Distance Learning In Higher Education. Expectations Vs Reality

In the following part of the paper we would like to present the positive and negative sides of the distance learning in general and via Moodle in particular as seen by the teacher.

By preparation and training in the Moodle system the teacher uses item collection of a course which comprises different types of activities (forums, glossaries, wikis, assignments, quizzes, choices (polls), scorm players, databases etc) and each can be customized quite a lot. By varying combinations of different elements of a course, the teacher organizes the studying process in accordance with the purposes and aims of the subject. The teacher can create and use any system of estimation within a course and set deadlines for the tasks. All marks at each course are stored in the summary sheet. Moodle also allows the teacher to control the students’ attendance, activity and time of their using the system. Moodle is aimed at collaborative work, involving the participants to interact and share their knowledge in the subjects studying.

Having made an overview of the problem raised in the paper it can be said that the problem of introduction of distance learning into the educational process has attracted a lot of researchers and scholars in the last decade (Halilović et al., 2016; Pervukhin, 2013).

In the case of online courses for any attendee, it is necessary to stress that it is precisely in this form of training that requires the maximum form of motivation because control over the students is virtually practically non-existent. In this case different methods to increase learning motivation can be introduced (Lan & Hew, 2020).

Referring to existing experience, it is necessary to note the following positive and negative points of distance education in general (Avdeeva et al., 2017; Seregina, 2018) and revealed in the present research.

Let’s name main positive sides of distance education on all participants of the educational process.

On part of the attendees:

• It is accessible to people, especially to those who do not have the opportunity to be educated in the traditional way.

• Distance education allows the student to choose convenient time classes: listening to lectures, participation in seminars and homework.

• Studying process can incorporate personalized learning scheme.

Without requiring large financial investments, ICT greatly reduce educational costs, reducing to a minimum the cost of distance education.

On part of the educational institution:

• High acceptance of students with minimal teaching staff, and as a result, fast recoupment rate of such an educational process.

The flexibility of the system, allowing the institution to respond to the needs of the market demands in the shortest possible time, introducing the required courses and programmes.

On part of the teachers and tutors:

• All the materials and needed data are located in one place.

• Possibility of controlling the deadline of the tasks, their format, size and other characteristics.

• Interactive communication with the students, involving individualized supervision.

Relative simplicity in creating, developing, operating and editing the courses present on the platform Moodle.

Nevertheless, a number of negative points can be also summarized and mentioned:

On part of teachers:

• Amount of time spent on using the system is not limited, thus making a teacher working 24/7.

The courses turn out to be not protected from the legal point being present on the platform and giving access to large groups of listeners. So, the author’s rights are regularly broken.

On part of the attendees:

• The lack of direct contact with the teacher.

• The absence of supervision by the teachers in many courses, which implies a high level of motivation of students.

• Impossibility to achieve high results in the educational process if not having a high degree of self-organization and self-discipline.

• Lack of communicative practice.

Proceeding from personal experience of use the Moodle platform as teachers, it should be noted that this system gives rather great opportunities to use it as an additional source of independent work within the learning of foreign languages, especially it concerns upgrading reading and writing skills. There the certain materials promoting fixing and repetition of the studied subjects and tasks for self-examination can be placed. Speaking about tasks for self-examination, first of all, these are test tasks where according to the studied material, it is necessary to choose the correct answer. Such tests are usually aimed at checking grammar and lexical material. Usually, these are tests where it is necessary to choose a suitable answer. It is the most sufficient way of practicing this aspect since it, in reality, the routine which demands the maximum quantity of time while studying. Generalizing, it can be stated that two aspects of the learning of a foreign language, grammatical and lexical, can be beneficently used in the Moodle system.

On the contrary, the quality of studying the stylistic aspect raises a lot of questions since the programme is still not able to monitor stylistically correct lexico-semantic communication. In order to control this aspect it is possible to give to the students writing compositions and essays, but checking this task is excessively time-consuming and inconvenient for the teachers because it does not give a possibility of correcting it directly in the file while working in the system. For marking the notes and recommendations it is necessary to open the other file and make all the correction work there. Students also need to open both files and to verify the mistakes and the recommendations of the teacher. Taking into account the number of the students in the group (according to the last requirements of the institutions it reaches 16 people), time expenditure on checking by the teacher is not expedient at all. Therefore, it is better to pronounce the mistakes of this kind in class to the audience so that all the students could hear them, note them down, correct and avoid making similar mistakes in their further works.

Concerning the aspect of listening, the platform gives the possibility of the wide use of materials of various types offered both by a course, and various Internet sources. These materials can be well integrated into the platform without causing special difficulties and do not demand any special knowledge of computer programmes. And the level of perception can be checked by test tasks.

However, the Moodle platform is not suitable for checking and grading the speech activity. This type of activity demands direct internal participation of the teacher. In the practical speech all earlier studied aspects – grammar, lexicon, listening skills are integrated. The ability to interpret the accumulated knowledge in the speech, especially at the beginner’s stage of learning foreign languages can be done only by the teacher in face-to-face communication. It can help the student to choose the most suitable lexical units proceeding from the given material and most competently to output it in their speech. Thus, the correct speech is from the very beginning formed stylistically and the possibility of storing of incorrect examples is excluded.

One of the benefits of the system Moodle that the teacher can add links to the needed resources on the Internet or download numerous audio and video files in a foreign language. It may broaden the students’ opportunities for studying: listening, repeating and pronouncing the material. We would like also to note that the development of phonological skills is extremely important. In spite of this fact, distance learning via Moodle does not control communicative skills, especially students’ pronunciation skills. According to our experience while studying a foreign language much depends on the pronunciation skills and they should be strengthened alongside reading, speaking and writing skills. Incorrect pronunciation, mistakes in speed, stress and intonation may lead to misunderstanding and unsuccessful communication. But, unfortunately, such reproductive skills as listening and speaking lay in most cases beyond grading. And moreover, the students are deprived of the main thing – quick control over the educational process, which is especially necessary at implementation of work of students with oral exercises and tasks. So we can state that the sphere of practicing and brushing the speaking and listening skills can be only controlled in a traditional way unless some other techniques introduced into the Moodle system.

In this part of the paper the attendees’ points of view are presented based on the obtained and analyzed data.

According to the survey the results identified are the following:

• All respondents ever used ICTS in their education.

• All the students were attendees of Moodle.

• All respondents positively graded the possibility of obtaining additional education in the form of distance learning.

• 70 % marked e-learning as an additional way of getting education.

• 40% of students agreed to take exams and classes in the distant way thus 60% preferred to attend classes and exams traditionally.

• As the positive point of e-learning all respondents identified the possibility of not attending classes.

• 70% of respondents of the second group (mature students) would prefer to use e-learning for their professional growth.

• Flexible time of the classes during using e-learning was accepted by all the respondents.

• All respondents noted the comparative availability of the courses.

• 30% of the interviewees mentioned as extremely uncomfortable such online courses in which you can participate only in real-time.

• Over 70% of respondents mentioned as a negative moment the lack of direct contact with the teacher.

• Over 50% stated the lack of control on the part of the teacher that dissatisfies them.

• All respondents stated that if blended learning is organized professionally then it can be acceptable.

As it is observable, the results of the questionnaire show that distance learning is preferred to on-campus learning with the group of respondents.

One of the most surprising outcomes is the contradictory answer concerning attendance of the university. On the one hand, participants appreciate the possibility of not being present in class studying via Moodle but, on the other hand, the participants want to attend classes.

The similarity in the answers of the investigated groups to the question about the distance education and its usage shows that people are ready to spend their time on achieving the result but are not willing to spend more time and effort on it.

Thus, comparing and contrasting the given responses, the most unexpected answer for the authors of this article is the necessity of direct contact with the teacher. It is the fact that was important for almost all of the respondents, not taking into account their age, gender and social status. Another surprising answer considered the desire of the students to attend classes in the traditional way, despite the fact that some of them will spend over two or three hours on their way to university and back.

Analyzing the results we can state that it might be because of their anxiety while dealing with technology and low self-assurance. Some authors discussed this issue in detail (Staddon, 2020).

Naturally, the possibility of immediate communication with the teacher and peers is valued and is still in great demand. To achieve that it can be recommended to introduce different types of interaction in computer supported collaborative learning (Hernández-Sellés et al., 2020).