The advent of the pandemic in the year 2020 has changed a lot of things around us and one important thing that has been completely transformed because of the pandemic is the education system.
Because of the pandemic, almost 93% of the families experienced some sort of distance learning for their kids and if you are thinking that online learning was a substitute for kids during the pandemic then you should know that this new age learning method is here to stay forever.
The pandemic left parents with no choice to shift to the online education system, even when they were against it before the pandemic. Some people still question its outcomes while others look at it as the new age of learning. But the main question here is which type of effect online education has on families and how it has affected the students. Let’s find out through this blog post.
The effect on families
The lack of necessities
With the digital platform becoming the learning center, many families have struggled to undergo this change. Families with a low level of income don’t have the two basic necessities of online learning; a computer and a high-speed internet service. You will be surprised to know that over 13.5 million children aged between 15-17 don’t have access to high-speed internet.
But this doesn’t mean that the real issue was online learning as the real issue is with the way we have underestimated the penetration of the internet in the past. Without online learning, even those students who have been able to continue their education during the lockdown would have been left isolated from the entire education system and that would have cost the entire nation and affected its future.
The only solution to this problem is to make the internet more readily available to different parts of the country as now after seeing how vulnerable humans are, there is no way we can compromise with the education of students and rely only on the traditional method of teaching in the future.
The lack of understanding
For most people, understanding the new learning center in the form of video classes and online courses was not difficult as they were already used to such a kind of system in the past but then there was a small group of the population that found it difficult to understand the online education system and they even failed to understand how it affected the overall development of their child.
But instead of considering online education as an enemy of your students, you should look at the facts and figures. According to a joint study conducted by National PTA and NEA, most students felt that they are improving and doing really well in terms of academics while learning through online platforms.
This simply shows how powerful and useful online learning can be but the way online learning has been introduced needs some changes so that along with making parents understand the process, we can communicate its effect and benefit for the students as well.
What benefits have been unraveled through online learning?
Flexible schedule
Students now don’t need to follow the rigid school schedule as they get the required flexibility through online classes. It has been found that following a rigid schedule affects the performance of the students in a negative manner.
Self-paced instruction
With online learning, students have been able to break big assignments into smaller chunks, and thus, instead of trying to match the pace with the whole class, they can learn at their own pace and learn more.
Less distraction
Students who get easily distracted may find online classes to be more helpful as there are fewer distractions in online classes. In addition to this, shy students struggle to ask questions in schools but they find it easier to do so during online classes.
Improved self-regulation skills
While using online platforms as a learning center, students are able to stay independent and they learn how to track their schedule, improvement and come up with a routine on their own. This improves the self-regulation skills of the students.
Better sleep cycles
This might sound absurd but it’s one of those rare facts related to online classes. With online classes, students get more time to rest and thus their overall sleep cycle keeps on improving with time.
Round the clock accessibility
Whether it is about the studying material or the results, students have round-the-clock access to everything related to their studies and thus they can better track their performance and improve their academic results.
During the pandemic, online education has come to us as a blessing in disguise as there are many benefits that both students and parents can harness from online education instead of rejecting it just because of the myths.
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