Why do students fail in Online Classes?

With introduction of online classes in our standard education procedures, a lot of things are changing. And as online class will get more popular, more changes are bound to come. But with this can come many problems as well. Already many students are facing different issues and problems with online classes.

And the most serious problem is failing to take online classes and getting dropped out from class. Yes, many students cannot cope up with the ecosystem of modern online classes and as a result with time their performance drops and they ultimately fail and dropout. So today let us try to understand the reasons for such failures and find some workable solution.

Our Traditional Education Ecosystem

In order to find the reasons of problems and failures in concurrent online class system, first we need to look at the system that we are long habituated in. Yes, I am talking about our traditional education system with offline classroom classes. Maybe we can get some important hints from this about why those students who do quite well in that traditional offline class system but often face problems or even fails at the online class system.

In our traditional classroom ecosystem, the central role is played by our teachers. Yes, teachers are very important components for this system. Have you ever seen that how much silence you can get from a class also depends on the teacher present in class. With one teacher the class can become a chaotic fish-market like thing whereas with another teacher the same class gets so quiet that you can even hear a dropping pin.

Why so?

The difference is in the teacher. Otherwise the classroom, the benches and the desks, the students all are the same….only change was the teacher. In school we can frequently see that with some teachers students learn well, remain disciplined whereas with another teacher the story gets upside down. So we can understand the importance of a teacher in our traditional system.

So let us see what are the basic or primary roles that any teacher plays in our traditional system – 

1. Teacher sets school and class timings 
2. They set class routines
3. Ask for explanations if you fail to attend your classes
4. Teacher teaches and explain subjects in class
5. Also ask questions in class
6. Punish if you fail to answer the questions expected from you
7. Give class assignments regularly and check it thoroughly
8. Give home assignments regularly and check it thoroughly
9. Punish you if you fail at your classwork or homework assignments
10. Teacher also take periodical evaluation tests

11. Ask for explanations for your bad performance in tests
12. Take annual exam and promote you if you get pass marks or else fails you.

So these are some basic roles that a teacher performs in our school or education ecosystem. Let us now see the online class ecosystem in order to understand some basic difference between the traditional offline class and online class. Perhaps in that differences are the clues of the causes of students failing in online classes. 

Online Class Ecosystem

In the newly evolved online class ecosystem there are a lot of changes with respect to our traditional offline class ecosystem, as I discussed with you above. Let us see some of the basic features of a standard online class ecosystem. 

1. You set your study and class timings
2. You set your goals and routines. 
3. No one is there to ask you reasons for not taking your online classes
4. The teacher teaches and explains the subject in online class
5. No one to ask question in class
6. And so no punishment if you don’t know the answer of a question you are expected or supposed to know
7. No classwork or class assignments
8. Limited homework or home assignments
9. No one to question you about your reasons of not completing your home assignments
10. Usually, automated evaluation tests are taken
11. Automated systems just rate your performances but don’t ask any reason or explanations for your bad performance
12. Take annual or terminal exams to promote you to the next level if you pass.

So these were some very common or natural salient points that automatically come with an online class setup. So can you say what is the most striking difference we can see between traditional offline class and online class?

Yes, the main and most important difference is in the role of the teacher. In a traditional offline class the role and responsibility of a teacher is extremely high and obvious. But in case of online class, we see a rather diminished role of teacher in almost every aspect of education.

In online class, the teacher’s main and foremost role is to create learning content. That content can be in text form like some study materials, or can be an audio-visual class (sometimes can be only audio also) and so on. And other than that a teachers role is to clear doubts and queries that come in as text like emails and chats or maybe through phone, video conference or any other such social networking tool.

Then a teacher needs to prepare assignment questionnaires, exam question database and so on. So by this we notice a major diminishing role of the teacher in a student’s personal study sphere. Thus in the online class or course ecosystem, the teacher appears to be far less worried or concerned about his student’s success or failure and more concerned about his performance in the online class setup.

This withdrawal or partial withdrawal of a teacher’s “care” has its own plus and negative point. The plus point is that the student gets lots of space and air to breathe and grow as he likes or wants. And the obvious negative is also the same….the student gets lots of space and air to breathe and grow as he likes or wants.

And this is in most cases a bit negative because a student without proper guidance can seldom move in the right track. In most cases people fail to properly use time and resources for development of career as well as development as a human without any proper guidance. We tend to misuse our independence and flexibility more than using it in constructive and better purposes.

And this negative will continue to be there in online class setup. And this is perhaps the main reason due to which many online students fail to grow properly by viewing online classes, doing online assignments, giving online tests and so on. And according to my views, if the teacher’s involvement and concern can be increased in online classes also and the students find proper inspiration and guidance under him then there can be some major development and improvement. 

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