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Article

Abstract

Well into the 21st century, the nature of higher education is ever-changing and very complex. Distance education is becoming a major disruption of the traditional self-contained classroom . At all levels of education, technology, software, and “apps” have permeated the educational environment. Smartphones are a “must have” for many persons, and information has no lag in the communications channel… users want almost immediate responses to queries. The transaction that we entitle “distance education” occurs in an environment where there is separation between teachers and learners. Learners and teachers need to cross this space and eliminate any misunderstanding. This is both psychological and communication space, which is called transactional distance (Moore, 1997). This commentary will review Michael Moore’s (1972; 1997) theories on distance education, then provide a criticism of it, corroborate support for Moore’s theory, and offer some concluding thoughts.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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