E-Learning is an approach to teaching -1

eLearning, I suppose, is an  approach to teaching as opposed to being a  tool of teaching. Of course, eLearning involves the use of a number of technological tools. However, eLearning, as an approach, primarily, to encourage students to construct their own knowledge in collaboration with other learners as well as experts in that subject matter. eLearning, therefore, is about collaborative construction of knowledge.

The use of technology in education, on the other hand, has a significant history. Initially, computers were applied in behaviourist modes in accordance with Skinner’s work (Ravenscroft 2001), which emphasized the teacher’s control over what is learned and how it is to be learned.

However, the emphasis, more recently, is on the co-construction of knowledge in collaboration with peers and/or  others which provide students with opportunities to develop their own understandings. Skinner’s behaviourism, Piaget’s cognitive constructivism and Vygotsky’s social constructivism can all be facilitated through eLearning. Tools and technologies are only a part of the whole issue. eLearning primarily is an approach to teaching.