Week 8 Discussions

Week 8 Discussions

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Week 8 Discussions

Discussion 1: Learner Emancipation

Designing and Delivering Courses to Improve Accessibility to Learners with Disabilities

E-Learning strives to improve accessibility to learning to all people. As such, for e-Learning to be truly accessible it should also be accessible to people with disabilities. E-Learning should eradicate any potential barriers to learning that people with disabilities experience in traditional learning environments. The resources provided by e-Learning should be accessible to all learners regardless of their environmental, technological, or physical constraints. E-Learning should enable students to learn using their individual learning styles and preferences. With this in mind, it is vital to design and deliver e-Learning courses that ensure adequate accessibility for learners with disability. Development of e-Learning courses that have audiographic systems would improve accessibility of the course to learners with disability. The course should be delivered synchronously, which would ensure that all the students are tuned into the lecture at the same time. The lecture may also be offered asynchronously, which implies that it would be recorded and the learners can listen or watch it at their own convenience. An audiographic lecture should be supplemented with visuals that include images, texts displays and PowerPoint slides. Use of audiographic system facilitates the presentation of information in various ways, which would benefit learners with disabilities.

Use of videos with captions is also one of the methods of improving accessibility to learners with hearing impairments. Captioning would also help learners that use English as a second language since the speed of the conversation may make it difficult for them to understand the information contained in the video (Laabidi et al., 2014).

Assistive Technologies for Online Students with Disabilities

Screen reading software and screen magnification software are some of the assistive software for online students with disabilities. Screen reading software speaks the information displayed on the screen to the students. It also enables the student to simulate the actions of the mouse using the keyboard. On the other hand, screen magnification software enlarges the content of the screen. This makes it easy for students with poor vision to see what is displayed on the screen.

Discussion 2: Learning Theories and E-learning

Learning Theory That Supports E-Learning Process

Behaviorism is one of the learning theories that provides the most appropriate framework to support e-Learning. This learning theory is based on observable changes in the patterns of behavior. It strives to develop a new behavior pattern through repetition until the behavior finally becomes automatic. In the e-Learning process, the learner may be required to use game-based approach that requires the repletion of certain behaviors. This ultimately enables the learner acquire the behavior related to the information being learnt.

Theoretical Shift in Education

Almala (2005) states that:

“Education is undergoing a theoretical shift from programmed learning and information processing approaches to knowledge building and transfer. Instead of focusing on how information is received, stored, and recalled, learning theorists are now turning their attention and concern to how knowledge is constructed within the learner’s mind, and the learner’ s interactions within a cultural and social context ” (p. 9).

The above statement implies that education is no longer focused on what but on how the learner learns that is taught. Traditional focus of what the learner has learned required the learner to memorize information. However, this did not facilitate the creation of new information, as it did not harness the critical thinking skills of the learner. In the contemporary learning focuses on how the learner learns what is being taught. As such, it focuses on the critical thinking skills of the learner and the ability to use the critical thinking skills to create new information. E-Learning supports this statement since it is mainly delivered using the internet. E-learning focuses on how various tools may be used to improve the learning experiences of the learner. Gamification of learning is one of the main tools that has improved the learning experience. Gamification does not focus on what is being learned. It simply focuses on how the learner understands the information being taught.

References

Almala, A. H. (2005). A constructivist conceptual framework for a quality e-learning environment. Distance Learning, 2(5), 9.

Laabidi, M., Jemni, M., Ayed, L. J. B., Brahim, H. B., & Jemaa, A. B. (2014). Learning technologies for people with disabilities. Journal of King Saud University-Computer and Information Sciences, 26(1), 29-45.