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Written by Oksana Shakula - Senior Applications Developer
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 There are lots of advantages and opportunities online learning can offer. A search of “online learning advantages” in Google returns 55 million results. There are disadvantages, too (and 2 million Google search results for that). So let’s talk about disadvantages – and how to make them into opportunities.
Putting myself in the shoes of a student, here are some things that I don’t like about online learning:
- Software issues - When course content is only compatible with certain browsers. When a site uses pop ups and my browser blocks them. When in the middle of work I am asked to install some special characters because the designer used them (as characters, not images) to make fancy background.
- Poor choice of educational activities offered: - Read some pages, take a multiple-choice test, Repeat.
- The fact that the grade for the test (administered by a computer) goes directly into my report card without live remediation.
- Non-repeatability, non-replicability. - You take a test and have some questions wrong. You want to print them out to discuss with your teacher, – but the course does not allow printing out the materials.
- Overall, the lack of a live person behind the course. - It is custom to provide technical support by course vendors and LMS administrators. But if there is a need for learning support – who provides that? The teacher who assigned the course
- When the only things you take home after the course are your grade and certificate.
If I would describe an e-learning course of my dreams, it would not be an e-learning course - but rather a careful blend of the best features of both worlds, online and offline.
- The goal of the application will be to help out a real teacher to carry out the learning process and not to act as a robot nanny who tries to do it all.
- An e-learning part of the course will be a desktop application. I install it once, and that’s when all software compatibility issues are checked and resolved. The application takes the whole screen by default. No browser URL string on top so I can concentrate better.
- The application does not mention a final test every time I am on the course home page. Surely, the final test is a necessary item that’s on the syllabus at the end of the course. But when completing my everyday assignments, I want to see the application as a good thing that helps me learn, and not as a bad thing that can fail me.
- I do an assignment on my own, going through it multiple times as needed – and when I am done, I can proudly transmit my best results to the teacher.
- For my assignment, I have alternative ways to complete it. I can either read a book or go through electronic chapter, or do both in either order for extra credit. Both will be discussed in class or online tomorrow.
- The application offers lots of e-goodies along the way. “Now that you have completed the topic, here’s a summary table for you to print out (or to put in your portfolio)”. The portfolio is for a student to take.
- The course still has plenty of real life elements. A live teacher will check my answers to open-ended questions. A field trip is not replaced by computer game or watching a documentary. Skills check is done on manikins, not by clicking a mouse button. A simulation of chemical reactions acts as a preparation, not a replacement of the real lab.
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Charlottesville, VA 22903
Phone: 434.244.5060
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