Assessing eLearning : finding a model for higher education

Like every form of education or training, e-learning must be assessed with respect to various criteria, bearing in mind that it is undergoing a constant process of improving and progressing towards its goals. However, it is difficult to define a single model for assessing e-learning as technology is evolving all the time, in addition to the fact that Web 2.0 has created new ways for internet users to relate to each other. Therefore, it will be important to analyse the ways in which assessment 2.0 of e-learning is undertaken, bearing in mind that it will correspond to an evolution in the assessment of the mode of e-learning that could be designated "e-learning 1.0", whose most important points are described below. In assessing e-learning, it is often usual to compare it to exclusively presential models, ignoring the fact that e-learning is about what could be called e-pedagogy, in which new standards of communication, collaboration and group behaviour co-exist. In e-learning, new models of learning are used, involving the way that learners interact not only among themselves but also with the educational resources available, both online and offline, resulting in a change in the way they perceive the learning context in which they are involved. The evaluation of e-learning should be tackled in a very pragmatic way. It should be appropriate to the learning project in question and not become a highly complex study resulting in a large amount of complicated data, in which the aims of the evaluation end up being unclear to users. A proper assessment of e-learning must therefore have objectives, indicators, and goals that are explicit and easy to grasp, making it possible to respond to the questions that users wish to see solved. Above all, it should create methods of presenting the results of the assessment in a way that is easily understood by all parties concerned