In the late 2019 a pandemic swept the globe and affected countless lives and still in 2022 has lasting effects that many people may not consider. From 2019 through 2021 the Covid-19 virus has forced many people to change their lifestyles and adapt to the isolation that the virus has caused. The Covid-19 Virus has had a major impact on a lot of different aspects of our lives. A major impact the virus has had is the schooling system shutdown and later switch to online learning. This switch has impacted many students’ grades and their learning in a way that has never been seen before. Even though there was a switch back to in person learning in 2021 we can still see the negative effects that online learning has brought. The effects of the switch to online learning can still be seen today with many popular colleges now providing additional online courses that you can take to replace your in-person classes.
A major part of the college experience or any schooling in general is the social aspect of it. Many people don’t realize how important learning how to socialize with others is learned through our interactions with our teachers and classmates. Whether it is asking the teacher for an explanation on a topic or just simply being friendly to a classmate socialization is one of the most important aspects of schooling. Through online learning students miss out on this important aspect of socializing and many important benefits that socialization can bring.
In the classroom whenever you have a question you could simply raise your hand or ask a teacher but online it is much harder to get you questions answered in a timely fashion. When taking online classes and having a question on the material or on your homework you usually must go through the process of writing an email and waiting for a response from your teacher just to ask a simple question. This long process usually isn’t worth it for many students, and they choose to just ignore or put aside their questions which can greatly impact a student’s learning process. There have been many times when I have been online learning and I have a question and email the teacher only to get a response three hours later when I have already forgotten why I asked that question in the first place.
Another way in-class socialization is important is through your socialization with your classmates. In class your classmates are an important resource that can help your understanding of the class. Classmates can also help you when stuck on complex topics in class and any simple questions you might have. There have been many times in class for me when a classmate has caught a simple mistake I made, that would have taken me a significant amount of time to catch myself.
The most important part about socialization for me is the school information you get from idle chat with teachers and classmates. The approaching deadlines or interesting events of college is something that many people have trouble initially finding out and a great way to find out about these is by getting information form a classmate or teacher. Online learning makes it a lot harder to find these deadlines and events because it doesn’t let classmates socialize.
Besides socialization online learning also has problem with the environment in which you are learning which can affect the learning ability of a student. There are a lot of differences between learning in a classroom and at home which can influence your grades and learning ability. When at home people tend to relax which can influence a student’s drive to learn and do their classwork. A good part of in-class learning is the “tone” that is set in the classroom which influences students to learn. The “tone” the class is the learning mood which is set by the teacher and in which our classmates influence us to learn. Another important aspect of the “tone” of the classroom is the ingrained view that a classroom is a place to learn which is different from learning from home. Teachers also benefit from the tone of a classroom by making them act more professionally in a classroom and they can also see how well the students are learning the material.
Tests are another major part of schooling that online learning can’t replicate well. The test taking programs that many courses have implemented have been complicated to use and have many glitches which can great hurt a student’s grade. Online classes test proctoring programs are not perfect and have many flaws which makes test taking a lot more stressful for students when something goes wrong.
By Brendan Hill, Activist Writer
