Online Instruction: Its Impact on the Profession and Practice of Adult Education - Literature review Example

Online Instruction: It’s Impact on the Profession and Practice of Adult Education Introduction The most precious possession that one person could have would be his knowledge. This is something that no one can take away from him. No one can rob you of what you know; you can only share it to others. They say that life is a continuous process of learning, we never cease to learn new things everyday and man is never contented with the knowledge that he has now. He is always ready to learn. Learning readiness means that we are able to acquire the skills needed for us to have a good grasp on the concepts being presented in school or in our daily lives. During younger years, children are being taught how to behave in school like how to sit and listen first to the teacher and when and when not to give reaction about the lessons. The mind is a critical element of a human being. The mind controls a lot of bodily functions like thinking which corresponds to learning which corresponds to reaction or decision we make depending on what we perceive as right and wrong as to what we have registered in our brain cells that is in our brain or our mind. This capability to think was a wonderful gift that was given to us, to human beings alone, not just the ability to think simply but to reflect critically on what is the meaning of our lives, of what is the meaning why a gift like this was given to us. The mind is a wonderful place to explore if we only knew how to use it to our advantage. Education is very important in any nationality or walks of life. Nowadays, there are many avenues that are being explored to facilitate education and learning as for different people could widen their knowledge and horizons. The traditional classroom teaching has many allies now. Some of these would be one on one teaching or tutorials, distance education and online instruction. Online Instruction The 21'st century has been an era of technological development. Life has been a huge success it is possible to get almost anything that you want. Development has been continuous and this is not going to stop. Each tries to adapt to the changes that happens in his life and he has to deal with it. Technological development is not limited to gadgets and material things alone even reshaping or remodeling one's body has been possible because of technology. However, that is not the most if it. The best part about all of these is that the field of education is not left behind with the technological development. This field was also able to be with the flow of modernization. The children of today can enjoy an array of different way of acquiring their education in the most possible way that would be comfortable to them. One of these is online instruction. It was noted that distance education started in the 60's, the same time that technology began to expand. In Canada, It was Athabasca University who started distance learning by the aid of telephone, fax, voice mail, e-mail, computer conferencing and regular mail. In 1970, England's Open University offered instruction through the radio and on television, with print-based materials, videos, and cassettes. However, the biggest break in distance education came in the 80's when personal computer became cheaper and computerized telecommunications become readily available to more people. (Kupczynski, Pendley and Hooper 2006 ) Online instruction is a field of education in which software and technology are use to make online instructional modes that are important for web learning. (Teaching Well with Technology, 2005) Then this was just a supplement instruction for some schools, colleges, and the training realm. Nowadays, it became a primary form of interaction and information. This form of learning computer network that are either a local bulletin board system (BBS), a local area network (LAN) or an intranet within a particular organization, global internet or world wide web. (Kearsley, 1998) There is an increase in the number of students enrolling in distant education as to the report of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation in 2002. It was reported that ninety percent of those institution that offers distance education have asynchronous computer-based instruction and synchronous computer-based instruction. (Kupczynski, Pendley and Hooper 2006) How are information disseminated in an online instruction system? The most common communication process that is utilized within the system would be the use of electronic mail or e-mail that helps students and teachers to send messages to each other. Multi person discussion uses chats, MUD/MOOs for group interaction and many other "groupware" programs. Because of the difference in the setting of the traditional mode of learning, in an online instruction system, a teacher serves more like a moderator or facilitator for in this set-up you can not command a complete capture of the attention of the students. Online instruction is as hard as that of the traditional way. Students still have to learn hard as they do in traditional setting. However, online teaching does not need a student with a very broad knowledge about computers or technology. Though this could be of great help, a student only needs to be apt in using the basics of a computer in getting and receiving information to finish a course. Adult Education It is assumed that all human beings are born with a unique capacity for language but the ability to put this language into action depends on the exposure that one would be having regarding the specific learning that he is having, a proper timing and proper teaching. Critical thinking is common among adults, those whose brain has been developed in a way that they do not only accept everything that is being presented to them as absolute truth but also has the capability of questioning the validity of the information presented and realizing if it could be accepted as a truth or not depending on the person's mindset, the person to whom the idea was presented that is. Idea is not only presented by mere saying, this could also have something to do with the environment, what we see, what we hear, we smell, we taste, we feel or in short, what our five senses can conceived. Critical thinking is the essence of learning. Critical thinking is applied in three kinds of learning, formal, non-formal and informal learning. Formal learning is where we acquire general knowledge about the world in a formal way. This form is usually use in classroom setting in schools and universities alike. Critical thinking is applied in formal schooling in a way that students and professors or teachers needs to understand their lessons, listen attentively and know what important notes should be written down and when and how to discuss lessons. Non-formal learning on the other hand, is when we carry out systematic instruction in one-off situation like taking short courses or learning a new skill that is beneficial to one's life. Informal learning has got to do on what we learn everyday, on how one reflects on certain emotions and ideas, critical thinking is also applied in everyday scenarios. When one is said to be a good critical thinker, he is not only a good professional but a good person as well because I believe that a critical thinker does not decide haphazardly but instead goes through the process of analyzing first that makes them a better person. Orientation as part of an adult learning is how we perceive lessons in life or in school. Five may all be looking at the same thing but they will arrive at five different conclusions. This is due to the fact that our orientation in life could dictate us on how we would think about the thing that we are looking at. Self-concept is a person's ability to relate them to what they are trying to learn. This means having a clear notion of how one could learn not only by the aid of our professors but also on how we would help ourselves to learn new concepts that are being presented to us. Adult and children have different ways in acquiring knowledge. Children more often accept everything that is presented to them as truth, they still learn by example. Adults already have a core in learning and this accumulated knowledge and experience can either add value to a learning experience or hamper it. Adult education was defined in the dictionary as an opportunity for those adults or those that are twenty years old and above to extend their education. An adult learns effectively if they could apply their knowledge in some practical fashion. The theory of andragogy was made by Michael Knowles and the point of this theory is that when an individual becomes an adult is when he has achieved a self concept and the essentials of gaining a self direction. In respect to his readiness and learning capabilities, there are five assumptions that Knowles has presented. These five assumptions are as follows: 1.That the move from a dependent character to one who is self reliant and can direct himself is just the same with the term maturity; 2. An adult pile up an increasing pile of experience, which is a rich foundation for learning; 3. The progress of an individual in terms of his social role is parallel to his readiness to learn as an adult; 4. As a person mature, his time perception changes, this would be synonymous to use of knowledge for the future to a more convenient application. At this point of his life, he is more problem centered and not so centered in subject when learning; 5.Internal factors are more influential in adult learning rather than external factors. (Kupczynski, Pendley and Hooper 2006) Examples of contemporary adult education would be instituted evening programs, extension work, courses without credit, correspondence courses, and distance learning programs wherein the courses are transmitted by satellite to different designations. In any learning standard retention is the main point that teacher should look at if the student is really learning something. Learners' errors should be corrected as soon as they are made so that he would know his mistake outright and at the same time minimizing the scenario of the teacher forgetting too what he or she is supposed to correct Impact of online instruction on Adult Education Stephen White writes, “Globalization is a reality occurring on an international, social, political, and humanitarian scale”. Online instruction is part of this globalization. It is necessary that the effectiveness of this new avenue of learning should be gauge. Education is not a one way thing where in teachers just teach without giving a test if the students were able to understand and really learned the lessons. Any system needs feedback about the service that they are providing as know if that particular way of teaching should continue or not. The impact of online instruction has been widely studies since its birth. The percentage of learning and effectiveness has been graph and leveled. Hodge, Tucker and Williams (2004) have studied what could be the best approach for a group of adults that are diverse learners with a range of learning styles. They assessed college students' perceptions of different course delivery methods. They were able to find out that it is important to set and educational climate that promotes active learning and uses strategies to increase the success of learners at a distance. There was also one qualitative research done by Kanuka (2002) regarding the view of some university instructor regarding distance education that uses emails as mode of communication. It was found out that some of the instructors fail to see the person behind the emails. Some has stereotype the students as mere red flags and not the same respect with the ones they see in a classroom setting. The technological discrepancies were overcome easier than creating collegial relationship with the students that they were able to interact more with the use of emails. Kanuka (2002) has concluded that there is a need for a more flexible ways in online postsecondary courses. The theory of transactional distance states that structure, dialogue and autonomy are important factors in distance education. Dialogue would be the interaction of the teacher and students. Structure in transactional distance education will be the course design and the node of teaching that was employed. The elements that are controllable by the student would make up the autonomy factor that is needed in distance education. This means that anyone who is providing distance education must be able to distinguish those characteristics that are within their limits and those that are not. (Kanuka, Collett and Caswell, 2002) What happens between the computers? How do teachers and students interact with each other and how do they look at the effect of online learning to them? These are the questions that Stacey and Rice (2002) tried to answer in their paper, ``Evaluating an Online Learning Environment,'' that was written in 2002. The point that they covered was the effect of interaction among students to the quality of learning that they are getting. The age group that they worked on was between the age of forty and fifty years old that is why this one is a good point in reviewing the impact of online teaching to adult education. Their result showed that online education has greater demands directed to the teachers because the level of interaction is directly related to the outcome of their online activity and the quality of response coming from the students. Some students were able to point out those others perspectives and resources have affected the outcome of their learning online. (Stacey and Rice, 2002) Though online education also the same component like traditional classroom teaching like exams and deadline, it was noted that those that are taking online education procrastinate more than those that go to universities and colleges. The way emails are made may have an impact on the behavior that a student shows. Since online education is more on what is the perception of the student with the email/s that was sent to him by his instructor, the type of email matters on their level of participation. Miller and Corley tried to prove this by testing students from an information systems online summer school course. Each of these students was sent an email depending on their performance, they receive positive feedback from instructors when they spent significant amount of time to complete their online task and a negative one if they don't. Their findings showed that it does matter the way a feedback email is written. Those that were given negative showed improvement on their next activities. (Miller and Corley, 2001) The way an adult learn online also has similarity with a child, they needed to be constantly reminded of what is good and what is not. Like in this study of Miller and Corley, those students who were constantly nag about the negative things that they were doing showed more improvement than those students whose negative attitudes were not given much attention. Maybe because of the set up of online education wherein the student and teacher don't see each other that is why these adults that are taking this needs more attention, by way of giving constant feedback on every activity and reminding them of what is. Conclusion Since the time internet came into being; information gathering has never been easy. Nowadays, we can get all information that we need with just one snap of the finger. There is no information that we need that we could not find an answer using the internet. Internet is an indispensable tool especially for students mostly for those taking online instruction. Since personal touch is lacking in online instruction, the method of delivery of message is important for quality learning. This would be how a module or material for learning was presented to the students, were they able to easily understand the lesson or the instruction that was presented to them? Thus in creating course outline, material and design, it would be helpful if student's view about the learning process and the course that is offered per se should be taken into consideration. The more motivational the instructor would be the better for the student and for the process. Being motivational in the part of the instructor would be providing diverse learning styles, taking into consideration the fact that the students are adults and mostly are also working and are just trying to broaden their horizon or are exploring new avenues in their field. How a student learn and how view his instructor could be pointed out to the effectiveness of the method of delivery employed. (Hunt, 2006) It is not easy teaching a student who has a lot of pre conceived knowledge and who are not new in the education realm. There are many factors to consider but this is not just a one way process, everyone needs to work as a team to make it a success. In the field of education, there is a golden seven principles that could be encompassed by teachers and students to make their studying fruitful, especially for adult learning. These seven principles formulated by Chickering and Gamson are: promote communication between students and faculty; work out reciprocity and alliance among students; push active learning; give prompt comment; accentuate time on task; communicate high vision; and respect varied talents and different methods of learning. (Hunt, 2006) How effective is online instruction for adults? Thos could be measured by the program that was presented to them, by making sure that they get quality education. (Smith, 2005) Since there is a different culture in online instruction, institutions need to make their teachers realize that their students have diverse needs and that there are some considerations that should be made. Theories on adult development they would be employed should be equal, as much as it could, for adults, for racial, ethnic minority, individuals with disabilities, females, or others. It is not easy being an online teacher, one need competencies because these adults that are studying will like to make sure that they are getting their money's worth. These are not little kids that one could make drool over a piece of candy. They seek a learner-centered advising to help in lesson retention as to make up for the modern atmosphere that online instruction is giving. Some sociologist believe that online teachers need to be more keen in giving attention to their students because they are not physically interacting with them or seeing are they seeing each other on a regular basis. Teachers are more of a facilitator when it comes to online instruction. A learner-focused approach could give online learning programs a blast and at the same time giving aid to the students' learning quests. (Hunt, 2006) This kind of approach is called a learner- centered approach and this helps create an awareness that the students are given importance and have information and perspectives that may aid others. Each student is responsible for their own learning. No one can force someone to learn if he or she doesn't want to. Since understanding cannot be perfect, student and teacher relationship in online instruction should try to meet a common ground criterion to make sure that they both understand each other and are working for a common purpose. Different media requires different amount of effort and task because a conversation change as the medium changes. The process that one undergoes to reach a mutual belief is called grounding. (Hunt, 2006) Good course planning can help prevent an online course from being excessively driven by technology. Institutions need to carefully plan the course first. It will be good to consider the options carefully in technology before pushing with the plans. Though the mode of instruction is different the essence of learning should not be lost. Each should be careful and make sure that their goal which is education-based. (Patsula, 1999) As a rule, the teacher will present the material to be learned through a series of tasks and activities. The teacher will structure his or her intervention by planning activities which, while attuned to student abilities, present increasing levels of difficulty (Greigoire and Laferriere, 2001) Feedback is the most important part of online education. This would help assess the quality of the lesson learned. The effectiveness of the style of teaching that was employed by the teacher and the learning outcomes of the students. This are being gathered and summarized to check if parts that needs improvements and in determining what are the future needs of the training. If feedbacks are well analyze, individual courses being offered by the institution or group could be enhance depending on the perception of those students who took it and develop the best online instruction practice. (Smith, 2005) Bruner's theories provide educationalist with useful ways of thinking with greater involvedness about how students learn and how best to offer education. Bruner's theories most important input to educational psychology and cognitive science is probably the importance he brings to socio-cultural essentials of learning and instruction. His theories are of greater use to describe successful learning approaches and diagnose learning difficulties than to prescribe particular methods of instruction for use by a profession that prizes its autonomy. The responsibility of creating a good connection is in the hands of the instructors or teachers. They are the drivers that try to help the students reach their destination. There are three steps that could be advocate by teachers to make sure that an intimate bond will be formed between the learning needs of adult working students and the practice of online instruction. These are: understanding the needs of working students; catering to a shared responsibility between teacher and student and a learning that is student directed; the last is making sure that there is balance between the goal of having increased revenue with that of enhancing learning by research and experimentation. (Kilmurray, 2003) Almost all that take online instruction has full time job or parental responsibilities making it difficult for them to take a regular schooling. They opted for online instruction because those provide them flexible and convenient learning opportunities. With the current trend now with a service- and information-based economy, the use of basic technologies in the web has been very easy for everyone especially for working adults and that making online instruction a better option for them. Since most workers now have the privilege of using personal computers to make their jobs easy, why not employ the same principle by learning without having to be present in a classroom? Information technology has given human kind an option of working and studying remotely (Kilmurray, 2003) With the knowledge and understanding of the plight of adult working-students, instructors and institutions would always bear in mind that these adults does not need to be coerce into studying, what they need is an environment that caters for them to learn despite the odds. The responsibility for learning is shared both by the student and the teacher. They have a choice what and how they will learn in the learning process. The teachers should guide them in the best way as they learn. (Kilmurray, 2003) With the increase revenue that institutions are getting with the boom of online education, one should not be caught up with all of this. They should bear in mind that they still have a responsibility towards their students. There should be a balance of increased revenue with improved learning. This balance could be achieved through research and experimentation. (Kilmurray, 2003) Martha Anderson and Eduard Lindeman (1927) have once said, “Andragogy is the true method of adult learning ... life itself is the adult's school.” Reference: Answers.com. (2005). Teaching Well with Technology Online instruction. CSUN. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.answers.com/Online%20Instruction. Greigoire, Reiginald and Therese Laferriere. (May 2001).Canada's SchoolNet: Project-Based Collaborative Learning with Networked Computers. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.tact.fse.ulaval.ca/ang/html/projectg.html#1 Hodge, Elizabeth, Sheila Tucker, and Scott Williams. (Winter 2004). Teaching and Learning: Student Perceptions of Course Delivery Methods. New Horizons in Adult Education Volume 18, Number 1. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.nova.edu/~aed/horizons/volume18no1Winter2004.pdf Hunt, William T. (2006) Shared Understanding: Implications for Computer Supported Cooperative Work. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.dgp.utoronto.ca/people/WilliamHunt/qualifier.html#RTFToC36 Kanuka, H., Collett, D., & Caswell, C. (2002). University instructor perceptions of the use of asynchronous text-based discussion in distance courses. The American Journal of Distance Education, 16(3), 151-167. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/summer62/simeroth62.html Kearsley, Greg. (April, 1998). A Guide to Online Education. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://home.sprynet.com/~gkearsley/online.htm. Kilmurray, James. (October 2003). e-Learning: It's More Than Automation. The Technology Source Archives The Technology Source Archives at the University of North Carolina. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://ts.mivu.org/default.asp?show=article&id=1034. Kupczynski, Lori Pendley and Buddy Hooper. (July 2006).The Internet as a Path to Adult Learning. New Horizons for Learning. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from.http://www.newhorizons.org Patsula, Peter J. (1999). Applying Learning Theories to Online Instructional Design. Sookmyung Women's University, Seoul. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.patsula.com/usefo/webbasedlearning/tutorial1/learning_theories_full_version.html#gagne Miller, M. D. & Corley, K. (2001). The effect of e-mail messages on student participation in the asynchronous on-line course: A research note. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, 4(3), Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/fall43/miller43.html Smith, Theodore C. (July, 2005) Fifty-One Competencies for Online Instruction Journal of Educators Online, Volume 2, Number 2. Western International University. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.thejeo.com/Ted%20Smith%20Final.pdf. Stacey, E. and Rice, M. (2002). Evaluating an online learning environment. Australian Journal of Educational Technology, 18(3), 323-340. Retrieved September 7, 2006 from http://www.ascilite.org.au/ajet/ajet18/stacey.html Read More