While we all agree that e-learning has been in  existence from the past many years, there are still many assumptions and confusions revolving around e-learning which has given rise to several myths.

While I interact with the clients especially those who are initiating e-learning in their organizations or those who are relatively new to e-learning, I feel they often have some preconceived notions or some misconceptions about e-learning. In this blog, I have curated five such common e-learning myths, which I have attempted to debunk through logical reasoning.

1.E-Learning is a magic wand to give immediate results

Many companies have jumped into e-learning to find immediate success for their various corporate training requirement without conducting any proper research on it. While e-learning as a long-term initiative is always desirable and mostly successful but expecting results in a short duration of time is difficult.

Myth debunked: e-learning is never a magic wand to bring success, before implementing an e-learning course it is mandatory to do a thorough research to find out if e-learning is required, as sometimes a simple effective classroom training can fix the learning gap.

2. Online courses lack interaction and engagement

This is one of the very common e-learning myths, which continues since a long time for people who have not experienced e-learning. I personally feel that people who still believe in this myth should be given a chance to enjoy an interactive and engaging e-learning module and then ask them the question- ‘How do you feel now?’

Myth debunked: a well-designed e-learning module definitely brings the element of interaction and engagement among the learners. The present-day e-learning doesn’t anymore mean plain slides with stuffed contents, but the present day elearning is all about how to better engage and interact with the learners. E-Learning developers use new technologies and strategies like game based learning, gamification, microlearning etc to successfully build user engagement and interaction.

3. E-Learning is difficult to track

In a traditional classroom training, after attending the training program, the trainers usually take the feedback to evaluate how much the learners have learned from the training.The management or the instructor can further grade this to classify the learners and understand the learning gap.

The sceptics believe that this is not possible through e-learning or otherwise it is not easy to do.

Myth debunked: With the present technological advancements in the e-learning industry, the modern LMS(Learning Management Systems) are now able to easily track the learner progress in much better and efficient manner. xAPI standard is taking the learner tracking a step further not limiting it to any browsers of devices.

4. Only millennials enjoy and benefit from e-learning

While I am not denying the fact that the millennials are a tech-savvy generation as they are born in a mobile era, having an easy access to technology and to new electronic gadgets. But this doesn’t mean that e-learning is only for the millennials.

Myth debunked: e-learning modules can be consumed by all generations of learners, be it baby boomers, generation X or millennials. However, while designing e-learning a right mix of user engagement and learning content should be blended to give the best e-learning experience to all the learners.

5. E-Learning is a costly proposition

While e-learning looks like a high one time investment initially and most L&D teams might not be able to convince their top management and get budget approvals for the same but a deeper analysis reveals that this is a big myth.

Myth debunked: Yes e-learning requires a one time initial investment in terms of choosing an e-learning vendor, developing e-learning content and deploying it, but the overall long term benefits both in terms of cost and time surpass the one time initial development cost.

If you are looking an initiating e-learning in your organization and have any myths about it, I suggest you debunk them all and give e-learning a try! I am confident that you will definitely benefit from it.