Elements of an Ideal E-learning Environment

When I was at University a few years back, e-learning was introduced to the students via the CWTS (Community Welfare Training System) course, which is mandated in the educational system. It was still a new innovation and quite disorienting to majority of the students, including myself. I didn’t have a very good opinion of e-learning back then which was evident in my dismal test scores. It’s only until recently that I’ve reflected on the possible rationale behind my distaste since I am currently considering taking an online course. I had to do a little bit of research, of course, and I encountered a couple of articles that talked about e-learning. The article that caught my attention was a piece done on the establishment of an e-learning environment that’s conducive to teaching and learning.


The success of elearning depends on a lot of factors, one of them being the learning environment. Like in a traditional classroom setting, the best learning environments nurture excellent motivation, comprehension and increased efficiency in learners or students. There are a number of certain elements that need to be cohesively integrated in order to create an ideal e-learning environment. Such elements include the following: organizational or classroom culture, e-learning maturity and strategy, resources, technology, subject matter expertise, instructional design, user interface and support systems. Each element tackles separate entities that focus on specific aspects that can either lead to accomplishment or failure. The proper individual management and successful integration of all of these elements guarantee the successful implementation and utilization of e-learning whether it’s for a business venture or educational purposes.


As I try and recall the role of each element in my past e-learning experience, I realize that the mismanagement or lack of one or a couple of these elements contributed to my negative stand regarding the matter. It is thus valuable to consider that the e-learning environment affects learning in such a way that it gravely affects, or even determine, the student’s ability to comprehend and internalize given information from the provided content which is highly dependent on quality, technology, delivery and accessibility.