The talk of the town is “Online Learning” but the question arises are we equipped to deal with it?

Since the out- break of Corona virus in Pakistan the first thing that happened was that schools, colleges and universities were closed to prevent the spread of Corona virus among students especially children who are among the more susceptible group.

This created distress among parents, teachers and educationists as one of the things that parents or care-givers had to do was to keep the children occupied while other thing was to make sure that the students should retain what they had learned and stay connected with their studies as the duration for closures of schools, colleges and universities was unknown.

After the closure a lot of schools started sending home work, work-sheets etc. to parents using different means which is appreciable and the effort on the part of the teachers and school administrations should be applauded but it also highlighted the fact that most of our schools, colleges and universities are not equipped to provide online education. The thought of providing and acquiring education using online platforms caused panic and chaos among students and teachers both who were used to traditional classrooms and methods of teaching. One of major hurdles faced by students as well as teachers is adaptability and acceptance. In any given situation it is very important to accept the situation and to adapt according to the situation. It is human nature not to like changes and like any other change getting used to online education will require some time. It also requires added effort on part of the teachers and self-study requires students to be motivated.

As far as technical aspect is concerned some schools had the vision and had started implementing online education few years back but teaching staff  and I.T teams at majority of our educational institutes are not trained to provide online education. They lack the basic technical framework and are not equipped to provide quality online education.  

Another thing is that the economic situation of our country is not very strong. Although in major cities most people have smart phones and laptops but the situation is quite different in small cities, towns and rural areas. Besides, this electricity breakdowns are also common which also causes hindrance in acquiring or providing online education. Due to connectivity issues teachers and students face issues in interaction which also causes hindrance in uploading content.

Almost everyone is trying to jump on this band wagon and trying to provide online education it is pertinent to monitor the content being taught.

The lockdown due to the Corona virus gave us a flavor of the face of education in the up-coming future and it has also familiarized us with the challenges and hurdles we are going to face in providing and acquiring online education.