Learning about E-Learning

I have taken a giant leap into technology, a field that has otherwise intimidated me. Let me explain why this leap is worthy of blogging about. I have never had any interest in technology, other than its social uses. Technology has always had the stigma of 'impersonal' and 'cold'. I chose the career path of corporate training because I am, in all sense, a people person. Yet, as I entered this world of training, I realize that I am one person for many, many people! E-learning is a platform that will let me reach my 'people'. However, I fear the elimination of a hand shake, eye contact, and even my voice inflictions that E-learning will bring. I believe that much of my ability to reach my audience comes from the "face-to-face." Like somehow, technology will zap all of my charisma, and I will be left with a boring, empty shell.
Yet, I have always been a 'meat and potato' kind of girl; I don't much care for 'fluff' and 'fillers', just give me the facts and give me the tools, and tell me how I'll use it. It is this part of me that finds E-learning appealing!
When I went to college for my Bachelors degree, I was in a lecture hall with five hundred other students, listening to teachers drone on about theories. At no point, did anyone ever tell me why these theories were important and how I was going to use them. So, the end result...I forgot all of these theories! They were useless rubbage in my brain, that I promptly purged. When I returned to school, after working for five years, in order to get my emphasis in Education added to my Social Science degree, things were very different.
I am an auditory learner (one of the 10% of the population). I thought that an E-learning platform would never work for me, because I needed someone to tell me information... I was wrong. I learned more in those 30 credits that I did in my first four years of college at a prestigous university AND I remember all of it.
It was this expeirence and my need to reach 'people' that lead me to pursue my Master's Degree in Teaching and Learning with Technology. Now, I will make technology personal and I will use it to touch my learners; the way E-learning as touched me.
-Lori Balog