Advantages of Face-to-Face Learning Environments

Online learning environments have come a long way in the past decade or so. Major advances have been made not only to the technology available to make content and learning resources available online, but also in the quality of instruction available online as professors catch on to the concept and it becomes more mainstream. Despite this, there are many advantages to face-to-face learning environments that cannot be replicated in online instruction. Among these are the personal contacts and relationships with other classmates, the ease to contact your instructor in person about questions and concerns about the course, and the networking that face-to-face instruction affords.
Face-to-face learning environments make it almost impossible for classmates to not become familiar with at least a couple of their classmates. In a New York Times article from August of 2009, Philip R. Regier states “learning has to occurs in a community”. Online environments do involve group work and interaction with course mates, but it will not ever be as personal as working with other students in groups in the same room. Furthermore, students are less likely to use each other as a study resource and make study groups or reach out with questions. Sometiems students are more comfortable seeking help from a fellow student than from their professor (Mooney, 1). Even in online courses when professors encourage students to interact with discussion boards or group work students are less likely to form personal connections, as they would be in a traditional classroom setting.
In addition to contacting students, contacting professors can be more of a challenge in online learning environments. Face-to-face courses allow for a student to stay after a class to ask a question and also involve office hours when students can reach their professors to ask questions or bring up concerns. In an online classroom, students are typically restricted to emailing the professor or asking a question during an asynchronous class and they are not afforded the privacy or personal setting that traditional face-to-face students get. Furthermore, a student’s self-efficacy has a strong influence on the motivation to learn (Moreno, 344). Professors that are in class with students are more likely to spot when a student is out of their comfort zone and help them through a topic that they might not otherwise be able to understand whereas in distance learning, the professor will likely have no idea the student is struggling unless the student takes it upon themselves (which as we know they may or may not do) to speak up about it.
Finally, and in my opinion most importantly, students in face-to-face classrooms have the huge advantage of being able to network with their professor and others they have access to in their school or college. So much of success is based off of networking these days that this is truly an invaluable resource. Professors who meet with their students in face-to-face settings are more likely to remember that student and see that student in more settings allowing them to be able to form a personal connection and confidently use their connections as professionals already in the field to help the student find a job or other opportunity. I have personally taken both online and offline courses and with the same level of attention to the course and effort put in, I have come out with many contacts from my face-to-face courses who have given me opportunities and none who I believe would go out of their way to find an opportunity for me in my online courses. This is simply due to the nature of online courses being less personal.
For all these reasons I feel that online classes have their place, but there are many advantages of face-to-face learning environments that cannot be replicated online. While test scores and academics play a role and are important, they are not everything that you take from your education, and most online programs fall short of offering the personal connections and contacts that can be an entry into the industry you want.



Works Cited:

Lohr, S. Study Finds That Online Education Beats the Classroom. August 19, 2009.
Accessed September 26, 2010, from Times News: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/19/study-finds-that-online-education-beats-the-classroom

Mooney, Shane. Advantages and Disadvantages of Online Education Classes. 2010.
Accessed September 26, 2010 from Helium. http://www.helium.com/items/1939854-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-distance-learning-and-online-education-classes

Moreno, R. (2010). Educational Psychology. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.