Today, we had a conversation about the topic that, if learning through online courses is more effective than learning in the traditional classroom setting.
In Bernda's opinions, she thought learning in the traditional way was more effective.
First, she thought learning in the classroom could make her more focused on the lessons because she would be affected by other people.If she felt sleepy or tired sometimes, she would probably refresh (/pick herself up) to listen to the class as long as some of her classmates kept concentrated on the lesson.But for online, she would close the computer and go to bed for sleep in the same case.
Second, she thought that she could ask the teacher for an answer timely when having some questions during the class. She believed that receiving the high-quality feedback in time was very important to study efficiently and could help her consolidate the knowledge learned
Third, she thought it was more flexible in the offline class than in the online. If someone couldn't understand some of the knowledge in class, they could ask teachers to explain it again. Sometimes their teacher would adopt different methods to explain in order to make them understand well.
In my opinions, I also disagreed with the idea that studying through online courses was more effective than offline. Exactly, I think it hugely( /mainly /largely) depended on how strong the interactivity would be needed in a class.
As for some classes with a strong need for interaction, such as experimental lessons and philosophy classes. I thought the traditional classroom setting would be the better choice.
For example, when we attend an experimental lesson, we would hope to have our questions answered by teachers in detail and in time. If we learned it through online, it might be harder to describe the questions we had met clearly. Besides, the answer we received might usually be delayed.
For another example, if we had a philosophy class, we students would always be asked to sit in groups so as to have group discussion. Thanks for we were sitting there, we could interact with each other not only by language but also through gesture and manner. Also, it would be easier to control the discussion scene through offline than online. So if we attended a strong interactive class, I thought studying through offline would be more effective.
However, as for some less interactive courses, with one-way communication from teacher to students, I thought learning online would be more effective.
First, we could study at our own space. If the knowledge points in lessons we had mastered, we could watched the video at a higher speed, while if we couldn't understand the point very well, we could use a lower speed too.
Second, we can study more freely without time and space limit. Studying through online allowed us to watch( /view) the teaching videos whenever and wherever, while studying through offline always asked us appear at a definite time and place.
Third, there was a huge amount of teaching resources on the net. So we could choose one or more lessons suitable for ourselves to attend. We also got the chance to attend some open courses, which were given by some teachers from elite schools.
In a word, I thought both online and offline lessons had pros and cons. Each of them had a better usage scenario. Studying through offline might be suitable for high interactive lessons, while studying through online might be more effective in unidirectional classes. As for me, I hoped we could have more autonomy to determine which form of class we could attend.
Today, after listening to all of my standpoints, Bernda said that she was inspired to be more critical thinking from both sides. I also considered it to be important because it always helped me to think deeper and made me be a wiser man.
Sukie
May 7, 2019