E-learning in Higher Education

The beginning of new ICT and the WWW has also encouraged new thinking by educational institutions including the view that open and distance learning is no longer mainly the province of specialist institutions. Ever more, higher education institutions are looking at how new technology can support open and distance learning for their existing students and for potential new markets. Therefore, the higher education today comprises a community of learners devoted to achieving higher-order learning outcomes. There is far more rhetoric that reality in the declaration that communities of inquiry in higher education today encourage students to approach learning in a critical manner and process information in a deep and meaningful way.Even though e-learning has concerned much attention, its adoption has largely outstripped our understanding of the technology from an educational perspective. Its value is not faster access to information. The value of e-learning is in its capacity to facilitate communication and thinking and thereby construct meaning and knowledge. To implant e-learning practices effectively, strategic change is required. Practices change continually, but without joined-up technical and pedagogic support alongside an appropriate reward scheme, this change will be undirected or even misdirected. All too often, staff development remains politically weak (often positioned purely as a service) whilst a complex web of interests (and self-interests) makes elearning high-profile by separating it from other activities, thus making responsibility for its policies and support problematic. In such a context, it is hardly surprising that such diverse forms of supp ort have developed.

کلیدواژه ها:

e-learning ، e-assessment ، information technology ، higher education