With the advancement of technology, online education is becoming popular. Over the decade, the use of the internet is becoming popular and both teachers and students love to study online. Also, if I think about the Covid times, online education and using tools have become popular and children were able to continue their studies.
In this debate, both agree and disagree teams came up with strong points. I will discuss some of them in my blog.
AGREE
- Digital Inequality: Every kid does not have laptops or high-speed internet. This gives rise to digital access and digital inequity.
- Homework: Kids vanish online and they do not complete their homework. Some parents go to work so they cannot help with issues.
- Screen time: With the use of laptops and the internet the screen time of students gets increased and it can impact their health. They can have sleep disorders, myopia, stress, and anxiety.
- Isolation: Students feel isolated while learning online which can impact the social-emotional learning process. Moreover, students can become unmotivated and can struggle with their appearance when they have to come to class and do face-to-face interactions.
- Physical education: With online study, it is difficult to perform physical work and the question arises that “how one can do physical education classes”.
- Music and drama classes are hindered by online classes.
- Assessment: It is difficult to access these classes. Assessment is not done properly in virtual education. Virtual learning causes fatigue and mental exhaustion. As a result, students fear losing and lack behind. Physical schools provide breakfast and provide safety, security, and stability.
DISAGREE
The disagree team said that online learning is a perfect supplement for learning. Online learning comes with many benefits and we have seen this in lockdown times.
- More flexibility: Self-pace and allows to set up the schedule and students and teachers can be flexible in the learning process.
- Small Groups: Teachers are able to work in small groups and one can learn at any time and anywhere.
- Time: It saves time for students and it develops important skills, especially in terms of technology. Online education meets the unique needs of the classroom. If I talk about the feedback, the online homework is easy to check and quickly assessed.
- Disability: A person with visual and hearing impairment can get the most of the benefits from online learning. For example, dyslexia as kids can change the font size while learning online.
- It eases the pressure of harassment in schools.
- Fewer distractions: Online learning prevents distractions as a student read and write alone in a closed environment.
Conclusion
Parents are concerned about their children’s long-term impacts of online learning. Children’s education has been disrupted, and their social, emotional, and mental well-being has suffered as a result of the change. Parents are rightfully concerned about the negative consequences of online learning, but there are some positive outcomes as well.
When the pandemic drove schools across the country to close, parents, teachers, and children were caught off guard. Even though some schools have reopened, others have remained closed, and millions of kids continue to learn remotely to some extent. Families and educators can gain useful information and utilize this as an opportunity to progress as the influence of online education become more apparent.
Pandemic or emergency online learning and teaching is very different from online learning in general. Online learning has been around for decades now, and when properly implemented, developed and delivered, it can be very successful for students with supportive environments, such as families, tutors, etc.