After reading this week’s article, I have a better understanding of open learning. In the article, online learning contain five elements: enrollment, amount, timing, platform and pathway. The elements included in different courses vary.
Of these five course structure elements, the one I am most interested in is enrollment. As mentioned in the article, the element of enrollment can be divided into closed and open. Closed enrollment tends to correspond to a traditional online course, while open enrollment expands the range of participants. In the examples mentioned in the article, open enrollment is also what most instructors choose when building an online course. I think of open education as actually making education available to everyone. Either university students or workers can learn what they are interested in through the internet.
In addition, the discussion of pathways in the article also made me think about it. The article talks about three types of teaching pathways: centralized, decentralized, and distributed. After reading this part of the article, I realized that distributed learning is more flexible than the centralized model of traditional online classes, but it also requires a strong sense of student autonomy.
Overall, I strongly agree with Howard’s point mentioned in the article that technology and tools only play a supporting role and do not teach you to learn, whether it is online or blended learning. Online learning are indeed convenient, but learner’s own effort is the main point. In addition, as online teaching technology continues to advance, teachers should continue to change their teaching strategies to better achieve their teaching goals.
Reference:
Johns, Hopkins University Press. Teaching Online : A Guide to Theory, Research, and Practice, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uvic/detail.action?docID=3318874.
I couldn’t agree with you more that technology and tools only play a supporting role regardless of the pathways. Learning still needs to be initiated by the students themselves, otherwise no way can help.
Hi Meng,
I thought that you had a good understanding of open learning. It is true that enrollment is one important element of open learning. When we enroll in a traditional course, we have to submit detailed personal paper information to the one who is responsible for it. The class scale is normally small-sized. However, in open learning courses, students from all around the world submit their enrollment through the Internet. The class sale is normally large and it actually enables more people to receive education. I also think that open learning is more convenient for students since it makes use of technology and multimedia in the course design.
Hey Meng,
I liked your post and had a good time reading it.
I agreed and wrote in my post about the advantages of open enrolment too. I also like how you mentioned workers as I think it would be useful for people in society to continue and learn new skills.
I appreciate you going over the decentralized aspect of online learning from traditional as I feel that’s what describes what is goes on with online learning. Rather than have a hub or centre for meeting the ability to learn anywhere with a connection and at any time provides new grounds on how information can spread as it’s not bounded by physical location. Thus providing more chances for people to take advantage of education.
I also agree that with such power comes elf responsibility. Especially as you mentioned online requires more self autonomy on behalf of the students. I’m happy you mentioned a teacher’s need to adapt with accommodating student’s success as I feel that is something that was lacking during the online courses provided for at Uvic. Overall you interested me in what you had to say and I’m happy to have read your discussion. 🙂