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A distance education learner is an individual who:
- is a high school graduate or holds a General
Education Development (GED) certificate
- chooses an alternative route to take course
work
Benefits of Distance Education:
- offers flexible educational experiences for
nontraditional students
- enables individuals to enrich themselves,
improve a particular skill for current or future employment
- allows students to try a college course to
see if you want to pursue a degree
- permits students to take college course work
to transfer to another institution
Successful Learning
Success in distance education courses depends on self-discipline and the ability
to learn without face-to-face interaction. IUP's distance education courses
maintain the same rigor and high standards as its classroom courses. Academic
progress is established and maintained through regular course participation.
Online students need to be prepared to interact with faculty members and
course-mates in writing. Strong reading and writing skills in the English
language are critical. The course is organized around the main screen from
which you may reach individual modules; or you may proceed directly to bulletin
board, help, chat room, professor, and/or references. Each module screen has two
frames. The menu frame on the left allows you to reach any portion of the notes
directly. The right frame shows you the contents of the notes. The notes have
embedded activities from which you can directly post your answers to e-mail or
the bulletin board.
What to do after your registration has been approved
Approximately three weeks prior to the beginning of the course you will receive
a letter from the professor that contains helpful information you will need. In
the meantime you would like to prepare for the course, you do the following:
- Order textbooks. Call and order the textbook
from the IUP Co-Op
Store at 800-537-7916.
- Develop WebCT competencies. In order to
successfully complete a distance education course you should develop
competency in WebCT using functions like e-mail, discussion, and quiz.
- Navigate the World Wide Web.
Browsing the Internet
If you
are not an Internet user, you may find it takes a little while to adjust to the
constantly changing environment of the Internet, and the frustrations that are
often associated with new technology. Your first pre-requisite then is to learn
as much as you can about browsing the Internet. The best thing to do is to get
connected and start surfing the net (browsing the vast pool of information
available on the Internet). This will provide the skills necessary to begin
using WebCT. A factor in most courses includes using the Internet, a massive
repository of information from myriad sources. You will use the Internet and
your web browser for information and reference. In order to optimally gain the
best benefit from a site, it is important for you to understand and apply search
engines such as:
http://www.dogpile.com
http://www.webcrawler.com
http://www.altavista.com
http://www.google.com
Seeking information
-- Notice that most search engines provide basic and advanced search features.
You can also enter different forms of the search: "__" (quotation marks must be
typed) for an exact match or words separated by + signs to combine terms.
Please explore these engines and practice navigating through the systems if you
are not already familiar with the function.
Evaluating Information
-- Since the World Wide Web contains information from many sources, it is
imperative you check that the site includes valid and current offerings. Make
sure the sources are legitimate, contain accurate information (citing good
references and sources), cross-reference information with varied sources, and
are organized for information dissemination. It is also important to check the
dates when the latest revisions were entered to ensure the information is
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