Online Learning

Technology has allowed people to communicate effectively over great distances.  First there was the telegraph, and then the telephone, and now the internet helps fill that role.  With new innovations in the internet, such as voice and video chats and instant messaging, events such as conferences can take place online, even when the parties are separated by countries.  This allows for these events to take place in an online environment, which gives them a distinct feel that does not happen when they occur in person.  However, they still have merit for the advantages they provide in time saving, while the only disadvantages are usability which will affect everyone differently.
The advantages that online communication provide are quite extensive.  Being able to still have English class even though the professor was not at the school is one of those advantages.  It should be noted that this class period was held in a chat room, so it was a large group instant messaging, rather than a video conference.  Instead of losing the class period, it allowed us to go over some housekeeping things.  While this was not necessarily the best use of that time, the discussion we had in class was necessary and made it so that time was not wasted entirely.  One incredibly useful aspect of the online class was that we were able to break into small groups much more effectively.  Rather than being given a portion of the room, each group was given an entire “room” that only they were in.  This was much more effective than a divided room for the simple fact that there were no people to distract us.  However, the online class room was no substitute for the real thing.
While the online class did allow us to make use of an otherwise useless time period, it still had a fair share of problems.  Typing to chat is not nearly as fast or efficient as speaking, and tone is far more difficult to interpret.  Furthermore, I did not feel as attentive in the online class as a real classroom.  While this could be for any number of reasons, the most likely one is that it was not done via video.  The reason why I feel this way is because I didn’t have an image to accompany the text.  In other words, even though we were being “talked” to, it was not nearly as effective as having a person to talk to because many of the things that accompany speech, such as tone or facial expressions, are unable to be expressed without video.  While this was not very problematic for the class I was in, it did make the class period boring.
All in all, an online classroom experience seems to have a lot of potential.  It would allow people to participate from nearly anywhere while having basically the same experience.  Unfortunately, for many online learning programs, that potential has not been fully realized.  Making the experience textual rather than verbal prevents it from being as fluid as a normal class room, and even then it may still not be perfect.  Working out these kinks would allow for a classroom experience, without the classroom.

Eric Carl