Four weeks have already passed since classes started this year, and I have never missed face-to-face lectures and seminars so much.
Since March 2020, when teaching and classes were moved online, I have found it quite challenging to stay at home and make the most of my university life.
What I have missed the most is the face-to-face interaction with professors and classmates during classes. Lectures and seminars used to be very interactive and engaging, in the sense that we could participate, share our points of view and learn from other students’ discussions. While online learning is quite interactive these days with Zoom, Blackboard discussion forums, Microsoft team... It is still not the same as sitting in the lecture theatre or seminar classroom from a real person.
However, no matter how much I miss my professors and friends, with how uncertain things are in the world right now, safety and well-being should be the top priority on our lists.
After a couple of months of online learning, studying at home is not that bad after all. In fact, it can be highly flexible. Lecture videos and materials are accessible anytime, anywhere and watched at any pace. Although lacking of interaction, online lectures provide students the flexibility to adapt and organize their classes based on their own schedule preferences. I always start to watch lecture videos at 9 am, because this is the time of the day when my brain works at its full potential. Then, I devote afternoons to practice and prepare seminars and workshops. This helps me to refresh and put into practice what I learned in the morning. In this sense, online learning really enables me to make the most of my classes.
Having online classes is also highly convenient, as there is no need to go to class physically. I have saved so much time from being every day “on the way” to uni. Moreover, like many others, I like to be in the most comfortable way while working and studying in pyjamas. I really benefit from this convenience and time-saving fact, as I have more time to focus on my studies.
Moving classes online has definitely been challenging for most of us, but I am sure we are all capable of overcoming these hard times and make the most of life at AMBS!
