Effective learning strategies for the on-line learning environment: including the lost learner

Much has been said about different learning styles, but it is not always clear how learning strategies should be adapted to accommodate different learning styles in the online learning environment. The question arises as to how one ensures that there are no lost learners, especially working with extremely heterogeneous groups in the South African context, where learners may be from eleven different cultural and language groups, urban or deep rural settings, varying computer abilities and often from disadvantaged educational backgrounds. It indeed proves to be a very challenging task, and including first year learners from the subject Journalism Practice at the Technikon Pretoria, with the cooperation of the lecturer, the author attempted to firstly design activities (instead of using an online survey) which in a fun way assessed these learner characteristics, and secondly using this information by giving students a choice of activities and assessments instead of limiting them to one or two methods. The study was aimed at encouraging learner autonomy, increasing learner confidence and trying to include the lost or "invisible" learner. The paper reports on the findings and conclusions from the study.