Introduction

The Internet is becoming one of the most important tools in the educator's or trainer's toolbox. Internet-based education and training have been experimented within many countries. Already, materials and courses, ranging from a simple syllabus to highly structured courses developed by instructional design experts, are available. Some courses are free, while others require a high fee. Some courses are well designed, and while other are not. Some online courses are offered as an extension to conventional courses, and others are created just for the Internet environment. There are also few dedicated institutions that only provide Internet-based courses.

Internet-based education is a form of distance education in which the course contents are delivered and the interactions are provided by the technologies and methodologies of the Internet. It is known as a media-rich, online environment that allows people to interact with others asynchronously or synchronously in collaborative environments; to gain access to remote multimedia databases for active, resource-based learning; and to manage self-paced, individual learning in a flexible way. Moreover, the independent time and distance of the Internet allows learners to enroll in a course from anywhere in the world at any time.

There have been studies that examine features of the Internet and the Web and apply them in designing Internet- or Web-based instruction. Most of these studies have focused on the effective design of Internet-based education using the various technical features of this technology. The pedagogical features of Internet-based education have been also discussed, and effects of the Internet on learning, participation, and attitude have been investigated in several studies. In addition, there have been a few papers that report on the cost-effectiveness of the Internet-based education.

On this site you will find an annotated bibliography of the articles on Internet-based education and training, published between 1997 and 1999 in refereed international journals, peer-reviewed online journals, and popular magazines in the fields of distance education and educational technology. The articles are organized in themes delineated from an existing distance education theory called the "transactional distance theory".

The transactional distance theory describes the pedagogical relationships existing in distance education environments "that have the special characteristic of separation of one from another, and a consequent set of special teaching and learning behaviors" (Moore 1972,1991, 2). According to this theory, there are three key constituent elements of distance education: dialogue, structure, and learner autonomy. "Dialogue" refers to the extent to which teachers and learners can interact with each other, and "structure" refers to the "responsiveness" of an educational program to learners (Moore 1972,1993). Learner autonomy is the extent to which learners make "decisions regarding their own learning" and "construct their own knowledge based on their own experience" (Moore and Kearsley 1996, 204&endash205).

Transactional distance theory, which first appeared in 1972, has been articulated as changes in the external conditions of distance education, such as delivery technologies, occur. Several studies have been conducted to explicitly investigate the conceptual framework of the theory across different technologies, such as audioconferencing, videoconferencing, interactive television, and computer networks.

Reviewing these studies shows that transactional distance theory provides a useful conceptual framework with which to define and understand distance education in general.

Thus, the conceptual framework of the transactional distance theory has been applied in reviewing and categorizing papers about Internet-based education for presentation on this site. Some other concepts, such as evaluation and general discussion, are also added as categories. If a paper discusses several themes but mainly focuses on structure, dialogue, or learner autonomy or collaboration, then it is placed in "Articles on Structural Features", "Articles on Dialogue", or "Articles on Learner Autonomy or Collaboration", respectively. If a paper presents methods of evaluating Internet-based education, it is located under the subhead " Articles on Evaluation." If a paper discusses development and implementation issues in general without putting particular emphasis on either structure, dialogue, or learner autonomy and collaboration, then it is under " Articles on General Issues."

This site is organized in three parts. Part A provides an annotated bibliography of the articles published in six major journals of distance education and educational technology between 1997 and 1999. Part B presents an annotated bibliography of the papers published in five online journals. Article reviews from two popular magazines are provided in part C.

TOP OF PAGE

Author

Dr. Insung Jung