Week 2 Readings: The Effectiveness of e-Learning

Both of this week’s readings covered information about the effectiveness of e-learning. Chapter 1 in Clark and Mayer (2007) contained these notable statements:

1. The instructional methods, not the delivery medium, produce learning (p. 21). Although this statement is not surprising, I wondered how the delivery medium could be separated from the instructional methods to arrive at this conclusion; the term “instructional methods” is broad and hopefully will be clarified in subsequent chapters.

2. e-Learning is the only technology-based delivery vehicle that can provide adaptive instruction (i.e., dynamic tailoring of instruction based on the learner’s progress, p. 23). This is a distinctive attribute of e-learning that should always be used to best advantage in e-learning design.

3. There are two common barriers to good e-learning: (1) lack of a job and task analysis, which leads to transfer failure, and (2) media abuse through over- or under-utilization of technology (p. 24). I agree that a job and task analysis would make any e-learning project more productive, and that this analysis probably happens all too infrequently. I know that by the time clients seek out services from my e-learning production company, they have already made the decision to use an e-learning solution for their training need. I often wonder how the clients arrive at this decision.

4. The learner’s prior knowledge of the course content exerts the most influence on learning (p. 26). This point has huge implications for the learner analysis aspect of e-learning design, but of course prior knowledge can vary quite a bit among a group of learners. The most effective e-learning products probably make the best use of adaptive instructional capabilities to address this variation among learners’ prior knowledge.

The overall finding of the U.S. Department of Education 2010 meta-analysis report was that on average, classes with online learning (all online or blended) produced better learning outcomes than face-to-face instruction. As an employee in the e-learning production business, I was relieved to see this result! The report explored many possible reasons for this result, but one finding was crucial: Most of the variations in the way online learning was implemented had no significant effect on learning outcomes (p. xv). Only two variations generated better outcomes: Blended learning produced better outcomes than purely online instruction, and instructor-led or collaborative environments produced better outcomes than self-directed instruction. Therefore, the instructor is still key to learning, regardless of the method of delivery.

References

Clark, R.C., & Mayer, R.E. (2007). E-Learning and the science of instruction: Proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning (2nd Ed.). San Francisco: Pfeiffer.

U.S. Department of Education, Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development (2010). Evaluation of evidence-based practices in online learning: A meta-analysis and review of online learning studies. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Education.