Chapter 2

ICTs and Teaching and Learning

As our discussions until now have demonstrated, considerations about the relationship between ICTs and higher education inevitably introduces a range of interrelated themes. Unsurprisingly, therefore, the same problem arises when one considers potential ways in which ICT applications might support teaching and learning. Consequently, we begin not with ICT applications themselves, but rather with an analysis of traditional conceptualizations of education delivery, and of how ICTs, amongst other factors, are making these traditional concepts increasingly irrelevant.

 New frameworks for understanding teaching and learning 

The more research SAIDE has conducted in higher education, the harder we have found it to maintain neat categorizations, as these are increasingly containing too divergent a range of education practices to remain relevant. This pertains particularly to the way in which different educational ‘modes of delivery’ have come to be categorized. In historical terms, the concept of ‘modes of delivery’ has been relatively simple to understand, as people have generally tended to differentiate between ‘contact education’ and ‘distance education’ as two readily identifiable modes of delivery. Internationally, this broad distinction began to merge as different institutions moved to establish themselves as ‘dual-mode’ or ‘mixed-mode’ institutions, particularly in the area of higher education. This generally began to happen as traditionally contact institutions introduced distance education programmes for students who were not able to attend their central campus on a full-time basis. In simple terms, then, the concept of modes of delivery covers these three broad institutional types:

•     Contact education institutions (where students attend face-to-face sessions of different kinds, and these sessions are the primary mechanism for communicating course curriculum);

•     Distance education institutions (where students and educators are separated by time and/or space, and communication of curriculum takes place primarily through use of educational resources, drawing on different media as necessary); and

•     Mixed- or dual-mode institutions (where the institution establishes parallel administrative systems to enable it offer both distance and contact education programmes).

‘Distance’ and ‘Contact: An Outdated Dichotomy?

We believe that the concept of ‘modes of delivery’ is based on an historical distinction that has existed in education systems between ‘distance’ and contact’ education. This distinction has been very useful for many years, particularly as it allowed for the establishment of innovative responses to education problems – such as Open Universities and Open Schools – that could be set up and run without waiting for changes in mainstream education systems. This flexibility was important to the success of many distance education institutions around the world, but has also had the unfortunate consequence of establishing two distinct education systems, which have historically operated in parallel and created long-term policy problems. This problem has been compounded recently, as there has been an explosion of education delivery options – stimulated by developments in ICTs – that has made existing policy frameworks, which are built on these two distinct ‘modes of delivery’ increasingly untenable. 

In a recent research report, SAIDE examined the growth of distance education at traditionally contact higher education institutions.[1] The different terms used by education providers and the range of practices we described in that report provide some illustrations of the extent of this problem. Our research revealed a wide diversity of practices at traditionally contact public higher education institutions. We believe that, if nothing else, this has demonstrated unequivocally that the traditional dichotomy of ‘distance’ and ‘contact’ education has outlived its usefulness.

 For example, distributed lecturing systems using video-conferencing equipment and systems using instructionally designed study guides and decentralized tutorial support both find themselves located within the same category of ‘distance education’, although they bear almost no resemblance in terms of pedagogical approach, technologies used, and their financial implications. This is not to suggest that one is intrinsically better than the other. It simply points to the inadequacy of planning approaches that assume the planning and implementation requirements of both will be adequately met by a common framework called ‘distance education’. 

The growth of distance education methods of delivery has been a key feature of education in the 20^th century, a feature which has marked South African education as much as education in any other country in the world. Initially, these methods were developed as distinctly different from contact education, resulting in the establishment of dedicated distance education institutions such as the University of South Africa (UNISA) and Technikon SA. To most people, distance education came to be seen as provision for those people denied access to contact education (either because they cannot afford the latter or because circumstances demand that they study on a part-time basis), and distance education was regarded as a separate educational ‘mode’ and operated through systems that ran parallel to contact education systems.

 The examples and case studies found in traditionally contact higher education institutions, however, reflect an ever-growing diversity of education practices being clustered under this ‘catch-all’ phrase of distance education. Furthermore, many education practices using what might historically have been described as distance education methods are not labeled overtly as distance education by their protagonists, either because it has simply not occurred to them to do so or because they are conscious of the threat of seeing their government subsidy reduced. These practices are also being integrated into contact education systems, as the growth in such practices at traditionally contact higher education institutions demonstrates. 

Further, awareness is growing that elements of distance education have almost always existed in face-to-face programmes, while educators involved in good quality distance education are increasingly recognizing the importance of different types of face-to-face education as structured elements of their programmes. This trend has rendered rigid distinctions between the two modes of delivery meaningless. Compounding this problem, the growth of ICTs has begun to make the notion of distance difficult to interpret, while creating a number of educationally and financially viable new means of providing education. Many case studies we have explored are incorporating use of such technologies into their offerings, while most higher education institutions are busy with processes of developing strategies to harness ICTs effectively.

In many other research and policy processes, SAIDE has suggested that an appropriate solution to this problem is the conceptual introduction of a planning continuum of education provision. This continuum has, as two imaginary poles, provision only at a distance and provision that is solely face-to-face. The reality is that all education provision exists somewhere on this continuum, but cannot be placed strictly at either pole. A major advantage of this blurring is that education planners can turn from meaningless debates about the relative virtues of particular methods of education provision, to consideration of the nature of learning and the educational value of a course’s structure and content. Educators often end up equating particular methods of education with good quality education, even when these methods are being poorly implemented. The notion of this continuum is free of such premature and unnecessary judgements about quality. We believe it should form the basis of any strategic planning processes undertaken to harness the potential of ICTs in South Africa, and should also guide policy formulation in higher education. It is vital in this context precisely because it can enable planners to remove the baggage of educational models developed for fundamentally different contexts (which continues to dog education interventions in the country), while allowing them to draw on the lessons contained in the implementation of these models. This conceptual shift is vital in changing the structure of higher education systems in South Africa. In particular, it will allow for greater flexibility and open up possibilities of collaboration, both of which are vital to an improvement in educational quality and in the cost-effectiveness of education provision, issues of particular relevance to South African policy-makers currently.

Distance Education and Technology-Enhanced Learning

Regretfully, the simplistic use of terminology outlined above has crept further into the field of educational technology. This new trend, particularly pervasive in American educational debates but now finding its way into South African educational discourse, has been to use ‘distance education’ and ‘educational technology’ interchangeably or even as a single, composite term. The most obvious problem with this is that is simply an illogical inference. Educational technologies are used regularly in face-to-face education environments, whether they be ‘old’ technologies like print or whiteboards or ‘new’ technologies like data projectors or personal computers.

More importantly, though, the use of distance education and educational technology as interchangeable or composite phrases introduces a blurring conflation of the terms, which – at least in many South African education interventions – has led to poor quality strategic planning. In many ways, it is similar to the conceptual integration of open learning and distance education in the United Kingdom and Australia – open and distance learning – which created a real misperception that distance education was intrinsically ‘open’. In the same way, many people in South Africa harnessing educational technologies think they are harnessing the benefits of good quality distance education, when, in most cases, they are simply finding technologically clever ways of replicating traditional, face-to-face education models. Many of these projects have blazed a sad trail of failed educational technology projects (most notably in applications of broadcasting technologies to transmit lecture-style programming), wasting huge amounts of time and money. On the positive side, these experiences have valuable lessons for South Africa, so there is no reason why we need continue repeating many of these costly mistakes.

The key point here is that each education intervention should be planned, implemented, and reviewed on its own merits, rather than forced into simplistic, dichotomous categories (such as ‘distance education’ or ‘face-to-face education’), which set arbitrary and unhelpful constraints. Leading on from this, attempts by South African educators to harness the potential of different technologies to support their education interventions should not automatically be regarded as distance education interventions. Technologies can be applied in a range of ways, to support an almost limitless combination of teaching and learning strategies, and it is essential to keep options as open as possible. This flexibility should form the cornerstone of all education planning processes. South African has a diversity of people with a wide range of educational needs. There is no single teaching and learning model that will equally meet these diverse needs equally well. This point seems obvious, but cannot be stressed strongly enough, particularly given the almost innate human desire to find simple, packaged solutions to complex problems.

Policy Implications

The above discussion is, we believe, not simply of conceptual interest. Specifically, it has three major policy implications, which are linked.

1.   The current funding approach for higher education makes an unreasonable financial distinction between distance education and contact education in calculating subsidy allocations to public universities and technikons. Currently, programmes defined as ‘distance education’ receive two-thirds of the allocations of comparable ‘contact’ programmes. This is problematic for various reasons. First, it assumes comparability in terms of expense of two broad categories of education: ‘contact’ and ‘distance’. Our analysis provides conclusive evidence that – at least – the category of distance education has become too broad to justify this simplistic funding approach. Second, embedded in this distinction is a deeply qualitative assumption that the output of distance education programmes is of less value than that of contact education programmes. While we agree it is critical to establish funding formulae that penalize poor educational practices, we see no evidence to suggest that this funding dichotomy achieves that goal. Further, the extent to which distance – or contact – education programmes reduce per-student costs is entirely dependent on how they are constructed. SAIDE has done extensive financial planning work with higher education institutions, which has demonstrated clearly that the traditional notion of distance education being cheaper is not intrinsically correct. More importantly, it also demonstrates that many attempts to harness the educational potential of ICTs are also not cheaper than traditional face-to-face contact. Thus, there is no basis to this qualitative distinction. Third, this strategy of penalizing broad categories of educational practice has the unfortunate goal of encouraging educators and institutions to misrepresent the nature of their educational processes, for fear of arbitrarily applied financial penalties.

      Consequently, we believe that the review of funding formulae for higher education should seek to remove this artificial distinction. This would greatly simplify the way in which institutions are expected to report, and also place the responsibility far more squarely on national strategies to assess the quality of output of all higher education programmes on equal terms, and make judgements about how to make allocations on this basis rather than on artificial and arbitrary categorizations. It would also achieve the important goal of promoting cost-effective exploration of harnessing ICTs to support teaching and learning, as the focus would be on outputs and not on technologies used.

As an extension to this recommendation, we also believe that the above conceptual framework should be slowly integrated into the higher education system’s three-year rolling plan processes. Support should be provided to higher education institutions to enable to cope with the changes implicit in collapsing boundaries between distance and contact education, and the lessons of best practice emerging from this trend shared throughout the system, functions that could be coordinated by the national Department of Education. 

2.   The Higher Education Quality Review Committee of the Council on Higher Education should focus on establishing a single, common framework for assessing the quality of output of higher education programmes. This policy issue emerges directly from the above discussion, and is a response to the standard concern often voiced about the needs to ensure the quality of pedagogical approach of distance education programmes, as well as programmes using ICTs in different ways. This theme has emerged almost without fail at traditionally contact higher education institutions where distance education programmes are introduced. While we concur totally with the observation that strategies to ensure the quality of distance education provision are critical, it has been interesting to note how few of the people who voice this concern see the logical inference that such strategies should also seek to ensure the quality of contact education programmes. In 1997, SAIDE developed a set of quality criteria of distance education programmes, which we believed would – with minor adaptation – apply to all educational institutions. Evidence of the extent to which such a framework can indeed apply to all education provision is that the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA) is currently in the process of incorporating these same guidelines into a single set of quality guidelines for all South African educational providers seeking to register with SAQA. 

We believe that it is critical to establish similar frameworks for measuring quality of output and pedagogical approach in higher education. Further, we believe that implementation of such a framework should not simply serve to guide educational providers, but should rather be used to direct public funding to programmes of higher quality of pedagogical approach and output. This framework could operate effectively in an environment where all educational programmes receive funding on the basis of pedagogical approach and output rather than according to an artificial distinction between educational ‘modes’. In making this recommendation, we do not seek to underplay the difficulty of creating and implementing such a framework, but it remains the only sustainable way of directing public funding towards educational programmes of the highest quality and relevance to South African educational requirements. Most importantly, this framework should be used to measure educational quality of all higher education offerings, rather than attempting to set up separate measures for programmes using ICTs. This latter approach unnecessarily complicates education regulation and also creates dangerous inconsistencies in policy approach, which can be easily exploited by those interested only in generating money from poor quality pedagogical practices. 

3.    National government should seek to spend a greater proportion of its energies on educating learners about how to choose quality education programmes. A consistent theme in this document has been that attempts to control quality by over-regulating higher education are doomed to failure, because ICTs create so many new opportunities for circumventing these regulatory frameworks. Under these circumstances, the most effective weapon against poor quality education is not trying to outlaw poor practice (which is very time-consuming and ultimately not possible), but rather to focus on educating the ‘consumer’ about how to make the most appropriate choices. Currently, at least part of the reason why poor education practice is able to flourish is because such practice involves large expenditure on marketing. These messages are those most consistently heard by prospective learners, and, in the absence of guidelines advising on how to make effective choices, are very compelling. We believe there would be significant value in running marketing campaigns that market the value of high quality education and that seek to equip learners with tools to help them avoid making poor choices about how to spend their money.

 What are the appplications of ICTs? 

Given the issues raised above, it is important to establish how ICTs can most effectively be harnessed to support education. This section focuses on outlining some potential applications for ICTs in South African higher education. It is important to stress that these are simply potential applications. The extent to which these applications are effectively deployed will depend entirely on how technology use is planned and implemented. Poor planning and implementation will lead to poor technology applications. This is critical because so much of the rhetoric on ICT use is imbued with a false logic that the technologies themselves can solve problems. Ultimately, the effectiveness of ICT use in higher education depends entirely on how people use the technologies, not on the intrinsic qualities of the technologies themselves. 

Delivery of Educational Resources

Beginning with the functionality to provide resources, one of the most immediately obvious strengths of ICT applications in a converging environment is their capacity to provide immediately up-to-date resources to large numbers of educators and learners easily and relatively cheaply (whether one is using the Web or e-mail technologies and regardless of the technologies used to secure bandwidth for data transfer). Changes made to resources can become immediately available to educators and students without incurring major additional distribution costs. Likewise, communication resources, such as tutorial letters, can be distributed more often, thus reducing costs of ongoing communication by education providers. These trends are already becoming increasingly important in a world where curricula no longer change in cycles of five or ten years (or even longer), but need to be adapted and updated continuously.

It should be noted here, however, that the capacity to facilitate quick distribution of resources should not be taken to imply an argument in favour of turning online environments into massive ‘electronic textbooks’ (although regrettably this appears to be how most web course designers tend to use the technology).[2] There is no evidence to suggest that today’s – or tomorrow’s – students are going to be interested in simply reading textbooks on a computer screen. Thus, one needs to plan very carefully how to take advantage of this functionality without simply creating electronic textbooks (which most students are simply likely to print out and read in paper form anyway). It should be stressed here that resource distribution should not be mistaken for education, although it often erroneously is (most often by people who understand education only as an authoritarian process of information transmission from educators to predominantly passive learners).

As an extension of the above strength, ICTs also support use of resources that combine more than one medium. While technical limitations still hamper the use of video resources (unless one is working within a reasonably advanced local or wide area network environment or is harnessing the bandwidth capacity of satellite), the ability to create multimedia resources – combining audio, graphics and images, and text - is a tremendous potential strength.

An additional benefit that ICTs can bring to designers of online learning resources is the huge resource base that resides on the World Wide Web. In itself, this is of negligible educational value, but, if harnessed effectively by educators, it can become a very useful resource. This might happen, for example, through judicious use of links to resources on the Web or by setting learning activities that demand learners to make their own selective use of this resource base. As an extension, it is worth noting that this benefit can extend to course design processes themselves. This resource base can be harnessed to support course design and development itself, regardless of the nature of resources being developed.

Facilitating Communication

The second set of strengths of ICT applications is their capacity to support a range of communication strategies, especially easy asynchronous communication between educator and learner and amongst learners. This is possibly their most important educational advantage, particularly as it opens significant new opportunities for learners to engage with educators, hence supporting changing roles for educators.

Of course, as people who are familiar with the full range of applications of the Internet will know, technologies such as Chat Rooms or Video Conferencing do allow for live, real-time communication as well (subject to limitations of bandwidth). However, the major new strength of e-mail particularly is the capacity to facilitate ongoing communication at times that are suitable to the individuals continuing the conversation. Thus, students can post queries or ideas to educators, who can then respond at later times. Where appropriate, this communication can be extended to include groups of people rather than just individuals. People who have used e-mail and discussion groups for business or research purposes will know the benefits that this brings – as well as the time it can save by focusing discussion – and these benefits apply equally in education. Of course, this is not intended to suggest that such communication can replace face-to-face contact; however, it can be harnessed very effectively for a range of educational purposes.

In terms of education systems, a major component of this strength is the capacity to support the many requirements for communication to ensure the effective management and administration of the system, many aspects of which are currently dysfunctional in South Africa. Cheap, easy, immediate communication opens significant new opportunities for circulating information through education systems (whether the system is a single university or a national higher education system), not least at administrative and management levels. This becomes particularly important in an environment where extensive and rapid change is underway, which is currently the norm in South Africa. Most importantly, cheap communication systems ensure that communication can travel in any direction through a system, rather than simply consisting of communiqués from higher levels to lower levels within a system.

Facilitating Interaction in Resources

Combining the above, it becomes apparent that ICTs can provide educators with a range of very interesting opportunities for creating resources that allow learners different levels of interactivity. Of course, this can quite easily be used poorly by educators but it can also lead to the creation of interesting and exciting interaction for learners with educational resources. Again, this is not intended to suggest that such interaction can replace all forms of direct human interaction; however, it can be used to engage learners effectively, creating richer teaching and learning environments. This can be facilitated by creative use of, for example, feedback forms, java applets, pop-up boxes, ‘yes-no’ and multiple-choice responses, and imaginative use of hyperlinks to guide learners through diverse learning pathways.

For example, in a printed resource, activities integrated into texts are usually immediately followed by some discussion of the activity, often discouraging learners from completing the activity. In a web environment, however, one could require some form of response from learners by developing this discussion about an activity as a response to a feedback form (thus requiring learners to submit some thoughts on the activity before seeing the discussion). To discourage thoughtless answers – and to encourage peer interaction – responses could be automatically collated and generated as an HTML page of student responses. Likewise, ‘yes-no’ responses could be used judiciously to guide learners down different, but equally relevant, learning pathways. In this instance, the response is used not to provide right or wrong answers, but rather to solicit information from learners on their particular preferences or concerns.

A requirement for many users is support in using various information services, whether these be primary and secondary source databases, library systems, or the resources themselves. Such services currently most often require direct interaction with the people who offer these support services, but there is a strong case to be made for providing online support services to help users. This would include the development of: intuitive search facilities that are easy to use, but accommodate various levels of complexity in searching; guides on information sources and how to find and store information; electronic library guides; guides to using, accessing, and evaluating resources; support guides on writing assignments or reports; and online examples of interactive learning methods and approaches.

Building and Exploiting Information Bases

In addition to the above, there is a further important trend worth noting. The rapid growth in functionality of Internet technologies opens possibilities for building and exploiting information bases in ways that were simply not possible even two or three years ago. In particular, the following developments are worth noting:

1.       Developments in the digitization of information of all kinds, whether it be text, graphic, audio, or video.

2.       Growing functionality of electronic databases, and particularly allowing people to:

•       Store any kind of information in digital format, with corresponding capacity to run increasingly sophisticated data queries on information once it is organized into a well-designed management information system; and

•       Run data queries - and receive the results of these queries – using web browsers, whether across the Internet or secure Intranets.

3.      Exponential growth in the speed of central processing units and storage capacity of computer hard drives, matched with corresponding reductions in the relative prices of this hardware. These developments contribute significantly to functionality of databases, both in terms of quantity of data storage and speed of manipulation of this data.

4.      Rapid developments in cheap electronic communication, more and more aspects of which can increasingly be automated. This is further facilitated by convergence in ICTs, which allows communication such as e-mail or fax to work automatically in tandem with information databases if well designed. 

Of course, the above sounds, in many ways, like the marketing jargon of information technology suppliers, elements of which have almost been repeated to the point of cliché. Indeed, such is the speed of communication and effectiveness of information technology marketing that, taken on their own, none of the above points necessarily even sounds particularly innovative, notwithstanding their relative novelty as developments. 

Nevertheless, hardly any organizations or systems in South African higher education have yet devised strategies for harnessing these trends effectively to the general benefit of education and social development, indicating clearly that their real potential is not yet well understood. Instead, repetition of rhetorical statements about the developmental potential of ICTs soon starts to ring hollow, raising more questions than they answer. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that introducing the notion of an information base is here intended to provide one practical way in which South Africa can seize the opportunity to take practical advantage of the potential of ICTs. This is essential if we are to work towards reversing current trends for the development of ICTs to entrench or widen the gap between developed and developing countries.

A fundamental shift in the value of information is taking place because of the rapid digitization of information and the consequent ease of its dissemination. Historically, information has been regarded as a product, which people were happy to purchase, to the financial benefit of those social structures that controlled and profited from its production and dissemination. While certain types of information will continue to retain value in this traditional way, the vast bulk of information, once it has been developed or collated, now rapidly loses value. Printed catalogues of information become redundant almost as soon as they are printed because this information changes so quickly. Cheaper and easier reproduction and communication of information constantly reduce the time that ‘privileged’ access to information provides strategic advantage. Access to multiple sources of information via the Internet is making it increasingly difficult to identify the source of new ideas, while the rapidity with which new information can be circulated reduces the time for which it can be regarded as ‘new’.

These changes make it essential to find ways to use information quickly in as many different ways as possible before it loses its value. These need to focus on re-using information in different ways without generating significant additional cost. In order to achieve this, it is necessary to establish effective information systems, which can allow for quick and easy manipulation of information once it has been developed or gathered. It is also advisable from this perspective to incur the minor additional cost of breaking links between gathering or compiling information and communicating it. Although this creates some additional costs initially, these can easily be amortized across the range of options that then become possible for communicating this information or using it to support a diverse range of educational opportunities. In this way, the expense of generating the information can be used much more effectively.

Possibly most importantly, it becomes essential to develop effective strategies for storing information in ways that allow it to be very easily manipulated for future purposes. If information about educational resources, courses, and programmes is stored in a database, it then becomes easily available for future applications. In this way, research can build on growing knowledge bases, rather than repeating basic work already conducted. This can maximize the value of money spent on course design and development or educational research. It can then also – where appropriate - be easily made available via the World Wide Web for access by other researchers in South Africa, thus contributing usefully to developing an effective educational resource and research base in the country. This has the potential spin-off of developing the country’s international reputation as a producer – and not just a consumer – of information.

Another point emerging from the above discussions is that increasingly value lies not in possessing information, but rather in developing the skills and capacity to manipulate it effectively for new applications. This indicates clearly the importance of developing management information systems that allow for cheap, easy, and logical storage and retrieval of information. There is added benefit to creating interfaces to information that enable users to engage with certain types of information themselves with little or no intervention by other people. If a simple web interface is added to such a database, it would be possible for educators and learners to select their own search criteria and extract relevant resources very quickly and at no additional cost to a national education system (or an individual education provider). This simple search level adds tremendous value as an educational resource. It is also very cost-effective, because changes made to the database are reflected automatically via the web interface. The lengthy processes of writing pages in HyperText Markup Language (HTML) are removed, because most pages can be generated automatically from the database

For all the above to work effectively, though, it will be necessary – at both systemic and institutional levels – to invest financial and human resources in:

•     Establishing the types and combinations of information needed to support teaching and learning environments, target learners, and strategies for making this information accessible to all learners;

•     Developing appropriate conceptual frameworks for computer-based management information systems; and;

•     Designing electronic database architectures that can be used to organize, store, and allow for multiple uses of information.

We believe that this has some important immediate applications in South African higher education, particularly in terms of building the capacity of certain systems to administer themselves effectively.

 Motives for integrating ICTs into delivery of Higher Education 

With the above applications in mind (and bearing in mind that this list is not exhaustive), we now turn to describing in more detail what has been motivating programme planners and, in some cases, entire institutions to explore and/or develop educational applications of ICTs. The list below is no doubt only partial. 

This analysis is important in deepening understanding of the nature of the practices, and also serves to highlight that cost is only one factor amongst many influencing higher education planners at institutional level. It also helps to illustrate that overly simplistic policy distinctions, unnecessary regulatory rigidity, or blanket moratoria on particular practices could as easily stifle important innovative activities as they could prevent poor quality pedagogical practice

It would, of course, be näive to believe that the motivations of all educators and education providers using ICTs to support teaching and learning are educationally driven. Some organizations and individuals in South Africa’s education system are using certain ICT-based education methods to increase student numbers and/or income with little or no concern for impact on the quality of that provision.

 Likewise, we do not wish to create the impression that all the programmes with which we have engaged in compiling this list have been driven by systematically understood and articulated reasons (or that all have been influenced by all of the reasons provided below). Much of the work we have explored has evolved organically, driven by the enthusiasm and interests of individual academics. Nevertheless, we believe it is important, in reflecting on the effect of such activity, to pull together broader trends that might have influenced or emerged from people’s work. Hence, the motivations outlined below aim to move beyond these simplistic interpretations of motivation to explore other reasons why educators committed to quality of education provision have been implementing such changes. 

1. Exploring new education models. We begin with a perhaps obvious motivation, but one that is also often overlooked in policy debates. This is that, in many cases, educational applications of ICTs have been motivated by an intrinsic interest in exploring what new value ICT use can add to educational environments. In many instances, this exploration is further motivated by specific research questions being pursued by individual academics or academic departments. Such exploration tends still to be most prevalent in – although certainly not limited to – postgraduate courses and can range from simple use of data projectors in lectures to fully-fledged web-based courses and programmes. 

2. Providing access to students who would – either because of work commitments or geographical distance – be unable to participate in traditional, full-time contact education opportunities. This reason helps to explain why so much of this activity (in terms of numbers of programmes rather than numbers of students) has been in the postgraduate domain. The drive has been motivated partly by growing awareness of the importance of lifelong learning and corresponding attempts to respond to market needs. It has also been motivated by dwindling student numbers in some of the more traditional areas of undergraduate education provision, particularly in Arts Faculties, and a corresponding need to find new education markets.

3. Finding new markets and new income streams. Linked to the above point is the important aspect  of finding new education markets. All higher education institutions in South Africa are currently exploring a range of ways to build new markets, as some of the more traditional markets come under threat, either because of their perceived irrelevance in the market place or because of increased competition from traditional and non-traditional sources. Linked to this is a growing perception of dwindling income and concern about the danger of relying so heavily on a single, dominant source of funding (the national fiscus). While evidence appears to suggest that government funding has not dwindled as many people claim, a growing percentage of young, higher education students (the traditional market of higher education) is not able to afford fees. This has motivated some institutions to invest in strategies to capture new markets, and many programme planners are attempting to use ICTs, which allow much greater flexibility in delivery of programmes, to reach these markets.

4. Responding to international and private competition. As we have noted above, ICT networks have begun to collapse many of the traditional boundaries of operation of different organizations. In education, they have created possibilities for education institutions to offer courses to learners many thousands of miles away, using web-based learning. While many educators protest that quality education under such circumstances is not possible, their concerns are not preventing organizations from trading on their reputations or speed to market to secure new education markets. Many attempts to integrate ICTs into education programmes in South African higher education are, in part at least, an attempt to counter this threat by being able to compete with international providers, as well as private providers moving in this direction. Of course, such attempts are also motivated by the potential spin-off benefit of being able to compete internationally. Thus, attempts to respond to new competitive forces are not simply about protecting South African markets, but also about entering new markets elsewhere in the world.

5. Building student skills in the use of ICTs. Another major motivation for exploring use of ICTs in education environments has been growing awareness – amongst both educators and learners – that ICT skills will be critical to employment for the foreseeable future. Thus, education programmes that do not provide these basic skills are becoming increasingly unattractive to prospective learners, in this case particularly young learners preparing for the world of work. This has been noted even at policy level, leading to a policy requirement that undergraduate students become ‘information literate’ as part of their studies. 

6. Reducing the per-student costs of education provision. Some exploration of use of ICTs has focused on aiming to reduce the per-student cost of educational provision. In some cases, this has led to development of electronic correspondence courses, where students engage with online ‘study guides’ and then are expected to pass examinations. In others, it has focused on delivering lectures to students electronically, using broadcast technology, and allowing limited two-way communication using telecommunication return paths. There is, as yet, no evidence that emerging models reduce per-student costs unless they also make significant sacrifices in quality. On the contrary, higher education institutions are discovering that delivering high quality education using ICTs usually ends up being more expensive than traditional contact education. This suggests that, for now at least, the previous five reasons for exploring ICTs have more lasting relevance than this final point.

 Potential educational pitfalls 

Of course, as well as creating possibilities, ICTs contain many potential educational pitfalls. Almost inevitably – as with most technologies – most of these are linked to the way in which the technologies might be used (or misused) rather than anything intrinsic in the technologies themselves. The following list outlines some of these pitfalls, which we present here to inject a note of caution into discussions about the potential of these technologies. It is by no means exhaustive. It should also be read in conjunction with our more general list of lessons learned in technology use, provided in the following section.

1. Potential for poor use. Although this a really obvious sounding observation, it is nevertheless worth reinforcing that there is as much potential for poor use of Internet technologies as any other educational technology. As has been the case with many technological innovations (such as radio and television), there has been a proliferation of rhetoric about the potential of Internet technologies to provide simple solutions to very complicated educational problems, much of which is generated by the marketing strategies of technology vendors. Of course, as the use of these technologies develops, a more sophisticated, critical understanding and rhetoric will emerge. Nevertheless, in the absence of this, it is currently necessary to remember that Internet technologies offer no magical panacea to educational problems, and can thus be used just as poorly as any other technology. As has been suggested above, they can also either function as a catalyst for educational transformation or entrench existing education practices.

2. Resource design is complicated and time-consuming. A second potential pitfall of Internet technologies is that complexities of resource design and development demand time and high-level skills. This problem becomes particularly acute in environments where human and financial resources are limited, and can be further intensified when poor financial planning leads to heavy expenditure in technological infrastructure that, in turn, absorbs budgets for curriculum and resource design and development. This problem is – almost paradoxically - masked by growing ease of use of different technological applications. For example, it is now very easy to generate HTML pages without learning coding, making it much simpler for people to generate their own web sites. This ease of use can easily mask the complexities of the educational or instructional design that is necessary to create effective web resources. This is reflected in the proliferation of online ‘educational’ material that is little more than reams of text on a screen.

Of course, this problem can be used to advantage if harnessed effectively. This is because these technologies and software applications have lowered financial and skill entry levels for people interested in exploring their educational use, thus enabling well-managed budgets and design processes to invest a greater percentage of expenditure in course design and development. The key to turning this pitfall into a possibility is effective management of resources. It is, however, worth noting that design of online learning resources can be very time-consuming. Discussion with people who have developed better quality resources, as well as consultation of international research, suggest that ratios of at least 150 to 200 hours of design time to each hour of learning time are not unusual.

3. Confusing rote response with interaction. A key benefit that ICTs have brought to the business world is the ability to automate certain rote tasks (such as management and retrieval of data or delivery of communication). Many of these benefits can be harnessed both in the administration and provision of education. However, they carry with them the potential danger that of confusing rote response with interaction. Some education theorists differentiate between different levels of interaction, with rote response as a very low level of interaction moving up to more sophisticated levels of interaction. While this is perfectly valid, we would argue that rote response and interaction are different processes, the former being designed in ways that can actually impede interaction on the part of learners. 

In the use of ICTs and online learning, multiple-choice questions and automated responses are probably the most obvious educational activities that tend to encourage rote response. At a more sophisticated level, design of automated learning pathways that ‘guide’ learners down a single ‘right’ path often also encourage rote response to and simplistic memorization of learning resources. Of course, this is not intended to suggest that there is no place for these education strategies. In certain working environments, memorization of key information may be essential to successful operations. When, however, this approach becomes pervasive within an entire education intervention, it starts to become highly problematic, and is likely to place serious limits on the effectiveness of that intervention.

3. Effective use requires information literacy skills. One of the features of increasing use of e-mail and the growth of the World Wide Web has been that there is a proliferation of useless information. This raises interesting challenges, and points clearly to the importance of developing effective information literacy skills. Of course, the term ‘information literacy’ is itself the subject of some debate.[3] Darch, Carelse, and Underwood argue that information literacy has two components. The one is a set of skills which enables users to identify their information problems and needs, find information irrespective of source or medium, and critically evaluate and use the information. The other is understanding a domain of knowledge, so that an information user is able to evaluate the significance of information in relation to a problem in that domain.

 In a later article (19 May),[4] Darch states that information literacy is not just a new name for something which we have always done. It is more than just a set of skills like being able to access a library catalogue or to understand the limitations of the television news. Darch argues that it implies a self-conscious awareness of the way in which information systems work (including modern electronic systems), of the dynamic link between a particular information need and the sources and channels required to satisfy that need. Developing these types of skills in learners who are going to use online learning environments will be essential to their successful implementation.

4. User unfamiliarity. Linked to the above point is the difficulty – particularly in South Africa – that most potential users, both educators and learners, are likely to be unfamiliar with Internet technologies. Of course, this depends on the nature and level of the education intervention, but it is a potential pitfall that needs to be factored into conceptualizing the use of such technologies. If one peruses existing online learning resources, it quickly becomes apparent how many assumptions have been made about proficiency of use of the technologies that learners are expected to bring with them. Likewise, strategic decisions to develop online learning strategies are usually taken with little or no reference to the capacity of the educators who will be expected to drive these strategies. Consequently, in designing education interventions using Internet technologies, it is always necessary to take account of the levels of expertise of educators and learners, and to ensure that appropriate levels of capacity are developed as part of the intervention. This, of course, has the spin-off benefit of developing important new skills.

5. Uncertainty around copyright issues. A minor, but important, point to note is that online learning often raises uncertainty around copyright issues. Although it is debatable as to how long copyright will remain a relevant concept as more and more information is digitized, it is certainly still a reality. Thus, one still needs to be careful about not breaching copyright when developing online learning experiences, particularly if one starts making extensive use of resources that exist on other web sites or that have been gathered through e-mail discussion groups. Issues of intellectual property protection will need to be carefully considered, and appropriate policies developed in concert with similar processes taking place in other social sectors in South Africa and internationally.

 Lessons in the use of ICTs 

A critical component of any strategic planning or decision-making process is an understanding of past experiences and the lessons they hold. In the field of educational technology, these experiences provide a clear basis for identifying key issues on which the success of any effort to integrate technologies into educational projects will depend. The purpose of articulating these issues is not to submerge this study in a quagmire of unachievable principles, which effectively prevents action or implementation. Rather, it is an effort to extrapolate essential lessons demonstrated by recent local and international experience in order to ensure that future projects build on this experience rather than repeating costly and educationally pointless exercises. 

Although it runs the risk of becoming over-used, a Tony Bates quotation helps to drive the point home:

The history of education is littered with the corpses of technology-based projects that were killed because of the high operating costs, problems of adaptation to local conditions, lack of skilled personnel to operate the technologies, and lack of effectiveness.[5]

Despite the wealth of experiences both locally and from around the world on which this country can draw in planning and implementing technology-enhanced learning, it appears that we are repeating many of the mistakes that have been made in such initiatives. Thus, South Africa does not yet appear to be ‘leapfrogging’ mistakes made around the world as was hoped would happen, but seems rather to be emulating those mistakes. The ideas summarized below provide a basis for avoiding certain obvious mistakes and building on various important lessons.

Understand Why Educational Technology Projects Fail

Reasons for educational technology project failures are many and varied, but include the following:

•     Imposition of inflexible technological choices made without reference to educational need and context;

•     Lack of investment in integrated curriculum and course design and development processes;

•     Integrating technologies into programmes based on poor pedagogical practice (a problem especially acute in South Africa where the legacy of fundamental pedagogics is still so strong);

•     Unexpectedly high operating costs, and a very high percentage of total expenditure on recurrent costs, which militates against achieving economies of scale;

•     Underestimation of the need for well-developed systems of student support, designed as an integral part of overall courses;

•     Lack of attention to designing and implementing effective management and administrative systems; and

•     Paucity of people with the necessary skills and expertise to staff programmes, and a corresponding absence of clear professional development strategies designed to overcome this problem.

Technologically-Driven Educational Solutions do not Work

When technologies fail to deliver solutions to new educational challenges, a key reason for this is often that the technology to be used is identified before a clear understanding of the educational challenges and needs has been developed. This often happens with ICTs, which are often described as ‘new’ technologies, where their ‘newness’ is determined by when they were invented. If this definition of newness is used as a basis for classifying technologies, then it is easy to understand why so many decision-makers fall into the traps identified by South Africa’s Technology-Enhanced Learning Investigation:

In most cases, decisions about what technology to use in the learning environment [are] made on the basis of the technological preference, rather than by determining which technology [is] most suitable for the learning objective[6].

The reasons for this hurried, unsystematic approach to making decisions are manifold; well planned and executed marketing strategies can easily create unrealistic expectations about new inventions, paradoxically often heightened when the experience of using such inventions for educational purposes is still limited. This can lead to very real political pressure to make investments in such technologies, either at government or institutional level, as decision-makers understandably wish to demonstrate their willingness and ability to stay in touch with the latest trends. Such pressure can be exacerbated when the technology has its own ‘missionaries’, people whose love of the invention and its capacity to perform certain functions generates tremendous enthusiasm and a well-intentioned desire to demonstrate its the technology’s capacity to solve educational problems. Such energy, together with the novelty value of recent inventions, can be very persuasive, especially in South Africa, where the pressure to respond to educational challenges very quickly and in a highly visible way is so great. Unfortunately, the desire to find quick answers often leads to short cuts in planning – for example, cutting out rigorous and systematic processes of clearly identifying educational needs before making decisions – sometimes with disastrous, and very costly, consequences.

 The following pointers are, therefore, worth taking into consideration.

1.   Educational principles and issues have to form the foundation of decisions about what technologies to use and how.

2.   Before making any contractual commitment, test the viability of using the particular technology or technologies for the intended educational purposes by exploring its potential in a chosen area with the best available educators

3.   Never take marketing jargon at face value.

4.   Do not get locked into contractual arrangements that force commitment to a particular technological solution for an extended period.

5.   Ensure that the choice of technology does not lead to imbalances in fixed and variable costs.

6.   Ensure that technological resources are affordable and cost-effective.

7.   Regardless of technological choice (often influenced by intersecting educational, financial, social, political, and economic interests), ensure that sufficient time for planning, designing, and developing an effective educational programme is scheduled.

Technologies can Either be Used as a Catalyst for Transformation or as a Mechanism for Maintaining the Status Quo

Educational discussions about the potential role of ICTs have an undeniable ability to generate tremendous interest, enthusiasm, and excitement. If harnessed effectively, there is a distinct possibility that this might be a very powerful catalyst for transforming dominant education practices. This task is sometimes made easier because development and use of ICTs have contributed strongly to eroding myths of the teacher as the source of all knowledge. Unfortunately, though, most uses of ICTs still tend to enhance the role of the traditional teacher, using new gimmicks as ‘high-tech chalk’. The assumption seems to be that the ‘talk and chalk’ approach is still the most effective way of organizing educational opportunities and that a key function of technologies should be either to enable teachers to do this better or to make his or her lecture available to more students at one time.

Using this as a starting point, there seems also to be an unproblematized assumption that use of ICTs is a valuable exercise in itself. In many examples we have examined, there is little questioning of the content being provided using these technologies and of how they could most constructively be used to enhance this provision educationally. There is often very little rigorous effort to match choice of technologies to learning outcomes and processes of courses and programmes. There also seems, in many cases, to be a lack of sophistication in mixing media and technologies to achieve learning objectives.

This points to the importance of ensuring that projects integrating the use of ICTs into higher education seek to create learning environments wherein exploration of educational roles for the technologies available can function as a catalyst for effective educational transformation and for building high quality education. It is also necessary – particularly given the scale of particular educational problems and backlogs – to focus on developing teaching and learning models that can be taken to scale cost-effectively. Many ‘pilot projects’ owe whatever success they have to intervention by enthusiastic individuals – who are also often very good educators – determined to make the pilot succeed. This is laudable, but can establish teaching and learning models that are not workable on a large-scale when this type of individual intervention is unable to compensate for weaknesses in such models.

Finally, it has often been noted that, in general, the development of new technologies is serving to entrench, or even widen, the gap between rich and poor, both between countries and within them. As we have noted, it seems that this trend is one of the most difficult with which South Africa has to deal. In general, people and countries with large resource bases are much better placed to take advantage of the educational benefits arising from using ICTs in teaching and learning than are people and countries with few resources. This is not an easy problem to solve, but clearly we cannot solve it by pretending that it does not exist. Rather, it is a problem that the South African higher education system has to work through in order to ensure that access to ICTs is opened up to marginalized communities in innovative and cost-effective ways. Above all, not tackling the problem head on is, as much as anything else, likely to be an act of perpetuating economic, and educational, marginalization.

High Quality Courses and Learning Resources are Crucial to the Success of Technology-Enhanced Learning Initiatives

The South African TELI Report makes the observation that:

experience from around the world indicates that introducing technological hardware into education and training is generally the easiest part of the process, and often ends up being the cheapest in the long term. The development of course materials to be used with such technologies, whether they be printed resources, video cassettes, or computer-based resources, is a far more costly and time-consuming process, and is also an ongoing one.[7]

Based on this, it went on to assert that:

The successful introduction of technologies into teaching and learning environments depends on high quality course materials. Unfortunately, however, inadequate attention, time, and money are generally devoted to the design and development of such course materials. In order to change this, it is necessary to redirect significant funds to course design and development processes.[8]

Unfortunately, in many cases where technologies are being used to support or enhance learning, high quality learning materials are conspicuous by their absence. Often, the use of technologies is not accompanied by any materials development processes. This is particularly strange because it seems that this very traditional approach to using technologies to enhance learning adds cost to the teaching and learning process without any particular benefits. A critical lesson to be learned from good distance education practice is the notion that the course, rather than the educator, provides an appropriate learning environment for students. Rather than simply referring to a set of materials, however, the course is the structure of learning that is designed into the materials. It has four basic elements:

•     Conceptual pathways to command of its knowledge, conceptualizing skills, and practical abilities.

•     Educational strategies for helping the learner find his or her way through these pathways.

•     Summative and formative assessment that are integral to the learning process.

•     Materials and presentation of the course as a whole that excite, engage, and reward the learner. Courses should be designed so as to involve learners actively in their own learning, and should allow learners quick access and clear movement through them. Although there is no need for courses to use advanced technologies, most, but not necessarily all, will make use of a variety of media. Provision should also be made, in the design of courses, for the necessary practical work. In order to be as flexible and open as possible, courses should be organized in modules.

Education is a Process of Engagement Between Two Groups of People; Learners and Educators. If Either is Not Equipped to Engage Effectively, it is Unlikely to Succeed

Often, in technology-enhanced learning initiatives, people tend to lose sight of the fact that, regardless of the technologies used to support communication or resource provision, education remains – at its most fundamental – a process of engagement between two groups of people: learners and educators. To succeed, educational projects seeking to harness the potential of technologies will have to focus clearly on ensuring that both educators and learners are equipped to engage effectively in the teaching and learning that takes place. It is vital to incorporate clear strategies to ensure that both educators and learners are equipped with the necessary skills, knowledge, and competencies to engage effectively in any educational project using ICTs. Ideally, these strategies should focus also on ensuring that their ability to use the technologies that they come into contact with during a project extends beyond the scope of the project itself.

Integrate Quality Assurance into Projects from the Planning Phase

Internationally, there is growing recognition that one of the most effective ways of ensuring the continual improvement of educational provision is through the establishment of sustainable internal quality assurance mechanisms. Once up and running, these mechanisms can lead to effective self-improving systems within institutions and educational programmes. They can also function as ongoing motivation and professional development for staff. Of course, as with all such mechanisms, there is no guarantee that their implementation will lead to self-improving systems. Nor can such internal mechanisms fulfil all evaluation functions within an institution or programme. Ultimately, success is dependent on the integrity and commitment of the people who implement and participate in quality assurance processes and on their ability to select processes and evaluation strategies appropriate to the context of the institution or programme in which they are working.

Quality assurance focuses on processes and procedures that cannot, in themselves, ensure quality. The standards set, and the notions of quality upon which such standards are based, are crucial. Especially in education, it is dangerous to reduce quality assurance to a mechanistic process, which is not nurtured and challenged by vigorous debate on the aims of education. Although processes and procedures are the focus, these need to be based on a negotiated and dynamic set of values and seen in a particular context. Processes and procedures must be conducive to quality of performance by all involved. They are not controls or judgements external to that performance. They can be viewed as the means by which the members of an institution ensure that it becomes a learning organization.[9] This then prepares the organization for any externally initiated quality evaluation. 

A related guideline here concerns the importance of not working in isolation. By linking up with other institutions, organizations and programmes, people can learn a great deal from each other and so avoid mistakes which have already been made. Partnerships between urban and rural institutions are particularly important because of the very different conditions under which learning is taking place, and the varied ways in which technology can enhance learning in those different contexts.

Ensure that Technological Resources are Affordable and Cost-Effective

Sustainability is a major issue in the introduction of resources for learning. This requires careful costing, not only of the purchase of equipment, but also of its security, maintenance, the ongoing acquisition of software, and the training required for educators and learners who are going to use it. Questions of cost-effectiveness are closely related to the quality assurance activities referred to above. Can the impact of the technology be measured and how does this compare with its cost? Are there in fact cheaper and more effective alternatives? Once again, these are complex issues which need to be built into the planning and evaluation process from the start so that the experience gained can be directly related to whether the learning objectives are being achieved in ways that are sustainable in the long term.

Finding the Right Partners

Much has been made recently of the importance of partnership and cooperation in South African education, particularly in a context of limited resources and massive need. Very often, however, the principle of encouraging and fostering partnership and cooperation has been presented unproblematically as something intrinsically ‘good’. Much recent educational experience in South Africa has demonstrated unequivocally, however, that establishing partnerships is no guarantee of better educational provision. On the contrary, a partnership established on weak foundations – and between partners with widely differing initial agendas – is much more likely to create impediments to effective educational provision and lead to resource wastage than organizations working in isolation. 

The above observation is not a recommendation for abandoning partnerships. On the contrary, effective use of ICTs depends for its success on a range of carefully-established partnerships. Rather, it points the way to identifying crucial ingredients for successful partnership. Amongst others, these would include:

•     Building partnerships between organizations and individuals with broadly similar objectives. This does not imply that there is no room for differences of opinion or approach to solving problems. Indeed, accommodating difference effectively within partnerships can create much better education. However, when philosophies or objectives are antithetical, partnership is very unlikely to work well.

•     Identifying clearly the contributions of each partner - and their capacity to deliver accordingly - before beginning work.

•     Developing clear, commonly agreed principles for the operation of the partnership and strategies for dealing effectively - without creating hostility - with partners who fail to adhere to these principles. Developing clear, commonly agreed strategies to ask partners to leave or to enable them to withdraw from the partnership. This might be necessary if the partnership comes to deviate too far from a partner’s own objectives or principles. Perhaps more importantly, it may become necessary in the event of non-delivery by one or more partners.

Educational Sustainability

The importance of ensuring sustainability in technology-enhanced learning initiatives is generally well understood, notwithstanding the vast number of such initiatives that fail to achieve this sustainability in practice. Countless technology-enhanced learning initiatives have stumbled into the trap of over-investing in expensive technical infrastructure and woefully underestimating the expenses of investing in course materials design and development and administrative systems design, as well as the recurrent costs of maintaining technological systems in education. Thus, ensuring that projects can achieve long-term financial sustainability is a crucial component of their implementation. In addition, though, we believe that it is important to achieve educational sustainability, that is to ensure that technology-enhanced learning projects stay true to the original educational intentions. Often the route to financial sustainability involves a range of compromises on educational quality and relevance that may make financial sense but are an educational disaster. Thus, we believe that sustainability should not be measured simply in terms of whether or not projects remain affordable – usually the easiest benchmark for sustainability – but also whether or not they are achieving their intended educational objectives. Thus, efforts to achieve educational sustainability will need to be closely allied to quality assurance processes.

Plan for the Development of Appropriate Infrastructural Networks if ICT is to be Used Effectively

This point is concerned with the broader context in which learning occurs. It suggests that the usefulness of technology depends on a host of surrounding factors. Some of these are quite obvious - for example, is electricity available to light classrooms and drive the computers? Is the school or college accessible by road? Some people refer to the need to develop an ‘infrastructural backbone’, especially where electronic equipment is used. For example, telephone lines or wireless telecommunication paths are essential if computers are to be connected to each other or to the Internet through modems. Cellular telephones will operate only if they are in range of the satellite network. Planning the appropriate infrastructural ‘backbone’ for learning environments needs to be done in an integrated manner, involving all relevant policy-makers and implementers from a range of different sectors or government departments.

 Other infrastructural issues may not be quite so obvious. For example, are appropriate resources (such as videos and audio tapes) accessible to the educator who wishes to use them in the learning situation? Does the educator have some guidance as to what might work best for his/her purposes? Is it possible for him/her to use the material flexibly, or can it be used in only one way? What happens if the equipment breaks down - is there someone close by whose job it is to repair the equipment and get it going again quickly? And how will the equipment be secured whilst still being accessible when it is required for learning?

 Footnotes 

[1] SAIDE Distance Education at Traditionally Contact Higher Education Institutions.

[2] Of course - the Internet does have the additional advantage that learners or educators would have access to a range of text-book like resources, and would be able to pick and choose from these without having to purchase a book. As the storage is the investment of the content developer, the user can potentially have access to a library of text books. Also, not all web-based educational resource development should seek to be new or make full use of the multimedia web environment (using graphics, audio and video clips, java applets, links to other resources and so on). The Internet can also be a good repository for existing volumes of educational content. Consider the lucrative practice of selling sets of past examination papers - common at grade twelve matriculation and in higher education institutions.  Examination papers (or sets of assessment activities) are useful to learners and educators alike. Having a database of all such assessment activities that is accessible to all who care to use it could be a substantial resource contribution to any education system.

[3] Darch (1996). Higher Education Review. Sunday Independent. 8.

[4] Darch (Ibid.). 9.

[5] Bates (1991). Media and Two-Way Communication in Distance Education. Distance Education: A Developing Method, Norwegian State Institution for Distance Education/NKI. 1.

[6] Education (1996). Technology-Enhanced Learning in South Africa: A Discussion Document. Pretoria, Government Printer. 39.

[7] Ibid. 96.

[8] Ibid. 105.

[9] Argyris (1978). Organisational Learning: A Theory of Action Perspective. Reading, Mass., Addison Wesley.