Compare and Contrast Essay: Online Classes vs. Traditional Classes

📌Category: Education, Learning, Online Education
📌Words: 752
📌Pages: 3
📌Published: 12 February 2022

Over the year 2020, virtual learning has become the standard for most schools. It may be convenient, but it isn’t the best way students should be learning. Traditional Classes are easily more effective. Traditional classes are more effective than online classes because they increase attendance, improve test results, and benefit the student’s overall social interactions. During online classes, it's easy to put off work or get distracted while trying to get work done. However, traditional classes, require you to be more responsible and disciplined, ultimately increasing attendance. As online classes become more prevalent, you’ll also see students’ mental health degrade. This is a result of the fewer social interactions, that students would normally find in traditional classes.

During online classes, it’s easy to put off work and stay on task while trying to get work done. However, traditional classes require you to get up every morning and maintain a schedule causing you to have a little bit of self-discipline. Therefore, traditional classes increase attendance and engagement. According to “challengesuccess.org”, it states, “42% report a decrease in engagement in learning.” This percentage alone shows the volume of students that are disconnected from their online schooling. The students aren’t at fault here, whenever you combine your home life with school life, it’s easy to become lazy. This is because students are used to their home as being somewhere you relax. Now when you add work from online classes to the mix, they often push it to the side. As a result of lack of attendance, students also struggle in other categories, such as test results.

Students in online classes often find themselves struggling to stay engaged in the structure, causing their test scores to plummet. However, with limited distractions in the classroom, traditional schooling improves test results. According to “digitalcollections.dordt.edu”, it states “the math scores of the public school's students versus the online students (p < 0.05). This indicates that the public school's students outperformed the online students”, although the traditional schooling barely outperformed the online students, there is still other things that could invalidate online school students scores. According to “Contrasting Traditional In-Class Exams with Frequent Online Testing” it says, “Although there are many reasons why online and in-class exam scores might differ, one of the most troubling explanations would be that these students were more likely to cheat” This shows how even though the test results may appear close, the credibility behind the scores aren’t the same. Students aren’t learning the content; they are just getting grades. Furthermore, if students aren’t learning the content they are provided with, nothing is truly being accomplished.

As online classes become more prevalent, you’ll also see students’ mental health degrade. This is a result of the fewer social interactions, that students would normally find in traditional classes. According to “kentuckycounselingcenter.com”, it says,” The lack of social interaction in online learning leads to feelings of loneliness, lack of motivation, and isolation.” This type of void will leave the student at rock bottom. This will directly cause students to perform poorly when it comes to schoolwork. However, throughout the school year of traditional school, students have ample opportunity to join clubs, make friends or just have a reason to get up and get ready for the day. Activities like these, which may not be available to online students, will prevent traditional students from falling into the rabbit hole of depression. Furthermore, getting out and networking will leave your headspace in a better place, we can all relate after being couped up throughout the pandemic.

When determining the effectiveness between online school and traditional school, traditional school prevails due to the increased engagement among students, more accurate test scores, and overall better mental health for the students. Online students find it rather difficult to stay engaged in their work, however in a classroom setting students will find it easier to stay on task. Online students tests scores have questionable credibility, whether it’s between unfair advantages or if the students are learning the content at all, traditional classes have more accurate test scores. Mental Health is important, due to the lack of social interactions of online school it doesn’t have the same opportunities traditional schools does. With all these gathered statements it's clear to see, traditional classes are more beneficial when it comes to overall performance. However, due to the circumstances of the year 2020, there wasn’t much choice when it came to the type of schooling available.

Works cited

Center, Ky Counseling. "Mental Health Effects of Online Learning." Kentucky Counseling Center. 20 Apr. 2021. Web. 14 Oct. 2021. <https://kentuckycounselingcenter.com/mental-health-effects-of-online-learning/>.

NBC News. "February 2021 - Challenge Success." Web. 13 Oct. 2021. <https://challengesuccess.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/CS-NBC-Study-Kids-Under-Pressure-PUBLISHED.pdf>.

Schultz, Sarah. "Digital Collections @ Dordt." Web. 12 Oct. 2021. <https://digitalcollections.dordt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1087&context=med_theses>.

Still, Mary Lynn. "Contrasting Traditional In-class Exams ... - Researchgate.net." Web. 14 Oct. 2021. <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/285904341_Contrasting_Traditional_In-Class_Exams_with_Frequent_Online_Testing>.

Tucker, Shelia. "Distance Education: Better, Worse, or as Good as Traditional Education?" Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration. University of West Georgia Distance and Distributed Education Center. Web. 15 Oct. 2021. <https://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/winter44/tucker44.html>.

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