Discussion learning activity; a novel approach to virtual education

The spread of ICT (Information and communication technologi es) in all aspects of human life has created fundamental changes. At the present era, the appropriate learning environment should always be wide enough with the necessary flexibility available to everyone, so that education can be possible not inside the educational centers with closed walls but everywhere. Large numbers of online class students, the lack of participation of all classroom students in learning, the lack of the necessary hardware and software facilities for creating interaction between students and faculty and students together, impossibility of face to face interaction and the existence of the other entertaining and interesting activities in the Web environment while attending in the electronic classroom, lead to challenges in the learning activities field, especially discussion learning activities. Therefore, the aim of this study was introducing the “discussion learning activities as the one of the learning activities in web-based instructions in both simultaneous and non-simultaneous ways. Information and communication technology plays a greater role by the passage of time in the higher education in general and in the curriculum in particular. Attention to the learner as the constructor of the knowledge is among from its major characteristics. Therefore, considering the learning activities in the web-based curriculum is necessary and several activities should be provided so that learner can increase his/her learning extent and richness through them.