Early Times Report
JAMMU, Jan 11: To illuminate the students on the pros and cons of online classes, GDC Vijaypur today organized a webinar on the topic "Merits and Demerits of Online classes" in which Dr.Jagdish Thappa, formerly Professor and Head, Psychiatry Department, GMC, Jammu was the resource person.
He narrated that pandemic has disrupted the normal lifestyle of people globally. It has impacted the education world too and virtual learning is a panacea in the times of COVID-19. He added that there was already a high growth and adoption of technology in education sector but there has been a significant spike in usage since COVID-19.
Throwing light on the ample number of merits of online education he said that online learning has shown to increase retention of information where a student retains 25 -60% more information as compared to only 8-10% in a physical classroom, is flexible, is more effective, is unbounded from time constraints and has low cost setup.
Virtual classrooms are entirely different from that of physical classrooms as they are accessible 24*7 and students can learn as per their convenience.
However, there are some downsides too. He elaborated that students from rural areas face issues of connectivity, students with disabilities struggle with online classes as resources for visual, speech and hearing impairment are not available which pose a serious hurdle for them, poor students don't have access to online facilities, thus creating a huge digital divide among the student community.
He also focused on the challenges of online teaching as not all teachers are tech savvy and are used to traditional methods of teaching. Therefore, online teaching has become a tough task demanding a higher degree of patience and skills that had ever been exhibited by them before . However, he insisted on the proper planning and training of teachers and employement of new strategies to cope with the issues to ensure that students do not miss out on their studies.
The webinar was coordinated by Dr Mohd. Yousuf Rather. The webinar was held under the able guidance of the Principal,Prof. Sangeeta Sudan, who thanked Dr Jagdish Thappa for sharing his pearls of wisdom and illustrating the factual benefits and impacts of online education. |
