I think that physical classrooms are better than online ones. There are a countless reasons for this. The most significant ones are listed below.

Firstly, there are too many distractions online. Students may read their messages during a class or check their Instagram/Facebook posts. If children do such things during a class, they will lose their focus. This will be a big loss for the students as they may end up missing out on crucial information that the teacher was explaining to them while they checked other things on their phone, laptops or whatever device they are using to access their digital classroom.

Secondly, people can cheat a lot more in an online classroom compared to a physical one. In a physical classroom, the teacher will make sure that no one looks in another child’s paper during a test or even for any class work assignments and assessments. However, in an online classroom, the teacher cannot monitor who is texting or asking for answers during a test or for any other kind of assignment. Therefore, children can easily message each other asking for homework or even test answers. This will again be a big loss for any children who cheat and take answers from their peers as they will not learn whatever was being taught to them on their own.

Furthermore, the more time that you spend online, the more harmful it is for both your physical and emotional wellbeing. Spending too much time online can be bad for the eyesight. If one looks at any kind of screen on any devices, the rays emitted from the screen is harmful for our eyesight.

Also, spending time online makes us very tired without actually having done anything physically, which is not a good thing especially for children who should be active and playing about. Spending time online makes us drained and saps all our energy like a giant monster that is hungry for our energy. As a result, we become lazy and have difficulty doing simple daily tasks that we have to do.

Finally, social skills are a very important part of our education. In an online classroom, one doesn’t learn any social skills at all and this is a big loss for us because they teach us how to get along with people, which is a skill that one needs in practical life if one wants to be successful. Children need to interact with other people that are the same age and make friends. Friends are very important as they help you learn to have fun. Without friends, life can become dull and boring.

All in all, once this Covid-19 pandemic is over, let us return with full enthusiasm to our physical classrooms without taking the heavy baggage of online learning forward with us.

Published in Dawn, Young World, June 13th, 2020