Points Of Interest: BBC, Learn Direct, What the future holds, Downside
Children and adults can now a days complete a lot of their learning tasks over the internet. Be it revising for your GCSE’s or in fact getting some extra adult learning, there are many services available over the internet enabling you to do it.
Let’s examine some online learning services:
BBC – Practically anything and everything
The BBC currently offers a wide array of learning services from revising for your first Key Stage exam to perhaps playing a revision game for your GCSE exams. BBC offer a very “children/youth” friendly interface designed for each type of exam. For example the “KS2 Revisewise” page is a lot more simpler and designed for a dedicated age group compared to the “AS Guru” page which uses far more complex language. Arguably using the internet for this is a “fantastic” resource for obtaining revision. Teachers claim that instead of reading trough stream of books, using the internet can be very convenient for both student and teacher. The main BBC learning site also offers services such as IT training and trying to learn a new language.
Learn Direct is one of many company’s offering “skills for adults” over the internet. It currently offers over 500 different online courses ranging from business management to “home user” IT courses. For many people of mixed ability these types of learning courses are ideal as they can get a bit extra learning from the comfort of their own home. This saves time and possibly expense of travelling to a course every week or so. Also, people may lack confidence to perhaps go to courses with other people so they can complete the online courses in privacy (excluding contact with possible members of staff).
From what is available today it has become more and more apparent that online learning is defiantly going to get bigger and bigger as time moves forward. Learning services may expand into perhaps kids solely using tablet/laptop computer or even taking all their exams over the internet. Some recent examples of online learning “expanding”: On 31st August 2006 BBC news reported “A high-tech project at a Leicestershire school could change the face of education in the county.” Explaining how one grammar school is planning to allow pupils to access the curriculum at home over the internet. Some schools are now even offering pupils to receive exam results over the internet. As BBC reported on 24th August 2006 “More than 300 GCSE students in England and Wales have taken part in an online pilot project that aims to revolutionise the way pupils access their results.” Explaining what I just said.
Just how long until perhaps pupils no longer even need to physically attend schools when they could do over the internet?
There is also a similar argument of why online learning is bad. People argue that the internet poses as more of a distracting and people cannot focus in the way they could if there were reading from a book in a class room. Some people say that “educational” games also are a distraction and that it doesn’t teach kids in an appropriate manor. Also IT skills are needed for both student and teacher which skills can be tedious to obtain for students and teachers. There is also the argument of what is the point of having learning sources available for such a young age even though they can’t use a computer. Of course parents/teachers can show students this but more often than not the student would tend to understand if they read the information first hand.
All in all, online learning is a fabulous source if used in an appropriate manor.