Investigating the Efficacy of E- learning for the Egyptian Higher Education Tamer Sameer AbdEl-Badea AbdEl-Gawad 2009

What should be anticipated to outcome from educational learning systems?

We anticipate to have… A qualified Teacher!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Professional Standards for QTS stated that qualified teachers should meet the following standards: You can find all the Professional Standards for QTS at:

The most important ICT standards are: Q8 Have a creative and constructively critical approach towards innovation, being prepared to adapt their practice where benefits and improvements are identified. Q16 Have passed the professional skills tests in numeracy, literacy and information and communications technology (ICT). Q17 Know how to use skills in literacy, numeracy and ICT to support their teaching and wider professional activities. Q23 Design opportunities for learners to develop their literacy, numeracy and ICT skills. Q25 Teach lessons and sequences of lessons across the age and ability range for which they are trained in which they: (a) use a range of teaching strategies and resources, including e-learning, taking practical account of diversity and promoting equality and inclusion. (Woollard, 2007: p. 5)

The most important E-Learning standards are: Q17 Know how to use skills in literacy, numeracy and ICT to support their teaching and wider professional activities. Q23 Design opportunities for learners to develop their literacy, numeracy and ICT skills. Q25 Teach lessons and sequences of lessons across the age and ability range for which they are trained in which they: (a) use a range of teaching strategies and resources, including e-learning, taking practical account of diversity and promoting equality and inclusion. Q30 Establish a purposeful and safe learning environment conducive to learning and identify opportunities for learners to learn in out-of-school contexts. (TDA, 2007:p. 9)

What are the benefits of the “e” to learning: 1- Speed: –Speed of giving feedback; –Speed of informing about new problems. 2- Communication: –It enables rabid communications of ideas across a range of audiences; –This communication aspect means that aspects of communication can be captured and given a degree of semi-permanence; –This semi-permanence supports the sharing of intellectual objects. (Pachler, 2009)

What are the benefits of the “e” to learning: 3- Construction and representation: –Representation: the ability to represent ideas in a variety of ways and to move and translate between these representations; –Technology can support learners in the representation of their own ideas; –Through representation technologies enable concepts to be “shaped” and this helps learners develops their meaning; –In representing their ideas in digital artefacts learners open up a window on their thinking; –Mutability: shared objects are not fixed, they can change/be changed easily. (Pachler, 2009)

What are the challenges of using e-learning? Technical problems; Lack of instructional intimacy associated with face-to-face conventional delivery systems in traditional classrooms; Lack of interactivity and limited interaction with the instructor; Delays in receiving feedback; Instructor’s inability to monitor students cues (both verbal and non-verbal) in distance education, researchers are finding that students have lower expectations concerning nonverbal behaviour than in the traditional classroom (Arburgh, 2001); Lack of compatibility of online instruction with individual learning styles (Fabianic, 2002: p. 173); Taking one approach in terms of application of information technologies without sufficient regard for appropriate learning design.

Quality in e-learning systems I believe that the quality of any educational environment can be obtained only by the satisfaction of all the elements evolved with that environment including the satisfaction with educational outcomes. “Providing the best possible forms of online learning is a critical component of the quality assurance process” (Oliver, 2001)

My research is an attempt to join the two worlds of theoretical educational research and the practical approach, by combining the designing of a systematic approach (model) for designing and evaluating quality e-learning systems, with the implementation of a suggested quality e-learning system (Computer- Maintenance e-learning system), in order to combine the theory with practice together and to make sure that my quality e-learning system model met the practicing conditions and circumstances which a quality e- learning system could face in the real practice context.

12 The model so far…