Distance education is a form of education in which students and teachers, students and educational organizations mainly use various media to carry out systematic teaching and communication, and it is an education in which courses are transmitted to one or more students outside the campus. Modern distance education refers to the education of transmitting courses outside the campus through audio, video (live or video) and computer technology, including real-time and non-real-time education. Modern distance education is a new type of education with the development of modern information technology. With the development of computer technology, multimedia technology and communication technology, especially the rapid development of internet, the means of distance education has made a qualitative leap and become a distance education under high-tech conditions. Modern distance education is an educational method which is mainly based on modern distance education means, compatible with traditional teaching forms such as face-to-face, correspondence and self-study, and optimized combination of various media.

Modern distance education can effectively play the characteristics of distance education. It is a teaching activity opposite to face-to-face teaching, separation of teachers and students, and non-face-to-face teaching organization. It is a cross-school and cross-regional education system and teaching model. Its characteristics are: students and teachers are separated; Adopt specific transmission system and media for teaching; There are many ways to transmit information; The place and form of study are flexible and changeable. Compared with face-to-face education, the advantage of distance education is that it can break through the limitations of time and space; Provide more learning opportunities; Expand the teaching scale; Improve the quality of teaching; Reduce the teaching cost. Based on the characteristics and advantages of distance education, many people of insight have realized the significance and broad prospects of developing distance education.