Delivery

The key to an effective eLearning program lies in finding the right mix of delivery modes for your particular program. With the invention of the personal computer and the advent of Web browsers, great advances have been made in the field of eLearning technology.

Two broad forms of eLearning delivery currently exist: asynchronous (or ’self-paced’) and synchronous (or ‘live’). Live eLearning is currently the less well-known educational environment of the two. Despite its less widespread usage, however, live eLearning can often be deployed more rapidly and at a lower cost. That’s where a custom eLearning management system like Excelearn can save an organization time and money.

Both eLearning formats are delivered to the user’s Web browser, both can be launched and tracked by an LMS, and both can make use of the functionality provided by an LCMS. The only major differences between them are the way eLearners use the accompanying courseware and the type of instructor support being given.

The advantage of synchronous eLearning is that it can be pursued at the student’s own pace. In that regard, it provides a great amount of learning flexibility. On the other hand, asynchronous eLearning’s limitation is that motivation can drop off and hinder the educational effectiveness.

Synchronous eLearning, also known as virtual classroom, requires that all students log on at a pre-set time for sessions of fixed length. Synchronous eLearners interact with facilitators and other learners in real time through both voice- and browser-based interaction. One of the advantages of synchronous eLearning is that it leverages the human resource knowledge of trainers and experts across geographical boundaries.

The various delivery modes for an eLearning course include:

Floppy Disks
During the 1980’s and the early 1990’s, training programs were largely delivered on floppy diskettes. A 3.5-inch floppy disk holds 1.44 megabytes of information, the equivalent of 700 pages of straight text. Given the large size of audio and video files necessary to make today’s eLearning effective, this storage amount is quite small. Therefore, training material delivered via floppy disk is usually text-based, with some limited graphics.

CD-I
Compact Disc Interactive is a multimedia system that was developed in the late 1980’s. This type of storage device was designed to be used at home, in schools, and in businesses. Like a video cassette, CD-I disks can be played back on any TV and can hold text, computer animation, digital audio, and video.

This media storage format was very popular in the early days of eLearning because it was easier and cheaper to implement than a complete multimedia CD-ROM-equipped computer system. A major limitation, however, was that no hard drive or floppy disk system came attached to the CD-I. This created a very big problem since eLearning data, such as student test scores, could not be saved. This limitation was the major cause leading to the decline of CD-Is.

CD-ROM
Compact Disc– Read Only Memory is a system for delivering multimedia to a personal computer. Reading of this type of media storage device requires a CD-ROM drive.

A CD-ROM has a storage capacity of 650 megabytes, meaning that one CD-ROM can hold as much as 450 floppy disks. This enormous storage capability advantage has made CD-ROMs an easy and inexpensive way to distribute large programs, including audio, video, and complex animations, to eLearners. Since the mid-1990’s, eLearning has been chiefly delivered via CD-ROM.

DVD-ROM:
Digital Video Disc – Read Only Memory is larger variation on the CD-ROM. It is the new standard being implemented into current eLearning programs. A DVD-ROM can hold 4.7 gigabytes of information, the equivalent of more than 2 hours of full-screen digital video. As a result of their huge storage capacity, DVD-ROMs are rapidly replacing CD-ROM technology. New computers equipped with DVD drives are also compatible with the older CD-ROM technology, making the purchase of such drives a sound technological investment.

Internet/Intranet:
Most organizations prefer not to deliver their private training programs through the Internet, which is open to the public. Instead, they like to host eLearning Web pages on their private internal networks, called intranets. Intranets are smaller, private networks that work on the same TCP/IP technology as the Internet. A Web browser provides the interface necessary for both Internet and intranet education. Therefore, the term “Web-based training” is more prevalent today, regardless of the network employed to transmit it.

Mobile Technology:
In the past few years, wireless mobile devices (e.g., cell phones and personal digital assistants) have become reasonably popular in the business environment. An emerging interest currently exists in developing eLearning applications for these devices. Such technology is referred to as
‘m-learning,’ the success of which still remains to be seen.

A successful live eLearning program should incorporate the following features into its delivery mode:
• Whiteboard - a virtual blackboard
• PowerPoint slides
• Voice-over Internet
• Net surfing
• Video - streaming and prerecorded
• Chat application
• Virtual break-out rooms
• Polls & quizzes
• Assessment tests (results fed back)
• Session record and playback

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