Education As a Drivers of Social Learning

Education is a vast field of study that includes learning theory, instructional design theory, curriculum development, assessment methods, teaching methods and pedagogy. Education is the process by which acquiring knowledge, skills, behaviors, values, beliefs, and social norms is facilitated through the acquisition of information, knowledge, attitudes, and communication. Educational systems include training, teaching, practice, research and applied learning. It has been perceived that education contributes to societal competence by building individual’s capacity for learning and increasing the quality of social relationships. In fact, teachers are the driving force for the learning process by being the primary source of information and of feedback.

The informal education is usually related to social media that facilitates intergenerational exchange of information among individuals through the means of video, audio, text and multimedia. It includes knowledge sharing through discussion boards, forums, blogs, online communities and wikis. Informal education is often considered as a part of the formal education. However, informal education is becoming more relevant in today’s world as it provides non-formal and inclusive learning opportunities. An informal education is characterized by the following components:

These elements provide the necessary ingredients to develop a successful informal education system. Therefore, the effectiveness of any educational system depends on the following key elements: adequate resources, curriculum, quality assessment tools, teaching methods, feedback mechanisms, participation, student/teacher ratio, educational technology, environment, behavior of students, and recognition. Resources refers to everything that makes up an educational system such as texts, videos, books, computer software, interactive games, software engineering and other related materials. Curriculum is the general topic or theme of all the subjects covered by the school and also covers the variety of courses offered. Quality assessment tools help in determining the effectiveness of any curriculum or course and thus contribute significantly to the overall effectiveness of any educational system.