Module 2 - Functional Organization of Distance Education
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This document discusses the organization and components of distance education systems. It describes different models for organizing distance education institutions, from single mode institutions devoted entirely to distance education to dual mode institutions that offer both online and in-person courses. It also outlines the key components of a functional distance education system, including sources of content knowledge, course design, delivery of materials, instructor interaction, learner environments, and management/administration. Finally, it advocates viewing distance education as an interconnected system and discusses how this systems perspective helps understand the changes brought about by online learning.
Module 2 - Functional Organization of Distance Education
- 1. Module 2 Functional Organization of Distance Education Stephen L. Esber/UPOU-MDE/EDDE 205/Management of D.E.
- 2. Objectives: •Learn how DE institutions are organized based on the mission/vision of the institution •Identify which model is appropriate for one’s institution
- 3. Levels of Distance Education Organization Single Mode Institutions All the faculty and staff of the institution are exclusively devoted to distance education Dual-mode Institutions Added distance education to its previously established campus and class- based teaching Individual Faculty delivers part of their classroom online, one or more courses as DE course/s Consortia Multiple institutions banded together to extend the reach of each
- 4. Courses and Programs in D.E. • courses are usually adaptation of the classroom courses delivered in the parent institution • courses have been taught by a wide variety of technologies • each course has both learners and a teacher, content organized around a set of learning objectives, some designed learning experiences, and some form of evaluation
- 5. Why Distance Education? increasing access to learning and training as a matter of equity • providing opportunities for updating skills of the workforce • improving the cost effectiveness of educational resources • improving the quality of existing educational structures • enhancing the capacity of the educational system • balancing inequalities between age groups • delivering educational campaigns to specific target audiences • providing emergency training for key target groups • expanding the capacity for education in new subject areas • offering combination of education with work and family life • adding an international dimension to the educational experience
- 6. Components of a Working D.E. System • a source of content knowledge and teaching (i.e., an educational institution, with faculty and other resources for providing content) • a course design subsystem to structure this into materials and activities for students • a subsystem that delivers the courses to learners through media and technology • instructors and support personnel who interact with learners as they use these materials • learners in their different environments • a management subsystem to organize policy, needs assessment, and resource allocation; to evaluate outcomes; and to coordinate other subsystems
- 7. Sources of Knowledge • At any of these organizational levels there must be content specialists who know the field and its literature, theory, contemporary practice, and problems; in the training field there must be people with highly developed skills that they try to transmit to others. • Students are also considered a source of knowledge according to contemporary constructivist philosophy, which leads to the inclusion of project work and other self-directed learning activities in the design of courses.
- 8. Design of Courses • Preparing a distance education course requires not only the content expert but also instructional designers who can organize the content according to what is known about the theory and practice of knowledge management and the theory of learning. • Since the courses and the teaching will be delivered by technology, the course materials need to be designed by specialists who know how to make the best use of each available technology.
- 9. Design of Courses • The instructional designers should work with the content experts to help them decide on such matters as: (a) the learning objectives of the course and each of its component parts, (b) the exercises and activities the learners should undertake to achieve the objectives, (c) the layout • Finally, evaluation and research experts must plan how to evaluate individual student learning, as well as the effectiveness of all aspects of the distance education course, in order to ensure that it works—in other words, to meet the needs of students and the teaching organization and provide cost- effective instruction.
- 10. Delivery of Course Materials and Interaction via Technologies • In all education there has to be communication between a teaching organization and a learner. In distance education this communication takes place through some kind of technology. • one basic principles in using technology, which is to recognize that no single technology is optimal for delivery of every kind of message to all learners in all locations. • another principle is that it is always desirable to have at least one recorded technology primarily suited to the delivery of content and another that is suitable for interaction between learner(s) and instructor(s).
- 11. Interaction: The Role of Instructors • distant learners need to communicate with people at the teaching institution, particularly the people appointed as instructors • it is the communication that goes on between the individual learner and an instructor that transforms common information into personally relevant knowledge
- 12. Interaction: The Role of Instructors • In a well-structured system, the interactions between instructors and students will be based on issues and questions determined by the course designers, who include, of course, the content experts. • in a distance education course it is common for the interaction to be conducted by specialist instructors who might have played little or no part in the processes of designing the course
- 13. Learners in Their Learning Environments • This environment in which people interact with their course materials and interact with their instructors may be their work places or homes, in a classroom or at a learning center, in hotels, or on airplanes. • Students’ environments also include the virtual environment when they meet together synchronously or asynchronously online. To take advantage of such a setting, instructional designers should create activities that involve interaction among the members of each group, and perhaps also interaction with other virtual groups.
- 14. Management and Administration making all the pieces work in a distance education system requires a considerable degree of management sophistication
- 15. Management and Administration • Managers are responsible for all the subsystems that lead to the design, delivery, and implementation of the program, beginning with the difficult process of assessing the needs of learners who are not usually easily accessible. • Administrators must ensure that money, personnel, and time are managed so numerous work tasks fit together and courses are produced on time. Suitable faculty and staff must be recruited and trained.
- 16. Distance Education A Systems View and Model
- 17. The Idea of a System • The healthy body is one in which all the parts are healthy and all the parts play their roles in harmony with each other. That is the concept of a system. In order to understand a system it is necessary to understand each of the parts; to correct a malfunction in a system it is necessary to diagnose which part is not working properly. • A distance education system consists of all the component processes that operate when teaching and learning at a distance occurs. It includes learning, teaching, communication, design, and management.
- 18. How a Systems View Helps Us Understand Distance Education
- 21. Distance Education Is About Change distance education is both a cause and a result of significant changes in our understanding of the very meaning of education itself—as well as of more obvious changes in understanding how it should be organized
- 22. Distance Education Is About Change distance education means that more people have access, more easily, to more and better learning resources than they could in the past, when they had to accept only what was locally provided, if they could access even that
- 23. Distance Education Is About Change Overall, distance education opens up many new learning opportunities for many people. Beyond access, distance education gives a greater degree of control to the learner in relation to the teaching institution, which might have significant effects on what the institution offers to teach and the way it teaches.
- 24. Reference Moore, M., & Kearsley, G. (2012). Chapter 1 - Basic Concepts, Distance Education: A Systems View of Online Learning (3rd ed.) (pp. 1-22). California, Wadsworth: Cengage Learning.