devices -- which sell for several hundred dollars less than the average PC -- to the K-12 market. 

For now, I’m eager about the future. I wonder just what else we can do with all of this newly-available technology,and just how much of it we’re willing to invest in to make sure we produce the best possible education for our students.

Ethics use of Technology in Social Media and Education

In today's organizations, ethical challenges relate to areas like fraud, right to privacy for consumers, social responsibility, and trade restrictions. For Information Technology (IT) specifically, these can translate to considerations on how technology is used to violate people's privacy, how automation leads to job reductions, or how management information and its corresponding systems are used and abused for personal gain. In the last 25 years, people have seen an overwhelming technology infusion affecting business, education, and society. Virtually all areas of the society have been transformed by the usage of technology. The change is important from an ethical perspective in terms of who Information Technology (IT) workers are today and what their tasks are. Higher education, specifically in business schools, needs to take some responsibility in preparing students for the ethical usage of information technology and the underlying information within those systems.The use of discussion teaching in an online ethics course is described. The course AC435 Ethics for Accountants received the dis on tinction of being recognized by Quality Matters in 2009. The course utilizes groups to bring about interaction of case studies in an eCollege course management system. Virtual world communications are practiced in the course giving actual social interaction experience to students. This touch of solving realistic ethical dilemmas is a favorite for students.

This video is about the effect of technology on education:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYMAULd2vhg

Effects of Globalization on Education

As the major formal agency for conveying knowledge, the school features prominently in the process and theory of globalization. Early examples of educational globalization include the spread of global religions, especially Islam and Christianity, and colonialism, which often disrupted and displaced indigenous forms of schooling throughout much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Post colonial globalizing influences of education have taken on more subtle shapes.

In globalization, it is not simply the ties of economic exchange and political agreement that bind nations and societies, but also the shared consciousness of being part of a global system. That consciousness is conveyed through ever larger transnational movements of people and an array of different media, but most systematically through formal education. The inexorable transformation of consciousness brought on by globalization alters the content and contours of education, as schools take on an increasingly important role in the process.

I found an interesting video about effects of globalization on education:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pw_PwtnxWi8

Post Secondary Education problems in Future

While many students and their parents are already struggling to pay for a university education, it is expected to get much more expensive in the coming years.

Part-time jobs are already scarce for young people trying to pay for their education, and many parents are wishing they had started saving earlier. But the situation could get worse.`

More than 40% of Canadian parents are worried about how their children will be able to afford post-secondary education, a new study says.

And they have good reason to, considering that a four-year university degree can cost more than $60,000 today and could rise to more than $140,000 for a child born this year.

According to the study conducted for BMO Bank of Montreal, 83% of parents anticipate that they will pay for their child's post-secondary education, while 44% say their child will pay for at least some of it themselves.

Interestingly, the report revealed that more than 35% of parents are not aware of key benefits of the Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP), including the federal government's contribution matching program.

"Parents should educate themselves on the various options available to help them save for their children's post-secondary education," said Robert Armstrong, a spokesman for BMO Investments Inc. "Taking advantage of the RESP government matching program is a great way to grow your child's education fund. After all, if you can get free money from the government to send your child to school, why not take advantage of it?"

If parents open a RESP and make regular contributions, government grants and compounded interest can add significantly to total savings, Armstrong says.

The little Big Power Of Social Media

http://www.thespec.com/news/ontario/article/841557--brampton-students-suspended-for-inappropriate-tweets

The relation between education and social media is becoming shorter every day. A simple example of this is that High School students got suspended in Brampton because they Twitted an "opinion" about some of their teachers, so apparently this was known by the school directives and had a direct consequence in the students "real" life, even though this was an "offense" , it was not committed at school or at a scenario where the teacher and student were still having the same roll of power over one another.

This is just a little sample to make a point, saying that a comment on the internet will get you a suspension at school, is facing a new stage on the internet era, social media is so incredibly massive and it spreads so fast that this students couldn't run away from its power, just type an aggressive comment and if it becomes interesting to anybody it turns into massive in just a matter of seconds.

Probably what made the teachers go crazy about this wasn't the fact that 7 students thought "they were a bunch of losers", that is not a major concern teachers have had situations like this since day one, perhaps decades ago.What really made them take that decision is that they know that their reputation could be easily destroyed just with one negative comment posted on twitter.

This is all possible today thanks to the power of social media.

Location Is Not A Matter

With the arrival of online education, location has stooped being a problem for anyone interested on studying anywhere in the world. a student from china could be working on his MBA at a European university or simply taking a short course miles away from home  ,but technically going to class every day, But how is this possible?

This is all possible thanks to the online educational system that is the changing the way we used to conceived studying and bringing it to a new era where, we are all connect.

Not too long ago i found myself in the middle of a conversation where a teacher pointed out the fact that she was taking a post-grad diploma at an american university. somebody was very surprised and said well this might be quite the trip you have to make to commute every day, so she explained how she could access the web anywhere and take the course as well as submitting work and having it marked.This really surprised the person sitting next to me it was like if she has never heard about this before.

the reality is that I shouldn't be surprised about her reaction the fact is that education is shifting and methods are changing into a much more effective way to be taken, and it will continue doing so through the easiest and most effective way of communication that up to date is the internet.

cheaper Education Doesn't Mean Cheap Knowledge

One of the advantages that the implementation of Online education could bring to people, is the fact that this education easily becomes a tool to be widespread over different amounts of people that are willing to go into online education.

among all the people that joins online education becomes evident that they all use the same type of tools to work with and this tools were are created as online documents are obviously much more cheaper and as efficient as the ones created in a tangible environment.

For an educational institution is much more expensive to have a professor 8 hours a day dictating class to their students, Which at the end of the day turns into expensive tuition fees towards some people. Instead the online education offers the advantage of having the same quality by providing them with this intangible but helpful tools to learn and improve their skills as they will do on a real daily basis. This practice becomes a lot cheaper for institutions and could turn into a much more affordable education for all of us if we decide to take it.
having said this, the implementation of a system like this if targeted towards people that for monetary issues are not capable to access to education, will certainly help them to reach a professional goals easily and faster.

This story will open your mind in how highschools are already taking advantage of this system,
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2009/0825/p25s03-ussc.html

The Future of Accelerated Education and the Pros and Cons

In a modern world that stresses the importance of post-secondary education and individual expertise, online learning can provide a fast track for completing post-secondary education in a shorter amount of time than traditional brick and mortar schools. Many sites that offer online educational services often boast the amount of time it takes to complete a course, and it can be assumed that by 2020, the average degree program will take no more than 3 years to complete through accredited online schools. This, of course, will all be made available through the use of social media tools to collaborate virtually with peers.

Already, many school are offering online equivalents for post-secondary education, and allow students to progress at their own rates. Some sites even claim that degrees are possible, with a lot of hard work and initiative, in less than 2 years. In Canada, there are also many options for online degrees.

Below is a list of the pros and cons to an accelerated online education, mostly sourced from this article, which also provides an interesting take on accelerated online learning as a whole.

Pros

• much shorter time than traditional methods
• costs significantly less overall
• easier policies regarding enrollment 
• doesn't require students to commute
• set your own schedule

Cons

• miss out on the "college experience"
• difficult to handle the constantly heavy course load
• hard to stay independently motivated
• historically, not as credible
• lack of "team building" and "people skills" development

Over the next 10 years, as more schools digitize at the primary, secondary and post-secondary levels, it can be assumed that the ability to fast-track one's own education at an early age will be made possible well before the post-secondary level. To refer to my earlier post about MOOCs, college and university level education is already being made available to students in high school. By 2020, it is very possible that even secondary school education will also be available online for students at the primary level. In theory, based on the future of accelerated education, students will be able to finish a post-secondary education by the age of 16.

The Growth of Decentralized Education

As globalization continues to bring the world closer, the next 10 years in education will see a decline in the centralization of educational institutions. In essence, it is expected that as classrooms become more digital, students will be more free to collaborate with their peers from different cities, provinces, countries, and even continents. It is argued that decentralized education is more efficient than traditional methods because such pitfalls as administrative "red tape", financial concerns, and often times, poor overall quality, can be avoided.

By 2020, it is expected that a large portion of Western schooling will be available digitally, however, many countries are already experimenting with new forms of decentralized learning. For example, in certain parts of El Salvador, the increased participation of parents and communities has resulted in lower rates of student absenteeism in community-managed schools.

In New Zealand, a country that decentralized their educational system more than 20 years ago, the onus is on schools to compete for student attendance and provide quality programs, independently. The result has been New Zealand being a high achieving country academically, ranking 13th in the world in terms of average IQ, 12 places higher than Canada. The main objection to this style of education is that there can be an inequity of educational outcomes based on social status, although it can be assumed that over the next 10 years, with the incorporation of social media and technologies into the classroom, these problems will dissolve.

The use of social media will play an increasingly larger role in the future of decentralized education, as my previous entry about MOOCs has shown. With the ability to study at home, the need for a physical building becomes more and more unnecessary, and by 2020, traditional schooling systems may prove to be outdated and illogical options, both in price and quality. Already, there are concerns about a necessary overhaul for modern universities and colleges, as trends suggest that the needs of students are changing.

For a brief summary of decentralization as it relates to education, with modern examples, this article will reinforce the main points of this post.

Negative Effects of an Online Classroom

Being in an online classroom isn't for everyone. Some people take online classes, thinking that they are easier in terms of work, time, etc, when in reality, they take just as much time and work as a normal class in school. Even with my own experience of an online class, I know it takes just as much, or even more time to review learning materials, set aside time for tests, and make sure all assignments are being completed.

After reviewing some websites, I have compiled a list of a few of the negative effects of a student learning in an online atmosphere:

1. Decreased Quality
• Online students interact less frequently with their instructors and classmates, as opposed to a more traditional face-to-face education setting (x)
• Course content may vary from online to in-class, it may not be as informative if it was taught in a face-to-face setting
2. Issues with Technology
• Easy for internet classmates to cheat and copy one another
• Glitches in digital materials, causing difficulty to the students
• Students may not be fluent in a specific type of program, which could cause trouble for them
3. Interaction with Students
• Vital social/interaction skills between students may not be developed properly, said by The Last Newspaper
• Events, sports, and clubs for students may not exist, therefore there would be no extra curricular activities which students could attend and interact with one another in a team building setting

While there may be great aspects of bringing the traditional classroom to a virtual one, I believe there are some kinks that need to be worked out.

Social Media and the Classroom

This is a video that I found that I think best describes not only the shift to an online classroom, but how easy it is for teachers to use to communicate with their students on mediums that they use constantly every day. As an example, Eric Landhal describes using Twitter as an informal way for students to gather, discuss, and complete assignments.

Read this article for more information on how teachers are currently using social media to enforce their lessons.

Positive Effects of an Online Classroom

After reviewing the negative effects of an online classroom, I compiled a personal list of positive effects that can occur when learning in an online environment:

1. Accelerated learning, or learn at your own pace
• Ability to expedite your learning in half, or you can go at your own pace/time
2. May become more empowered,  independent and vocal
• Students that aren't vocal in a traditional classroom, may feel more comfortable online
3. Cost
• As mentioned by Curtis, free credible university credits are available for anyone around the world to use
• Students don't need to go into student debt to learn
4. Easy to access anywhere, anytime
• As long as you have internet access, you have the ability to access your virtual classroom from anywhere in the world
5. Ability to communicate with people around the world
• You can learn different views, opinions, and culture from other countries

For even more information on how there are positive effects of an online classroom, here is an article that discusses positive effects of internet use for a child which I found very interesting.

Tips for a Positive Online Education Experience

In order to be a successful student, we also need to make sure we personally have some guidelines. After reading 7 Tips for Creating a Positive Online Learning Experience for teachers, I decided to make one for students. Here are a few tips to create the best possible online education experience!

1. Stay organized and Be Pro-Active
• Have due dates for assignments and tests printed out, go over it every night
• Make sure everything that is required on the assignment is completed
• Don't leave things to the last minute
2. Have an online presence
• Talk to others, engage in conversation revolving around the course
• Talk to your teacher, ask questions, be informative
• Give feedback to others, participate 
3. Set aside time for your online class
• Set aside a few hours every other day
• Check up on your teachers email's, class discussions', etc. just in case you may miss something
4. Re-read and re-write
• Always re-read assignments and test reviews, in order for you to know what is expected of you
• Cut out information that isn't needed in your responses, assignments, etc. This will make the most important information stand out.
5. Be open
• Be open to the idea of a new way of learning, don't get discouraged 
• Be open to others views and opinions, discuss

If you're still not sure about online education, you can check out this link.

Social Media being "Liked" by Teachers

Teachers that resist using social media in the classroom are stripping their students of an essential component of their future success. Avoiding -- or worse, banning -- social media platforms for students prohibits them from being successful professionals in fields like accounting, chemistry, the arts and more - x

 The most growing network that everyone is using isn't email or face-to-face; it's social media networks.  With a new popular network popping up everyone so often, it's only common that social media becomes the way the world communicates. As said by the Huffington Post, using the phone and writing a letter may still exist, but how fast can you send a mass message to your closest 200 friends by letter?

By using social media in the classroom, teacher-student-student communicate will excel. As an example, in our Identity, Status, and Power in Social Media class, our class has our own hash-tag, as a way to not only communicate with other classmates about news, projects, and lessons, but will also have the guidance of a teacher there as well. The only implication of the use of social media networks for classroom use, is that if students were to use it for their own personal use as a distraction.

In my personal opinion, it's best to go with the growing trend instead of against. If high school students were using their favourite sites for classes, perhaps they will not only understand their assignments more, but be more inclined to include in on the discussion with their classmates. In this article, an English teacher in Detroit named Nicholas Provenzano discusses the improvement of using social media in-class:

"That in a class of 30, only about 12 usually carried the conversation, but that eight more might pipe up on a backchannel. “Another eight kids entering a discussion is huge,” 

Free Online Education and MOOCs

Before discussing the future of free education and MOOCs, watch this great video that will define and outline its principles for people who are unfamiliar with the term.

As you've watched, MOOCs are essentially open and free university and college level courses designed to give the user further self-interested knowledge on a subject. However, these courses are also participatory and engaging in nature, which leads to both develop networking skills and independence in learning.

A great example is Khan Academy, partly because of its history. In 2006, Salman Khan, a graduate of both MIT and Harvard, began tutoring his nieces and nephews on subjects that they needed help in in their high school courses. He would post a detailed, step-by-step video on YouTube, and send them the link, where they would watch, and learn a more comprehensive approach to their studies. After a short time, other YouTube users found the links and began learning from these videos originally intended for his family. Within months, these lessons grew in such popularity, and broad subject content, that by 2012, 200 million lessons had been delivered, all for free.

The viability of these lessons is based on two things: credibility of Salman Khan (and, now, many other instructors), and the free cost. While these courses or modules do not grant credits towards degrees, the goal has been simply to develop the pursuit of learning and education.

The implications of this is that, now, children in developing countries, that have very few options in their future, can learn about any subject in great detail from credible Harvard graduates, completely for free, while only requiring an internet connection. Theoretically, the possibilities are endless, as individuals can choose to either learn, or not learn, and become whatever they want to be in their lives. This also applies to countries like Canada, where as students at Sheridan College, we can learn more than what we are taught in our courses to give us a competitive and specialized edge in the job market- the idea being you decide if you want to be successful in an increasingly competitive world.

The integration of MOOCs in the future will likely see colleges and universities granting credit for completing course work from online courses, or such sites as Coursera and MIT OpenCourseWare offering degree programs of their own. Last month, it was announced that Antioch U, a university in America, will be the first school in North America to offer credit for completing Coursera courses. It can be expected that by 2020, this trend will have grown substantially, and one can only wonder about how modern higher educational institutions will adapt to the availability of free courses that offer credibility. Further, it can be expected that by 2020, some developing countries will begin seeing a boost in their worldwide IQ rankings, as the popularity of MOOCs grow, and populations begin learning to better themselves and their situations.

The Likelihood and Potential of Future Online Classrooms

One way the future of education will be affected by the use of social media is the changes in the ways learning takes place. Already, Distance Education and Hybrid courses are becoming increasingly popular, as students who are willing to work at their own pace are able to work easily from home.

Distance Education, or Distance Learning, is simply the use of the Internet, or other methods, to receive an education for those who cannot physically travel to a classroom. Hybrid courses are even more practical- essentially being courses that combine online and classroom learning. As a student at Sheridan College, I've had one Hybrid course per semester so far, and at least half of my courses have had a lot of online integration, such as online tests, or online assignments.

The Government of Canada also offers a virtual alternative to traditional post-secondary education by promoting the electronic resource- Canadian Virtual University. Currently, the CVU offers more than 300 programs and 2,400 courses, but combined, other Canadian colleges and universities offer thousands more.

It is easy to identify the trend of online education, and it can assumed that by the year 2020, a much as half of learning will be done in "online classrooms". Despite the future success of this type of learning, it would appear that online learning will never totally surpass traditional methods of learning. This can be shown by data that suggests that as a teacher gains more years of experience teaching online courses, their likelihood of keeping their course content a fully online experience drops. The same study shows that teachers with 0-2 years of experience teaching online courses are more likely to rely solely on online content, where teachers with 6+ years of experience teaching online courses are more likely to integrate their courses with face-to-face time.

Further, according to a survey, the three most significant factors that affect the success of online programs are monetary support (24.7%), teaching competency of the instructors (22.9%) and technical competency of the instructors (15.3%). These details clearly show that despite the potential for online learning, instructors will still have to be equally as regarded upon as traditional professors.

Lastly, the focus of future online education and online classrooms will be on a dynamic, engaging and active learning experience, and this will ultimately be the reason why the concept will either succeed or fail in the future. Ten years ago, the projected success of online learning was significantly higher than it would realistically become, and as such, it can be expected that the next ten years will provide the same challenges for a personalized education. For an interesting perspective on the future of "online classrooms", read this article written in 1998 about the next ten years of online education, and notice the similarities between the 1998 and 2012 perspective.

Introduction

This blog is part of a group project for the class "Issues in Social Media" at Sheridan College. Featured on this blog will be myself, Curtis Aquino, as well as Kelsey Barnes, Talha Hassan and Nicolas Galeano. The content will explore the Future of Education as it relates to the use of social media. Over the next week, all of our posts will be added before final submission. In total, there will be a minimum of twenty blog posts.