eLearning

Thanks to technology and the rise of the internet, eLearning becomes more and more accessible to almost everyone. For the first time ever, the location you take part from, doesn’t impact the quality of the educational content you consume as a student. While eLearning is definitely not perfect, it’s a new method to approach a problem we face for a long time; How can you offer a high quality study program that reaches everyone around the globe, while being more affordable?

Different Types of eLearning

Inherently, there are 2 types of eLearning. We distinguish between synchronous and asychrnous learning. Let’s analyze the differences between those two methologies.

Synchronous eLearning

In synchronous elearning the learners and teachers are interacting at the same time through online tools. Everything happens in real-time from different locations. Therefore it is essential to have a good internet connection to be able to follow along the live webinar. The students are able to ask questions to the teacher with instant messaging tools, and if the time is right, the teacher responds with an answer. Through chat tools, the students are also able to exchange ideas and knowledge among themselves. 

Advanced teaching software enables also other innovative teaching methods, such as group disposition and shared white-boards. The teacher has the option to subdivide the whole class into small learning groups, in which they work on a specific question. One student among the group takes the moderator role and takes responsibility. The students have the ability to collect ideas through voice communication and they are also able to write the ideas down in real-time on shared white-boards.

Asynchronous eLearning

In asynchronous eLearning, the teacher and the students are not online at the same time. This methodology therefore uses different kind of technologies such as blogs, discussions forums, online courses, eBook’s and email. 

This has obviously some advantages. The students are able to learn at their preferable time by not affecting their daily commitments. It’s clearly more flexible and individually customized.

Collaboration

One might argue that eLearning issolates the students socially and is bad for collaboration. I’d like to flip that; with the right methods, the students are able to collaborate even better through online tools. 

When working in groups, the students are able to exchange knowledge and experiences, which they gained while working on their tasks. This means the students are teacher/mentor and learner at the same time. 

Some online tools, such as collaborative text editing software, make it extremely easy to work on tasks with your colleagues at the same time.

The Difficult Parts

Online learning has some difficult parts you have to consider. The students are on their own, when it comes to learning in asynchronous phases. They have to motivate themselves in order to learn the required material. This makes it extremely difficult for students who struggle with time management and motivation. In theory, you also have more spare time, which could then lead to procrastination. 

Furthermore, it’s really easy to distract yourself during synchronous online sessions. The teacher isn’t able to see your activities while you are online. This means you could do anything at the same time. Browsing reddit, scrolling through social media and yes even watch youtube videos. 

As you can see, it really requires self-awareness and discipline to stay attentive.

Thank You

Thank you for reading. If this essay provided some value to you, feel free to share this with your closest friends and family members. There’s nothing better than sharing valuable experiences with loved ones.