Blog 5: Online Schooling

The article for this week really caught my attention off of the Google Alerts because of my high interest level in this topic.  The article is saying that online school is basically the future of education.  I believe there is going to be a strong switch to this type of learning for several reasons, but some were mentioned in this particular article.  The case of families moving around for specific reasons could cause the student to be loosing out on the learning experience let alone the social aspect of schooling.  Another reason was independent learning being such a positive thing to gain as you are younger to move through real world tasks. This online learning is linked to ESL learners because the location of this learning is world wide.  We are using online learning with everything from speech development to vocabulary to video/audio assessment and much more.  The idea that online learning is the future has already taken over a lot of ELL classrooms and curriculum.

In the article it described a school called eLearning Academy that allowed for on site facilities or distant learning options.  That means students could pick and choose to come to the facility either for certain hours, certain days of the week, or no facility attendance at all.  This is the flexibility I think a learner is lacking when being in the classroom a required amount of hours.  The time of day, just like nutrition and sleep, is affecting your learning as well.  How well students are motivated to do independent learning is a large factor of it.  It is also on the parents more if students are not attending a facility to learn, but have the opportunity to work at their own pace through the same curriculum other students are using. We have spoken a lot about independent learning within the parameters of this course.  Having students being engaged in their own learning pace is a benefit to both L2 learners and online learning students.  

In conclusion, I do agree with this article that online learning is our future in education.  There is going to be that flexibility option for time, days, pace, etc.  My idea is that online learning is already developing faster for ELL students because of independent learning platforms, learning management systems, assistive technology available, an online classrooms like the eLearning Academy.  Everyone will have an opinion on this type of learning whether it is good or bad, but the learner I think really needs to be top priority about what are their wants, needs, habits, and attitude towards learning. As the ELL students have more specific priorities to order within the online learning environment I think online education is the current and future for those students.

The article is short and to the point, if you'd like to read through it quick. Online Schooling Article