Do you know the COVID-19 pandemic led to a 900% increase in demand for online educational courses? This has led to a perpetual shift in the learning process.
The impact of the digital revolution has percolated to the education system, paving the way for online education. Also dubbed as e-learning, it has gained prominence over the traditional education system in a brief period.
However, there might be certain facts and points about it that you might be oblivious of. Moreover, its true essence and prospects need to be considered to understand it well.
For this, we have delved into all its prominent aspects, especially the advantages and disadvantages of online education.
Online Education and Its Development
Online education refers to the provision of educational content through digital means. It includes providing live or recorded lectures and other study materials on the internet.
Considering the statistics, a study has revealed that e-learning saves approximately 50% of time as compared to traditional offline education. Figures also mentioned that the e-learning sector in the Asia Pacific region will reach around $35 billion by 2025, and following the trend, Forbes has predicted that the value of the e-learning market will reach around $325 billion in a few years.
The above pattern has been driven by some global trends that stimulated the growth of online education in the past few decades. Here are some key causes behind it.
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What Caused Growth in Online Education?
The perpetuation of online education has been triggered by some dominant factors. Here are some of these causes substantiated with the relatable data and stats.
- Technological Advancement: Key statistics have revealed that as of 2024, approximately 4.8 billion smartphones are in use worldwide, with China leading the race, followed by India. It also shows that 94% of young adults in the US aged between 18 and 29 own a smartphone.
- Cheap Data Rates: With worldwide mobile data consumption increasing exponentially, the data rates in populous countries have decreased significantly, as shown in the major studies.
- Government Support: The government schemes, policy support, and financial aid for technological upgrades have further expanded the reach of the handy smart gadget. Some examples are the UK’s Virgin Media O2 National Data Bank, which targets low-income groups by providing 25 GB of free data per month. Similar attempts have been made in the US for free tablets from the government for low-income families. Similarly, India’s states have also been providing such services at the regional level. For example, the Tablet Yojana by the Rajasthan state and the Digi Shakti Scheme by Uttar Pradesh Government.
- COVID-19 Pandemic: Prevalent observations have revealed that Zoom meetings have surged from around 10 million in 2019 to 350 million in April 2020. Similarly, Google Classroom users have increased from 40 million in pre-COVID times to 150 million in 2021, indicating a shift of educational and business interaction from physical to online.
- Pervasive Wireless Coverage: The technological revolution across the globe has also been sweeping high with every passing moment. Data shows that around 90% of the world population is under the coverage of 4 G. However, there has been a disparity in its accessibility owing to the digital gap between higher, middle, and lower-income nations.
Types of Online Education
The above factors have led to the emergence of different types of online learning to fit the demands of students belonging to diverse backgrounds.
- Asynchronous Education: It is a type of learning where students and teachers don’t have a real-time interaction, i.e., prerecorded lectures and materials are made available, which can be accessed by the students at any time.
- Synchronous Education: In contrast to asynchronous, it provides real-time interaction between the learner and the teacher through live group video services such as Google Meet or Zoom.
- Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC): This type caters to the educational needs of numerous students. An array of courses is exhibited on the platform, from which the learner selects, pays, and learns. Some notable examples of MOOCs are Coursera and Udacity.
- Mobile Learning: Utilizing mobile phones for educational purposes is what we call mobile learning. A dependable study has disclosed that about 90% of the phones are smartphones, and approximately 7.2 billion smartphones are being used worldwide.
- Adaptive Learning: It aims to integrate artificial intelligence with the learning process. AI tools facilitate a personalized educational system by adapting the study resources in a form that the learner feels comfortable with. The large language models, speech-to-text and text-to-speech tools, etc., have simplified the learning process to a greater extent.
These globally prevalent situations and the emerging varieties of e-learning modes have increased their scope owing to their noteworthy features.
Notable Features of Online Education
Online education has been adopted across the globe, which has been attributed to its distinguished features. These characteristics have reinforced its adoption among the masses.
- Device Dependent: An online education system is highly dependent on devices such as a computer system, a laptop, a tablet, or a mobile device. Some peripheral devices, such as speakers, headphones, and a router for Wi-Fi, can also be required for a better experience.
- Multiple Course Options: The online courses provide an array of options from which the student can choose and learn.
- Diverse Interaction: The students form global communities, get connected, and this facilitates engaging in productive discussions and exchange of logical ideas during the e-courses.
- Geographically Independent: All it demands is the device, an internet connection, and a regular power supply. This makes it highly accessible even in remote areas.
- More Inclusive: Being independent of the location, it extends the opportunity to attain education to people living in distant locations and also to low-income groups who can’t afford traditional high-cost education.
These features of e-learning correspond to certain merits and strengths, providing it with an edge against traditional offline education.
Advantages of Online Education
Online education poses many advantages that have led to its popularity in such a short span described in above above-mentioned data. Here are some explicit pros that you need to be aware of to understand them well.
- Flexible Access: The online classes are accessed using tablets, laptops, and smartphones, which are easy to carry and get settled with. Working on the wireless network provides an immense opportunity to manage the devices employed in learning.
- Avoid Harsh Situations: Some areas are either frequently or seasonally exposed to the harsh climate. In such cases, the movement of the people, especially children and student’s is hampered. Heavy snowfall, heatwaves, floods, cloudbursts, etc., are some prominent situations where online classes have been a boon. The war-torn areas have also adopted it as a standard mode.
- Recording and Retaking Classes: The screenshot or screen recording features in smartphones and laptops help capture important study clips and photos during the lecture, which can be accessed, learnt, and replayed after the class.
- Digital Study Material: During online classes, the students are provided with PDFs and other study material that can either be used on their gadgets or can be printed and read. This negates the issue of the availability of books to far-flung areas.
- Make Education More Inclusive: About 42% of the global population resides in rural areas, including some communities inhabited in extremely remote locations. Such people, like the tribal and backward classes, get privileged by the provisions of online classes, making it more inclusive and accessible.
- Saves Cost: The e-learning costs less in tuition fees than traditional classes. Other expenses, like hostel fees, living expenses, transportation costs, and other miscellaneous charges, are saved when switched to online classes. The platforms providing multiple online courses offer the choice to select a specific course and pay for it, thus saving expenses on unnecessary subjects.
- Stimulate Other Qualities: This mode of education incites digital literacy in the student as well as the parents. It stimulates self-paced learning and reflects the development of critical thinking.
- Choose a Learning Environment: Online classes are generally taken at home or in libraries, which provides an immense opportunity to choose and select the environment.
Now we should consider its shortcomings as well to understand this prevailing concept better and arrive at a conclusion.
Disadvantages of Online Education
Online education has certain cons, discussing which i necessary to explore its facets. Below are some important shortcomings of it that you must be mindful of.
- High Disturbance: Studying at home can be disturbing due to household noise, TV, music, and other sounds, which can interrupt the learning process.
- Impacts Social Interaction: This mode of education cuts the student off from the social circle. The traditional in-class education system curriculum contains a sports period, extra-curricular activities, clubs, and events that secondarily develop emotional and behavioural strengths in the students.
- Zoom Fatigue: This term came into being to depict the hectic chorus of engaging exhaustively over Zoom meetings. It is considered an emerging issue in this type of learning process.
- Technical Hindrance: Power shortage, signal lags, or issues with the gadget can hamper the learning experience during online classes.
- Lack of Assessment Medium: It is hard to gauge the performance of the students in online classes, as taking short tests regularly cannot be managed.
- Lack of Self-discipline: Conducting online classes is a laborious task, especially for small kids. Ensuring time management and maintaining discipline is a challenge.
- Shortage of Multiple Gadgets: In low-income families, where all siblings have to take online classes, the shortage of multiple gadgets hampers their accessibility.
From these perspectives, we can identify that its pros pose strengths then its cons. These disadvantages can be negated by adopting the strategy suggested below.
How to use Online Education Prudently?
Utilizing the online education system is necessary to counter its cons and enhance its benefits.
For this, you can consider the following suggestions to harness its true potential and cope with its transformation.
- Hybrid Classes: You should keep a balance between online education and offline classes. Classroom education will inculcate the necessary qualities, along with keeping the student fit and sociable.
- Keep the Batch Small: The institutions can consider keeping batches small during online classes to increase focused attention on all students.
- Claim Benefits of Government Schemes: As mentioned above, some federal governments and independent organizations are providing free tablets and an internet connection to the low-income groups to expand the digital reach. The eligible people can claim such gadgets and services and use them for e-learning.
- Maintain A Good Surrounding: Maintaining a calm, silent surrounding, with good lighting, better sound gadgets, and a good display tablet or laptop will enhance the learning experience.
- Keep in Touch with Batchmates: The students should stay connected to their batchmates through school community websites or WhatsApp to maintain a social link.
- Contact the Teacher and Mentors for Feedback: It is highly advised to stay in contact with the teachers to get timely feedback and ensure the learning strategy goes well.
This mode of education has contrasting features with the traditional offline classes, which have been discussed in the next section.
Comparison Between Online Education and Offline Learning
Offline education is the traditional education system where students have to stay physically present in the classrooms. On the flip side, online education employs the internet and smart devices as a medium to impart education to the students right from the classroom.
To get a better understanding of them, the table below distinguishes these concepts clearly.
| S. No. | Differences | Online Education | Offline Education |
| 1 | Medium | Gadgets and internet connection | Physical attendance |
| 2 | Accessibility | Flexible and personalized | Specific timetable |
| 3 | Location dependence | Pervasive availability | Location specific |
| 4 | Cost | Less costly | More costly |
| 5 | Sociability | Less | Much more |
| 6 | Demands self-discipline | More | Less |
After the entire discussion, it is evident that online education has been conquering the education field and will further metamorphose to all new levels in the coming times.
Future of Online Education
The disadvantages of online education have been nullified by employing emerging technologies and strategies. Its prospects have been driven by its integration with some future tech and adoption of novel approaches in this endeavor. From this, we can predict its direction through the following perspectives.
- AR/VR: These immersive technologies will further improve the learning practices by making it a more interactive and socially integrated process by employing some extra gadgets.
- AI-based Assessment System: AI-integrated bots, virtual mentors, and a smart assessment system will improve the learning outcomes and provide instant results to gauge the student’s retention capacity. The large language models will further furnish a much personalized educational setup.
- Metaverse Education: Experiencing a virtual school setup through the metaverse can be the next innovative step in this field.
- Neuroscience-dependent Learning: The prevailing research striving to enhance the neural pattern and align it with computer systems will explore opportunities to improve the educational process.
Although these improvements are swiftly engulfing the online education sector, some more advanced and innovative technologies are expected to integrate and revolutionize this fledgling sector.
Conclusion
The above discussion has explored the dimensions with special focus on the advantages and disadvantages of online education, which will help you understand this evolving concept better. Its integration with the emerging technologies will further widen its scope and will further revolutionize education. The gamification of education, large language models, and other technologies have
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FAQ
Ans: Online education means employing gadgets and the internet for educational purposes. It is also called e-learning.
Ans: Online education saves cost, provides inclusivity, saves time, and ensures inclusivity. However, it negates sociability, and its aim could not be released due to the digital divide. But all in all, it is good for students.
Ans: Both online and classroom learning cater to specific needs. As online learning provides pervasive access to lectures and study material, classroom learning flourishes with immense opportunity to interact socially. Hence, a hybrid learning system is suggested.
Ans: Synchronous education means students and teachers have a real-time interaction with each other through applications such as Zoom and Google Meet. While asynchronous education refers to pre-recorded lectures and segregated study material kept at the disposal of the student, considering his discretion of taking classes and accessing material.
