A crisis opens the door of new options and opportunities
Online vs Traditional Classes: Any crisis comes with great learning, new thinking, and hidden opportunities. You need to keep your eyes open, look for problems, think for solutions, find opportunities, and take appropriate actions to sail through the crisis.
When we pass through the crisis, we are left with our experiences. These experiences mold us to be adaptable for new ways of living.
Being locked down at homes has opened the doors for online teaching and learning. People around the world started looking for online learning and teaching options to keep the ball rolling. But in reality, are we ready to embrace that?
Online Classes -A critical view
We humans learn from our experiences. The real experience comes with an actual walk through the event. To some extent, the virtual world can simulate an event and may assist in your learning. But, it can’t replace the experience you get through the real event. However, it can improve your reaction to the event.
Online teaching is a virtual platform. Teachers generally have a limited feel of students’ expressions or their interest in class because they can’t see them. Students are mostly on their own and require more discipline. In reality, it’s difficult for a teacher to know if students are enjoying the topic or simply getting bored.
On the other hand, teachers can create and share rich content using new technologies. Students have options to see recorded sessions multiple times as per their convenience. This allows them to learn at their own pace.
Traditional Classes-A critical view
Physical classroom teaching and learning go hand-in-hand as a two-way process. Teachers in a traditional classroom can notice a student’s involvement, interest, and concentration in the class. Consequently, they can change their pace, tone, and content to make the session more interesting.
The teacher’s presence and physical environment of the class help students to get involved and interested. It doesn’t only impact students academically but also emotionally and helps in improving their attitude towards learning.
However, traditional classroom teaching has a constraint of resources. It lacks diversified content and has less flexibility of timing for teachers and students.
Online vs Traditional Classes-a comparison of effectiveness
The effectiveness of online versus traditional classes varies from individual to individual.
Online live classes can be more effective for self-motivated, self-disciplined, and quick learners. Those who are serious about scheduled classes and prepare themselves in advance, find virtual live classes more fruitful.
On the other hand, we have students who need continuous support and mentoring to remain on track. These students have challenges with online classes and are left with a lot of gaps in their understandings. This happens mainly because of the following reasons:
- Lack of interest and seriousness (due to no physical classroom environment)
- Lack of concentration (as there is no eye to eye contact)
- Lack of discipline (taking a class at comfort of home)
- Mismatch in online delivery speed and student’s understanding
- Student’s mind-set for classroom learning (used to classroom environment)
- Shyness to ask questions
- Distraction by other digital contents online
An Effective Teaching Model during or after COVID -19 Era
A model that has an appropriate blend of both the teaching methods (virtual as well as a classroom) is a promising solution.
Technology must help in flexibility to create and dynamically change teaching contents according to the level of the student group. Teachers should be trained to deliver content effectively in an energetic classroom environment. They should keep a balance between classroom and virtual content for students to go through.
Here are a few suggestions to make students learning more effective, interesting, and fun.
- Reduced traditional classroom sessions to save student’s time in traveling and other activities.
- Introduce some part of studies online, especially where students don’t need teachers’ presence. For example tests, quizzes, and practice questions.
- Enrich the classroom teaching by using relevant online content – like some video, story, or puzzle.
- Enhance the classroom environment by conducting rapid-fire Q & A, discussing real-life problems, examples, or events.
We are currently at a very initial stage of online teaching platforms and the teaching community needs to do a lot. This is a long journey and we have just started …
Here is a 4 min video recorded with teachers & students. See what they say about online live classroom teaching & learning.
