Order from us for quality, customized work in due time of your choice.
As part of the restrictive measures of Covid-19, Plymouth University introduced online learning for the SCP course. I was advised that I would be required to use online platforms such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams, to name a few, for lectures and group work.
Before the start of the induction week, I felt anxious about navigating such technology. I worried about the prospects of technical difficulties, Wi-Fi connection issues, or how I was going to maintain my motivation and attention in the face of numerous possible distractions. I was concerned about the emotional removal that potentially comes from not being in a physical classroom and how that will affect my working relationship with the rest of the cohort.
I met the rest of the students online on the first day. I was relieved to know that I was not the only one who felt technologically inadequate and that the majority of them also had the same concerns.
There were very few technical difficulties which I attributed to the preparedness of the course tutor and all the lecturers. It didn’t take long for me to learn to navigate the learning platform. While I thought the lectures were properly delivered, I found the technology posed a challenge to interaction. Having to mute your microphone to minimize noise feedback made it difficult to jump into a conversation quickly. I also found some topics were much harder to focus on online than others.
Preparing for each day by making sure I had the right links to each session and making sure they worked was beneficial. I familiarised myself with the different platforms beforehand to make sure I had a basic understanding of how they worked. By doing so, I alleviated a lot of my worries about the technology. Pre-course reading materials were also provided which I made certain to read the night before. I noted down questions about the topic and I found this helped me stay more focused during the lectures.
I learned that there are advantages to online learning. Not needing to commute and being in the comfort of your own home certainly has benefits, especially during this time when the anxiety about being in a crowd can be high. I also learned that while new technology may seem daunting at first, with practice it certainly gets easier. But it also has disadvantages. I realized that some subjects are much harder to learn online. Online learning also requires more motivation to stay focused. I found it also limits back-and-forth dialogue between people in some ways.
Providing how-to webinars on using online platforms to both students and lecturers can make the experience better. The lectures could be improved by making them more interactive and engaging as the technology gets better. For now, we just need to be accountable for our own standard of learning by making sure distractions are kept to a minimum and employing our own measures to stay motivated.
Order from us for quality, customized work in due time of your choice.