The Difference Between Online College and Tradition College

 

The goal, for both traditional and online colleges, is to provide students with education while also awarding degrees. Despite this similarity in purpose, there are, however, significant differences. Of these, a major one is the Internet-Based Curriculum. By definition, according to NCES (National Center for Education Statistics), an online class is a formal education process in which the students and instructors are not in the same place.

 

Explaining this interprets that the lectures, exams and most of the reading processes of the online classes take place on the web. Despite this being, arguably, the biggest change in the transition from traditional to online classrooms, most students have overcome this barrier of online instruction, adapting finally well to the online educational system.

 

❖ Physical Meetings:

Online courses, like traditional courses, have instructors and numerous class attendants. However, any possible communication between class participants would be mainly through the use of telephoning, email and live chats. However, there are courses that may require on-campus appearance or clinical visits that may present students with the opportunity to communicate directly.

 

In the absence of this, then students do not meet their instructors, or other students face to face. In traditional courses, physical presence is required, and students can listen, take note and interact with the professor or with one another. There are even many traditional courses where attendance is compulsory, especially if you are concerned about high grades.

❖ Communication with Instructors:

Online and traditional courses also differ where it concerns exchanging information with the professors. In online courses, instructors are required to provide detailed and comprehensible feedbacks more than in traditional courses, in order to present materials clearly. This was what Sloan Consortium was referring to when it says there are additional types of feedback that are important to online courses.

 

This feedback may be written, audio clips, image or voice support chats that helps to highlight the key ideas and create follow-up questions. As such, the provision of key assistance and interaction to and with students has become a defining factor of a good online instructor.

❖ Flexibility:

In terms of flexibility, online courses are preferable to traditional courses and this means convenience for the students. You can work and at the same time, attend classes, in online courses. By large, this has made schooling while fulfilling family and work responsibilities easy for many and finally, the quest for further education has become easier.

 

Attending classes at a convenient time and learning at one’s pace is now a possibility and this is not something that traditional students can boast of, especially with their schedules.

 

❖ Timing:

In traditional courses, the timing of courses is always synchronous. The professors and the students taking part in a lecture have to be together at the same time and the same place for lectures to take place. In online courses, however, the lecture can be either synchronous or asynchronous.

 

All student may log in live to join a lecture or students may decide to download the lecture and watch later. In asynchronous lectures, the students decide the time and place to complete the work, so far it is completed before a given deadline.

 

❖ Feedback Speed:

The speed of feedback from instructors to students differs in both online and traditional courses. Online courses makes heavy use of written contents and when you stuck while working, your instructor and or peers may not be immediately available to provide any necessary feedback.

 

However, effective instructors have developed various method of making these materials available. However, it is still not as fast as in traditional learning.