Online education is the most exciting segment in the Indian IT space. A host of e-education sites continue to enter the market with focused offerings, linking up students and teachers, almost on a daily basis. This is happening because the new medium seeks to supplement -- not replace -- traditional teaching-learning methodologies. Keeping in view the global and in country/domestic market changes, India has to play a vital role in terms of software exports, skilled manpower support, and online education. With India currently in the midst of a "dotcom" wave, Indira Ghandi National Open University (IGNOU) has taken the initiative in launching online in January 2000 two of its educational computer programmes. More...

This article presents NKI's experiences with online education from the time the idea was conceived in 1985 to the point when the total number of course enrolments exceeded 10,000 in June 2000. The 15 year period covers three generations. The first generation (1985-1994) was characterised by system development and experimentation with emerging technology. The second generation (1994-96) was a period of transition from the EKKO computer conferencing system, which NKI developed for online education, to Internet systems with text-based user interfaces. The third generation, 1996 to the present, began with the introduction of graphic user interfaces and the World Wide Web (WWW) and is characterised by a vigorous expansion and the introduction of large-scale online education. More...

Table of Contents

Editorial

Research Articles

Research Notes

Book Notes

Full Issue

IRRODL Volume 1, Number 2

PDF 1-154

Research is seen as something grounded in theory that can lead to improved practice. Without a theoretical basis it is unlikely to go beyond data gathering. The theoretical insights leading to good research are more likely to come from educational and social theories generally than from an attempt to develop a theory of open and distance learning. More...

Since the 1950s and expansion of social science research, distance education has been studied in comparison to face-to-face or classroom instruction. Although researchers continue to conduct comparative studies, their usefulness in revealing more information has diminished over the years; invariably, they have returned a “no significant difference” result between various forms of instruction. More...

The premise of this article is that theoretical frameworks and models are essential to the long-term credibility and viability of a field of practice. In order to assess the theoretical challenges facing the field of distance education, the significant theoretical contributions to distance education in the last century are briefly reviewed. More...

Table of Contents

Editorial

Research Articles

Book Notes

Full Issue

IRRODL Volume 1, Number 1

PDF 1-110

A course design question for self-paced courses includes whether or not technological measures should be used in course design to force students to follow the sequence intended by the course author. This study examined learner behavior to understand whether the sequence of student assignment submissions in a self-paced distance course is related to successful completion of the course. More...

In order for higher education institutions, which implements blended and/or online learning to remain competitive and innovative it needs to keep up with the cutting edge technological and educational advances. This task is usually very difficult, keeping in mind the budget constraints that many institutions have. This usually implies that existing open source solutions have to be used and adapted to individual needs of each institution. More...

The purpose of this study was to identify the relationship between the psychological variables and online behavioral patterns of students, collected through a Learning Management System (LMS). Test was attempted of a structural equation model representing the relationships among Time and Study Environment Management (TSEM), one of the sub-constructs of MSLQ, influencing a set of time-related online log variables: login frequency, login regularity, and total login time. Data were collected from 188 college students in a Korean university. Employing structural equation modeling, a hypothesized model was tested for measuring the model fit. The results presented a criterion validity of online log variables to estimate their time management. More...