Online learning, also called e-learning or online training, is when you access and study for your course by using a computer and the internet. Online courses can work in different ways and may use different techniques to help you learn but the basic principle is that all the work can be done through a computer.
Online learning courses can incorporate any or all of the following techniques:
Online courses can usually be accessed from any computer with an internet connection, this means that you can study from your home PC, at a library, at an internet cafe, or even at work. That gives you much more flexibilty in when and where you can study and means that you can plan to make the most of your time whenever you have access to a computer.
Online learning courses are designed to be flexible, convenient and simple to use. Some courses use lots of interactive procesess to engage and stimulate you to help you learn. Others may rely heavily on simulations, audio or video presentations, sample exercises or questions. Most online courses offer great freedom, allowing you to do as much or as little work as you want in one go, and returning to the point where you finished last time when you next log on. Also you are often able to skip sections of the course if you are having trouble with them or not interested in that part and move on to the next section, you can usually return to the skipped sections later on. Whether you get this option or not depends on the course and qualification that you are doing.
Before starting an online course make sure that you have an email account that you can open and use on any computer. Ths is particularly important if you are going to be using lots of different computers to study from as you will need to stay in regular email contact with your tutor and will need to check regularly for messages, new materials, lessons, resources etc. You might be better off by getting a new email account that you just use for your course so you will know that anything that you receive on that address will just be related to your course. That way you won't have to plow through lots of other home or work related emails, where you could possibly overlook important messages, to get to your course information.
As well as an independant email account it is neccessary to have free and easy access to a reliable PC with an internet connection. With online learning it is best to have a broadband internet connection as that way you can download and save the course information more quickly than with a dial-up connection.