Comparison of Distance learning with traditional Classroom in Medical College Students in Covid-19 lockdown period in India

Introduction:

  The COVID-19 pandemic is a major health crisis of its own way. The “Janata Curfew” was an important decision taken by prime minister for further awareness and preparedness about the quarantine in India. India is now locked down and loaded in its fight against the corona virus.

 Many countries have decided to close schools, colleges, and universities all over the world. Home schooling is parent’s major worry for children’s social life and learning. Teaching and assessments are moving online, on an untested and unpredicted way of trial and error. Many assessments have simply been cancelled which may delay the recognition of both high potentials and learning difficulties. It can have harmful long term consequences for the students. It depends upon the policies of institutes how they can solve the problem of assessment in a positive way in Covid-19 lockdown period. Faculties and students are doing their part to support each other for getting adjusted with new ways of online teaching and learning. Technology has a great role in educating the future generations and the role of the educator must change too.

 Computers have been the major audio-visual aids in the education world since the 1960s. They have been used enthusiastically since 2000 with blooming of the internet. But most of the researchers think that learning is acquired not only with improvement in technology but also with the content presented in the medium (1).

The distance-learning is the delivery of a training or education program by electronic device like computers, tabs, smartphones, and CDs where teachers and students are not present in the same place. In distance learning tools like computer system or electronic devices are used to give educational material, and web based training is used to facilitate learning anywhere (2). In the distance learning process the teachers are not able to trace the learners’ activities (3,4). Distance education have some advantages over traditional teaching like freedom, flexibility, and convenience. Distance learning allows students to listen to lectures again and again, as well as students can rewind the lectures and learn them at their own pace

In medical education, suitable methods and skills are essential to produce a good number of skilled doctors who should have human and social outlook. It should be the main agenda of a teacher to instill social service mind and human attitude among medical students. Teacher’s explanations enable students to understand the content. Traditional classroom methods had already proven their efficiency by producing thousands of well-known, talented, and successful doctors all over the world.

In COVID- 19 lock down period, there is an increasing demand for structural basic changes in medical education, as traditional teaching is not possible in the classrooms. So the present study was conducted to compare the student’s views about the distance learning technique with traditional classroom teaching as a method of teaching in medical college in the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods:              

 The present cross sectional study was conducted in medical college in April 2020 in lock down period. The following research hypothesis was formulated to guide the study:

 H0: There is no significant difference in effectiveness of distance learning and traditional teaching methods in COVID-19 lockdown period.

H1: There is significant difference in effectiveness of distance learning and traditional teaching method in Covid-19 lockdown period.

 In the COVID-19 lockdown period, after stoppage of classroom teaching, our medical college institute started online lectures for medical students. Almost 6 lectures of Respiratory system diseases were taught in classroom by traditional teaching and 7 lectures were taught online through zoom platform.

The self-administered and structured questionnaire was prepared in order to get the responded views about online and traditional classroom teaching by the students. The questionnaire validation was done by content validity analysis. The questions were based on the pattern of direct asking. The questions were based upon either ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ responses. 270 students of 3^rd MBBS were selected by simple random sampling. For all participants the similar questions were used in English language. The participants were asked to fill the questionnaire online. Instructions for filling the questionnairewere explained to them.Data were collected and analyzed statistically.

 For the analysis of the data, basic descriptive statistics, percentages, and graphs have been used. Microsoft excel was used to analyze data and to create graphs and tables.

Results:

The medical students’ view about usefulness of traditional classroom teaching and distance learning in COVID-19 lockdown periods are shown in tables 1 and 2 respectively.

The ability of medical students to understand the topic without attending traditional classroom teaching in COVID-19 lockdown period, and their ability using distance learning are presented in tables 3 and 4 respectively.

The students’ views about e-learning in COVID-19 lockdown period are demonstrated in table 5.

Table 1. Views of medical students about usefulness of traditional classroom teaching in COVID-19 lockdown periods

Table 2. Views of medical students about Distance learning in COVID-19lockdown periods

Table 3. Ability of medical students to understand the topic without attending traditional classroom teaching in COVID-19 lockdown period

Table 4. Ability of medical students to understand the topic using distance learning without attending traditional classroom teaching in COVID-19 lockdown period

Table 5. Students’ views about e-learning in COVID-19 lockdown period

Discussion:

 When faculties and students heard about lockdown because of COVID 19, it was a challenge for both faculties and students to go for virtual classrooms, virtual learning, and teaching. In this crisis there is a wide use of technology in teaching- learning process in educational institutes. The higher educational institutions like medical colleges have opted for online classes. The tools used by faculty during lockdown for teaching and learning through online modes are as Zoom app.Learning environments have impact on learning outcomes (5). In the present study we compared the student’s views about efficiency of distance learning and traditional learning in physical classroom in COVID –19 lock down period.

 In the present study, 89.62% of medical students found traditional classroom teaching more useful than distance learning. Distance learning was felt well than physical traditional classroom teaching by 10.37% of medical students. Very few students 34.44% were able to understand the topic without attending physical classrooms. Only 36.66 % students were able to understand the topic without attending classes while using e-learning. Our study results showed that traditional classroom teaching is better than the distance learning technique.

 Some researchers believe that the distance learning is more effective than traditional learning as it provides the opportunity to the student to learn at own pace. The distance learning also provides increased convenience and flexibility to the learners (6, 7, 8).

  Students may feel isolated, confused, and frustrated in distance learning environment (9, 10). Student’s learning effectiveness and interest in the subject may be reduced (11). Students may feel stressed and isolated when they lose group connectivity in distance learning (12).Because of the COVID-19 pandemic and social distancing community, stress is more seen in isolated environments.

  An important component of physical classroom learning is the social communication among students and their teachers. The Main purpose of medical education is to develop students socially and teach them doctor patient relationship. Student’s active interaction in the classroom is the main motto of current education system and fundamental learning activities. Conversation, discussion, and debate among students and teachers make the new concept more clarified.

  In medical education, old assumptions of teaching and learning are challenged and diagnostic, and communication skills are developed by practicing on patients during demonstrations. Only traditional teaching is more effective in teaching Doctor- Patient interaction as compared to distance learning.

 Distance learning requires lots of adjustment by teachers and students for successful discussion to go on. Online e-courses are more preferred over classroom interaction. In distance teaching teacher’s control is less over the students. It is easier for students to neglect their teacher in online learning. In traditional teaching it is not so easy to ignore teachers.

 Some researchers found that interaction in an online environment promotes more detail discussions than a traditional physical classroom. It focuses more on students’ centered learning and encourages wider students’ participations (13, 14). Online discussions also encourage introvert students to participate to a greater extent (15).

 So, the present study demonstrated that traditional classroom teaching could not be replaced by distance learning in medical teaching. Distance learning is still in its primitive stage. In coming days it is the need of current situation to develop new methodologies and pedagogy to improve distance learning methods.

The limitation of the study was that the effectiveness of teaching method by conducting test for every method had not been evaluated. Only the student’s opinions were considered by questionnaire method.