Weekly Reflection #10 EDTL230.2008.M008

This week in EDTL was a unit on Distance Education. Now, there may be preconceived notions about Distance Education specifically that it cannot work. These were addressed under the heading “Preparing for Murphy’s Law” because Murphy’s Law states, “Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.” The trio share group stated that backup systems should be incorporated in case of a failure in the primary delivery system. For example, if a class is being conducted by videoconferencing and the primary video system fails, then you could have a speakerphone available so that class can still be conducted. I appreciated that the group addressed how important feedback was and also how it can be difficult to provide feedback when conducting class via distance learning technologies. However, the group showed us that distance learning institutions integrate many contact methods such as frequent phone calls, email, etc. into their plans in order to combat the lack of face-to-face contact. I also appreciated that the group spoke knowledgeably about many of the pertinent technologies such as videoconferencing, discussion boards and web portals, internet chat, radio broadcast, and compressed video. In essence, I feel as though distance education is becoming more and more useful as a way to accommodate special circumstances and really encompass the learning needs of all students.