eLearning in Maritime Envoronment

Computer Mediated Communications and Distance Learning (CMC/CMDL), and particularly asynchronous learning through the Internet, are becoming major vehicles for fulfilling the needs of Lifelong Learning (LLL). With the inception of computer technology in the 1980s and developments in communications technology in the 1990s, the potential for improving the quality and effectiveness of distance learning has grown. This has resulted in the development of a variety of learning technologies and the incorporation of a number of new elements into distance learning: video films, multimedia courseware, and live lessons delivered to remote classrooms. Until the mid 1990s, the integration of such educational technologies was only partly successful, for methodological reasons, and due to considerations of cost and accessibility. Today, we are at the threshold of a new era in which technological learning solutions are developing into effective applications. The Internet has become an essential communications platform and has new capabilities that can be utilized for distance learning. Various new models of education are described and discussed in this paper.