E-LEARNING: The Reds and Greens

 E-LEARNING: The Reds and Greens

Times are changing and so are the ways of imparting education. And that is how the augment of online learning on the scene of modes of delivery of education took place. Earlier the modes of digital education were confined to the closed doors of auditoriums within schools and colleges but have now broken free and transpired in the personal spaces of individuals. The homes and places of comfort that were earlier unimaginable for imparting knowledge and other things of importance whether it be concerned with new areas of leisure and hobbies are now catering to an established regime of filling up the gap left by the absence of traditional classrooms. And while going through the Covid-19 pandemic, it can be seen as a phenomenon widely being adopted all around the world.

As E-learning being the only feasible option in the current dreadful times, it has been observed that the opinions of the general population are hugely divided into the benefits and flaws presented by the new-age systems of delivering education. A huge chunk of this population believes that the non-flexibility of the time constraint has been relaxed to a large extent for the students seeking online education. But, it doesn’t take a person keen enough and specifically looking for it, to find some cons lurking around it. How about we dig into the pros and cons of E-learning-

The Pros-

• Flexibility of timings- The flexible time schedules are one of the brighter sides of the new establishment. The learners are no longer confined to classrooms and rigid class timings when it comes to broadening their mental horizons and that provides an environment for a seamless balance between the personal lives and the curious stimulations of the individuals. The time is theirs, as well as the way, decide to fit it in purely subjective too.

• A learning more individualized- The learners are not faced with a ‘one t-shirt fits all’ paradigm, in the online learning space. The things that interest a person might be different from another, and unlike classrooms where every person is expected to be on the same page while adhering to the curriculum, the new system allows people to explore topics that fit their interests, and thus learning ceases being more of work, rather becomes fun.

• Opportunities no longer weighed on the age of people- While in an established system, learning new things ideally has never seen the age of people, but as responsibility seeps in for the parents and elderly people, it quite obviously gets tough for them to attend the courses in person and drop everything else. They might find it tough to return to the classrooms and in some cases might as well feel misplaced among their fellow learners who might just so happen to be way younger than them. The human complications getting in the way of learning, hamper the process, and for people like them, online learning proves to be just the right escape from it.

The Cons-

• Decreased social interaction- As the process of imparting as well as absorbing the knowledge gets digitalized, the most important factor working in favor of traditional classroom setup gets lost in translation. The tactile conversation between the teacher and the learners is eliminated, which does in a long run puts at stake the overall personality development of the people.

• A lazier medium of learning- The learners and the teacher aren't physically present at the same place together, so the thing that takes a hit is discipline. Unlike the traditional age-long methods of classroom teaching,  online learning cannot completely ensure all the eyeballs to pay attention, which isn’t good news for anyone.

• An inferior reputation- The industry is everchanging, and the thing that cannot be overlooked is the dynamic nature of everything in existence. When the concept of online learning hit the horizon, the issue that plagued its reputation was mainly the highly unregulated nature of the medium. Even the recruiters looking for capable employees had reservations while looking over the online degree programs as an option, and due to that it’s inferiority against classrooms has never died. But due to the recent changes and the global onset of a pandemic has brought in a necessary improvement in this aspect, and bigger players and reputed educational institutions are taking their programs online, which is improving things.

What does all this mean? The thing that can be learned out of this is that looking at the current developments on a global front, it is easier to conclude that online learning is here to stay and it comes to it being the need of the hour. We must adjust our perceptions and welcome the new changes into the established norm. 

Article by: Avi Sharma

Edited by: Aastha Soni