The pros and cons of online learning

Online learning has increased in popularity as a result of COVID. There has been a relatively sudden shift away from the classroom locally, Australia wide and many parts of the globe. Some are wondering whether the adoption of online learning will continue to persist post-pandemic, and how such a shift will impact the training and education market. At Skills Strategies International we have definitely had an increase in online participation. This has been in both our fully online self-paced courses and also in our virtual classroom courses.

Research suggests that online learning has been shown to increase retention of information, and take less time, meaning the changes coronavirus have caused might be here to stay. However, this research data needs to be analysed further. 

One of the advantages of self-paced online learning is you can do it whenever you want wherever you want. The problem with self-paced online is that you can do whatever you want whenever you want – and that means you don’t prioritise it! The other problem is the expectation that there will be trainer support whenever you want it. This becomes physically impossible and causes stress for trainers and frustration for learners. 

The solution is to make expectations very clear to learners. They are not going to be spoon fed and will have to take responsibility for being independent learners. Online learning probably requires more effort from the learner. That is probably why research indicates an increase in learning retention. We can also make increased use of learning forums so that learners can support each other, and facilitators can add to the conversation.

All of our courses are offered online. We usually recommend the Virtual Classroom courses rather than self-paced. If you want further information please give us a call on 61432180 (This number will get you access to our Balcatta Training Centre, our Mandurah Training Centre or our Victorian Training Centre