1) Tiffin and Rajasingham define education as a process of communication operating on the "assumption that all of us in the long run need some assistance to acquire complex sets of skills that are external to us." As they explain it, "education is a process of enculturation, of learning how to deal with the world and solve the myriads of problems it presents, according to the ways of a particular culture."
What do you think of these definitions?
2) The authors assert that our current educational system is based upon enculturation into an industrial society. In what ways is this or isn't this true? Do we need a new paradigm based upon an information society, a "system based upon telecommunications rather than transport?"
How close are we, anyway, to an information-based society? In any case, should the educational system be modeled upon society as it currently is, or should it prepare children to enter society as we want it to evolve? In other words, does the vision begin in the schools, or does it filter down?
3) What does an information-based paradigm add? The authors assert that virtual learning brings closer the ideal of asynchronous learning, eliminates physical restrictions, allows for a greater course variety, and provides a link with like-minded students around the world. Is this true? If there truly are no physical restrictions to the virtual school district, who pays for the equipment and software development and distribution? The only disadvantages Tiffin and Rajasingham allude to are a decrease in real-time socializing. What other disadvantages do you see?
In other words, "What will be the social, economic, political and psychological consequences if the virtual class becomes the dominant mode of instruction?"
4) Tiffin and Rajasingham talk a lot about the necessity of a classroom setting in our current understanding of education. As they define it, "classrooms are bounded systems which, paradoxically, isolate learners from the problems of the real world in order to study the problems of the real world." As the authors explain, some scholars believe that this isolation is critical; that without it, we are mere animals reacting to the world on a visceral rather than intellectual level. How essential do you see the classroom setting to be? What are its assets and limitations? What do we need to take from this in our construction of a virtual classroom?
5) Other things to think about in our consideration of the virtual classroom:
Four Factors of Learning:
Three Functions of Communication
How does the concept of a virtual classroom interact with these models?