untitled

Distance Education, Vol. 25, No. 2, October 2004
Charting Trends for E-Learning in
Asian Schools
John G. Hedberg* and Lim Cher Ping
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
E-Learning is the conﬂuence of many technology-based learning opportunities. It employs
technologies as part of the delivery systems, as tools to assist with the representation of ideas, and
most recently as the integration of processes and the topics to be learned. This paper reviews some
of the approaches adopted by Asian schools and charts the trends that will guide instructional
designers as they seek to effectively employ e-learning strategies. It also suggests a more integrated
view of e-learning for those managing the learning and training systems within schools.
Introduction
Over the last few years, e-learning has been perceived to be the springboard for
lifelong learning in schools, where learners learn how to seek out new information,
think critically and show initiative to meet up with the challenges of the fast-chang-
ing world. E-Learning can mean asynchronous or synchronous facilitation of learn-
ing over the Internet to the learner’s computer wherever it is located. It has the
potential to provide students with access to up-to-date information anywhere and
any time, to promote active and independent learning, and to support communi-
cation between experts and novices (Rosenberg, 2000).
Attracted by these opportunities, schools all over the world began to focus on the
technological challenges of buying the right learning management system (LMS),
getting enough bandwidth allocated to e-learning, and obtaining state-of-the-art
learning tools and materials. In the context of this paper, e-learning in schools takes
two different but complementary forms, in which e-learning tools are used to
mediate:
• distance education where students and teachers are separated by time and place
(McIsaac & Gunawardena, 1996);
*Corresponding author. Learning Sciences and Technology, National Institute of Education,
Nanyang Technological University, 1 Nanyang Walk, Singapore 637616.
Email: jhedberg@nie.edu.sg
ISSN 0158-7919 (print); 1475-0198 (online)/04/020199-15
© 2004 Open and Distance Learning Association of Australia, Inc.
DOI: 10.1080/0158791042000262148

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J. G. Hedberg and Lim Cher Ping
• classroom activities where students and teachers are at the same time and place
but students are given the opportunities to work at their pace.
A Frost and Sullivan (Business Times, 2003) survey of the e-learning market in Asia
estimated:
the total market size to be US$1,321.82 million in 2003. This is expected to go up to
US$2,761.87 million by 2005. The academic component of this market is about
one-third at US$479.58 million in 2003, and is expected to go up to US$1,211.98
million by 2005. Taking 2001 as the base year, this represents a compound annual
growth rate (CAGR) of 64.46 per cent through 2005. (http://it.asia1.com.sg/newsdaily/
news003 20030408.html)
The academic component in the report referred to institutes of higher education,
vocational institutions and schools.
However, we have to be aware that the value of e-learning does not inhere solely
on the technologies and content, it depends a lot on the approaches adopted both
at the micro and macro levels. This paper ﬁrst examines some approaches that Asian
schools are adopting towards e-learning, and attempts to chart possible trends for
e-learning in Asia. These trends may be categorized as either the design of learning
tasks, or the support and resources in the learning environment. The former
spearheads the trends by addressing issues of authenticity, on-demand learning and
assessment, while the latter includes knowledge management, digital libraries,
learning objects, communities of practice and emerging technologies.
E-Learning Approaches in Asia
Asian countries are at different stages of development of the use of information and
communication technologies (ICTs) in education. The UNESCO (2003) compre-
hensive report reviewed 90 ICT projects in education and concluded that the
current stage of development means that countries can be roughly categorized into
three types: those which are already integrating the use of ICTs into the education
systems; those which are starting to apply and test various strategies; and those
which have just begun and are more concerned with ICT infrastructure and
connectivity installation. Needless to say, there are countries, especially in the
Paciﬁc, which have not started at all.
The UNESCO report continues with a three-level categorization, depending upon
the main focus of their ICT initiatives:
• Advanced countries (integrating ICTs into the education system) include South Korea
and Singapore. The characteristics include: almost all classrooms have been
equipped with computers and other ICTs; they have a high student/computer
ratio; there is a high level of Internet access to all schools; the curriculum has been
revised to ensure that ICTs become integral nationwide; and delivery of education
is increasingly online.
• Countries with national ICT policies and master plans, applying and testing various

Charting Trends for E-Learning in Asian Schools
201
strategies but not fully integrating ICTs within education, include China, Thailand,
Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, and India. While there is great variation, common
features are: developed national ICT policies in education, and established goals
and objectives about introducing ICTs in various aspects of education.
• Beginning countries, either with national policies, but not enough resources to implement
their policies and work plans, or without policies, but running pilot ICT projects, include
Myanmar, Lao PDR, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Bangladesh, among others. Some
have developed national policies; some have ICT projects on a small scale. All lack
the budgets to implement their policies and work plans, with infrastructure and
ICT penetration as the main concern.
Regardless of categories, many schools in Asia are exploring innovative strategies to
ensure the success of e-learning. Some examples of successful pedagogical, policy
and technological approaches to e-learning employed by Asian schools include:
1. individualized learning (customizable learning paths and scaffolding templates);
2. greater emphasis on just-in-time learning and on-demand training;
3. increased collaboration between schools and industrial partners;
4. review of the modes of assessment with a shift towards formative assessment,
learning process, and peer- and self-assessment;
5. building learning communities among teachers and learners;
6. pedagogical shifts with increased emphasis on meaning making and knowledge
construction and less on practice and repetition;
7. reassessing and reﬁning the curriculum towards interdisciplinary teaching and
learning, and allowing for more ﬂexibility;
8. acknowledgement of the complexities of the ICT learning environment.
Of course, these approaches are more common for countries around the region that
have reached reasonable stages of establishing infrastructure, especially Singapore,
Malaysia, Japan, Korea, India, Brunei, Thailand and Hong Kong. It is less true for
those that are still striving to obtain more computers (or even electricity) to schools
(e.g., Vietnam, Laos, Indonesia, and Cambodia).
Schools in Singapore, for example, have been working with industry partners to
create and acquire Interactive Broadband Multimedia (IBBMM) content for their
e-learning platform, to develop tools and platforms for teachers and students, to
provide training for teachers and students to familiarize them with the tools and the
content, and to provide technical assistance to maintain and update the content for
the teachers and students. In many instances, the partners have explored—with
teams of teachers and students—ways and innovations to improve upon the
pedagogical aspects of IBBMM in the school curriculum. One example project at St.
Andrew’s
Junior
College,
Singapore
(http://onezine.s-one.net.sg/@School/
Standrew/) consists of a set of 30 physics experiments with video illustration and
online technical notes and worksheets. The experiments illustrate and explain basic
physics principles, reinforce basic concepts, and allow for reﬂection of concepts and
principles learnt. Students can work through the experiments at their own pace,

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J. G. Hedberg and Lim Cher Ping
supported by a variety of scaffolding tools, to achieve the learning objectives of the
online lessons. Similar projects between schools and industry partners to promote
knowledge construction among students can also be observed in the Philippines,
Thailand, and Indonesia. In the Philippines, for example, the Adopt-a-School Act of
1998 complements direct assistance packages from the government by encouraging
ﬁrms to develop online resources for schools (Tinio, 2002).
To ensure that teachers and learners are equipped with ICT-related skills for
teaching and learning online, many Asian countries have shifted away from “just-in-
case” to “just-in-time.” In Thailand, the new curriculum standards in 2003 have
dropped ICTs as a separate subject in school and instead are encouraging the
integration of ICTs into the curriculum as tools for developing decision making,
critical thinking and communication skills. A particular set of ICT-related skills are
now taught or learnt just before the commencement of the module or lesson that
integrates a particular ICT tool. In some secondary schools in Singapore, a needs
training programme caters to teachers’ further development of ICTs and pedagogi-
cal skills. Such just-in-time learning ensures further professional development of
teachers and minimizes the reliance on the less effective one-off workshop strategy
without any follow-up. Changing the professional development model to include a
range of activities over time is in line with current thinking about what approach
would have the greatest impact on the professional development of teachers (see, for
example, Hoban, 2002)
In South Korea, digital libraries for primary and secondary education have been
introduced to support and deliver teaching and learning based on the enquiry-based
approach. The initiatives of developing school libraries and adopting new pedagog-
ical approaches are in response to the urgent need for education reform to meet the
demands of knowledge-based society. The reform focuses on two main issues: ﬁrst,
greater freedom in choice of time and place in learning; and, second, knowledge
conceptualized as something generated or constructed socially by individuals.
EduNet is the backbone of this infrastructure run by the Korean Educational
Research Information System (KERIS). The digital library supports the provision of
instructional materials, while experts and novices meet on EduNet to share ideas
and information. The participants in EduNet are usually teachers who support each
other in subject-speciﬁc teaching and learning strategies and resources, and help
each other in implementing new education initiatives. The digital libraries and
EduNet complement each other and facilitate the building of a community of
practitioners among teachers in Korea (UNESCO, 2004).
On a smaller scale, a digital library project has also been implemented in some
schools in Thailand to provide them with a repository of Thai-based teaching/learn-
ing lessons contributed by a university (Kasertsart University, Thailand), a science-
centre-based team and by other teachers and students. The project also offers these
schools the opportunity to participate in international collaborative projects and
training courses. At the national level, Thailand has developed science, mathematics
and technology education materials that include e-books, e-journals and courseware.
The recent project, entitled “Developing an Educational Resources Clearing

Charting Trends for E-Learning in Asian Schools
203
House,” initiated by the Ministry of Education, offers a database of resources
produced by all ministerial departments and organizations, and it includes curricu-
lum and supplementary materials. These projects may gradually change the roles of
the learner and teacher in education and training. The learner is no longer a passive
recipient of information delivery. With the help of the teacher, knowledge is
constructed in the minds of individual learners (Witayangkoon, 2003).
In Malaysia, the SchoolNet project aims at providing Internet broadband access
to 10,000 primary and secondary schools. The project aims to link up all schools,
including those in East Malaysia, to the SchoolNet to enhance their teaching and
learning capabilities. These include catering to the different capabilities of students,
allowing students to learn at their own pace, meeting the needs of both teacher-cen-
tred and student-centred learning environments, and allowing for the horizontal
integration between subjects and vertical integration between learning areas in a
subject.
While curriculum redesign is an important factor to ensure effective e-learning,
assessment approaches also need to be reconsidered if effective change is to occur.
Curriculum and assessment are interdependent and mutually supportive. There is
often a greater role for formative assessment in an e-learning environment, as
observed in Singapore and Thai schools, and an online programme in India. In
Singapore, different modes of assessment such as project work, simulation software
to assess students’ ability to formulate hypotheses, and self-assessment software are
being explored by administrators, teachers, and students in schools. In Thailand, the
new curriculum standards encourage the use of authentic assessment across the
curriculum. The traditional paper-and-pencil test methods are gradually giving way
to portfolio assessment, group or individual observation, peer evaluation and per-
formance assessment. In an online education programme on rehabilitation and
resettlement offered since 2001, the mode of assessment is a formative-summative
blend that includes an online computer marked assignment, participation in dis-
cussion forums and an online diary (Mishra & Jain, 2002).
E-Learning Challenges
The examples of the e-learning approaches of Asian schools discussed in the
previous section suggest a need for the effective alignment between practice, policy,
and technology, and a more urgent need for teachers to shift from traditional to
rethought approaches to learning. These interrelationships and shifts are represented
conceptually in Table 1. In rethinking approaches to learning, alternative pedagogi-
cal models may be constructed—models that will provide a better balance of control
among teachers, students, schools, policy makers and industrial partners. Students
will then no longer focus upon testing themselves within a traditional assessment
regime with little concern for the situatedness of the knowledge, and also the social
and network sharing of resources.
Rethought approaches require mixed modes of learning; they require the use of
asynchronous modes to allow greater ﬂexibility and shift the time demands; and they

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J. G. Hedberg and Lim Cher Ping
Table 1. Aligning practice, policy and technology: from traditional to rethought approaches
Context of ICT
Traditional approaches
Rethought approaches
Focus on incorporation of
Focus on rethinking the
technology in classroom
strategies and curriculum to
Discourse is on integration
integrate in authentic and
(adding on to existing
technology-enhanced learning
strategies, teacher-centred
systems
Pedagogy/classroom
Technology is used to deliver
Technology is used to support
content
thinking and task completion
Most popular tools are drill
Focus in on construction of
and practice or learning
personal meaningful artefacts
management systems
Distributed instructional
Centralized design of
design
resources
Curriculum is based on
Curriculum is process
knowledge lists and some
oriented
processes.
Focus in on learning
Content is decontextualized
outcomes and student choice
System/policy
Focus is on organization and
Teachers are supported in
provision of equipment and
their design of learning
resources
experiences with just-in-time
Focus is on teacher skill
skills provision
enhancement
Focus is on student-generated
and researched texts
Focus is on system texts
Focus is on hardware and
Focus is on mobility,
software
communication software,
Special technologies for
Internet linkages and shared
speciﬁc tasks
communities of interests
Technology/applications
Content is designed for
Technology is ubiquitous
display on particular
Content conforms to the
technologies
available technology for
“One size ﬁts many”
display
Software is focused on
personal need and support of
people in place
require learners to have access to authentic resources and to determine how and
when they are used. Effective mobile and creative applications are more likely to be
feasible with a focus on communities of practice, shared learning resources, and the
increasing mobility and miniaturization of technologies. In rethought approaches,
individuals are increasingly determining their own learning needs, seeking resources
and choosing their own strategies that match these needs. Those who cannot
identify their training and learning requirements are at a disadvantage. However, the
learning tasks given to learners become more critical if the rethought approach is
going to use the capabilities that access to networks provides. Therefore, for the

Charting Trends for E-Learning in Asian Schools
205
potentials of the rethought approach to be fulﬁlled, three issues become critically
important for successful e-learning in Asian schools:
1. design of learning tasks;
2. support and resources in the learning environment;
3. reorganizing the ways we communicate.
Design of Learning Tasks
Several research studies have shown that learner engagement is paramount to
learning success (Herrington, Oliver, & Reeves, 2003; Lim & Tay, 2003). Engage-
ment here is deﬁned as the “the mobilisation of cognitive, affective and motivational
strategies for interpretive transactions” (Bangert-Drowns & Pike, 2001, p. 215) of
the learning activities through interactions with others and worthwhile tasks (Kears-
ley & Shneiderman, 1998). In the e-learning environment, engagement must entail
mindfulness, cognitive effort, and attention of the learners in that environment.
When learners are engaged in the learning process, levels of learning and retention
are possibly increased, and hence the whole learning experience is enhanced (Kears-
ley & Shneiderman, 1998). The question then is: “How do we design the learning
task to engage learners in the e-learning environment?”
Authenticity
Authentic tasks have the capability to motivate and encourage learner participation
by facilitating learners’ engagement with the instructional message of the e-learning
component. Learners need to know why they are learning something. Herrington
and her colleagues (2003) claim that immersion in authentic tasks can provide
motivation that is needed for the initial perseverance of an otherwise “discomforting
and unfamiliar settings” (p. 69). When such familiarity is developed, learners are
more likely to be engaged in the learning process and, as a result, more likely to
apply the new knowledge and skills to their work or lives. In the context of
problem-based learning, several studies have shown that the solving of authentic
problems helps learners to see the meaningfulness and relevance of what they learn
(Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2000; Jonassen, 1997). Unlike traditional direct
instruction, learning by problem solving begins with the presentation of an authentic
problem that is central to the learning goal. These problems serve as springboards
for enquiry; information-gathering; and reﬂection of theoretical concepts and rela-
tionships, industrial standards, norms and practices, and culture. Increasingly, the
choice of authentic problems focuses more upon ill-structured problems, which are
messy and complex in nature, with no ﬁxed and “right” solutions. The choice of
authentic problems increases the cues around the learning task, increases the
awareness of how elements are combined in different contexts, and increases the

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intrinsic motivation of learners who feel the skills they are employing represent those
they will employ in real-world contexts.
Just-in-Time Learning
Another aspect of learning task design is the time the knowledge and skills are to be
employed. Instead of focusing on “just-in-case” learning, “just-in-time” learning
may be more effective. For example, students who are taught to use spreadsheet
programs just in case they need to use the spreadsheet in their mathematics or
science lessons may forget much of what they learn if they have little chance to
practise and employ these skills shortly after being taught. But “just-in-time”
learning provides these students with more personal and relevant reasons for
learning about the spreadsheet program to carry out certain learning tasks; in this
case they are asked to learn the skills only when there is a need for them to employ
these skills in a learning activity.
Gery (1995) has written extensively about the need to generate performance
support systems that match the time and type of support needed. In particular, she
has suggested structures for electronic performance support systems (EPSS) that
can reduce the need for “just-in-case” training and convert more to “just-in-time”
training, thus saving organizations on unused training. Once the approach is con-
sidered common within the organization, it also reduces the need to prepare huge
amounts of e-learning training resources before they are really required. Laffey
(1995) has also suggested that employing performance support tools can “act as an
intelligent assistant responding to the needs articulated by the performer, and … act
as a mentor guiding the performer to a higher level of the work being performed”
(p. 40). Thus, the employment of a performance support approach goes beyond the
distribution of information, for which many e-learning systems are currently used, so
that they become modelled solutions demonstrating an awareness of situated cogni-
tion (Hedberg, Brown, Larkin, & Agostinho, 2001).
Assessment
As the processes of acquiring information and skills changes in the new world of
e-learning, so does the concept of assessment and what should best reﬂect effective
assessment. With the new e-learning technologies, assessment tasks can be progres-
sively captured, reviewed, and shared. The record of progressive versions of an
artefact not only explain the development of thinking but can be a powerful way of
linking the processes through which they were constructed to a metacognitive
awareness of why the process has been successful or unsuccessful. Not only does this
shift employ metacognitive strategies but also, if the task has been well designed,
then the learner will know when it has been effectively completed. This in turn will
diminish the need to have repetitious feedback and support systems in place,
reducing costs and ensuring that the learner is aware of their own solution patterns.

Charting Trends for E-Learning in Asian Schools
207
Support and Resources in the Learning Environment
As we have intimated above, the nature of the learning environment is moving
beyond the static Web site managed by LMS as a repository of information.
Increasingly, instructional designers are asked to scaffold solutions and encourage
learners to actively search and actively contribute resources. In this area, trends are
emerging at different levels of the information enterprise. At the micro level, learning
objects are considered effective ways of reducing the need for high-cost reproduction
of similar resources. Within each organization, we are becoming more aware of how
we can manage our resources through the employment of knowledge management
concepts, and at the macro level we are sharing resources in more intelligent and
organized ways through the sifted and sorted world of digital libraries.
Learning Objects
Learning objects may be loosely deﬁned as any digital resources that can be reused
to mediate learning. Gerard (1969), in a surprisingly visionary statement early in the
history of computer-based instruction, describes how “curricular units can be made
smaller and combined, like standardised Meccano [mechanical building set] parts,
into a great variety of particular programs custom-made for each learner” (pp. 29–
30). Thirty years later, the value and practicality of this idea is becoming apparent.
This trend leads the choice in the next generation of instructional design, develop-
ment, and delivery of e-learning, owing to its potential for reusability, adaptability,
generativity, and scalability (Lim, 2002).
Reusability is the fundamental idea behind learning objects where small instruc-
tional Web-based components are reused in different learning contexts. Adaptability
refers to the individualization of instruction where the online learning system makes
decisions about the nature of the subsequent events (linking to instructional objects)
to be used in the learner’s learning based on a set of response-dependent rules.
Generativity refers to the ability of the online learning system to create instructional
messages and interactions by combining reusable instructional objects and interac-
tion elements rather than by storing pre-composed messages and interaction logics
(Gibbons, Nelson, & Richards, 2000). And scalability refers to the possibilities of
expanding the number of users who might learn with such systems while containing
incremental development costs. In this case, online learning systems make use of
learning objects through a number of mechanisms: “reusability, standardised con-
nectivity, modularity to optimise transmission from central stores, and standardised
manufacture” (Gibbons et al., 2000, p. 11).
How big or small the reusable learning object is—its “granularity”—will pose a
trade-off between the possible beneﬁts of reuse and the speciﬁcity of content and
eventually the expense of cataloguing. In order to ensure that these objects are
searchable, there is a need to consider their metadata—i.e. “data about data,” the
descriptive information about a resource. It allows one to locate the item very
quickly without investigating all the individual items through which one is searching.

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J. G. Hedberg and Lim Cher Ping
Most metadata created include title, author, subject, topic, version, and format. It
may consist of ﬁlling out a form of 20-odd ﬁelds like “Semantic Density.” However,
there is a need to focus more on the pedagogy-related information such as objec-
tives, target audience and approaches to support the decision-making process
(Schatz, 2000).
Knowledge Management
Knowledge management is more widely understood within the industrial arena than
education at this time. The move to training systems, which are derived from an
increasingly participative workforce, which contributes to the knowledge base of the
ﬁrm, is increasingly seen as a competitive advantage of modern ﬁrms. Bhatt (2001)
has described knowledge management as the creation, validation, presentation,
distribution, and application of knowledge within an organizational environment. As
recently as 2002, in a survey of Australian universities (CAUL, 2002), only 10
respondents (38% of 26 responses) were aware of the issues and had any plans for
capturing the knowledge generated within their organizations. No survey has been
conducted in schools to date and it can be predicted that the situation may be
similar to that of the Australian universities surveyed.
There is an increasing convergence of knowledge management and e-learning as
managers become aware that they both depend upon similar underlying technologies
(Barron, 2000). Indeed, Inglis (2003) has suggested that in addition to the regular
functions of the university such as teaching, research, administration, and e-learn-
ing, knowledge management is essentially converging with
e-learning at a time when capacity and graphical processing limits of computers and
software have been lifted. [It] offers the prospect of very much more interesting
solutions and, given the strong organizational learning orientation of Knowledge
Management, solutions that are much more closely aligned with contemporary thinking
on teaching and learning. (p. 9)
These opportunities provided by knowledge management for universities are also
available to schools in which teaching is their central role.
Digital Libraries
At the most macro level we have also seen in recent times the combination and
collaboration of individual repositories in interested professional domains. For
example, the digital library for earth sciences (DLESE1) located in Colorado and
supported by the National Science Foundation provides a meta-tagged index to
several of their constituent institutions which is selected and annotated as being
relevant to both professionals and novices in the ﬁeld. Searches for “earth wind and
ﬁre” in this database will not return links to a pop group. Further, it can be expected
that with more detailed meta-tags the materials returned could be identiﬁed by
language and level of expertise of the user, thus ensuring that the materials can be

Charting Trends for E-Learning in Asian Schools
209
matched to the enquirer’s language skills. The design of scaffolded “road maps” to
the resources will be the next test for instructional designers, as they seek to provide
useful paths that will support constructivist or didactic instructional strategies.
Reorganizing the Ways we Communicate
Changing Cultures: From learning communities to communities of practitioners
A community of practitioners is fundamentally identiﬁable by its activities, practices,
and tools used. It is also connected by intricate, socially constructed webs of belief
and ways of thinking. What is considered real and authentic within a community is
framed by its culture and demands. Meaning is socially constructed through negoti-
ations among present and past members. Activities thus cohere in a way that is, in
theory, if not always in practice, accessible to members who move within the social
network. Hence, every member in the community counts. Every member helps to
frame the culture. However, in education, we really only have communities of
learners unless they seize control of their own interactions and resource sharing.
Realistically, the move from the types of linkages and groupings that are possible
within formal courses are constrained and forced compared with professional groups
determining their own agenda and activities. The move from learning community to
community of practice, which might provide some exciting possibilities for pro-
fessional development, is somewhat peripatetic (Hung, Hedberg, Koh, & Tan,
2003).
Emerging Technologies
New communication technologies such as Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) and
General Packet Radio Services (GPRS) can facilitate the development of a com-
munity of practitioners. WAP is an open, global speciﬁcation that empowers mobile
users with wireless devices to easily access and interact with real, anytime, anywhere
information and services similar to those on the Internet in a very thin client
environment, “thin” meaning virtually no processor power and very limited display
rendering capabilities. GPRS, on the other hand, is a standard for wireless commu-
nications which runs at speeds of up to 150 kilobits per second, compared with the
current Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) system’s 9.6 kilobits.
GPRS, which supports a wide range of bandwidths, is an efﬁcient use of limited
bandwidth and is particularly suited for sending and receiving small bursts of data,
such as e-mail and Web browsing, as well as large volumes of data. The essential
difference between WAP and GPRS is that WAP is a presentation service/browser
while GPRS is a network technology.
The important educational opportunities of such communication technologies lie
in their connectivity via micro-browser-equipped mobile phones or GPRS-enabled
handheld computers: they connect learners at different geographical locations be-
yond the boundaries of classrooms, allow learners to exchange information within a

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short period of time synchronously and asynchronously, and provide the ﬂexibility
for one-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-many communications. Connectivity
among learners is critical for a learning community, without which social construc-
tion of collective knowledge will be greatly impeded (Lim & Lee, 2003).
From Trends and Challenges to Actions
The trends and challenges we have outlined in this paper are not just technological
changes; they represent rethought approaches with conceptual shifts about the ways
in which learning tasks are structured and accessed, and the strategies through which
resources are generated, managed, and shared. We believe that the series of
rethought innovations throughout the Asian region are indicators of the possible
challenges suggested in the second section of this paper. Predicting the future is
always fraught but the personal utility and the apparent simplicity of the challenges
are indicators of the parsimony of explanation to support these directions. In
addition, the growth of interest groups into learning communities in formal courses
and communities of practice in professional contexts provides a ready vehicle for
generating and sharing of resources, experiences, and expertise. The challenges we
have outlined may substantially change the learning experience, but many actions
can be undertaken without the need for high-technology solutions, making them
possible within a wide variety of economic contexts. Particular strategies such as
developing learning communities or collaborations between schools and other cul-
tural institutions such as museums and libraries offer the possibilities of maintained
cultural relevance at the same time.
Given also that access to technologies will always be a challenge for governments
and individual schools, the changes in technology costs and more innovative strate-
gies for their deployment can support a rapid move into the digital world. Already,
students are more familiar with mobile telephony for social communications and
resource sharing than their teachers. With the rapid changes in functionality of
mobile devices, not only are our learning tools likely to be more affordable but they
are also already beginning to change form to support greater integration of functions
with increased miniaturization.
The challenge is both to provide skills and positive experiences for each teacher
and learner, and at the same time to ensure that the cognitive demands of using the
technology are not seen as an impediment. E-mail and discussion forums can enable
learners to learn collaboratively with the need only for intermittent technology
access. Thus, the real skill of modern teaching becomes the agility with which each
teacher and student can weave into the learning environment these new resources
and the insights that other people and places can provide. As the technology also
subtlety changes the nature of processes and the actual content of the curriculum,
emerging technologies can be employed to support more elaborate assessments of
processes and the creation of artefacts which demonstrate higher order thinking and
reﬂection on the outcomes.
As we have already admitted, this paper has pointed to possible directions of

Charting Trends for E-Learning in Asian Schools
211
future development in an area where prediction is inherently risky. We have
suggested some challenges for the use of e-learning within the educational enter-
prise. The trends are dependent upon good choices of both new technological
solutions and the increasingly integrated applications that help not only to collate
the information resources for the schools but are also reusable as part of the learning
systems in place in the schools. The recent experience with major interruptions to
learning in school, an example of which is the severe acute respiratory syndrome
(SARS) episode in Singapore and other countries in the region, has provided new
impetus to support alternative methods of using the technology effectively and with
speed. The ability of teachers to establish alternative links among their students and
the availability of resources will prove to be the deciding factors in achieving success
in the future much sooner than we might think.
Notes on Contributors
John G. Hedberg is Professor in Learning Sciences and Technology at the National
Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He is
the principal investigator of several projects which explore effective uses of
ICTs in education and training throughout Singapore, Indonesia, and Hong
Kong, China. He is the co-author of a recent book, Evaluation of Interactive
Learning Systems.
Lim Cher Ping is an Assistant Professor in Learning Sciences and Technology at the
National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singa-
pore. He is the principal investigator of a US$150,000 project on the “Effective
Integration of ICT in Singapore Schools: Pedagogical and Policy Implica-
tions.” Email: cplim@nie.edu.sg
Note
1.
See, for example, http://www.dlese.org/dds/index.jsp
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