Learning Theories: Implications for Online Learning
Design
Hesham Alomyan
University of Petra,Jordan
halomyan@uop.edu.jo
ABSTRACT
Globally, online learning is widely used as a modern means of
delivering instruction. Yet, a significant proportion of online
material fails to meet the benchmarks of successful teaching and
learning highlighting a need for guidelines on how to structure
online materials for effective learning. By presenting learning
theories; behaviourism, cognitivism, and constructivism, this
paper will highlight and discuss principles that can be applied to
online learning contexts. The implications of these principles will
be discussed to showcase online learning practices where learning
is promoted and learners are actively engaged.
CCS Concepts
• Applied computing➝Education➝E-learning.
Keywords
Online learning; learning theories; online content structuring.
1. INTRODUCTION
Online learning has become an urgent necessity imposed upon us
by fast changes and developments in educational systems and
technology. Traditional methods of education are no longer
sufficient to provide learners with the knowledge and skills
necessary to work and excel in an era of globalization.
Online learning refers to learning that utilises the Internet to
deliver content and activities, skills, and tests through the World
Wide Web. [1] Gotschall (2000) describes online learning as any
learning that occurs using a computer network and possesses the
following characteristics:
• Instruction is delivered via the World Wide Web;
• Face-to-face meetings are not required;
• Students have access to learning materials and assignments at
any time and from anywhere [2];
• Communication tools (e.g., email, discussion lists, video
conferencing) are often used to encourage collaborative
learning and allow students access to their teachers or
lecturers at any time [3]; and
• Interactive multimedia components like videos, animated
presentations and interactive tutorials are encouraged.
Remaining of concern is the most effective ways in which to
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3355966.3358412
126
Deborah Green
University of South Australia, Australia
Deborah.Green@unisa.edu.au
present online material to ensure effective teaching and learning.
Educational institutions are increasingly placing more learning
material online; yet, a significant proportion of this material
seemingly fails when judged from a teaching and learning
perspective [4], [5]. While many guidelines have been introduced
to support developers of print-based materials few have been
considered for online learning [5], leaving an urgent need for such
guidelines to be developed [6]. We therefore need to design online
learning materials carefully to ensure they conform to learners'
characteristics of readiness, intelligence, abilities, tendencies,
attitudes and individual differences while supporting them to
achieve the desired learning objectives in less time and with less
effort and cost.
Like print materials, the development of effective online learning
materials should be based upon proven and sound learning
theories [7]. To effectively engage learners and promote learning,
the current paper will extract implications from learning theories
before integrating them into online learning contexts. These
theories include behaviourism, cognitivism, and constructivism.
More specifically, this paper will provide online course designers
with implications for designing high-quality courses that achieve
desired learning objectives for different learners. Following is a
review of the theoretical framework of learning theories, which
highlights key principles and implications for designing effective
online courses.
2. LEARNING THEORIES AND ONLINE
LEARNING DESIGN
By way of overview, it is possible to describe three broad
theoretical approaches that have contributed towards the human
learning psychology and might have implications for online
learning design: behaviourism, cognitivism, and constructivism.
The following is a review of these learning theories, followed by a
presentation of implications for designing online courses derived
from these theories.
2.1 Behavioural Learning Theory
According to the behavioural learning theory, learning occurs as a
result of external stimuli with the human mind being like a black
box [8]. [9] Skinner (1977) argued that internal mental processes
cannot be proven to know whether a person is learning or not.
Ignoring the impact of the thinking processes in the mind, this
theory focuses on different behavioural aspects that can be
observed during the learning process. The impact of behavioural
theory on learning was significant as attention was drawn towards
many key principles that have implications in teaching and
learning design. The general principles underlying the behavioural
theory can be summarised as follows [10]:
1. Describe the behaviour or performance of the learner,
identify, analyze and divide it into its sub-elements.
2. Provide all the information and educational stimuli in the
pre-structured learning content, obtained by the learner to
achieve this desired behaviour, and divide this information
into separate units or subjects.
3. Formulation of content stimuli in a gradual way: from easy
to difficult, from simple to complex.
4. Provide appropriate reinforcement to strengthen the desired
behaviour (feedback).
5. Repetition of behaviour to strengthen the link between
stimuli and responses.
6. Pay attention only to the impact of past experiences in
learning without the present.
7. Pay attention to external and internal motivation and satisfy
the need to obtain satisfaction, and achieve the required
learning.
8. Learning is a change in behaviour as a result of information
obtained by the individual.
9. Learning is evaluated on the basis of specific behaviour.
Drawing on the above review of behavioural theory, implications
for designing online courses are determined and presented in
Table 1 below.
Table 1. Implications for designing online courses derived
from behavioural learning theory
Course Implications for designing online courses
design derived from behavioural learning theory
elements
- Identify learner’s characteristics related to
Learners’ the cognitive, emotional and physical
characteristics aspects of online courses, as well as their
previous experiences, knowledge and
behaviour.
- Determine the content of the online course
and analyze it into its components, and
Course divide it into units and classes according
content to a particular theory, taking into account
structure learner’s characteristics [11].
- Arrange and format elements of the course
content in a gradual, scaffolded way: easy
to hard, simple to complex; to help the
learner understand and acquire the
material.
- Formulate the learning objectives
accurately and present them to the learner
Learning at the beginning of learning, so that they
objectives relate to each subject of the online course
[12].
- Each objective should include the
parameters of acceptable performance of
the learner.
- Drill and practice: Provide opportunities
for practice and repetition, which helps to
master learning, and provide practical
examples and exercises applied in real
situations [13].
- Diagnostic tests: Learners should be able
to skip some parts of the course or repeat
Instructional it according to their assessment in
strategies diagnostic tests.
- Navigation: The clarity of the way of
navigation between course pages and
elements [14].
127
- Sequencing: sequence learning in
stimulus and response actions [15].
- Pre-assessment: Pre-test the learner to
determine the level of placement in the
Assessment course.
- Post-assessment: Evaluate students'
learning in terms of knowledge, skills and
emotions, in light of specific objectives, to
ensure that they are achieved using
appropriate assessment methods for each
learning objective.
- Immediate feedback: To help and guide
the learner’s performance, and produce
Feedback the behavioural responses provide
appropriate timely feedback as soon as the
learner responds;
- Various feedback: Use different methods
of providing feedback (i.e., verbal and
nonverbal feedback) as opposed to only
one method.
2.2 Cognitive Learning Theory
Cognitive learning theories recognize the acquisition of
meaningful knowledge by helping learners to use mental
processes in organizing and linking new information [16]; such
processes include memory, thinking, abstraction, meditation and
motivation. According to the information processing theory,
information is received by different senses, processed, and then
transferred to short and long-term memory. By attracting the
learner’s attention to important and critical information the
learning process can be enhanced [17]. Cognitive theories,
especially dual code theory, support the use of visual forms of
learning. This theory assumes that information is stored in one’s
long-term memory in visual and verbal forms and that this
information is remembered better than information represented in
only one form [18]. Therefore, cognitive theories can be used in
the design of online courses in many ways, especially the visual
design of the course content and pages.
From the above review of cognitive theories, implications for
designing online courses are determined and presented in Table 2
below.
Table 2. Implications for designing online courses derived
from cognitive learning theories.
Course Implications for designing online courses
design derived from cognitive learning theories
elements
- Identify learners’ characteristics
especially their mental abilities and
Learners’ cognitive learning methods, their level
characteristics of intelligence, their common thinking
patterns, and their previous experiences
and knowledge.
- Clarify the topics of the course; provide
a complete description of the objectives,
subjects and strategies.
- Analyze the content of the course to its
components, and divide it into units and
Course classes arranged according to a
content particular sequence or theory, taking into
structure account learners’ characteristics.
 - Provide maps for the information
contained in the course, whether linear,
hierarchical, or spider-shaped [19].
- Use advance organizers to organise the
course content in the main pages of the
course, whether these organizers are
presented as text or image.
- Present important information in the
centre of the screen.
- Highlight critical information to attract
learners' attention using headings and/or
colour [20].
- Information should be chunked- between
five and nine items on a screen -to
prevent cognitive overload during
information processing [21].
- Use different modes of presentation
(textual, visual, animations, video, and
audio) to facilitate information
processing and accommodate learning
styles.
- Formulate and present learning
Learning objectives to the learners at the
objectives beginning of their learning so that these
objectives relate to each subject with
emphasis on thinking and meta-
cognitive skills.
- Learning objectives should include
developing learners' mental abilities and
cognitive strategies.
- Translate, whenever possible, verbal
information into visual forms that are
clear and easy to perceive and
communicate.
- Highlight important information to draw
Interface and
the learner’s attention.
visual design
- To achieve a clear vision for the learner
of the online
and increase the speed of reading
course
information on course pages, take into
account the color contrast between the
item and the background.
- Use reasonably simple graphics and
visual forms. Avoid using more than one
animation on a page.
- Make sure that convergent objects
appear in the form of a single group, as
it is easier to perceive them as a group or
as independent forms, such as displaying
a group of images in a miniature form
that revolves around one meaning, then
the learner chooses what s/he wants to
see in details [11].
- Balance between written and illustrated
information on the course pages.
- Organize the course page elements in a
way that is easy to understand and
discover relationships among and
between them.
- Include real-life applications to assist the
learners to develop personal meaning,
contextualize the information, and
facilitate deep processing.
128
Instructional - Include activities that take into account
strategy individual differences and needs of
learners [22].
- Use advance organizers to link learner’s
exciting knowledge with what is being
learnt [23].
- Use concept maps to provide the “big
picture” to learners, which will help
them, comprehend the details of a lesson
and in turn facilitate deep processing.
- Use pre-instructional questions to
activate the learner’s current knowledge
and set expectations for learning new
Assessment materials.
- Provide learners with self-check
questions and exercises with immediate
feedback throughout a lesson to enable
them to assess themselves [11].
Motivate learners intrinsically and
extrinsically by[24], [25]:
- Capturing the learner’s attention at the
Motivation & beginning of the lesson and keeping it
feedback throughout the lesson.
- Informing learners of the importance of
the lesson and its benefit.
- Informing learners of the lesson’s
outcomes and provide ongoing
encouragement to complete the lesson.
- Providing feedback on learners’
performance and allowing them to
contextualize what they are learning by
applying the information to real-life
contexts.
2.3 Constructivist Learning Theory
Dominating education today, constructivist learning theories
argue that learning is an active process whereby learners are at the
centre and develop their own understandings; a stark contrast to
theories where learners passively receive knowledge.
Constructivist theories posit that learners need to be actively
engaged, whether individually or in small groups, to seek
knowledge and information that will help to develop
understanding [26]. However, there is not one view about what
constructivist learning is with [27] Phillips (1995) articulating that
there are many forms of constructivist thinking, including those
that seemingly contradict each other. Cognitive and social
constructivism, however, appear to be the two main views from
which others have extended. One main difference is evident
between these two positions with those supporting cognitive
constructivism arguing that individuals construct new meaning
within the context of their current knowledge, experience, and
environment [28], while more emphasis on the social context of
the actual learning environment is placed by those supporting
social constructivism. The latter argues that knowledge is not
constructed by the individual alone but instead is influenced by
social groups working in a collaborative learning environment and
the social norms and interpretations that arise from these [29].
Applying these learning theories to the online world
constructivism highlights the need to design learning
environments that are both learner and community-centred. In the
learner-centred learning environments, recognition needs to be
given to building on the conceptual and cultural knowledge that
students bring with them to the learning experience, linking
learning to students’ experiences, accepting and exploring
multiple perspectives and divergent understandings [28]. Through
its characteristics and tools, the World-Wide Web offers a perfect
platform from which learner-centeredness can be developed. For
example, tools such as text, audio, video, self-testing, and Internet
links, multimedia, and concept maps can be used to support
learner-centred instruction enabling prior knowledge, cultural
norms and experiences to be used as a foundation for learning [6].
Designing learning environments that are community-centred are
central to constructivist approaches to learning [30]. Thus,
implying that learning is strengthened by environments which
support and value all students' participation whose social norms
encourage collaboration, negotiation of meaning, and search for
understanding [28].
Through the effective use of online communication tools students
studying online can feel less psychological distance between
themselves and their peers, resulting in reports that relationships
between learners’ perceptions of their social presence and
satisfaction in, and perceived learning from, online courses have
improved [31]. Furthermore, the World Wide Web, through its
new online interactive communication tools (i.e., social-
networking sites, wikis, and folksonomies), enables learning to be
situated in authentic, real-world problems while linking to local
communities, thus supporting the tenets of social constructivist
theories.
Iimplications for designing online courses are determined from
the above review of constructivist learning theories and presented
in Table 3 below.
Table 3. Implications for designing online courses derived
from constructivist learning theories.
Implications for designing online courses
Course design derived from constructivist learning
elements theories
Learners’ - Determine learners’ characteristics,
characteristics especially previous experiences related to
course requirements.
- Do not specify content in detail, use key
ideas, and do not specify a compulsory
sequence that learners need to follow.
- Provide and use information in a
Course content functional way related to real life.
structure - Provide activities, assignments and
projects for learners to reach the desired
content by searching for appropriate
detailed information from multiple
sources linked to real life.
- Set general objectives at the beginning of
the learning and allow learners to set their
Learning
own learning objectives, thus achieving
objectives
the general objectives of the course.
- Make learning meaningful to learners by
including activities and practical
examples of theoretical information,
which can keep the learners active during
the learning process resulting in high-
level processing [32].
- Provide interactive online instruction
where learners take the initiative to learn
and interact with other learners and the
instructor, which eventually results in
constructing their own knowledge.
129
Instructional - Encourage communication and foster
strategies collaborative learning among students
through e-mail, discussion forum, chat
programs, and video conferencing.
- Give learners control of the learning
process and allow them to make
decisions about learning goals, with
some guidance from the instructor.
- Give the learners time and opportunities
to reflect on their learning. For example,
embed questions about the content
throughout the lesson.
- Provide interactive learning activities to
promote higher-level thinking while
providing social presence for students
and teachers in different ways [33].
- Use different methods of assessment,
such as individual self-assessment, team
assessment, short tests, projects, research
groups, electronic files of achievement.
Assessment
- The assessment should be continuous for
the student's performance to ensure that
he or she is prepared to move to other
modules or lessons.
- Provide explanations and assistance on
how to use the technology included in
the course, such as e-mail, content
management systems, tools and
Reinforcement programs used in the course, which are
& support easily accessible when needed.
- Provide diverse learning resources, such
as PowerPoint presentations, flashlights,
written texts, images and animated
graphics.
- Provide easy to access course content
across the network with speedy
downloads, and fast links.
- Provide learners with immediate
interactive instructions when needed.
3. CONCLUSION
Given the complexity of online learning systems, it is necessary to
review key learning theories to understand the possible
implications they have for effective online learning design. From
the review herein, it is argued that there is no single learning
theory that can be solely relied upon to design effective online
learning systems that achieve the desired learning objectives.
Behaviourism focusses on the apparent behaviour of the learner,
which is subject to observation and measurement without looking
into the mental processes behind the occurrence of such behaviour.
Cognitive learning theory is concerned with the mental processes
that occur within the learner’s mind and the results this has on
behaviour. Constructivist theories seek to study methods of
building the learner's knowledge of the world around them based
on their experiences and activities. Therefore, while each of these
theories has its limitations, they are all critical to effective
learning whether online or face-to-face. Hence, each of these
theories, along with its key principles, has been explored and its
strengths presented in a framework that can be employed in the
design of online learning courses, providing online developers
with choices to ensure that the right decisions are made to
enhance online learning.
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