Although distance learning may seem like a fairly new phenomenon which arrived with the advent of the internet, people have in reality been taking courses offered by distance instructors for hundreds of years.
Some of the earliest distance learning on record dates as far back as 1728, offering to teach students how to write in shorthand through lessons sent to their home weekly.
However, it was the development of postal systems both in the U.S. and abroad that brought about the true beginnings of distance learning as we know it today. The pioneers of distance education used the postal system, the best technology of their day, to open educational opportunities to people who wanted to learn but for various reasons were not able to attend normal schools.
Distance learning started to gain wider adoption in the 19th century when Englishman Isaac Pitman taught shorthand by correspondence. Students were instructed to copy short passages of the Bible and return them for grading.
In the early 20th century there was a significant improvement with the Pitman Self-Educator, examples of which are illustrated. With the Self-Educator students had a resource designed specifically for distance learning.
These days distance learning also makes use of computer conferencing on the internet where teachers and students present text, audio, and video. File sharing and communications tools such as email, chats and audio and video conferencing are all part of the internet model.
With the ever increasing accessibility of computers and the internet, it is not yet clear how online learning will evolve in the future. However, given the growing popularity of this type of learning, we can be certain that distance learning is a resource for students that will be around for years to come.
