Human Touch: The Missing Attribute In E-Learning

Abstract

The microelectronic age we find ourselves nowadays has the potential for helping all of us to share in the inherited and accumulating resources of human beings. However, the computer and its accessories will not automatically supply us with improved human resources. We need to be reminded that many past technological innovations that were widely publicized as solutions to problems of curriculum and instruction simply failed to materialize. In their writing, Tyack and Hansot point out that "Those who seek pedagogical salvation in computers ignore the fate of earlier technological panaceas", (Shane, 1987). They conclude that teachers remain the key to effective instruction that effective instruction resides in warm persons who care and who can communicate with learners of any age. For such persons e-Iearning and computers become a resource for extending human potential.
It is the purpose of this paper to extrapolate irreplacability of teachers by exclusive elearning system. The topics covered are e-learning as an aid to teachers, new framework for curriculum and instruction for the future, tomorrow's teacher role, does technology define our education and finally, can technology save us from our own mistakes.