Week 11: Chapters 9 & 10, Question # 3

3. What is distance education? What types of support are critical to the success of distance education? Why?

According to Lever-Duffy and McDonald, distance education or distance learning is the delivery of instruction to students who are separated from their teacher by time and / or location. Distance education courses that require a physical on-site presence for any reason including the taking of examinations is considered to be hybrid or blended course of study. This emerging technology is becoming widely used in universities and institutions around the globe. With the recent trend of technological advance, distance learning is becoming more recognized for its potential in providing individualized attention and communication with students internationally.

Distance education provides major benefits to at least three main markets or categories, such as:

• Expanding access: Distance education can reach underserved populations of students who cannot attend a school that offers the educational services they desire, perhaps because they live to far away.

• Cost reduction: Distance education can turn production of content into a repeatable and durable learning tool that does not require as much infrastructure. As most material can be packaged in an easy to deliver “just-in-time” format, the expanding payroll of educational institutions become unnecessary.

• Emerging market opportunities: Distance education fuels the public’s need for lifelong learning in education by providing access to learners not in the traditional k – 12 age group.

• Adapting to new technology and environments: Educational institutions may adopt distance education as a means to adapt to the rapid changes in technology being used in education today.

The types of support technologies used in the delivery of distance education that are critical to its success are divided into two groups: synchronous and asynchronous. Synchronous distance education is a mode of instruction in which all participants are “present” at the same time. Although typically not in the same place generally require a timetable to be organized. Web and video conferencing, and internet chat are examples of synchronous support technologies. Asynchronous distance education is a time shifted mode of instruction in which participants access course materials on their own schedule. Students and teachers are not required to be together at the same time. Message board forums, e-mail and recorded video are examples of asynchronous support technologies.

Week 10 : Website

I really enjoyed creating this website!!! It was much easier than I expected. The possibilites are endless. Creating internal and external links didn't take nearly as much hassle as Dreamweaver. The need to know html codes / language was also eliminated. Anyone can create a website using goolge sites. Click here to view my website.

Week 8: Webtools

This assignment was very interesting. While creating the various products I learned a lot of valuable information. The information that I obtained will definitely be used in my classroom. I had no idea that these tools existed. Using these tools makes creating interactive puzzles, online quizzes, rubrics for various projects and trackstars a piece of cake! Trackstar is amazing,which made it my favorite project from this assignment.This is a great resource for teachers and students to use. From looking at the example the assignment looked very hard. After viewing the tutorial and getting further into the assignment I found it be very easy. Though creating the puzzle and quiz were easy I had somewhat of a problem saving them in google docs. After several attempts I thought I'd found a solution, which involved exporting the bookmarks and saving them to my desktop. Once I saved them to my desktop I uploaded them to google docs as links. This still was correct. After viewing the tutorial Dr. Wang provided I finally got it right (I hope). Click on the links below and let me know what you think.

Webtools:
Rubric
Puzzle
Quiz, Answer Sheet
Trackstar

Week 7: Chapter 7 & 8, Question 2

2. What is the difference between asynchronous and synchronous communication? Name and describe the Internet communication tools that fall into each category.

Asynchronous communication allows collaboration between two or more parties without all parties involved being present at the same time. Most communication between devices with computers and between computers and external devices fall into this category. Through asynchronous communication people are able to connect together at each person's own convenience and schedule. Though communication often becomes very impersonal, it provides the opportunity to properly analyze the message and think about a meaningful response. Asynchronous tools are useful in sustaining dialogue and other valuable information that can easily be accessed, day or night. One advantage of these tools is the ability to involve people from multiple time zones. They are also helpful in tracking the history of group interactions. Some examples of these tools and their uses are listed below:

Email Messages (most popular): One-to-one or one-to-many communication, acts as a virtual post office box

Discussion Boards: Dialogue that takes place over a period of time

Blogging: Sharing ideas and comments

According to Lever - Duffy and McDonald, “Synchronous communication is a method of communicating in which the participants interact at the same time or in real time." Real time refers to sensing and responding to external events nearly simultaneously with their occurrence. All parties involved must be present in order for communication to take place. Participants are able to receive an immediate response but lack time to think about their response. It allows collaboration in a same time different place mode. This creates a communication challenge for participants in different time zones or with conflicting schedules. In addition, they tend to be costly due to the extra equipment required (speakers, microphone, webcam, etc). Some examples of these tools and their uses are listed below:

Web conferencing: Sharing presentations and information

Instant messaging: Ad hoc quick communication

Chat: Information sharing of low-complexity issues (public or private)

Video conferencing: Live voice and video messages