Jordan Quinones
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Online schooling even gave me the opportunity to take college classes. This wonderful experience convinces me that online schooling is superior.
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– Jordan Quinones
Over the past decade, there has been a huge increase in the number of people taking online courses. One reason for this increase in popularity is that online courses can bridge learning gaps through allowing students to work at their own pace, engaging students with different learning techniques, and by giving students the ability to do school work anywhere. To begin, in an online work environment, students can study at their own pace. If a student is struggling with a lesson, then they can focus on that lesson for a few hours at a time. Or if a lesson is easy, then they can master the concept in a few minutes and move on quickly. Unlike brick and mortar schools, you can take as much time, or as little time, as you need to learn a concept. Secondly, students are provided with a plethora of learning techniques. Different students learn best with different methods and online courses make those methods available.
Online schooling capitalizes on video, audio, and written content. It also provides students with the ability to engage with other students through online discussion forums. And for those who are hands-on learners, online courses also do projects that apply the ideas that are being learned. Providing students with all these options greatly helps in bridging learning gaps. Lastly, online courses give students the ability to choose their work environment. Some students are unable to handle a traditional classroom setting and online courses gives them an alternative. Students can do the course work at a library, coffee shop, restaurant, or in their home. Whatever work environment is best for a student can be used. In summary, online courses lets students work at their own pace, gives students different learning tools, and allows students to do schoolwork anywhere. All these options contribute to keeping students engaged thus bridging learning gaps.
In addition to the opportunities that online courses provide, some characteristics of an online learning environment include liberty, responsibility, and motivation. Online learning gives students a huge amount of freedom to how they complete their course work. For the most part there is no one monitoring students and whether they complete their school work. This characteristic leads to responsibility.
A student must be responsible or he will fall behind in his lessons. To give an example, I met with a fellow online student and she related to me how she fell behind in her lessons because of a family issue. Before she knew it, she was 30 lessons behind schedule. It is imperative to be responsible or falling behind is inevitable. This leads to the characteristic of motivation, specifically self-motivation. Self-motivation goes hand in hand with responsibility. In order to get up and complete lessons, a student has to be driven to do the work from within. A teacher is not supervising you throughout the school day like in a traditional school. In online schooling, a student does the work because they are driven to learn. This is a unique characteristic of online schooling that sets it apart from other methods of schooling. Some people cannot handle online courses because it requires self-motivation. To sum it up, characteristics of an online learning environment are liberty, responsibility, and motivation.
My personal experience in a traditional classroom versus online could not be more polarizing. In middle school, I attended a public school in Montclair and I was absolutely bored. The teachers did not challenge me and I was not engaged. It was difficult to pay attention because the teachers would go at a slow pace. All of this resulted in me struggling academically (most of my grades were Fs) and getting into a significant amount of trouble.
In the middle of 8th grade my mom put me into an online school and things slowly changed. I became engaged and interested in learning. I started to feel challenged by the online teachers and I adored the amount of freedom that online schooling gave me. My grades improved dramatically (honor roll) and I no longer got into trouble. In fact, I was able to earn Eagle Scout in the Boy Scouts of America and work two jobs. I have now been in online schooling for my entire high school career and it has been enjoyable. Online schooling even gave me the opportunity to take college classes. This wonderful experience convinces me that online schooling is superior.