Abstract
This chapter intends to explore distance learning today both in the television medium and in the online one, acknowledging that during these early decades of the 21st century multiple and diverse remote learning opportunities have arisen given the permanent technological evolution and of societies. In order to present this actual circumstance, focused analysis of both media is developed pointing out each main key characteristic, benefits, and disadvantages, examining the existence and reliability of each respective means of assessment.
TopBackground: Society And Distance Learning Today
Human professional and cultural development have relevantly changed in the last 50 years. Accompanying this evolution, education has moved as well into a new perspective, concept, or idea, becoming DL the natural response to the changes in our society. DL is a generic term used to refer to the physical separation of teachers and learners (Schlosser et al., 2006), which slightly differs from the e-learning concept that is an instructional program delivered online including tutorials proposed on campus, workshops, short courses and worksite-based instruction (Ruhe et al., 2009).
The increasing number of distant learners, as opposed to the ones attending collective presential classrooms, seems to rely on plural factors, as the growing number of population, that limits the access to schools, living in distant locations from educational areas, the general growing interest in being educated and to acquire knowledge, the capability and/or preference to study by themselves, the difficulty of completion courses and also the need to enter into the labor market.
Alongside with social reasons, DL evolution has also benefited from technological improvements that foster educational environments. Interactive software has been evolving in a such a progressive way that tends to be the basis of DL´ future, by recycling pedagogical interfaces, improving educational relationships to overcome its spatial and temporal former issues, bringing us to a global bidirectional technological mainstream system where new teaching procedures and methods of evaluation provide new flexible forms of learning.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Artificial Intelligence: The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.
Distance learning (DL): Involving some technology-driven component such as web-based or mobile phone technology including e-mail, live video interaction, or mobile app.
Edutainment: The term combines the words “education” and “entertainment” referring to any form of entertainment that is educational with the goal to make learning enjoyable and fun.
Assessment: Systematic collection, review, and use of information about educational programs undertaken for the purpose of improving student learning and development.