Active Elearning - Driving Online Students to Learn Better and Enjoy Learning at the Same Time

Students differ from one another; there are those who are fond of studying, others study because they need to but there is one sure thing when it comes to how students learn: they learn more if they enjoy learning. When someone enjoys what they are doin vedic maths g they develop passion for that certain activity. People have hobbies because they are fond of that activity and they dedicate time and effort in their hobbies. This human behavior applies to everything, including learning. When students find their lessons engaging and entertaining they will look forward to their learning sessions. If the teaching method used by an instructor or professor are monotonous and routinely, students tend to loose focus and attention in participating in the lesson being taught. Observe in classes where a teacher conducts an hour of pure lecture, you can see students chatting with other students, doodling and drawing in their notepads or worst some students are sleeping in class. The reason why students reacted in that way is because they find the lesson boring. Boredom can really hinder students from learning. Through online learning where students learn right in front of their computers, the risk of boredom is greater. Elearning software solutions create active learning content key to blow boredom away and let students actively study. More and more authoring software are being developed to create active learning content. However online learning authoring software is only a tool, it still depends on authors to create active learning contents. In the virtual classroom, content authors should not always let their target market or students act as passive viewers only. If it always allows online students become passive learners most of the time students will probably lose focus. Losing focus could let online students do other things than pay attention to their lesson. In real classrooms, student chat, draw and even sleep if they are bored, in the virtual classroom distraction are abundant, online students could play online games, check email, visit their networking account, stream videos and do other online activities. So how does an online learning author create an active learning content that will allow students to become active participants in online learning? Understand the target market of the online learning content. Elearning authors should study the characteristic of the target market. What is the age bracket of the students? What online website do they often visit? What interest or what hooks them? In this way online learning authors can tailor made learning content based on what their target audience wants. Adopt interactive features. If the student market is around 18-25 years old most likely they are interested in websites like YouTube, Facebook, twitter and online games. Adopting features from these websites one could turn a passive lecture into an engaging and interactive learning experience. Example a boring quiz can be spiced up, adopt a video or online games mechanics to turn a simple quiz into an interacting quiz game. Create a lecture supported by interesting videos, recreate the same viewing pleasure students feel when they are viewing web streaming website like YouTube. Active online learning content could really make a difference in the success of an online learning system. Elearning software solutions provide a tool to create interactive materials but it is the authors who have the skill and responsibility to come up with the ideas to make active learning content possible. They should always come up with fresh ideas and learn how to maximize authoring tools to create materials that will make online students active learners and not passive viewers only.