The Handbook of Blended Learning E-Book

Curtis J. Bonk

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 1021

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

This comprehensive resource highlights the most recent practicesand trends in blended learning from a global perspective andprovides targeted information for specific blended learningsituations. You'll find examples of learning options that combineface-to-face instruction with online learning in the workplace,more formal academic settings, and the military. Across theseenvironments, the book focuses on real-world practices and includescontributors from a broad range of fields including trainers,consultants, professors, university presidents, distance-learningcenter directors, learning strategists and evangelists, generalmanagers of learning, CEOs, chancellors, deans, and directors ofglobal talent and organizational development. This diversity andbreadth will help you understand the wide range of possibilitiesavailable when designing blended learning environments. Orderyour copy today!

Leseprobe

Contents

Title

Copyright

Dedication

Forewords

Preface

Part One: Introduction to Blended Learning

Chapter One: Blended Learning Systems

Background and Definitions

Current Trends and Issues

Directions for the Future

Chapter Two: The Blended Learning Imperative

Reasons for Creating Blended Learning

Conclusion

Chapter Three: Why Blended Learning Hasn’t (Yet) Fulfilled Its Promises

Why is Blended Learning the Current Trend?

A Chronology of Learning Delivery Technologies

Where We Are Today?

So What’s the Problem, Really?

Designing Blended Learning Experiences

How Do We Design the Blend?

What is the Role of Community in Designing Blended Learning Experiences

How Do We Know if the Blend Works?

Facilitating Blended Learning Experiences

How Do We Get it All Done?

How Do We Teach Our Team?

How Do We Prepare the Organization?

Conclusion

Chapter Four: On Designing Interaction Experiences for the Next Generation of Blended Learning

The Next Wave of Blended Learning: Education Unplugged

Why Interaction Matters

Schools of Thought on Interaction

In Support of Interaction Strategies for the Future of Blended Learning

Summary Thoughts

Part Two: Corporate Blended Learning Models and Perspectives

Chapter Five: Blending Learning for Business Impact

Basic Blue for Managers: IBM’s New Manager Program

Evaluation Strategy

The Results

Impact of this Learning Practice on the Organization

Lessons Learned

Chapter Six: A Learning Ecology Model for Blended Learning From Sun Microsystems

Why a Learning Ecology?

Background to the Learning Ecology Framework

Learning Ecology Framework

From Learning Ecology to Knowledge Ecology

Conclusion

Chapter Seven: Putting Customers First at Microsoft

Global Perspective on Technology Training

Customer Needs

A New Framework for Empowering Partners and Creating More Successful Customers

Case Histories

State of Wisconsin

Integrated Solutions Technology, Philippines

Microsoft de Argentina

Conclusion

Chapter Eight: Transformation of Sales Skills Through Knowledge Management and Blended Learning

Knowledge Management

CRM Portal

Avaya Solutions Knowledge Center

Executive Solutions Selling Business Acumen

Conclusion

Chapter Nine: The Cisco Networking Academy

Literature Review

The Cisco Networking Academy as a Blended Learning Environment

Approaches to Blended Learning in the Cisco Networking Academy

Conclusion

Chapter Ten: To Blend or not to Blend

The Background on Blended Learning

Community Building in Blended Contexts

Oracle’s Leader Track

Studying Blended Outcomes at Oracle

Is Community Worth It?

The Future of Blended Learning at Oracle

Part Three: Higher Education Blended Learning Models and Perspectives

Chapter Eleven: Global Perspectives On Blending Learning

Blended Learning—In the Beginning

The Blended Learning Spectrum: From a Single Course to a Degree Program

Institutional Strategies for Blended Learning

When Blended Learning Becomes “Learning”

Chapter Twelve: New Zealand Examples of Blended Learning

The University of Waikato: A Tertiary Institution Case Study of Blended Learning

Examples of Blended Learning at UOW

Technological and Pedagogical Support

Chapter Thirteen: E-College Wales, a Case Study of Blended Learning

Trends

U.K. Developments

Definitional Complexities

Local Designs

Conclusions

Chapter Fourteen: Blended Learning Enters the Mainstream

Blended Courses at the University of Central Florida

Some Demographics for Blended Learning

Outcomes for Blended Learning

Learning Effectiveness

Student Satisfaction

Blended Learning as a Transformative Construct in Higher Education

Chapter Fifteen: Integrated Field Experiences in Online Teacher Education

Context

Principles

Challenges

Conclusion

Part Four: For-Profit and Online University Perspectives

Chapter Sixteen: Blended Learning at the University of Phoenix

Global Perspectives

Local Designs

Conclusion

Chapter Seventeen: A Different Perspective on Blended Learning

Perspectives from the Literature

Blended Learning at Capella University

Chapter Eighteen: Blended Learning Goes Totally Virtual by Design

Growth Factors for the For-Profit Universities

Blended Learning Models for For-Profit Universities

Jones International University: A Virtual-Only Model

Significant Issues and Questions

Opportunities

Conclusion

Part Five: Cases of Blended Learning in Higher Education From Around the World

Chapter Nineteen: Blended Learning in Japan and Its Application in Liberal Arts Education

World Economy Not Leading E-Learning

Trends in Higher Education in Japan

Definitions and Development of Blended Learning in Japan

Blended Learning in a Liberal Arts College

Conclusion

Chapter Twenty: The Emergence of the Cyber-University and Blended Learning in Korea

The Cyber-University

Trends of Online Learning

Discussion and Conclusions

Chapter Twenty-One: Designing Blended Learning Focused on Knowledge Category and Learning Activities

Needs of Blended Learning

Challenges Faced in Implementing Blended Learning

Designing Blended Learning

Case One: “Introduction to Educational Technology,” an Online Course

Case Two: “Multimedia Technology,” On-Campus Curriculum

Conclusions

Chapter Twenty-Two: Open Distance Pedagogy

Research on Blended Learning

An Overview of Blended and E-Learning in Malaysia

Open University Malaysia’s Blended Learning Model

Face-to-Face Learning

Online Learning

Blended Learning Challenges at Open University Malaysia

Future Plans

Conclusion

Chapter Twenty-Three: Blending on and Off Campus

Background to Each Context

Blended Learning in Wollongong

Singaporean Blended Learning Contrasts

Learning from the Tale of Two Cities

Conclusion

Chapter Twenty-Four: Blended Learning At Canadian Universities

Blended Learning Rationale

Blended Learning Practices at COHERE Universities

Online Pedagogy

Conclusions

Chapter Twenty-Five: Tecnológico De Monterrey in México

Brief History of the Intensive Use of Technologies in Formal Education in Mexico

Growth of the Internet in Mexico

La Red Escolar: Internet Tools for Children

Fifteen Years of Teaching with Technology in ITESM

Learning Management Systems to Support a Blended Approach

Student and Faculty Roles in Blended Learning

Conclusion

Chapter Twenty-Six: From Analog to Weblog

Blended Learning: Simple Socialization

Crude Forms of Blended Learning

The Shift to Web-Based Blended Methodology

Instructor Variation

Final Note

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Virtual Tau

Background and Rationale of Virtual TAU

Diffusion of Web-Supported Academic Instruction

Pedagogical Configuration of Course Web Sites

Use of Content Included in the Course Web Sites

Implementation and Use of Asynchronous Forums

Conclusion

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Management Education for the Twenty-First Century

The Open University’s Approach to Blended Learning

Business Schools and Learning Innovations

Mass Management Education

Rethinking Approaches for the Twenty-First Century

Choices for Certificate in Management Students

The Role of the Tutor Online

Authentic Blend for Tutor Development

Conclusions

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Blended Learning in Undergraduate Mathematics at the University of Pretoria

Online Teaching and Learning in Undergraduate Mathematics

Scope of Blended Learning in Mathematics

Conclusion

Part Six: Multinational Blended Learning Perspectives

Chapter Thirty: The Integration of Learning Technologies Into Europe’s Education and Training Systems

Current Status

Education and Training Systems

Self-Learning

eEurope

Education and Training and Technology Policies

From Distance to Blended Learning

E-Learning for Some or All?

The E-Learning Initiative (2002–2004)

E-Learning Program (2004–2006)

Some Reflections

Conclusion

Chapter Thirty-One: Developing an Understanding of Blended Learning

Technology for Teacher Training in Rwanda

From Academic to Industry Education Adviser at Cisco

Developing Jordanian Teachers Through Blended Learning

Blending Can Remove the Technology Dissonance in E-Learning

Chapter Thirty-Two: Blended E-Learning in the Context of International Development

The Information and Communication Technologies Revolution

The Track Record

The Challenge: Bridging the Knowledge Divide

Blended Learning in Developing Country Environments

Trends in Learning Design

The Global Distance Learning Network Experience with Blended Learning

Lessons Learned

Conclusion

Part Seven: Workplace, on-Demand, and Authentic Learning

Chapter Thirty-Three: Putting Blended Learning to Work

Global Perspectives

Putting Blended Learning to Work in Shell EP

Key Issues

Chapter Thirty-Four: Blending Learning and Work

First-Generation Learning Systems

Evolution of Blended Learning

Real-Time Work Flow Learning: Blending Learning and Work

Building a Real-Time Work Flow Learning Architecture

Real-Time Work Flow–Based Learning Example

Benefits of Real-Time Work Flow–Based Learning

Conclusion

Chapter Thirty-Five: On-Demand Learning

The Ever-Changing Global Marketplace

Defining Embedded Learning

Expanding Learning Beyond the Individual

IBM’s E-Coach: The Next Generation of Personalized Learning

Conclusion

Chapter Thirty-Six: Creating Authentic Learning Environments Through Blended Learning Approaches

Authentic Activities in Learning Environments

Authenticity in Learning Environments

Authenticity and Blended Learning

Conclusion

Part Eight: Future Trends in Blended Learning

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Blended Learning in Military Training

Creating Training Requirements

Closing Comments

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Expanding the Boundaries of Blended Learning

Expanding Boundaries of Learning

Applications of Mixed and Virtual Reality to Support Training and Performance

Challenges of Using Mixed Reality for Training

Designing Blended Learning Environments Using Mixed and Virtual Reality

Next Steps and Technological Evolution

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Future Directions of Blended Learning in Higher Education and Workplace Learning Settings

Studies on the Future of Online Teaching and Learning

Future Growth of Blended Learning

Pedagogical Techniques in E-Learning

Emerging Technologies

Future Trends in Blended Learning

Final Reflections

Name Index

Subject Index

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Handbook of blended learning : global perspectives, local designs / editors, Curtis J. Bonk and Charles R. Graham.

p. cm.

ISBN-13: 978-0-7879-7758-0 (alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 0-7879-7758-6 (alk. paper)

1. Education, Higher--Computer-assisted instruction. 2. Education, Higher--Effect of technological innovations on. 3. Internet in higher education. 4. Blended learning. I. Bonk, Curtis Jay. II. Graham, Charles

Ray, 1942-

LB2395.7.H22 2006

378.1'734--dc22

2005014650

Acquiring Editor: Lisa Shannon

Director of Development: Kathleen Dolan Davies

Editor: Bev Miller

Production Editor: Susan Geraghty

Manufacturing Supervisor: Becky Carreño

Editorial Assistant: Jesse Wiley

About This Book

Why is this topic important?

Blended learning environments combine traditional face-to-face instruction with computer-mediated or online instruction. The term blended learning has become a corporate buzzword during the past few years (Lamb, 2001). Recently, the American Society for Training and Development identified blended learning as one of the top ten trends to emerge in the knowledge delivery industry in 2003 (cited by Rooney, 2003). As noted by Barbian (2002), Marc Rosenberg, author of E-Learning: Strategies for Delivering Knowledge in the Digital Age (2001), has argued that “the question is not if we should blend . . . rather the question is what are the ingredients.” Based on our travels the past few years to Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Australia, this perspective seems to be universal. In fact, surveys published in the United Kingdom in Training News (2003, 2004) not only indicate that most companies in the United Kingdom and North America already find blended learning effective; they predict significant increases in the use of blended learning for delivering training as well as associated changes of blended learning evaluation. The reasons for this sudden increase in blended learning include improvements in the rate of learning, as well as the efficiency of training, maximizing corporate investments in reusable training materials, and, of course, attempts to save on training time.

In higher education, the term blended learning is being used with increasing frequency in academic conferences and publications. Issues related to the design and implementation of blended learning environments are surfacing as technological advances continue to blur the lines between distributed learning and traditional campus-based learning. Many universities are beginning to recognize the advantages of blending online and residential instruction. In 2002 the Chronicle of Higher Education quoted the president of Pennsylvania State University as saying that the convergence between online and residential instruction was “the single-greatest unrecognized trend in higher education today” (Young, 2002, p. A33). Along the same lines, the editor of theJournal of Asynchronous Learning Networks has predicted a dramatic increase in the number of hybrid (blended) courses to include as many as 80 to 90 percent of the range of courses (Young, 2002).

What can you achieve with this book?

This book documents global perspectives related to blended learning, including models at the institutional level for designing blended learning environments. Such documentation will help to raise awareness of the issues associated with adopting a blended approach from an institutional perspective. The chapter authors hail from countries around the planet, in particular, countries that have become dependent on online learning environments such as Australia, Korea, Malaysia, the United Kingdom, Canada, and South Africa, thereby adding to the global perspective of this book. At the same time, this book presents cases related to local implementations of blended learning environments. These case studies provide a unique perspective on the strengths and weaknesses inherent in the implementation of certain approaches to blending. Both the contributions to the global perspectives and the local designs raise research issues that will prompt future studies related to the design and use of blended learning environments.

How is this book organized?

This book begins with forewords from Jay Cross and Michael Moore, two respected leaders in the corporate and academic worlds. The body of the book is then organized into eight parts that share a wide variety of cases and perspectives on blended learning.

Part One: Introduction to Blended Learning. The four chapters in this part introduce the concept of blended learning.

Part Two: Corporate Blended Learning Models and Perspectives. The six chapters in this part describe institutional models of blended learning that large global corporations use.

Part Three: Higher Education Blended Learning Models and Perspectives. The five chapters in this part describe models of blended learning for higher educational institutions.

Part Four: For-Profit and Online University Perspectives. The three chapters in this part share the perspectives on blended learning from three high-profile for-profit universities.

Part Five: Cases of Blended Learning in Higher Education from Around the World. The eleven chapters in this part share cases of blended learning in higher education contexts from countries around the world.

Part Six: Multinational Blended Learning Perspectives. The three chapters in this part provide insights into blended learning from individuals with a multinational perspective.

Part Seven: Workplace, On-Demand, and Authentic Learning. The four chapters in this part highlight cases of blended learning that focus on workplace and authentic learning environments.

Part Eight: Future Trends in Blended Learning. The three chapters in this part provide a glimpse into mixed-reality learning environments and the future directions of blended learning systems.

References

Barbian, J. (2002, Summer). Blended works: Here—s proof! Online Learning Magazine, 6(6) 26–30.

Lamb, J. (2001, June 4). “Blended learning” is the new buzz phrase. FT.com.

Rooney, J. E. (2003). Blending learning opportunities to enhance educational programming and meetings. Association Management, 55(5), 26–32.

Rosenberg, M. J. (2001). E-learning: Strategies for delivering knowledge in the digital age. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Training News. (2003). New survey provides insight into blended learning in the UK. Retrieved March 1, 2005, from http://www.trainingreference.co.uk/news/bl031111.htm.

Training News. (2004). Survey predicts transatlantic increase in blended learning. Retrieved March 1, 2005, from http://www.trainingreference.co.uk/news/bl041118.htm.

Young, J. R. (2002, March 22). “Hybrid” teaching seeks to end the divide between traditional and online instruction. Chronicle of Higher Education, p. A33.

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FOREWORDS

One unique feature of this handbook is that it contains two forewords. The foreword by Jay Cross, a thought leader in learning technology, performance improvement, and organizational culture, who coined the terms e-learning and work flow learning, reflects the corporate training aspects of this handbook. The second foreword, by Michael G. Moore, a pioneer in distance education and founder and editor of the American Journal of Distance Education among other accomplishments, is written from a higher education perspective.

Foreword

Jay Cross

When Curt Bonk asked me to contribute a chapter to this book, I flat out refused. As you might guess from the quantity of top-notch authors who appear here, Curt is persistent. He asked me again, and again I turned him down, this time with an explanation.

I told him I considered blended learning a useless concept. To my way of thinking, blending is new only to people who were foolish enough to think that delegating the entire training role to the computer was going to work. I could not imagine unblended learning. My first-grade teacher used a blend of storytelling, song, recitation, reading aloud, flash cards, puppetry, and corporal punishment.

Is it not nutty for a learning strategist to ask, “Why blend?” The more appropriate question is, “Why not blend?” Imagine an episode of This Old House asking, “Why should we use power tools? Hand tools can get the job done.” For both carpenters and learning professionals, the default behavior is using the right tools for the job.

My perspective is corporate, not academic. My bottom line is organizational performance, not individual enlightenment. Not that I am dismissive of research. In nearly thirty years in what we used to call the training business, I have read my share of Dewey, Kolb, Bransford, Gagné, Schank, and John Seely Brown, but as a businessman, I also pay allegiance to Peter Drucker, Stan Davis, and the Harvard Business Review. And I hobnob with least a dozen of the authors whose work you are about to read.

Here are a few issues for you to consider as you ponder this fine collection of observations and advice from learning pioneers around the globe.

What’s a Blend?

First of all, these are not useful blends:

40 percent online, 60 percent classroom

80 percent online, 20 percent face-to-face

80 percent workshop, 20 percent online reinforcement

After reading a few chapters of this book, you will see these for what they are: oversimplifications.

Four or five years ago, it was commonplace to hear, “We’ve tried e-learning. People didn’t like it. It didn’t work very well.” This is akin to saying, “I once read a book. It was difficult to understand. I’m not going to do that again.” The book in your hands describes rich variations and applications of e-learning. After reading it, you’ll find that you can no more generalize about e-learning than you can generalize about books. Consider this description of a blend from Macromedia’s Ellen Wagner (see Chapter Four, this volume):

Evolving blended learning models provide the essential methodological scaffolding needed to effectively combine face-to-face instruction, online instruction, and arrays of content objects and assets of all form factors. For example, in such a blended learning scenario, a student may find him or herself participating in a face-to-face class discussion; he or she may then log in and complete an online mastery exercise or two, then copy some practice exercises to a PDA to take advantage of what David Metcalf calls “stolen moments for learning”—those times between classes or meetings, while on the train, or waiting for an appointment. Think about sending a text message with results of your practice sessions to someone in your virtual study group using your mobile phone—and getting a voice mail with feedback on your results when you arrive at the end of your flight.

People do not know what they like; they like what they know. For example, many assume that face-to-face instruction is the one best way to teach and that online learning is inherently inferior. They seek ways for online initiatives to support the high-grade face-to-face experience. Capella University turns this view on its head, asking what face-to-face support is required to supplement online learning. Having found online learning universally effective, Capella uses face-to-face only to further social goals such as building a support network or creating informal affinity groups. From its perspective, a blend may contain no face-to-face element at all.

Blended learning can take place while waiting in line at the grocery store or taking the bus home. Its ingredients may be courses, content chunks, instant messaging pings, blog feedback, or many other things. Interaction is the glue that holds all these pieces together. Interaction comes in many forms, not just learner and instructor, but also learner-to-content, learner-to-learner, and learner-to-infrastructure. Interaction can create an experience so compelling that it makes workers hungry to learn and drives otherwise sane people to pay four dollars for a cup of coffee at Starbucks.

What Goes into the Blend?

Great recipes are the product of generations of experimentation, tasting, and refinement. E-learning is at the same embryonic stage as American cuisine when home chefs rarely started a sauce without a can of condensed mushroom soup, and garlic was reserved for scaring away vampires.

First-generation e-learning initiated, delivered, and completed online; its consumers lost their appetites. Today’s tastier recipes include organizational skills assessments, books, content objects, workshops, clinics, seminars, simulations, collaboration, technical references, learning games, and links to communities of practice.

At the University of Phoenix, I developed a classroom-based business curriculum in 1976. A dozen years later, an online program debuted. More recently, the university introduced blended programs that combine some classroom and some online. Add more classroom, and the result is the “local model” blend; add more online and the result is the “distance model.” Some blends are like “vibration cooking”: a pinch of this, a handful of that, and however much wine is left in the bottle. C’est bricolage.

IBM’s four-tier model shows how the ingredients of the blend must be matched to the nature of the outcomes sought. Web pages work fine for performance support. Simulations are good for developing understanding. Groups learn from community interaction and live virtual programs. Higher-order skills require coaching, role play, and perhaps face-to-face sessions. Each dish requires its own recipe.

Blends are more than a learning stew, for as the authors here amply demonstrate, blends fall along many dimensions (Figure F.1).

FIGURE F.1. DIMENSIONS OF THE BLENDED LEARNING STEW.

A Blend of Blends

The ideal blend is a blend of blends. Take the last dimension in Figure F.1: formal to informal learning. Studies find that most corporate learning is informal. It’s unscheduled. It’s learning on the job. It’s trial-and-error. It’s asking someone who knows.

If informal learning is so important, dare we leave it to chance? If we seek an optimal result, we cannot. Instead of a single blend that calls for x percent of this and y percent of that, I propose we take the blends of many of the authors here into account. We must replace one-dimensional thinking with simultaneous consideration of dozens of pie charts.

The many cooks of The Handbook of Blended Learning do not spoil the broth. On the contrary, their diversity of opinion and method enriches the book. Editors Curt Bonk and Charles Graham are to be congratulated for preserving the unique flavor contributed by each author.

Mike Wenger and Chuck Ferguson of Sun Microsystems make a strong argument for thinking in terms of a learning ecology instead of a blend of classroom and e-learning. “Classroom” deprives the concept of the rich, multifaceted experiences that take place there (see Chapter Six, this volume). Similarly, “e-learning” covers over the multiple possibilities born of the marriage of the learner and the Internet. There’s simply a lot more to it than that.

School’s Out

Corporations seek self-reliant workers they can trust to do the right thing without supervision. Every manager wants self-starters on her team. Yet when it comes to learning, many workers wait for others to tell them what to do. Why don’t they take matters into their own hands? I think it’s a vestige of schooling.

Several hundred years ago, compulsory schools were set up as a separate reality. Students were seedlings, while schools were the greenhouses to protect them from outside elements. The mission of schools was transmitting values and teaching a body of knowledge. The noise of the real world might taint the righteousness and clarity of the lessons.

Many of us equate learning with schooling. That is why we think of learning as something a person does in isolation and that its ideal delivery takes place in the classroom or the library, cloistered from the outside. Group work is by and large discouraged (it’s called “cheating”). Authorities choose the curriculum. Self-direction is viewed as rebellion.

People credit me with coining the term e-learning. I would never use the word in the executive suite. Why? Because senior managers too equate learning and schooling; they remember school as an inefficient way to learn. They are not willing to pay for it.

What Is Wrong with This Picture?

How many times have you seen a diagram of the learner-centric model that’s supposed to crowd out the instructor-centric model? It usually shows various learning modalities (for example, content, the Web, discussion groups, videoconferencing, live help) arrayed around the worker.

The image is misleading. It implies that the learner is of paramount importance. In the corporation, the work of the group comes before the work of any individual. The learner-centric model retains vestiges of the classroom and its one-to-many oversimplification of how things really work.

There’s an even larger problem: work is not part of the picture at all. Imagine a situation where a worker must respond in real time. Say there’s an important customer asking about an order or something has gone haywire in the automated warehouse. Learning must be filtered through what is happening in the work environment. Otherwise the worker may accept the customer’s order even though there’s nothing in the warehouse to ship.

Blending Work Flow Learning

In the knowledge era, learning is the work. Harvey Singh’s prescient chapter proposes the most important blend of all: the marriage of learning and work (see Chapter Thirty-Four, this volume). He describes self-perpetuating systems of continuous improvement. Smart software applies its awareness of conditions and context to take a hand in concocting the ever-changing blend. Cycle times shrink to the point that all business becomes a real-time activity.

The components of Harvey’s work flow learning blend are:

Portals and Web parts

Internet and mobility

Granular knowledge nuggets

Collaboration

Work flow automation and knowledge linking

Human and automated virtual mentoring

Presence awareness

Simulations

Business process and performance monitoring

Continuous knowledge capture and feedback

Real-time notification, aggregation, and decision support

Integrated learning and enterprise applications

Interoperable, reusable content framework

The End of Blend

So, given the breadth of choices, is it worthwhile to read a book about blended learning? Yes. As Elliott Masie says, “The magic is in the mix.”

Blended is a transitory term. In time it will join programmed instruction and transactional analysis in the dustbin of has-beens. In the meantime, blended is a stepping-stone on the way to the future. It reminds us to look at learning challenges from many directions. It makes computer-only training look ridiculous. It drives us to pick the right tools to get the job done.

Enjoy the book. Don’t just read it. Make it a blended learning experience. Discuss its cases with colleagues. Incorporate it into your plans. Reflect on how to apply its wisdom. Blending will help you learn.

Foreword

Michael G. Moore

Writing in 1886, William Rainey Harper (1886), the first president of the University of Chicago, declared: “The correspondence system would not, if it could, supplant oral instruction, or be regarded as its substitute. There is a field for each which the other cannot fill. Let each do its proper work.” Always effusive in his enthusiasm for using printed text as a teaching medium, Harper went on to assert that “the student who has prepared a certain number of lessons in the correspondence school knows more of the subject treated in those lessons, and knows it better, than the student who has covered the same ground in the classroom” (Harper, 1971, p. 12).

The truth of this second of Harper’s insights, that the quality of learning in a well-designed distance education program is often superior to that of the classroom, is now becoming more widely appreciated by a growing proportion of the population. What of the other assertion? Could correspondence, in its modern, online version, “supplant oral instruction”? Harper would not dare say so, but given the numerous research studies that show the effectiveness of distance learning, in an age when we have become accustomed to book our travel, mortgage our homes, and obtain our medicines online, it does not seem so unreasonable to consider the proposition that some educational programs, or at least components of such programs, might be accessed that way and be removed from the classroom in the interest of both the quality of learning as well as cost-effectiveness of teaching.

At last, it seems that the assumed superiority of classroom teaching, above all alternatives, a dogma that has been so pervasive for so long throughout academia, is beginning to give way to a more nuanced understanding of the suitability of nonclassroom environments for formal study and the desirability of adding new forms of communications to enhance, and yes, sometimes to supplant, the professorial lecture. The emerging view is of a mutually respectful relationship between teaching at a distance and teaching in the classroom, and the idea that “each can do its proper work” is now encapsulated in the concept of blended learning. Like distance education itself, under whatever name one prefers to call it, blended learning is a long-neglected idea whose time has arrived. Importantly, growing numbers of educators and influential policymakers are discovering not only the advantages but also the lack of threat in combining the advantages of teaching and learning in the two different environments: classroom and home or workplace.

It is by no means a new idea, however. You may be intrigued, as I was, to discover that blending classroom and mediated delivery of instruction at the high school level can be traced as far back as the 1920s, when it was known as “supervised correspondence study.” Started by an innovative school principal in Benton Harbour, Michigan, it was promoted by educators at the University of Nebraska to the extent that by 1930, it was a method used in more than a hundred public high schools across the nation and in 1932 was the subject of a national conference held in Cleveland Ohio.

In more recent history, as noted by authors in this handbook, blended learning was introduced in 1969 as a basic component of the teaching system of the world’s principal distance teaching institution, the United Kingdom’s Open University. When I was a tutor at the OU, I had the dual responsibility of providing instruction by correspondence to a cadre of distance learners based on their study of prescribed texts and video programs. At the same time, I had the responsibility of traveling to study centers and summer schools to meet these students in classrooms, to advise, discuss, and in other ways supplement the teaching materials designed by colleagues at the Open University’s central campus.

There is often misunderstanding among academics who have not had this kind of experience, voiced in their expression of concern that it might be demeaning or diminishing of one’s expertise to be a mere “facilitator” of learning content that has been chosen and organized by another person—or in the case of the Open University, by a team of other persons. In reality, in my experience and that of most others with whom I have discussed this, there is an enormous sense of freedom provided by the relief of not having to “cover” basic information or design the course structure, but instead being able to concentrate on interaction with individual students and engage in a creative interpretation with each individual or group, of the issues and subtleties lying within and beyond the previously determined content and instructional design. Essentially, blending the expertise of content and instructional design specialists with the facilitator’s skill at inducing knowledge creation is simply an application of the sensible principle of division of labor that is common to all professions. Perhaps more important, for the purposes of this book, it is one of the explanations why teaching and learning is so good in high-quality distance education institutions like the Open University and its analogues around the world.

At this point, I would like to insert a plea that readers, being interested in blended learning, should be sure to consolidate their understanding of its manifestation in the distance education context. Certainly one can, and should, study the concept from the point of view of the classroom teacher and the pedagogical theories underlying classroom practice. However, blending face-to-face teaching with those forms of teaching in which the principal delivery technology is not the classroom, but is a mechanical or electronic technology, that is, distance education, is so important that blended learning will not be fully understood if one’s perspective is only that of the classroom teacher and does not include knowledge of research and practice in the distance education field. From my perspective, we have to rise above the limitations of American experience since in the United States, distance education has rarely included face-to-face tutorials. That is not universally the case however, as a single reading about study centers in, for example, the Indira Ghandi National Open University, would soon prove.

When I reflect on my own Open University tutoring experience and try to explain such views of distance education to American students or when I am a consultant and try to explain to a client the advantages of letting go of certain teaching responsibilities and outsourcing them to external specialists, the following is one of the ways I explain it. Begin by recognizing that each form of every communication medium and technology has distinctive qualities and also that students respond to these in different ways. It follows that a composite of two or more applications of these media or technologies is therefore likely to disseminate a message better than is possible by any one alone. In addition, it is important to provide more than one opportunity of satisfying each student’s style of learning. (A medium is the form in which a message is communicated, for example, a still image; the technology is the vehicle that transports the medium, as, for example, a television, computer screen, or photo album.) Furthermore, recognize that technologies vary in cost of installation and maintenance, and media vary in cost of production and dissemination. It follows that responsible educational administrators and program designers have to face the difficult decision about which are the most cost-effective combinations of these media and technologies for their particular teaching purposes, and the decision taken in one case cannot be assumed to apply with equal validity in others.

In this argument, together with the technologies that deliver teaching materials by recorded and interactive audio, video, and text media, the teacher in a face-to-face classroom can be regarded as a communications technology, albeit an expensive one. The administrator’s and designer’s challenge is to know when to use this costly classroom technology and when to substitute an equally effective and less costly alternative. In higher education, this is a challenge that has more often than not been avoided, with administrators and faculty frequently failing to select media and technology for good pedagogical reasons. In turn, correspondence, broadcasting, teleconferencing, and the Internet all have been employed for reasons other than because they had proven to be the most suitable form of communication for particular content, teaching process, or student characteristics. And so has the teacher-in-the-classroom.

The classroom is an ideal technology for achieving some learning outcomes, but for others it can be disastrously unsuitable. With the potential offered by alternative technologies to provide control of pace, redundancy in practice, multiple testing, access to alternative media, and a vast virtual library, I venture to suggest that there are many ways to provide a superior environment for all learning objectives that do not require spontaneous, person-to-person interaction. However, even readers who consider that view to be overly enthusiastic will concede that getting the right mixture of media and technologies that includes the right use of the classroom teacher in a well-designed integrated multimedia program is the most promising approach to obtaining both a high-quality learning experience, and, at the same time, the best return for dollars invested in the educational enterprise.

This Handbook of Blended Learning is strong evidence of the growing acceptance of this simple concept and strategy that advocates mixing the technologies of distance education and the classroom. It is also a unique source of information, stimulation, and encouragement for those who have not yet fully understood or accepted the importance of this concept.

It is not for me to introduce the authors and their themes. This has been ably done by the editors. However, I will venture to make just two short, general comments. First, with regard to the themes represented by the chapters in this book, I suggest that whereas the approach taken by many authors is to describe the effects and potential benefits of blending newer forms of computer-based technology with classroom teaching, beyond these immediate and local benefits are major policy issues—indeed, political issues—of great significance, whether considered at the institutional, national, or indeed global level.

In this brief foreword, I am not able to expand on, among other vital elements, the component movement toward creation and application of learning objects, but I want to at least underscore its importance. If one accepts the rationale for these developments and the underlying movement toward blended learning, one is, in fact, aligning with what I believe is an inexorable trend toward fundamental change not only in ancient concepts about teaching, learning, and the place of the academy in society, but in how society allocates the resources it invests in education—particularly, the relative apportionment of resources between people and hardware. Far more than the mere application of new hardware in the classroom, the ideas and practices represented by authors in this book lead, at the minimum, to questions about what roles of teachers are worth paying for in the information age, what should be their relationship to students in an increasingly consumerist culture, what their rights and responsibility for ownership of content are, and what training, monitoring, and control will become the norm when teaching takes place in a blended system as compared with the privacy and monopoly of control that characterized the classroom of the past.

Beyond such changes in thinking about teaching, what is represented by this handbook is the expansion of a slowly growing political movement that anticipates strategic changes in how national and institutional resources are allocated for the educational enterprise and how they are managed. Questions are raised about public and private ownership of educational institutions and the changing responsibility and power of local administrators and managers in emerging large-scale systems. One of the core issues can be summarized as follows: given that certain teaching functions can be equally effective when provided through technologies outside the classroom, as the pressure for more cost-effective undergraduate education and also for adult lifelong learning continues to have an impact on the demand for the services of colleges and universities to be delivered in blended forms, institutional survival will depend on moving financial resources from a large labor pool of full-time faculty resident on campus to a greater proportion of the teaching load carried by communications technologies supported by part-time instructors.

In a competitive market, dominance will be achieved by those institutions that offer superior-quality products and services, and this requires higher dollar investment in a wide range of mediated programs as well as superior student support services. Within emerging, blended delivery systems, both campus-based (and extramural) faculty will find employment and satisfaction, not as the Jacks-and-Jills-of-all-trades, but in a variety of new specializations. Both the financial and technical resources as well as these changing human resources must be orchestrated by managers responding to pressures and opportunities that are quite different from those of the undergraduate residential subject-oriented university of the past. Increasingly specialization will characterize higher education institutions also, as each finds its comparative advantage, that is, what it can do better than others, and then offers its more narrowly chosen curriculum to a global constituency in an effort to recapture high investment costs.

I am tempted to refer for illustration to institutions and interinstitutional arrangements represented in this book, as well as to suprainstitutional arrangements (which I believe is the strategy that will press particularly hard on established institutions). However, resisting that temptation, I ask only that readers reflect on my suggestion that the contents of these chapters reflect a gathering movement with enormous policy implications as they go forward.

Finally, it has given me great personal satisfaction to discover so many old friends and distinguished colleagues among the chapter authors of this handbook, including Ellen Wagner, Alan Chute, Insung Jung, Randy Garrison, and Bob Wisher, to mention those who (as well as editor Curt Bonk) contributed to my own Handbook of Distance Education (Moore & Anderson, 2003). Perhaps even more pleasing when I first read the Handbook of Blended Learning was being introduced to a rich constellation of emerging leaders, new voices who are coming to address some of the same issues that have occupied distance educators, but from a fresh and powerful new perspective. That the editors have obtained contributions from such authors in so many different countries is especially impressive.

It may be argued that the United States retains its leading place in inventing and developing many of the computer-based communications technologies that underpin most of the developments talked about in this book. Still, there should be little doubt that it is to nations such as South Africa, South Korea, Mexico, and Malaysia, to mention only some of those that I have some personal knowledge of, that we should look to for ideas about resource allocation and examples of related national policies that could be of value to the United States as well as other nations. One need look no further than the use of study centers in the world’s open universities referred to earlier, where millions of students have learned to study in a blended mode. I assume, of course, that policymakers and leaders of educational institutions will, before too many more years go by, be willing to hear and understand what is being reported, both domestically and internationally.

The Handbook of Blended Learning should prove to be a splendid contribution to this improved understanding. I commend it to readers, and I compliment the editors on their initiative in conceiving it as well as their fortitude in producing it.

References

Harper, W. R. (1886). The system of correspondence. In J. H. Vincent (Ed.), Chautauqua movement (pp. 183–193). Boston: Chautauqua Press.

Harper, W. R. (1971). The system of correspondence. In O. Mackenzie (Ed.), The changing world of correspondence stud. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.

Moore, M. G. (2002). The Benton Harbour plan. American Journal of Distance Education, 16(4), 201–204

Moore, M. G., & Anderson, W. (2003).Handbook of distance education. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Jay Cross is CEO of Internet Time Group and founder of the Workflow Institute. A thought leader in learning technology, performance improvement, and organizational culture, he coined the terms e-learning and work flow learning. He is CEO of the eighteen-hundred-member Emergent Learning Forum. He is the author of Implementing eLearning, writes the “Effectiveness” column for Chief Learning Officer magazine, and is writing a book on informal learning.

Michael G. Moore published the first statement of theory about distance education in 1972 and has achieved a number of other “firsts” in this field. While teaching the first course about distance education at University of Wisconsin-Madison, he helped plan the annual Wisconsin Distance Teaching and Learning Conference there. Moving to Penn State in 1986, where he is now professor of education, he founded the American Center for Study of Distance.

I thank all the wonderful people I have met in blended learning environments and positions around the world who have opened my eyes to many exciting and significant global perspectives with their local designs.

Curt Bonk

To family and friends and particularly to my wife, Dawn.

Charles Graham

PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Curtis J. Bonk, Charles R. Graham

Institutions of higher education as well as corporate and nonprofit training settings are increasingly embracing online education, especially blended learning (Allen & Seaman, 2003; Bonk, 2004). It is clear from the chapters in this handbook that the number of learners enrolled in distance programs are rapidly rising not only in colleges and universities within the United States (National Center for Education Statistics, 2003), but in higher education and corporate training settings around the globe. Given this enrollment explosion, many states, countries, organizations, and institutions are working on strategic plans for implementing online education (see, for example, NGA Center for Best Practices, 2001).