Hello, how are you? Let us discuss something new today. Online tutorial class. In the last few articles I was discussing about home tutors and online home tutor consultancies and so on. In 21st century education, one of the most happening concepts is perhaps online class. Many also call this virtual class. Though according to me there is a very narrow but sharp difference between online class and virtual class. Today we will discuss these concepts.
So if you are not much aware about online classes then let me explain it a bit. Nowadays you all have good and fast smartphones and also a high speed internet connection. And you must be watching videos on Youtube and Facebook, and many such other digital platforms. And perhaps you also know that audiovisuals you see on the internet are basically of two types, one is pre-recorded and the other is live streaming. A video can be recorded and then uploaded to some online platform for viewers to download and watch at his or her convenience. When you will find time then you can access the URL link of the video and download it to view.
Then there are another way of sharing an audiovisual, that is called live streaming. When the audiovisual program is directly shooted by a video camera and broadcasted on the internet at real time…or you can say “on-the-go”, then that concept is called live streaming.
Now you must ask why should you go for online classes instead of traditional offline classes? Is there any special benefit? Even more serious questions you may ask…whether it is at all good to attend a class where there would be no teacher present by himself physically? So many such questions must be arising in your mind.
Why Online Classes?
Let me at first discuss a little about the benefits of online class. Then you will automatically understand why you or anyone can opt for online class instead of offline class and under what condition or situation you are beneficial for such decisions. Let us see the main issues that an offline class has. The main 3 points of factors or issues that can arise most often are time factors, distance factors and economic factors. Let us discuss one by one.
When you have to attend an offline class then either you or your teacher or sometimes both of you need to travel a distance. So this is the time factor. More the distance between your house and your teacher’s house, the more time it will take to travel. It is very much possible that both of you are busy with different schedules, and spending some more time in regular travelling is not always a winning choice. So there is the use and benefit of online class. If you take an online class, then neither you nor your tutor needs to travel to waste time and energy. You can take the class right from your home and so does the teacher also.
Beside time, the distance is also a major factor. More the distance, more is the waste of time and energy. The time you or your teacher probably invests for travelling distances can be alternately used in better stuff like more studies, creative hobbies etc.
And the third important factor is money. As you need to travel frequently in a week, and as more the distance you need to travel every time, naturally you have to spend more money for transport. This money adds up your expenses besides your tutorial fees. So with online class you can avoid these transportation costs. In case the teacher is a home tutor and needs to travel, then also the tutorial fees are usually inclusive of travelling costs. But in online class you can get significant price benefits from the tutor as he is also saving his time, energy and money.
Many people nowadays need to continue studies even after taking up a job, for further development of their career. For him attending online classes may become kind of the only viable option because he cannot attend his offline classes beside his daily office schedules. Even the tutor can also be in a job, home tutoring as his alternative profession. So in that case also online class becomes very useful and viable.
Online or Offline?
So by now you must be having some idea about what are the most general reasons or factors for online classes. And under what compulsion you or your tutor needs online classes. These are all great points or advantages with online classes. But there are some obvious problems as well. In traditional offline classes the teacher-student communication is usually much better.
Tutor can have better idea about a student’s progress by his body language, confidence and interaction. Student also benefits from body language and confidence of the tutor. In online classes there are scopes of communication and interactions but quite limited in comparison to offline classes. In live stream online class the scope of interaction is better as both the tutor and student are available online at that point of time and also they are online with the common purpose or common interest which is related to the ongoing online class. So naturally interaction can be made fast and better. But in case of recorded broadcasts, the interaction and communications usually are not real time and seamless, instead responses are usually discreet and delayed. So this is a major problem with online classes.
But still there are of course obvious causes and advantages of online classes which made it a widespread success all over the internet world. But to my opinion, if there can be somehow something in between then may be that would have been even better. What I want to say is, we can plan something that can be called a hybrid method….that is a proportionate combination of offline and online class. If the tutor and the student can have periodic offline class sessions and then complement that with frequent sessions of online class then maybe we can extract the best of the benefits of online class as well as keep the traditional goodness of traditional offline study sessions. It’s like a fusion of tradition with modernization.
Maybe this would not be possible especially in cases where geographical and economical constraints are more but can be taken as a serious alternative where such constraints are relax-able or flexible.