IDEAS: Instructional Design for Elearning Approaches – Elearning Planning and Management

http://ideas.blogs.com/lo/elearning_delivery_strategies/

This blog authored by Ferdinand Kraus is about the book that Marc Rosenberg wrote, “Elearning Strategies for Delivering Knowledge in the Digital Age.” Kraus wrote that early in the book that Rosenberg stated that there were two critical points concerning the delivery of online classes, “the technology in and of itself will not enhance learning” and “without a comprehensive strategic foundation elearning implementations are prone to failure.” The first point has to do with the tools that are used in conjunction with elearning; cable television was used as an example. The cable used with elearning is said to enhance the learning outcomes. I would attribute our video programs that are utilized in our class to function like cable television in this instance. The second critical point has to do with elearning projects that do not match the objectives, which were set too high in the first place. Concisely, the objectives were not realistic at all. Rosenberg attributes the senior staff members to not doing their homework when designing elearning classes.

Kraus will be working on elearning geared for the online Master’s of Health Sciences Health Administration Program in conjunction with the Department of Health Policy Management. Kraus’ hope is to develop a template that other programs may utilize as far as the delivery strategies are concerned. Kraus wrote, “The plan will include the costing structure and operational requirements for their program as well as evaluation and performance indicators and methodologies.” Personally, I know that we will be learning about the evaluation, performance indicators, and methodologies in are latter classes in the MS Instructional Design and Technology Program.

Kraus makes mention that Rosenberg is coming from a corporate training perspective not education at all. Kraus disagrees with some issues that Rosenberg presents, for instance, elearning may be cost effective. However, Kraus contends from a university perspective this is not the case. Elearning, for the most part will free up classrooms, however, it things like “software licenses, hardware, maintenance of course and hardware, expertise, opportunity, faculty time, etc. may increase the cost significantly. The number of students registered for a certain class may be cost effective. Second, Kraus wrote that the hardware systems are fading rapidly, which falls into universality. Kraus stated that in regards to the exchange of “a different hardware and software system is prohibitive.” Lastly, the fact that online classes can hold as many as 100,000, which Kraus contends is false. She stated, “Few Universities or colleges have the resources to put the infrastructure in place for such a dramatic increase in participants.”

This information contained within this blog will help me in my future as being an Instructional Designer because it spoke about the planning and management that go into designing a class. It is interesting to hear the perspective of a corporate trainer in relation to an educational one. Views and practices are very different in nature of the online designing. The online designing should be left to the expertise of each category, corporate for theirs and education for theirs. It was nice to see how the corporate world views online their views are much different. It was nice to get this perspective as well.