One of the great aspects of cloud computing is that it is quantifiable. It takes a challenge and accounts for it in hard figures. If it is software, one rents it and pays for the time he or she spends on it. If it is education, particularly, students come to know the time they spend in a remote learning environment will come back to them in the form of a certificate or degree. There are different ways in which the ubiquity and easy accessibility of otherwise expensive resources and data has affected micro-learning. Here are five such ways, beginning with the most quantifiable revolution.
Expanding the scope of class
One intriguing remark from a professor appeared online, recently, to the effect that he now reaches a hundred thousand learners in a single session, via the Internet, whereas it would take him two and a half lifetimes (each lifetime a 100 years) to teach such a multitude in his typical four hundred-strong physical lecture hall. This shows that with just a few resources that micro-learning places one’s way, it would be easy to extend boundaries and meet new challenges. It only requires a computer with a video teleconferencing icon, a few saving programs and back up, to appear on some remote student’s desktop in a later podcast, if not live.
When it comes to integrating everything that education can have with Internet resources, one gets the end result: virtualization. Every arm of learning, be it science, humanities or IT gets cognizant with the web. This is why learners who, for one reason or another, cannot make it to a lecture can follow the notes of the day on their virtual platforms. It is this trend that is making the world a global village where one need not have a lot of money to attend Harvard or Cambridge. Rather, it is the interactive nature brought about by web connectivity that is required to bridge the gap between campus-based and e-learning models.
Failures, drop outs and the unqualified can now get fresh grades
Before the advent of economical resources like hardware and programs for learning, if one dropped out of college or high school, the decision marked the culmination of his/her school pursuits. The drop out would go on to wallow in the mire of frustration in a world that demands plain certificates to get white collar jobs. Now, micro-learning, with its minimalist hardware and software requirements has changed all that. One can get that elusive degree or a certificate courtesy of remote cloud education. In fact such academic certification could easily be stronger than that of a typical book worm, because all kinds of libraries are free online and in the right formats.
The digital revolution of referencing
One of the major breakthroughs of cloud in the education sector is that it has made history an everyday occurrence. If one wants to know what Ptolemy or Alexander the Great actually did in their days, they need not rummage libraries from one end of town to the other. Chances are that they would get nowhere near to the truth. However, the Internet is a free-for-all cloud that brings even rare manuscripts for research and referencing. Of course there are logging details that may cost a fee, but that may change as many digital files go to the public domain for everybody to view uncharged.
Micro-learning- the core of collaboration
The great aspect of micro-learning in cloud education is that it uses odds and ends of technology that meet somewhere with other technologies and synchronize. This unity leads to the sharing of resources and creating mutual initiatives where the users can learn from each other. They no longer have to rely solely on teachers to elaborate a point. They evolve concrete meanings of concepts from their virtual collaboration. Specific examples include research projects between students across the oceans, sharing on educational material on the social networks and doing a sketch, simultaneously, through tablet technology.
Those are some of the leaps that cloud computing through micro-learning has introduced into the sector. The above is just a drop in the ocean of what is to come in the better years of this tender century. There are education apps to explore as there is a new crop of graduates who will have never seen a classroom in their entire academic careers, to exploit.
By John Omwamba
