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During the pandemic, many students had to take classes online. It turns out that this wasn’t the worst or the most inefficient thing in the world. Finally, many of these kids and their parents saw the potential behind this concept.
Also, many people had too much time and energy on their hands and had no option to leave their homes. Therefore, some decided to find an interesting course or two; some even acquired real-world skills online.
The lockdowns are over, and, for many people, the pandemic is a distant memory, but online education’s rise seems to continue. Why is that? More importantly, why is online education considered by many to be the future of learning? Let’s find out!
- Availability
Even in the most remote areas of the world, there’s some sort of a school or a teacher. What these areas lack is choice. You have this one option in these areas, and every other educational venue is unavailable.
Compared to local options, this online education has one more hidden perk – it gives you a more cost-effective education. What quality of local education would you be able to afford for that amount of money? This further expands on the concept of availability since more people can afford higher education.
There’s also an egalitarian character to this since all that people need to access it is a smart device and access to the internet. About 65% of the planet’s population can now access the digital world. Ideally, it will be 100%, but we won’t deal in hypotheticals, and it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to say that knowledge was never more available than today.
Even if you don’t have the money or don’t want to pay, there are a lot of free courses, sample courses, and trial periods that you could use. It’s simpler and cheaper, like watching movies at home is more convenient when compared to going to the theater.
- Flexibility
The best thing about online learning materials is they’re always available. No materials are back at school/uni or only take place live and can’t be replicated later on.
This is also incredibly useful for parental involvement since the parents can fully review the learning materials and even see what the lectures were like in person. This is true for many different materials, including stream learning. The bottom line is that they can help their kids keep up with the curriculum or sync their lessons with pre-existing learning materials.
Another great thing about this learning method is that it works with any learning style. Usually, you can watch a video or download an e-book, but you can also get a transcript or find interactive material to work with. The fact that it’s so great for different learning styles means that it has a greater appeal to all types of learners.
Not to mention that since you can access this through any device, you get to choose the location and the screen size. In other words, you can repeat a part of the lesson while on public transportation or do it in a bathtub.
The freedom to customize your learning environment can revolutionize learning as we know it.
- Cost-savings
Previously, we’ve briefly mentioned this, but it might be best to address it more thoroughly. Namely, traditional education is expensive, and for a good reason. Production of traditional learning materials. Travel expenses for guest speakers, the rent, the utilities for the institution, and more cost money, and they’re not cheap.
All of this can be eliminated with online learning.
Also, since traditional learning institutions have limited seats (and all of these expenses to cover), they increase the costs to maximize the profit. With live streaming, this is no longer the case. First of all, the number of lesson takers is not limited. This means that the course can make the same profit by attracting more attendees, and they can do this with lower costs. The scalability comes from attracting more learners, which can be done by becoming more competitive.
Then, there are the costs that the course attendee is facing. The learner also doesn’t have to travel, buy new clothes to wear to these courses, spend money on coffee on recess, and undergo a million other small expenses when taking lessons in person.
- Better for a balanced life
Many kids already have too many obligations in the traditional school system (classes, extracurricular activities, etc.). Many adults are already working full-time in their jobs and struggle to coordinate properly. This is one of the reasons why a chance of a more balanced life while taking these lessons is so great.
Earlier, we’ve mentioned flexibility as one of the major advantages. While this is true, a part of this flexibility lies in a chance to make a more balanced schedule. Accessing these learning materials at any time, even while in transportation (listening while driving or being driven) gives you a space in the schedule that otherwise wouldn’t exist.
Remember that while a course is supposed to be temporary, learning is a lifelong process. Therefore, you need a system, a method that will yield consistent results.
- Personalization
In the past, learning materials were made with the lowest common denominator in mind. After all, they can’t risk skipping something that a newcomer wouldn’t understand, which makes many books and lectures unnecessarily long with introductions and digressions.
Modern platforms and algorithms can pinpoint your knowledge levels.
Another thing to understand is that people usually don’t miss whole sections but have random gaps and inadequacies. These platforms and their analytical capabilities could identify these in the same way a teacher would in a one-on-one interaction (perhaps with an even greater accuracy and reliability). In other words, everyone gets a different learning experience (made to help them deliver the best results).
The fact that you see better results as a student means that your immersion and motivation remain high for much longer. Not to mention that you save a lot of time and effort and spare yourself from frustration.
Wrap up
You must understand that progress leaves no stone unturned. However, education is not the last thing to be improved with the integration of the internet. It’s probably the first field to receive this type of preferential treatment, and, as such, it’s hardly surprising that this trend will carry on in the future.