TASK 2: ACADEMIC ESSAY

INTERNET FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING

Internet is giving us a wide array of choices for teaching and learning process.
Teachers can develop different types of teaching and learning tools using different
applications and students can also choose their modes of learning and can revise the
previous lessons easily. Online learning is also widely known as E-learning and it is a
learning system based on formalised teaching but with the help of electronic resources.
While teaching can be based in or out of the classrooms, the use of computers and the
Internet forms the major component of E-learning. E-learning can also be termed as a
network enabled transfer of skills and knowledge, and the delivery of education is made to a
large number of recipients at the same or different times (Coleman, 2019). Online learning
did not receive such a warm welcome at first when it was introduced as it was assumed that
the system lacked the human element in learning (Joshua Stern, 2015) but as the
technology progress, people started to embrace E-learning.

There are a few types of online learning such as asynchronous online courses,
synchronous online courses and hybrid courses. In asynchronous online courses, students
are provided with content and assignments and are given a certain period of time to
complete exams and coursework and as interactions only takes place through discussion
boards and wikis (Riley North, 2019), there are no class meeting time. This type of online
learning is effective for students who have time constraints or busy schedules. While in
hybrid courses or also known as blended courses, it requires both in-person and online
interactions. Besides, online learning demands for tools in order to function and among the
online tools that are quite familiar to the students are TED-Ed, Quizlet and Wikispaces. TED-
Ed is an educational platform that encircles talks and other forms of materials to teach young
students. Their videos are usually animated and cover a wide array of topics such as history,
science and philosophy. Teachers can also create their own lessons and custom them
according their students’ needs. The second online learning tools is Quizlet and also one of
the most famous online learning tool that allows teachers to create all kinds of quizzes and
tailored them to their lectures while another online learning tool that can be used by teachers
in their lessons is Wikispaces. It authorizes the teachers to create a members-only website
that will serve as the Wikipedia of the class in which all members can join discussions and
share knowledge and documents in it. It is very useful since it supports collaborative writing
and also acts as a social news feed (Jessica Freeman, 2017).
 The usage of online learning can also help teachers to overcome issues in teaching
and learning. Among the few issues that can be addressed are lack of interest in the lessons
being delivered. The lack of passion among the pupils are a norm and sometimes is
inevitable but that does not mean that it cannot be overcome. In order to solve this issue,
teachers can use the online learning tools such as Haiky Learning and also Studyblue. Haiky
Learning makes the process of learning exciting as teachers can create classroom pages
with eccentric layouts, find various content to share and also add their own materials. Apart
from that, even the students can install the application on their mobile devices and they will
have easier access to any updates or new content at all time. Meanwhile Studyblue is an
online platform that supports a huge base of study guides and flashcards and the students
can even create their own flashcards according to their needs and subjects. Using this, the
teachers can emphasize the important parts of the materials in an interesting way and would
surely grab the students’ attention. Thus, it is proved that the lack of interest in the lessons
being delivered can simply being solved using a variety of online teaching tools to grab their
interests.

Another issue that can be addressed in teaching and learning is heavy and
elaborated teaching and learning materials. Teachers often have to carry lots of teaching
and learning materials in order to make the lessons interesting and ease the understanding
of their students such as boxes, wheels and physical board games. But this issue can be
solved if teachers switch to E learning. The teacher do not have to bring heavy teaching aids
to school and instead just bring a laptop and ask the students to look up on certain websites
that the teacher have listed down and navigate the learning process on their own such as
watching videos and play games, all online. This has absolutely solve the issue of heavy and
elaborated teaching and learning materials and ease the teachers to plan and develop their
lessons.

It is no doubt that in this era of rapid progress in technology, an academic lesson that
is not engaged to any type of online learning is actually being left behind since the usage of
E-learning is such a big help towards the education itself. Teachers can create their own
teaching and learning materials easily and share them online and students can also have an
easy access towards the content without having to write it down or copy it one by one. Not
only that the notion of E-learning is making the education world evolving at a faster pace, it
also helps both the teacher and students to save their time by not having to have any
physical meet ups everytime a problem arise and simply have a video conference instead.