It’s hard not to be influenced by current trends especially where technology is concerned. You cannot keep yourself isolated or stagnant in the midst of competition where everyone else has embraced the latest trends. Training people for example, has been brought out of the formal settings of the classroom and placed where the activities are being done, where trainees are immersed in the actual practice of what they are being trained for. In connection with this development, one of the strategies that has gained ground in the last few years is the concept of e-learning courses, where instead of grouping learners into a class and being led by an instructor, a learner can study the lessons in his or her own time. The learners themselves are in charge of determining how they can access the lessons, what they want to learn and when they can do it.
E-learning courses are designed to involve a dynamic process of learning where each subject to be studied is customized according to the learner’s requirements, capabilities, and educational goals. Each lesson within the course is available anytime, and on demand by the learner. It is the learner who can control the process of interacting with the course’s content and manner of presentation. Because lessons are accessible anytime, the learner has all the time for reflection on the subject matter and for practical application of what has been learned. The contents of e-learning courses are built in modules so they can be combined with other related subjects and can be presented as needed in different learning environments. They can be reused, reassembled, and reproduced in real time where there is a need for the subject by any number of learners in any given venue. It is important for the contents to be capable of being reformatted so they can serve as the basic content, component or matrix for other related contents. It is up to the course developer how to use the contents and present them in a manner most suitable to the logical needs of the application where they are needed.
Since e-learning relies heavily on computer technology, it has to be usable in different kinds of available standard formats such as HTML, XML, PDA and others. It involves a large dose of knowledge management where information should be made available on demand all the time and provided according to the needs of the learner who should be able to collect the information pertinent to his or her goals, create something out of it, and distribute the fruits of his or her reflection on the information. For this reason, e-learning courses must be content-rich and flexible. Companies should be able to use this information towards achieving their goals and objectives without fail. But this can only happen if the same information is used to advance their people’s knowledge and skills – which in turn must be readily accessed and shared by all those who must and need to.
The manner of using e-learning as a method for training employees is best suited for companies because every member shares the same interest. The e-learning courses they create are the products of their collaborative efforts, where each subject is readily identified and selected according to the company’s needs. Companies already have built-in self-limiting structure that they can exploit in developing their own e-learning courses. The courses are defined, designed and refined according to the results they get after each implementation and development cycle so that improvements are integrated seamlessly. Each version of their courses is an opportunity for the organization and the learners to interact and respond to the current and future challenges, enabling them to achieve higher performance goals together.
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