DISTANCE EDUCATION IN ICELAND
WHERE WE ARE TODAY AND WHERE DO WE WANT TO BE?
Ebba Thora Hvannberg (ebba@hi.is)
University of Iceland, Hjardarhaga 2-6, 107 Reykjavik, Iceland Rognvaldur Olafsson (rol@hi.is)
University of Iceland, Dunhaga 5, 107 Reykjavik, Iceland Sigrun Gunnarsdottir(sigrung@simi.is)
Iceland Telecom, v/Austurvoll, 150 Reykjavik, Iceland
Many universities are now faced with the challenge of adding more technology to their teaching. Although distance education has been carried out for many years, the advent of the web, video conferencing, video-on-demand and improved telecommunications create more possibilities. In this paper we describe several modes of distance education, media used and possible platforms. We are carrying out a trial that uses video-conferencing over an ATM network. The trial is categorised in order to focus the different trials and experiments that will be done in the coming quarters.
KEYWORDS: INTERACTIVE TECHNOLO GY, DISTANCE LEARNING, NOMADIC, ATM, ISABEL
INTRODUCTION
This paper gives an overview of distance educationin Iceland, describes the present status and where we want to go. We will discuss why Iceland is so interested in distance education, the different type of media that can be employed for distance education, and look at the variables that have to be taken into account when incorporating distance education into the traditional university setting. We describe a pilot project that two universities and Iceland Telecom are running and how the project fulfils the aims we set for technologically assisted education. The solution selected in Iceland is to introduce technology assisted education to the present schools and universities. In this way we attempt to make the education equally available to students on campus, throughout the country or in other countries.
We begin the paper by stating the educational aims and then describe the landscape in Iceland in terms of culture, education and telecommunication. After we have set the stage we also describe the ATM trial that is a basis for our work. In this trial a course in Graphical User Interface programming (GUI) is transmitted in video-conferencing between two cities. In the following sections we use this trial as a reference when describing the learning modes, media and communication platforms. In conclusion we describe how our university can adapt to the new technologies and set the scene for future work.
THE EDUCATIONAL AIMS
“Nomadicity is defined as the systems support needed to provide a rich set of computing and communication capabilities and services to nomads as they move from place to place in a transparent, integrated and convenient form” [8].
Leonard Kleinrock
In the domain of teaching this can be translated into nomadic learning:
??Seamless, that is the technology is transparent to both the teacher and the student and there is a coherent interface to everything they are doing.
??Mobile, that is the teacher and the student can be anywhere.
??Integrated, that is the teacher can use different kinds of media in an integrated way to reach his goals. ??Interactive, that is the student and the teacher is in control and reach the objective of being close. A teacher is to encourage students to explore, raise interest in the subject at hand, and encourage them to look for further references, and learning by communicating amongst himself or herself and with the teacher. We want to teach students skills that they can use when they graduate. These are some of the aims that we set when selecting which new technology to use.
In traditional education we have several means to reach these goals. In distance education we need the same attitude, we have to use a number of technologies and methods that together add up to give a complete education. Too often distance education is thought of as one technology and one teaching method. This leads to unfruitful discussions.
REQUIREMENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES IN ICELAND
Iceland is fairly large but sparsely and unevenly populated. The total population is 275 thousand. Three-quarters of the population live in the only large population centre in and around the capital Reykjavik in the southwest corner of the country. Reykjavik has a
population of about 110 thousand but the larger Reykjavik area nearly 170 thousand. A small population centre is Akureyri in the north of the country with about 15 thousand inhabitants. The rest of the population is fairly evenly spread over the country in small fishing villages and farms.
About 72% of the population live within about one hour’s drive from Reykjavik and about 9% within a similar distance from Akureyri. The rest of the population is spread over a square area of 103 thousand square-kilometres, which is more than the size of Denmark and Holland together or about the same as Cuba.
The Icelanders speak Icelandic, a Germanic language and the education system basically uses Icelandic although English textbooks are used at university level. A small population that is running a modern technical society needs all its human resources and can not afford to have an
under educated population. The new communications technologies provide a method for getting the education to the remote villages. With such a small market and a local language it is expensive to develop educational material.
Each junior high school graduating class is about 4000 students and at the present time a little over half of these students go to university. There are some seven teaching institutions at university level in Iceland, the largest ones are University of Iceland, University at Akureyri and the Teaching university.
Telecommunication is fairly advanced in Iceland. Iceland Telcom is the main provider of telecommunication service in Iceland and has a broad portfolio of services for the Icelandic market. All households in Iceland are connected with twisted pair copper wire and every home has also the option to get ISDN. The services offered for data communication are: connection to the public switched data service over an X.25 packet switched network (64 kb/s), connection to the high-speed network (hahradanet) (2 Mb/s) and a connection to the broadband service. These services are offered to most parts of the island and a first part of an ATM network has been taken into use. The firm also operates an ISDN bridge called “Byggdabruin” that is mostly used for distance education but also administrative meetings.
Icelanders are technologically minded and are heavy users of new computer technology and communication services. About 37% of the population have access to the Internet in their homes in addition to the access they have at work and school.
Educational networks are being established around the country. Partners in the networks are educational establishments, local authorities and industry. The networks depend on local schools, which co-operate with the universities and colleges to provide university level courses. In this way new educational structures are being formed. Technically the networks depend on videoconferencing via ISDN and, to a lesser degree, on the Web.
DISTANCE LEARNING EXAMPLES AND TRIALS
There are several ongoing trial in distance learning in Iceland. They use different medium to deliver the learning material and in the process of communication with the students. Some of the experiments are at school level but most are at university level. In a separate report we discuss the experiments being done on the university level only, although there are interesting experiments being made at school level as for example the so called “IT Experimental
schools” where the Ministry of Education is supporting various experiments in the use of information technology.
In the spring semester of 1999 we offered the GUI course to around 70 students at the
University of Iceland, located in Reykjavik and 12 students at the University at Akureyri which is located in the north of Iceland.
The current offering is carried over an ATM network with video conferencing software called ISABEL [1] that has been developed in Spain within telecommunication projects supported by the European Commission. It has been widely tested and used for video conferencing of up to 20 sites. The latest one is Global360, which was broadcasted from IST’98 to sites connected in a network all around the world. ISABEL has recently been ported to the Linux operating system and in our configuration it runs on Linux. The ATM access network is fibre to the home and there is thus one ATM switch at each end.
ISABEL is especially designed to handle multiple points but not many of the current tools can handle this. For example NetMeeting and ProShare only handle one single point-to-point conference. Several manufacturers will be offering an MCU or a multipoint control unit.
The course that we use in the trial is a first year course that covers the basic steps of analysis and design of client-server systems including GUI design and database design and the architecture of such a system. The students have one book and a web site where homework and projects are announced on a weekly basis. On the web site there is also a course plan, contact to the teachers and slides that the teacher uses in a class. During the class the teacher can project the slides that are stored on a computer onto a large screen.
MODES OF DISTANCE LEARNING
There are many factors that affect all types of learning, and they are also present in distance learning. In this section we will review some of the choices available in distance learning and take a careful look at how we could improve our GUI trial. Table 1 shows the categorisation of the trial according to several modes of distance learning.
Category GUI trial Room for improvement
Learning alone vs. Co-operative learning
Co-operative learning through team projects – not technology assisted
Addition of user groups or discussion tools
Fixed paced vs. variable paced
Fixed paced Retrieve on demand
Mastery vs. Non-mastery Non-mastery Highly interactive material Amount of interaction Little interaction except in problem
sessions that are local
Self-assessment modules Quality of interaction Quality of audio is excellent but there is
room for improvement for video
MPEG-2 in parallel with JPEG stills
Table 1 Categorization according to modes in distance education
The only co-operation between students in our GUI trial is through project work with no technology assistance. We recognise that peer learning is a very valuable learning method and we want to put more emphasis on assisting students to work together in a group instead of working alone in their home. By adding user groups and discussion tools to the course web site the students will be able to discuss the material covered in class and the teacher can join in and give some comments.
Another option to consider is that the course we offer is fixed paced. The student has to be in a certain place at a certain time to be able to attend the lecture. The literature shows that not all students learn at the same rate, so other possibilities should be considered. By taping the lectures and offering the students to watch the lectures as often as he/she would like, would make the course more flexible. The question is, would anyone show up for class and what about the interaction? This needs further investigation.
This brings us to one of the most important issues to consider when delivering distanc e learning material, the quality of interaction amongst the students and with the teacher. Lecturing is a widely used form in the educational setting today, but it is not interactive. When forming a new approach to learning with distance education we should maybe step back and consider how we can use the technology to enhance learning instead of trying to use the technology to deliver learning like we do it today.
Our university uses the grading system to classify students. Since our goal as educators is to educate the student, we could introduce a learning method called mastery learning. This method gives the student the opportunity to retake a test (different tests) unt il he has mastered the material. Mastery can be defined as 80%-100 % correctness on a test, depending on the teacher. This method is of course very difficult to offer if you have class of 90 and no technical support. By introducing highly interactive learning material as a part of the course
we can force the students to learn some of the material to mastery. This would be interesting to test and evaluate.
INTERACTIVE TECHNOLOGY LEARNING
It is our strong belief that introducing highly interactive multimedia technology as a part of a course offers the best possibilities for the future of distance learning. The system should include a conferencing system, a web site carrying useful information to use within the course, and access to discussion tools. The computer is the primary delivery system, but the interaction process can be implemented with several different methods as is categorised in Table 2.
Method for interaction
Media Advantage Disadvantage Room for improvement Teachers as the interactive partner E-mail, Usenet, Chat,Conferencing system Quality teaching
Time consuming Better conferencing systems. Better video Highly interactive material as the interactive partner Computer Interactive software Reusability. Teacher is an advisor. Development time is long Broadcasting video Co-operative learning amongst students E-mail, Usenet, Chat,Conferencing system
Inexpensive May not get enough supervision
Better conferencing systems Table 2 Type of modes to provide interaction
We can provide interaction in three different ways: the teacher interacts with the students; we can have highly interactive instructional software designed to tackle some parts of the course; and finally there is interaction between students. It is necessary to try to encourage this interaction. We also know that not all the material is suitable for interaction with the students, so some courses will use only little or non- interactive methods as is categorised in Table 3. Methods Who
controls
Media Advantage/Disadvantage Room for improvement Point to point Either the teacher or student. Desktop conferencing
Good interaction, one teacher one student /Too expensive
Not a possible solution in a big university Point to multi point (broadcast) The teacher Desktop conferencing system
Little or no interaction during the lecture/ Increased interaction in teaching Multi-point to multi-point The teacher Conferencing system or Desktop
/Little interaction during the lecture Improvement in educational technology, Streaming,v ideo, text and sound The student
Internet Does not have to be fixed paced /No interaction during the course of the lecture.
Improvement in how material is presented Table 3 Possible solutions of using the lecture form in distance education
In distance education we can have different set-ups. We can have a lecture hall full of
students and the lecture is broadcast to one or many other lecture halls. This set-up gives very little time for a quality interaction. Similar to this set-up we have one teacher talking to many students each sitting in front of a terminal. This set- up gives more room for interaction, the
teacher can direct the students to use, write or draw the given material. Finally we have the situation where there is no teacher, only the student interacting with the computer.
MEDIA FOR LEARNING
Many distance learning institutions will involve a combination of media for learning. Thus a particular course might involve both print material and multimedia interactive technology. Our aim in learning is not to exploit one particular technology, but to provide the best possible learning environments. Since students learn in different ways, alternate media strategies and approaches may be highly desirable. The question of what mixture of media is “best”, for which type of students, can be determined experimentally. Unfortunately few such studies have been made but this is an important research area for the future of all learning. Most formal learning environments rely on printed material for learning. Distance education material also relies on text. Text is not interactive, so this is a weak strategy today. However it is often used partially because it is familiar to many.
Major vehicles for audio learning are voice over Internet, CD or cassettes. The Internet and public libraries have a wide variety of such materials available. Aga in interaction is usually missing.
Video conferencing is very popular today, and most of our distance learning institution that deliver learning material over distance uses this technology. This technology has mainly been used with large groups on every end. This does not supply a high degree of interaction and differs only slightly from one very large class.
Video broadcasting is fundamentally non- interactive. Video on demand is slightly more interactive than broadcast video, because a student can decide to review a particular section of the video. The question of how to create an active environment for video has concerned many distance learning projects.
Another possibility for obtaining interaction with video is to make the video a part of the teaching material, or interactive multimedia in the best modern sense of that term. The notion is that the software will be making many of the decisions and will be responsible for the interaction with individual students. The computer will have at its command a large amount of video and other media such as sound and still pictures. This material will be used where appropriate in the learning sequences, as determined by the students’ progress. With this arrangement the video can be fully interactive.
In Table 4 we characterise the GUI trial once more and now according to the media used. We also consider whether those media that are not used such as animation should be used. It would definitely add value to the subject to see for instance animated collaboration between software components.
Media Use in GUI trial Levels of interaction
Audio Yes Moderate
Video on demand No N/A
Video conference Yes Moderate
Video broadcast No None
Interactive multimedia
No High
Graphic Limited in slides None Text Web-pages, slides and
Moderate – can control selection High interaction in e-mail
Animation No N/A
Printed material A book None
Table 4 Categorization by media
TRANSMISSION MEDIA OR HARDWARE PLATFORM
Multimedia data can be carried in several ways. We need to fulfil certain quality levels, but yet offer solutions that are feasible and cost-effective. In this section we will discuss some means of carrying video.
Video is now widely distributed on tape or DVD. Such video can be used at any time by students, and can be viewed multiple times. The production of full- scale video courses via satellite is a major industry in the United States. Many of these courses are used in distance learning environments. The major problem with almost all of these courses is the low qua lity interaction.
With the new services that are being offered in Iceland, we will be capable of delivering video over the internet over high-speed ATM network, and with the integration of the ADSL
technology, we will be able to deliver the video to the students homes. Moreover, there are low bandwidth solutions such as RealAudio that could be used.
TV is not interactive so it has limited added value when it is the only media used. The benefit is however that it is accessible to everyone. Video conferencing is often delivered over 1-3 ISDN telephone lines. The quality is often inadequate, but the technology is widely available. The client device is the device through which the student or the teacher interacts. This can be a computer, a WebTV, a Set-top-box or simple a screen on which the computer screen has been projected. It would be valuable if the video could be carried over the internet and the client device could be a computer screen. Other options are of no interest.
INITIATIVE FOR DISTANCE LEARNING IN A UNIVERSITY SETTING In Iceland the market for distance education is not sufficiently large to justify a new
institution catering only for the domestic market. It is therefore necessary to use the existing schools and universities as the foundation but change them in such a way that they cater for the needs of distant students as well as the present local students. This in reality means integrating the present schools and universities into a virtual institution, reaching students in all parts of the country. The virtual institution requires two major changes: A network to connect the schools and the users together and a change in the teaching methods in the schools. The following should be aimed for:
??Combine the school’s resources by teaching the same course simultaneously at two or more institutions with the aid of modern technology.
??Change the teaching methods at the present institutions in such a way that the teaching is accessible to distance students in local education centres or at their homes.
CONCLUSION
The authors regard the most promising technique for a new distance education initiative to be based on highly interactive technology, including multimedia capabilities. We can then combine the ability to have all kinds of media available for the student, allowing a high level of individual attention to student needs, and providing an interactive motivating learning environment. One can examine all the possibilities at a given time, and make decisions based on the most modern technology available, stressing pedagogical needs.
It is critical that we build the possibility of evolving from the beginning. We see the trial described in this paper to be the first one in a series of 3-4 where different possibilities will be compared. The experience from carrying out such trials will also be valuable to evaluate future technologies, which are bound to come our way.
Although we have added technology to the university and often increased distance we should not loose the relationship that we want to have with our students that is rapport, empathy and persuasion [7]. These are the skills we want to encourage our students to establish among themselves in addition to co-operation and consensus building in their teams. The underlying mechanism or process for this is increased interaction among students and with the teacher. References
1. Isabel Distributed conference service. Published on the WWW at http://selva.dit.upm.es/~proy/isabel
2. Gage, N.L. and Berliner, D.C. editors. Educational Psychology. Hoghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 4, edition, 1988.
3. Bork, A.M. Schools for tomorrow: A new technology-based learning system. This is a work in progress.
4. Dillenbourgh, D. and Schneider, D. Collaborative learning and the internet. Published at http://tecfasun1.unige.ch/tecfa/tecfa-research/CMC/colla/iccai95 1.html. ICCAI 95 5. Olafsson, R. Fjarkennsla, University of Iceland. This is work in progress.
6. Bork, A.M. and Gunnarsdottir, S. Rebuilding our educational system. Plenum publishing, expected publishing date jan 2000.
7. Goleman, Emotional Intelligence, 1996
