Doing our best to support the medical community during this pandemic, health and safety is a priority right now. All schools and universities do distance education and online learning during the COVID-19, they give students useful documents and resources to save their semester. The goal is to give students tools to create virtual classroom communities, they create some applications that help them to do meetings, chats, video calls and collaboration features. Each university has chosen a platform which might offer efficiency, but what is sure is that all these measures predict that online education after this pandemic will get a serious boost, which will change education in the world into a digital education. However to develop this change it can take a couple of years, but are students dealing with this current situation in the same way?

The distance learning has multiple advantages for students; its main advantages are, allowing students to save both time and money spent in going to the educational institution, which makes the access to the courses easier if the students are having a distance or financial problems. Students benefit from  easy access to video conferencing, is the best solution, when the experts are not located in the same country or town as the students. Developing the interactive skills of students with other cultures and benefiting from experiences of other students from schools all over the world would not be reachable without the distance learning. However, this type of learning requires a self-inspiration where students motivate themselves and create the convenient environment for themselves to study and learn how to control it by engaging themselves in this environment. Improving their technological skills is also one of the benefits of this e-learning where students must use multiple applications, e-methods for their assignments. Finally, yet importantly, let’s not forget about the main reason of this distance learning all over the world which is also an advantage for our safety and the safety of our beloved ones by keeping our social distance.

Still, online courses have negative side, first, students find difficulties to join discussions especially in our country that suffers from connection issues, a thing that makes studies difficult for students. Secondly, the unavailability of resources for the majority of students, as an example some students cannot have the materials to participate at online courses, therefore, they found a lot of struggle to understand their subject which creates a form of inequality between those who have an easy access to internet and those who don’t. Thirdly, Technology has made our lives easier. However, as we know, mobile phone, laptop and other technology devices are toxic to our body, the overuse of them may cause vision problems, hearing loss, neck strain, and other problems that can affect our health, therefore parents try to keep their children away from these devices. Finally the nature of some courses such as “communication” requires interaction between students and professors which is difficult to achieve or even impossible sometimes with a large number of students.

When designing an e-learning service, accessibility and support for students should be considered. It is necessary to apprehend, anticipate all the obstacles that can hinder learning. The singularity of each handicap obliges the designer to find a specific workaround, so that the experience remains effective and comfortable whatever the audience who benefits from it.  E-learning platforms should bet on simplicity. Select online courses that require little internal memory, little internet speed, and a simple yet solid script. Give priority to courses that do not require software downloads or document printing. Paying attention to the sound quality and be sure to test the course on multiple smartphones, browsers, and operating systems.  Moreover, we should not forget the impact of technical infrastructure on teaching systems in Africa, especially when they fail: power cuts, network cuts, insufficient flow rates, in this case the government should make it accessible to the students to log in the platform 24/7 with the lowest cost. As we, all know, due to this horrible pandemic, students are really stressed and afraid of getting contaminated; they are worried about their families and loved ones.

Professors must take this into consideration; they should make sure that the lessons are divided into small parts, for instance, including short lessons that can be completed in a short time in the purpose of not adding more stress to the situation; if the learner is faced to a large teaching blocks, it is likely that he/she will never find the time to learn all of that amount. Institutions should establish a simple and clear schedule with the dates by which the different parts of the online training should end. In addition, send reminder messages to students to let them know that time it is running out and encourage them to finish the course. To sum up, a convenient environment is crucial for the students to succeed in this era of covid-19.

In these conditions in which we unfortunately live today and considering the confinement, there is no other alternative than the online courses for the students to pursue their lessons. However, that does not mean, that is it can replace the face-to-face courses. That is why all educational institutions must schedule catch-up sessions, just after the confinement to give students, who did not have the opportunity to follow their courses, catch up sessions. In this period of confinement, it is very important that the teachers understand what the students are going through, for example, connection problems, moral pressure that the world is sick, confinement “that you have to stay at home for two months”. We must be unified to overcome this difficult period as quickly as possible.

Authors

• HLIB Chaimaa.
• IHIA Lamiâ.
•  HAHOU Titrit.
• HAMOR Khawla.
• HAMMAMA Chaimae.

Resources

• https://www.eztalks.com/elearning/benefits-of-distance-learning.html
• https://www.indiaeducation.net/online-education/articles/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-distance-learning.html
• https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10489-017-1051-8