What is virtual classroom and its impact on education? : The use of digital tools to teach virtual classrooms in different educational contexts provides valuable benefits for both teachers and students that should not be lost by face-to-face. Meet them!
2020, with the theme of the health emergency, revealed a list of opportunities for improvement and innovation in many scenarios, especially in education. Due to the closure of schools, principals and teachers had to start looking for ways to implement their classes and engage their students; It was at that time that virtual classrooms came into their own.
But in reality, virtual classrooms were born a long time ago, when the need to provide training to those who could not attend a classroom arose. Nowadays, this modality has become a great complement for effective learning . Its use bridges the gap between traditional education and new trends.
What is virtual classroom and its impact on education?
How do virtual classrooms work?
Virtual classrooms, which are generally found within a learning management platform, have been an important ally of education in the teaching processes of recent years.
There, students can develop activities and actions such as: reading documents, doing practices, exchanging ideas, asking questions to their teachers and even doing teamwork.
For this reason, teachers, heroes of the new educational reality, have become creators of digital content ; they are innovative according to their needs and those of their students. Their interest in connecting with students and guaranteeing their true learning has generated great empathy for virtual classes and LMS platforms.
But it is not only this. The figures indicate that in Mexico, since 2018, more than 50% of students already used an online platform to study; and the number continues to increase year after year throughout Latin America.
In Colombia, according to the National Higher Education Information System (SNIES), virtual education went from having 16,042 students in 2012 to 200,742 in 2018. This shows that virtual classrooms are a very efficient tool for current education , taking into account account the great growth of virtual teaching after 2020.
In this context, it is very important to understand the benefits that virtual classrooms can generate. But not only for students, but for teachers, directors and educational institutions in general.
And now that we return to face-to-face?
If we have learned something from the pandemic, it is that both flexibility and openness to change are essential to living a full and happy life. In the field of education, this openness has been essential to continue providing education to children and young people. Thanks to the technological tools available today to teach classes in virtual classrooms and the willingness of teachers to incorporate new skills, strategies and technological tools into their teaching practice, education around the world has not stopped despite adversity.
Now that it is back to face-to-face, it is of the utmost importance to understand that the use of technology in the classroom should not be abandoned for this reason, since the need has forced us to quickly acquire new technological skills. We must continue to focus our professional development in this area and take advantage of the benefits that digital tools offer us to maximize the learning of our students and facilitate the teacher’s work.
The use of digital tools to teach classes in different educational contexts (face-to-face, virtual, hybrid) provides valuable benefits for both teachers and students that should not be lost by attending.
These are just some of the benefits:
Benefits for teachers
1. Flexibility, creativity and effectiveness of lesson planning
Resources such as digital games, videos, voting tools, etc. They allow to capture and maintain the attention of students in a more creative and effective way, especially in virtual classrooms.
On the other hand, with the help of technology, methodologies such as the flipped classroom can be applied, where students study part of the class content on their own through the use of digital tools. In this way, the teacher can dedicate more class time to implement activities such as discussion of topics, debates and presentations that develop collaboration and critical thinking instead of doing repetitive practice.
This type of interaction between students can be carried out either in a face-to-face or virtual class; You can even set up online discussion forums that help encourage analysis and reflection by keeping students more involved with the issues.
2. Measurement of progress and personalization of teaching
Thanks to the fact that there are digital platforms that can grade homework automatically, it is now much easier for teachers to identify the specific strengths and areas of opportunity that each of their students has. In this way, teachers have more possibilities to provide personalized support, either by assigning exercises aimed at their particular needs within the platforms and/or by designing classroom activities more focused on what their group really needs to move forward and reach it. to its highest potential.
There are even more up-to-date functions on the platforms with which the teacher can monitor in real time how their students are answering an exercise during class. With this tool, the teacher no longer depends only on those students who actively participate in class, but can know more precisely both the level of attention of all their students and the effectiveness of the class. This type of teaching is called data-driven instruction.
3. Less workload for the teacher
It may be a little challenging at first to learn how to use new digital tools or incorporate new practices for digital teaching. However, once they are learned, the teachers’ job is simplified.
As mentioned above, an example of this is platforms that can automatically grade all student practice work and even exams. Teachers can now invest more energy where they really make the most impact: in the classroom, whether virtual or in-person, instead of spending valuable time preparing classes and grading.
Student Benefits
1. Greater responsibility and empowerment of their own learning process
Before, the teacher was given full responsibility for the learning process of his students, now the use of technology allows students to make decisions about how, when and where to study.
For example, now they can choose to spend their study time watching a video as many times as necessary or doing practice exercises from their cell phone. Through the information provided by the platforms, they can be more aware of their own progress in the subjects and know their areas of opportunity and strengths to focus specifically on what they need to improve.
They also have much more control over the pace of study and the level of depth with which they study the topics. All of these factors contribute to a higher degree of motivation and commitment to their own education.
2. Development of soft skills for life and the world of work
The freedom and interference in their own learning that virtual classrooms offer implies that students develop skills such as organization and time management. As we know, today’s work contexts are changing rapidly. According to a study conducted by Owl Labs on remote work, during the COVID-19 pandemic, 70% of workers worked remotely. Post-pandemic, 92% of respondents expect to work from home at least 1 day per week and 80% expect to work from home at least 3 days per week. Some
Key skills for the success of this modality of work are organization and time management. The use of technology in teaching allows students to start developing these skills from an early age, which will help them to be much more prepared for their future work.
Likewise, the application of methodologies such as the flipped classroom and project-based learning allow students to go much deeper into the topics and demonstrate what they have learned through various means. What before could only be demonstrated by taking a written exam, can now be done through projects where students can highlight their skills and talents using technology.
This not only influences the development of important soft skills such as collaboration, teamwork, communication skills, problem solving, etc. rather it keeps students motivated as they enjoy the learning process more.
Inclusivity
We live in a world of global mobility and constant change. Learning in this age is not limited to a certain age or stage of life, education is now a personalized lifelong process. We will all continue to acquire new skills and relearn others throughout life, and the flexibility that virtual classrooms provide makes this process incredibly easy.
As UNESCO rightly mentions, “information and communication technologies (ICT) can complement, enrich and transform education for improvement.” Technology will never replace the human connection and intuition that a teacher provides , however, it is crucial to continue to incorporate the use of these tools to reach the goal of providing a higher quality and inclusive education throughout the world.
Virtual classrooms should not then become a simple mechanism for the distribution of information. On the contrary, they should be a complementary tool to the work of teachers, where activities that allow interaction, two-way communication and the application of knowledge are involved. This is its true impact on current education.
We know that there is still a long way to go in the world of technology and education. Although virtual classes have helped us achieve great progress, we must continue to move forward and adapt to a generation of digital natives.