Category: E-Learning

Some learning envirnoments can be great fun.  Others are deathly boring.  I can remember one or two subject at school that were exactly the same – maths, sadly was not a barrel of laughs for me.  I struggled constantly.  Whether it was the delivery, or the fact I couldn’t keep up, I don’t know, but I was constantly petrified of not being able to do the mental arithmetic.  I could not manage those ‘problems’.  I think if the teacher had taken me aside and explained one to one, how each element worked, I would have quickly grasped the rest of it.  My daughter had a similar story – she hated maths.  When she wanted to take the QT tests for teacher training she panicked.  Until a neighbour showed her the fantastic government online tutoring to help candidates overcome these blocks.  Once she’d done a handful of the tests, there was no stopping her.

There is absolutely no doubt that until this academic year, there had been a quite efinite difference in the educational examination attainment of boys to the girls coming out of most state provided schools.  This is generally in the areas of reading and English language skills, humanities and even the sciences.  This rather worrying scenario has in fact started to change – possibly with the additional effort being put in at the sharp end – in the way schools attract and deliver the message to boys throughout their upper school years.  When you look at the broader schemes offered in the private, fee paying sector, there is no difference in pupil attainment.  Today all students who stuggle at any stage  can be helped with online education back up – schools have this facility and can make parts available to classes.  The benefit of learning in a quiet environent without peer pressure is immeasurable.

Many moons ago when I was a nipper, I had the delight of taking typing lessons.  I was lucky to be able to ‘do’ commercial and secretarial courses at school – but we didn’t have E-education or online learning to speed the learning along.   We had two excellent shorthand and typing teachers and each had their own unique wat of getting us to touch type without cheating and looking at the keys and without resorting to the nasty typing erasers.  Once we had shown some proficiency in the home keys: A,S,D,F,G,F. :,L,K,J.H.J , we were able to speed along to the lower line and then the top row.  How I remember the fits of giggles when we really got up a head of steam and starting typing to music.  Rossinni’s William Tell Overture.  Many years alter I joined another typing class of sorts – but a distincly online version – European computer driving licence, with all the ms packages.  Great fun.

Oh how I remember when offices didn’t have computers – let alone lap tops, palm pdas etc. etc. and the first mobile phone in the building was such a massive great thing – it was pretty hilarious to look at.  When our managers did at last decide that enough was enough, we’d fallen behind quite quickly and thus it was high time we took the bull by the horns and got online – big time!  So the very long winded business of building online operational systems with accounts, orders in, stock movements, delivery notes and invoices out etc. etc. All that took a couple of years to develop, with the help from the international community within the administrative group.  There were no such things as e-learning, online education or VLE software.  We were lucky to be given a mouse and mat with instructions to play Solitaire to get us used to pointing at the screen!

I have been watching many old documentaries on catch up tv on my ipad.  This is a constant pleasure and all the more because I never know what’s going to pop up on screen at any one time.  There is one series based around London, made between 1965 and 1991.  Just odd sequences of black and white film showing all kinds of London areas.  Covent Garden fruit market costa mongers, then it might jump to Borough Market or Petticoat Lane market.  These social history documentaries are a truly inspiration lesson to all generations – take pictures, videos and keep records of how we live now.   Learning how to read the history behind the lens is vital for all kinds of subjects.  When you take up a software training package, knowing how to read properly what you see in front of you is not something we always appreciate at the time.  Learning to learn is the key.

We are hearing all the time about the changes in secondary age education in the uk.  There have been many changes  with local education authorities being swept away with their school responsibilities replaced by government funded academies and free schools.   Teaching schemes and new style methods of learning were intended to free up the beaurocracies that stifled so much of the education system – apparently preventing the free thinking and learning that is needed.  What is more of a problem is the very limited curiculum that only teaches children to complete exams to a very high level, but completely misses out everything that isn’t on this very rigid proscriptive method.  For a youngster to get a fully rounded education in all subjects and to enter university fully equipped for a career focused degree course, they can help themselves with online courses and more robust teaching of the missing elements.

I always find it quite a challenge to learn a new skill or task without having it demonstrated clearly, preferably by another human being, or very often these days, on video.  Some folk find learning and all educational schemes in book form to be perfectly easy to follow and enjoy – the more academic amongst us I feel.  I’m not sure if my seriously left handed bias, causing a lifelong lack of co-ordination and balance could have something to do with a constant struggle to get the gist when trying to read instructions and carry out the required or desired activity.  For me then, the advent of e-learning and other means of online educational facilities would have been an absolute boon when I was at school – it’s too late for me to take any of the fantastic choice of career focused online courses but for younger colleagues – life is for grabbing and e-education gets you there quicker.

I’ve been happily taking interest in my neighbour’s son who seems to be a complete whizz-kid where computer games is concerned.  He knows all the titles – of the ones appropriate for his age group, of course.  He was born into the computer world – nothing seems odd or diffiuclt for him to attempt.  In fact, he is absolutely fearless and will have a go at any game scenario etc.  This is very good because it opens his eyes to all kinds of opportunities of learning in other ways.  He is definitely not one for hours of copying out lesson plans, comprehensive ‘work schedules’ for each subject.  He can literally log on, look at the game and know instinctively how to operate those hand gizmos and get stuck into the game without a seconds thought.   To help him achieve greater academic stability, his parents have invested in several online tutoring courses so he is comfortable with all aspects of the national testing programme for his age group.

When you get to a certain age, there is a tendency to panic at the thought of anything more challenging than learning to play scrabble or sudoko it seems.  I go to healthy walking group regularly and the rest of our group is mixed but mostly over 60s – it being a weekday.  I have made it a point to engage lots of the walkers in general conversation regarding their past careers, and what made them do this and that.  They don’t seem to mind.  I am fascinated by how each person has reached any particular pinnacle of success and how they did so.  What is obvious is so many miss the discipline of going to work and the training courses they may have attended in latter years.   Many of my pals have taken up a real variety of training opportunities with U3A for example – and the world is very much their oyster.