Lesson 3 - Implementing Online Learning

The role of text or writing in education also has a long history. According to the Bible, Moses used chiseled stone to convey the ten commandments in a form of writing, probably around the 7^th century BC. Even though Socrates is reported to have railed against the use of writing, written forms of communication make analytic, lengthy chains of reasoning and argument much more accessible, reproducible without distortion, and thus more open to analysis and critique than the transient nature of speech.

The invention of the printing press in Europe in the 15^th century was a truly disruptive technology, making written knowledge much more freely available, very much in the same way as the Internet has done today. As a result of the explosion of written documents resulting from the mechanization of printing, many more people in government and business was required to become literate and analytical, which led to the rapid expansion of formal education in Europe. There were many reasons for the development of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, and the triumph of reason and science over superstition and beliefs in Europe, but the technology of printing was a key agent of change.

Improvements in transport infrastructure in the 19^th century, and in particular the creation of a cheap and reliable postal system in the 1840s led to the development of the first formal correspondence education, with the University of London offering an external degree program by correspondence from 1858. This first formal distance degree program still exists today in the form of the University of London Worldwide. In the 1970s, the Open University transformed the use of print for teaching through specially designed, highly illustrated printed course units that integrated learning activities with the print medium, based on advanced instructional design.

With the development of web-based learning management systems in the mid-1990s, textual communication, although digitized, became, at least for a brief time, the main communication medium for Internet-based learning, although lecture capture and video streaming are now changing that.