Virtual Schooling

The pandemic really did flip everything upside down. In schools, there were drastic, sudden changes made that caused a shift in education, of which we continue to see in place in our schools today. One of those changes was where learning took place. Due to the pandemic, all learning was done in an online format which was then called virtual schooling. For the first time, all education was done through online structures such as zoom, google meet, or even just through pre-recorded videos. Virtual schooling was the only option for education in that time period. Today, some school systems are still meeting virtually and are not actively in the classroom yet. While there are many benefits to virtual schooling, there are many downsides as well. The New York Times published an article discussing virtual schooling and the ways it has played out through America. First, one of the benefits that virtual schooling has is its flexibility and how a student can go at their own desire pace. It stated, "The mantra of online learning is, ‘Your own time, your own pace, your own path." While this is a positive outlook that many middle school and high school students would greatly benefit from, elementary school students might rather suffer from it because of the structure that they are used to experiencing in school. Moreover, the article mentions a primary interview where the student stated he was falling behind because he had no structure and no one to keep him in line.Therefore, while flexibility in school is a huge perk of this way of learning, there are also many drawbacks. To no surprise, the article mentions academic performance and the way it has been affected because of virtual schooling. They stated that as a result of nearly 300 studies they found that, for the most part, students tend to learn less efficiently in virtual schooling, unless there is a facilitator or mentor at hand.

Student ,at a computer, attending an online lecture

    Since I too am in school during a pandemic, I have seen virtual schooling effect my academic performance in college. I have seen the benefit of the flexibility play out in my own schooling as I am able to work more at my job, which I love. Virtual schooling has been great in that aspect, as I have more free time to do with what I please. Although I have loved and seen myself flourish with asynchronous classes, I have seen the opposite effect in my classes that use online meeting software such as zoom. In zoom classes, I tend to zone out and become distracted even with that structure of formal meeting times. I can only imagine how an elementary school student can stare at a computer screen for a lengthy amount of time in one day, if even a college student like me fails pay attention more than half of the time on this software. Therefore, I believe all students should be in the classroom for at least 2 days a week. While, I do believe elementary school students more than high school students need that structured class time with the teacher in the room and would ideally get all 5 days of in-person instruction. With that, virtual schooling served a tremendous purpose during the first few months of the pandemic, as it helped education continue in a way that not many people had done before. However, I feel that the classroom purpose is even more so important, and as educators we should push for more in-person learning as it has proven to be so beneficial for both elementary and high school students alike.