The Effectiveness of Web-Based Instruction

As the Army focuses more on Web-based instruction as a delivery option for training, professional development, and education, it is important to understand its instructional effectiveness. A search of the literature between 1996 and 2002 identified more than 500 reports concerning Web-based courses, that is courses delivered over the Internet or an intranet and conveyed through a browser. Most concerned recommendations for design or technology issues rather than empirical measures of learning outcomes. From this larger set, 47 studies reported empirical measures of outcomes; of these, 15 studies reported data with sufficient detail to compute an effect size. The effect size, comparing Web-based instruction to conventional classroom instruction, was .24, which means the average student moved from the 50th to the 59th percentile. In earlier analyses of the effectiveness of other forms of computer- based instruction, effects sizes of between .32 and .41 have been reported (corresponding to the 63rd and 66th percentiles). In terms of instructional effectiveness, it appears that current practices in Web-based instruction improve learning when compared to the classroom, but many more complete studies are needed before the full effect size is understood.