The Open Courseware initiative, also generally referred to as "online learning" or "e-Learning", has only to look to the past to find a clear path for future evolution. In 1980 many people became excited about learning because of a single television program. Prior to that, the television had been referred to as the "idiot box" and most agreed that watching too much television could very well ruin our minds. While the attitude about television persists today, after this 1980 TV program became widespread many realized that TV was simply a tool that could either help build or destroy young minds. The program that I am talking about was "Cosmos" and it's host, Carl Sagan, had us spellbound by thoughts that may have never occurred to us without the program. While the ideas discussed by Sagan were clearly interesting and important, adding a multimedia environment really enhanced what might have eventually devolved into a boring lecture.
Today the web is probably just evolving from a parallel of where TV programing would have been in say the late 1960s to early 1970s. We have learned to tell a good story and have some multimedia, but; we have yet to marry the important information with the cool multimedia effects. The online learning, Open University, Open Courseware intiative is even further behind.
For learning to reach more people and for that learning to truely persist in the minds of people that can do something with it, we have to look back at what the Sagan group did with Cosmos and get multimedia specialist married up with the professors.
If you have the time and the inclination take a look at this Cosmos episode provide by Hulu. This show is one of my favorites and it is a really fun way to learn!
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