Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
and “many to many” forms of learning by maximizing the benefits of a relatively low-level
information technology platform. The philosophical stance has its origins in social theory
and addresses the emerging demands of learners to accommodate the pressing needs for
flexibility in time management and location.
The future learning environment will be increasingly ubiquitous and require the full
capacity of information technology operating asynchronously and at a distance to engage
the needs of “lifelong” and “life wide” learners while minimalizing the extra demands of
teachers and facilitators. It is also expected that students would come from increasingly wider
backgrounds with different aspirations for learning and learning styles. There has also been
an increasing trend that students demand alternative forms of interaction with their teachers,
other students, and the educational institution's administration. Online courses have a great
inherent flexibility to cater for a wider range of students' needs and demands, particularly with
respect to different interaction possibilities. Unfortunately, while there have been many
examples of online teaching and learning, there is a dearth of new philosophical frameworks
that maximize the inherent capacities of information technologies to guide the delivery of
courses.
BACKGROUND
It is well documented that the use of Information Communication Technologies (ICT)
in the context of teaching and learning can increase the possible use of a greater range of
teaching and learning options for on-campus and distance education modes of course
presentations, through open learning, online, and resource-based learning, etc. Furthermore,
in the provision of distance education, the use of learning centers, small groups, or individuals
can bring new learning opportunities into local community advantage. This can assist in the
development to “learning communities” by widening access in local communities to eduction
and training opportunities, increasing interpretation of knowledge in a local context, and
supporting existing educational systems (Longworth, 1999).
The use of ICT by regional (territorial) communities as a technology strategy or
discipline is defined in this chapter as “community informatics” (CI). As indicated by Gurstein
(2000), CI can link ICT at the community level with emerging opportunities in community
development and lifelong learning. As such, this term brings together the concepts of ICT
and that of community development based on individual growth within a framework of shared
learning, sharing experience across cultural and geographic boundaries and interpreting
information from within a community context to create applicable knowledge.
In conjunction with the developments in the use of ICT to improve equity of access for
distance education, there has also been an increasing realization of the need for educational
institutions to provide a leadership role in society for democratic process and to address
issues of equity (Harkavy, 1998).
In this chapter, the role of online approaches for distance education from a theoretical
stance is addressed. The dangers of unitary approaches that the use of ICT can promote are
exposed, and an approach is outlined that can assist local communities in benefiting from a
wider interpretation of knowledge available through online distance education.
