E-learning has moved a long way in the last five years or so. In the early years of the 21^st century, the debate focused on whether e-learning was a viable alternative to instructor-led training (ILT).

That debate has run its course. Both sides of the argument have embraced the other. The result is blended learning: a combination of ‘e’ for such things as pre-course learning and assessment plus post-course aide memoire, and ILT for the development of skills etc.

Today’s key issues – which are being explored at the Learning Technologies conference and exhibition in London on 31^st January and 1^st February – include:

• The pitching of  blended (‘formal’) learning versus ‘rapid’ or ‘informal’ learning in a fight for fashionable supremacy;
• The adaptation of their products by learning management systems’ producers to cope not only with monitoring and measuring informal learning but also – or especially – with mobile-delivered learning, and
• The pursuit for increasing learner motivation, via greater interactivity through the use of story-based and simulation-based learning.

Comment:

Refinements in technology continue to make more things possible when delivering learning electronically. Although lip service is paid to the importance of ‘learning structures’, it is the ‘technologies’ aspect of the Learning Technologies event that always seems to attract attention.