A Course Reflection: Walden's EDUC 6135--Distance Learning

Distance learning has changed over the years alongside technology advancements. Distance learning about 20 years ago and before that was through mail correspondence and paper and now it can be done online and in a more timely fashion (Simonson et al., 2012). With things rapidly changing, of course, there are going to be differing opinions about distance education.

            Perceptions of distance education among educators is different that those of the students. Educators seem to believe that distance education is at a lower quality than  traditional courses; however, students were satisfied with their courses (Hannay & Newvine, 2006). Hopefully as the years go on and technology becomes even more dominant in our culture educators will see that it is necessary to incorporate it into their teaching and schools will incorporate distance learning into their curriculum. Fortunately, the future is fast approaching. When Hannay and Newvine (2006) did their study, things were looking lowly, but now things are beginning to look up.

            “In 2007–08, about 4.3 million undergraduate students, or 20 percent of all undergraduates, took at least one distance education course” (Distance learning). There were nearly 4 percent of undergraduate students who participated in a solely online program (Distance learning). I hope that perceptions and quality of distance education continues to rise as the future takes hold. According to Dr. George Siemens (Laureate Education), the increase of acceptance of distance learning is due to “the increased in online communication and practical experience with new tools.”

            As an instructional designer, I hope to help bring more positive perceptions to distance education discussions. I would also like to bring more rigor and quality to my courses to help perceptions to continue to improve. Technology is always emerging and I want to bring that into my classroom as a teacher as well. I want students to know that distance education is able to help them throughout their lives either through paid courses or open courses available to them. Not only do the students need to realize that technology will be a tool for them to be educated but teachers as well need to embrace this thought.

            Hopefully, as an instructional designer, I can work with school districts to educate their teachers in the realm of distance learning. The district where I work is going towards a 1:1 program but the teachers do not understand how to get their content online in order to teach their kids in the proper way with discussion boards, assignments, and other tools (Simonson et al., 2012). I hope to be able to do this for them and to do it for other districts to bring technology to our K-12 students rather than only college students and those training in the private sector.

References

Distance learning. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=80

Hannay, M., & Newvine, T. (2006, March 1). Perceptions of distance learning: A comparison of online and traditional learning. Retrieved from http://jolt.merlot.org/documents/MS05011.pdf

Laureate Education (Producer). (n.d.). The future of distance education [Video file]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu

Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., & Zvacek, S. (2012). Teaching and learning at a distance: Foundations of distance education (5th ed.) Boston, MA: Pearson.