Looking Into The Future Of eLearning
"When you take the free will out of education, that turns it into schooling." – John Taylor Gatto
eLearning is all about using electronic technologies for educational curriculum outside the boundaries of traditional classroom and, of course, it is gaining popularity especially among the younger generation over the past decade. Nowadays, obtaining a degree or a certificate for a course opted has become very easy. You don’t need to actually sit and take a lecture at the MIT; instead, all you need is an internet connection to access any lecture of your favorite professor online. The broad-band of eLearning varies from distant education, learning online, computerized electronic learning, and many others which makes it more appealing to the public. But what about the future of eLearning?
4 Current eLearning Trends
The eLearning industry is getting revolutionized by current up gradation of cyber and technological industry. 2016 and coming years can be considered as the renaissance period of the eLearning industry with constant evolution of its components. Listed below are the few trends being the hot topic of educational system of the future:
1. Gamification.
Learning through gaming has been popularized in the recent years. The key objective behind gamification of education is that it is fun and more appealing to the general. Studies have shown video games boost hand-eye coordination and enhance general IQ and brainpower.
Games increases a person’s ability to switch between tasks and incept multiple ideas at the same time for problem solution. Serious games often contains points, badges, and leaderboards driving learners to attain best ASAP for accomplishing levels that are key lessons or topics.
2. Cloud-Based Systems.
Most of the learning management systems are switching over to cloud-based systems. Often managers of large industries use cloud-based corporate training.
Cloud-based systems increase the trend of eLearning reducing appreciable training cost online.
3. Big Data.
It is the Big Data produced during learning content interaction by learners. It gives advantages in realm of eLearning to both learners and developers.
The data is collected via Content Management Systems (CMSs), Learning Management Systems (LMSs) and other media like social networking sites, which enables learners to interact with learning programs.
4. Wearable Technologies.
Oculus Rift, Apple Watch, Moto 360, and Google Glass are few of the brainstorming innovations which are flourishing in the eLearning industry.
The learner interacts with the subject in a multi dynamic way. The concept behind such technology is to make the learner immerse within learning subjects with 3D and real-time simulation of eLearning games. Thus, virtual reality will create a deluge over conventional educational system.
Future Prospects Of eLearners
The conventional education system gives an idea of an environment where the Teacher is the supreme authority and students are their subjects. However, most of the adults who need to enhance their educational backgrounds find the campus experience difficult.
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Often people look forward to educate themselves further, but retrieve back giving up the idea. eLearning provides great future aspects to those people, offering the following features:
1. Economic.
Opting for educational courses might be expensive, while eLearning provides affordable and free online based certificate and degree courses, distant education, and learning contents.
2. Dream Institution.
eLearning provides an opportunity to avail classes from distant educational institutions of their dream online overseas. The most prominent example is the MITx courses.
3. Subjects And Assistance.
The learner gets the opportunity to choose from a wide variety of subjects and courses. They get to study as per their preferred time and flexibility, get academic assistance or assignment help online, they can give their exams online, etc.
4. Time Management.
The learner can practically take the courses at a convenient time with customized options of their choice. Time management is essential for candidates with existing jobs who find it quite difficult to take out time for studying.
Job Prospects For eLearners
“Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school.” – Albert Einstein
eLearning has been proved efficient across various industries, ranging from engineering to pharmaceuticals.
There are good prospects for eLearners in career development. Nowadays most of industries and workplaces accept online certificate courses as a benchmark to asses candidates’ expertise on a subject. eLearners can simply sit at home and get most out of everything ranging from studying online, searching jobs online, getting their resumes or CVs done online.
The certificates published by prestigious institutions like MIT, National University of Singapore, and Hong Kong Universities are very well accepted by almost all the industries.
Vogue Of eLearning
1. Learning Through eLearning.
Often skills required for the 21st century are good communication skills. eLearning provides a variety of applications and courses to improve one’s communication skills. Teamwork ability, digital literacy, and ability to learn independently are other skills required for good career development. eLearning has provided people to sit at home and gain those knowledge and skills.
The Norwegian government launched a Competence Network of Norwegian Business and Industry (NKN). This plan included training Norwegian citizens to develop an entrepreneurship visionary among them, thus changing a whole nation.
2. Working From Home.
eLearning has made possible for people to sit home, learn and work from home. The Royal Bank of Scotland has trained its employees through media like CD-ROM. The media contained more than 100 hours of materials defining the job roles and competencies of their employees, which resulted a 700% massive return on its investment. ICL also faced a shortage of skills at massive levels.
They set an eLearning tool of a modular six-month program consisting online methods to train ICL’s 4000 engineers and developers to the MCSD and MCSE standards within 33 months. This was done without affecting productivity over the period!
References:
- Moore, J. L., Dickson-Deane, C., & Galyen, K. (2011). eLearning, Online Learning, And Distance Learning Environments: Are They The Same?. The Internet and Higher Education, 14(2), 129-135
- Noesgaard, S. S., & Ørngreen, R. (2015). The Effectiveness Of eLearning: An Explorative And Integrative Review Of The Definitions, Methodologies, And Factors That Promote eLearning Effectiveness. Electronic Journal of eLearning, 13(4), 278-290
