The proliferation of communication technologies in the last decade has opened new horizons for learners and instructors, offering new modes for learning and communication. With modern open and distance learning technologies, instruction and learning hold new dimensions and new meanings. For the first time, education becomes independent of time and space and can be delivered anytime, anywhere, and to anyone. Nevertheless, despite their great potential, the use of learning technologies raises a wide range of questions regarding the traditional learning paradigms, and it poses challenges for learners, instructors, and policy-makers, who need to develop new teaching and learning strategies that fit the new synchronous and asynchronous ODL platforms.Educational technologies are used today in most educational systems for a large variety of purposes, including delivering knowledge and managing the teaching/ learning process, as well as for communication between learners and instructors and between learners and their peers. Present-day studies on the use of educational technologies in educational systems indicate that they have become an inseparable part of the teaching/learning process. However, a meta-analysis of the last-decade's research on the integration of ODL technologies suggests that it suffers from a series of severe pedagogical, political, cognitive, and technological problems, which hinder their successful implementation and lead to frustration among educators, decision-makers, and learners. The major problems are outlined below:Users face problems in reading effectively from a digital display of text and coping with graphic user interfaces.Learners and instructors are not proficient in making effective use of ODL platforms.Learners face problems in gaining knowledge from the hyper textual and non-linear learning environments, which are most common in ODL learning.
Bridge over Troubled Waters: Learning Technologies in the Middle East Eshet-Alkalai and AydinPage | 2Most present-day ODL environments are ineffective for learning due to their design as a simplistic conversion from the "good old" traditional, face-to-face teaching & learning paradigms, and there is no educated use of the pedagogical possibilities that are offered by the ODL technologies.Learners suffer from feelings of loneliness and non-ownership and face learning difficulties when no instructor is physically present.Learners face problems screening the huge volumes of information available in ODL environments and constructing coherent bodies of knowledge from them.As indicated by a great majority of recent studies, the key issues in developing effective distance learning models are the adoption of adequate pedagogical paradigms that make educated use of the special technological features of ODL technologies and the consideration of state-of-the-art knowledge about designing effective distance learning environments. These studies also indicate the pivotal role that local conditions, such as the cultural, political, economical, sociological, ethn...