Article Review # 3: Learning Design Implementation for Distance e-Learning: Blending Rapid e-Learning Techniques with Activity-Based Pedagogies to Design and Implement a Socio-Constructivist Environment

My article is about how modern technologies are changing the teacher-student-content relationships from the delivery of so-called 'distance' education courses. The term 'distance' is at issue here in the global network environment. With new communication and collaboration tools, and possibilities to disseminate high-quality audio, video and interactive materials over the information superhighway, the process of educational design in relation to distance education materials has new insight as we explore in order to improve and even possibly re-engineer the whole ‘distance’ teaching and learning concept. The educational design process changes with technology and provides many examples of how modern tools and techniques are being used and implemented to design quality socio-constructivist learning environments. This article shares these ongoing processes at the University of Mauritius, Mauritius in which I'll cover three. The two different e-Learning methodologies I will cover are namely the e-book approach and rapid e-learning techniques; these can be used to create a quality learning environment based on socio-constructivist learning principles.

The Classic e-Learning Model (the e-book)

The classic e-learning model is mainly content focused HTML websites that are structured and chapters and sections. The e-book is a new information technology innovation that teaches reading and acquisition of information. The work is readable on the screen of a PC, a PDA (personal digital assistant) or a reader specifically designed for that purpose (Kang et al., 2009).

The ADDIE model has been subject to criticism as it is not seen to be applicable in the modern technology-based error. ADDIE is like a waterfall-like model that is used over a long period of time, and requires a variety of resources and instructors with different skills so that a final product may take form in the end (CreateDebate. com, 2009).

The e-book approach has come under scrutiny mainly by proponents of socio-constructivism be argued that the world wide web is already in abundance of content and adding more content to it would not be necessarily a benefit to the learning transaction. The focus however should be on how to use the abundance of material out there so as to design a more meaningful learning activity and to actively engage the learners (Schneider, 2003).

The Rapid e-Learning Methodology

Rapid e-learning is a term that has emerged from the software development industry based on the concept of rapid development. The key here is to acquire the ability to develop and deploy high-quality interactive multimedia e-learning courses which are generally short to medium length learning units in a very short amount of time (Brandon, 2005).

Interactive video lectures which tries to re-create a learning environment for the student feels that he or she is listening to a live lecture but actually the control of the presentation goes to the learner rather than the teacher as in a traditional face-to-face class.

There are three different metaphors that have been used for rapid e-learning development, the tablet metaphor, lecture metaphor and the interactive whiteboard metaphor. The key to the tablet metaphor is its simple navigational structure and it's visually appealing icon-based design. It is basically a redesigned e-book where the focus is on reducing the cognitive load of the learner as it reduces the amount of text displayed on the screen. It is based mainly on the traditional lecture style where a teacher would explain in detail the different points highlighted in his PowerPoint presentation. But there are three advantages over this tradition, first the lecturer can plan well in advance what they want to say on a particular topic, second it minimizes the division of attention that a student would give a traditional lecture, and last the student can view a lecture as many times as they wish whenever they decide to do so. And the interactive whiteboard metaphor can expand the lecture as it provides the student with interaction to activities such as drag-and-drop as well as controlling the flow of the lecture.

Reflection

Constructivism is an active process of knowledge construction through development of competencies and skills through authentic activities and through interaction with their environment (Shieh, 2012). The concept of constructivist learning has often been extended to socio-constructivism which further argues that by peer interaction, group reflection and discussion, learners are able to challenge their own representations and that of their peers to build on their existing knowledge (Wood et al, 1995). So from this article we can find some design principles that can be applied to designing constructivist learning systems:

·         learning should be controlled by the learner

·         focus on solving real world problems

·         make reflective practice a priority

·         use authentic task and enable context and content dependent knowledge construction

·        always supports collaborative construction of knowledge

Santally, M., Rajabalee, Y., & Cooshna-Naik, D. (2012). Learning Design Implementation for Distance e-Learning: Blending Rapid e-Learning Techniques with Activity-Based Pedagogies to Design and Implement a Socio-Constructivist Environment. European Journal Of Open, Distance And E-Learning.