This framework can be used to consider what the implications of technology-mediated learning might be for your course, program, or institution. The following four components should be considered together. Research has shown that while knowledge can be conveyed by any technology, technologies vary in their capacity to develop skills. Adapting a course for use with technology involves shifts to unfamiliar materials, creation of new types of assignments, and inventing new ways to assess students' learning. Research has shown that instructors and students also appear to have more success in learning with technology when they have greater control over it.
Technology investment incurs both fixed and variable costs.
Planners also need to remember that since technology investments often increase capabilities, the greater the use, the greater the associated costs. Therefore, it is ordinarily difficult to find instructional savings directly associated with using technology. It can be seen as formal instruction in which a majority of the teaching occurs while the learner and the instructor are a distance from one another. The design and development of a course or program for distance learners takes into account a set of planning considerations. These considerations are illustrated in the Planning Model below.