Learning Objectives

The Rise of Virtual Classrooms

The outbreak of COVID-19 has seen the rise of virtual classrooms for collaboration and discussion. Two facilitate a virtual classroom environment, two elements are needed.

Learning Management Systems (LMS)

LMS help facilitate digital content management by creating an online directory to store teaching resources for students such as assignments, readings and so on.

Example LMS include:

Moodle
Seqta
Acorns
Google Classroom

Virtual Meetings

A program is needed to connect both the students and teachers in real time to facilitate tutorials of content.

Examples of Virtual Meeting programs include:

Microsoft Teams
Zoom
Google Meet

Here at the ATAR Survival Guide, our job is to help facilitate the content side of learning, not exactly a LMS or a virtual meeting space.

Benefits of Digital Communication for Education

Recorded Tutorials

Tutorials can be recorded and playbacked at anytime. This allows students to refer to classroom topics anytime, anywhere.

Eliminates Geographical Disadvantage

Students can connect into the classroom anywhere a strong internet connection is possible.

Costs of Digital Communication for Educations

Disengagement in Virtual Learning Environments

How many times have you gotten distracted by a text or doing something else on the side during a virtual meeting? It is so easy to get distracted in virtual environments as no one can see what you are doing! This can create issues for learning, espically with primary/secondary students who may need a little push to stay focused.

Misinterpretation Issues

How many times have you read a text differently to how the sender intended it to say? Virtual communication can be difficult to follow through tutorials whereas a teacher could better explain concepts in person.

Cost

LMS and virtual collaboration software is not free. There are costs for schools to implement virtual environments for students.

Access to Digital Content

While under the copyright act, there are inclusions for Educational Purposes, there may be difficulty in accessing digitalised version of textbooks and other content due the lack of willingness for the publisher to make the content available.