Environmental and Social Issues
One benefit of online education is it is paperless. The same page can be served to every computer in a classroom as easily as to a single student. No photocopies to be crumpled, lost, or turned into paper aeroplanes for later use in the playground. One aim of this project is to extend it by adding Program and register facilities and student class lists and mark registers. Using this approach could automate many of the repetitive tasks teachers have to do. Documents could be updated without needing to reprint thirty copies; those documents needed for record keeping can be printed using a print friendly version of the page, designed as a separate CSS file attached to the original document.
Any subject can be taught in this manner, of course. What is needed is access to computers in the classroom. Routine access to computers is far from the norm, however, but for an IT subject it is an appropriate way to present a course. While it is possible to download all materials needed over the internet, a more feasible solution in a school is to run the site on the school's intranet, speeding up the delivery of the pages to individual computers, and removing the need for an external internet connection.
Using this approach can make substantial savings in paper. Class notes, exercises and assignments can be posted; students can submit work; it is possible to set multiple choice exams that can be marked automatically and the results saved into your marks register.
The social benefits of this type of education are intriguing; having myself been engaged in online learning I can see the advantages, but also the potential drawbacks if not accompanied by direct, personal contact with the teacher. In particular I notice the lack of the ‘progress report' or informal feedback on the quality of an assignment before it is finally submitted.