What is Independent Learners

The question is not whether high school students should be taking online courses. It is whether they should get out of high school without taking one. As students negotiate the 21st century, the skills that students employ in taking an online course are the ones they need to negotiate their productive working lives and 21st century citizenry. What are the skills that students must master in an online learning environment? Independent thinking, self-motivation, self-directed learning, information seeking, and information giving—these are all elements of online distance learning. Students must not only have basic reading and numeric literacy to negotiate the content of the online courses, but must also be able to persevere and bring to completion a course of study. To further stretch the 21st century student, the work must be completed outside the school walls and school day, on the students’ own turf, blending a learning environment and living environment all in one. Perhaps most important, the absence of a teacher’s physical presence means that the student must find inspiration from within.