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Should we return to traditional learning?

One of the main takeaways of the COVID pandemic has been that online learning is more than a viable alternative. It’s an effective learning tool that just makes too much sense to leave out of our traditional educational systems
And now that many college and high school students have had a full year to experience online learning, with all of its advantages, it looks like it’ll be hard to put the genie back in the bottle. Will students ever settle for having classrooms as their only learning option again? And should they?

The Advantages of Online Learning

For students, learning from home hasn’t been all sunshine and flowers. Many schools and universities have reported falling grades and reduced ‘attendance’ during the pandemic, as students had a hard time adapting to online learning tools. Just like some people learn better from reading and others learn better from listening, some students took to online learning right away, while others struggled.

However, the number of students who have simply thrived under the new system is far from insignificant. Many find it easier to study from home at their own pace, surrounded by their creature comforts.

Studying from home also eliminates the need for a commute, and reduces downtime between classes, which has allowed students who adapted well to the new regime to have more free time and be more efficient.

Many have been using that extra time to engage in healthy habits, such as exercising, eating better, and taking natural supplements like CBG oil. This means that studying from home not only has a positive effect on their learning and grades, but on their entire life. These students who have been thriving are understandably dreading having to return to the old routine.

Forcing students to go all the way to a classroom and sit still for several hours so they can learn at a pace that is often too fast or too slow for them hasn’t made sense, for decades. Students often put up with it because they had never experienced formal education in any other way, never been given any other option. But the pandemic changed that reality.

And it’s not like students aren’t the only ones reaping benefits from this. Everyone from teachers to administrators is now experiencing, first-hand, all the advantages of a remote work environment. And while some teachers had trouble adapting, others have found themselves able to be much more effective and simultaneously less stressed while managing online classes.

The pandemic effectively forced students and teachers around the world to undergo a one-year trial period of remote learning. And once that trial period expires, it’s safe to assume that many won’t want to go back to the old ways.

What Educators Can Do

Some areas around the world are already returning to some version of normal college life, with classrooms filled to their limited capacities. But at the time of writing, the education world is still very much in a state of flux.

This is a perfect opportunity for educators and institutions to band together and make the hybrid approach (that was forced upon them, due to COVID) a permanent fixture of their curriculums. Why not make it easier for students who thrived on online learning to continue learning that way? While the students who missed classes, get to go back.

Opportunities for change and reform like this one don’t come often, and it’d be a shame to let it go to waste.


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