In these days of online, high-tech, cloud solutions, we sometimes forget how important human interaction can really be. It’s an odd world perhaps in which individual entrepreneurs are praised for creating tech tools to enable us to avoid other people on the planet.
There’s probably a law – yet to be named – that identifies the relationship between how much we enjoy using online services and the frustration we feel when they go wrong.
This is particularly the case when you’re learning. Online distance learning can be really helpful in enabling you to fit studying for your qualifications around a busy work and home life, as well as being a cost-effective way of building your career.
People who are able to experience social interaction in a classroom environment are likely to do much better than those studying on their own
However, ultimately, humans are social creatures and nothing beats face-to-face interaction.
There are several reasons why we spend a fair (or unfair, depending on your experience) amount of our childhood building our knowledge and preparing ourselves for the adult world in a classroom; the face-to-face interaction with a subject expert is an established, tried-and-tested approach to learning. It makes perfect sense to have a supportive figure to guide you through your learning.
Learning styles, of course, come in several different forms, and yours might fit best in a face-to-face environment. But here are the three, main types, together with their needs and preferences:
Over the years that I’ve worked with students from all sorts of different sectors, ages, geographies and backgrounds, one thing always seems to hold true: people who are able to experience social interaction in a classroom environment are likely to do much better than those studying on their own through distance learning.
In a classroom environment people generally feel more confident to interact and, of course, a good tutor will encourage those students who haven’t said as much as others, to ensure that everybody gets equal attention.
Here’s an interesting statistic for you: 95% of ACT students who attended face-to-face tuition for the CertFMM exam in April last year passed it, compared with the overall pass rate of 61%. Across our qualifications, average pass rates are consistently higher for those attending face-to-face learning.
The ACT acts on feedback from students and always strives to improve the quality of the online experience, but the statistics don’t lie.
Whatever your learning style and however comfortable you are asking questions in an online setting (or not, as might be your preference), you’ll have a much better chance of passing your assessment if your studying includes interaction with expert tutors and fellow learners.
So it seems slightly ludicrous to think that when we’re learning as adults, having an interaction with an expert figure is not required, or at least not considered essential.
Your school may or may not have been a fun environment for you, but if you are studying (or perhaps thinking about studying) for a professional qualification, hopefully something in treasury from the ACT, then you should look for the option that offers you the best of all possible worlds.
We’d like to think we can meet that demand.
Vanessa Harwood-Whitcher is director of education at the ACT
