Online learning challenges and ways to overcome

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the education sector in Malaysia. This pandemic had caused a major shift to online education, which had impacted students and teachers immensely (Almazova et al. , 2020). According to Hijazi and AINatour (2021), online education is classified as a type of distance education as instructions and assessments are all completed using the Internet. Due to the sudden shift, teachers had to adapt and transform the current curriculum, which was made for physical classes, to one that would suit an online class. This is so that education would still go on despite not physically attending class. Changing from a physical class to an online education has many advantages. Students were able to conveniently gain access to teachers’ assessments and materials through an online learning platform (Mukhtar et al. , 2020). Additionally, students were able to save on travelling expenses as they do not have to go back to campus. For lecturers, their administrative tasks, like recording of lectures and marking attendance are easier done online, as it is relatively easy to record lectures with an online platform. Despite the advantages, there are also multiple problems that comes with online learning. Lack of money, good internet connection, a proper computer, and personal attention are some of the biggest problems when it comes to online learning (Dhawan, 2020). Teachers were also unable to evaluate students’ understanding on the topic due to the lack of immediate feedback given to the students (Mukhtar et al. , 2020). There are many challenges that are faced by students and teachers that could hinder the process of learning in schools. Thus, the purpose of this essay is to analyse the challenges faced by university students and lecturers in online learning and discuss the reasons and effects of the challenges. Then, solutions and methods for the challenges mentioned will be examined to help lecturers and students improve on online learning in the future. Discussion Problems One of the most prominent challenges in online learning is Internet infrastructure. Students would constantly have poor and unstable connectivity along with limited broadband mobile data (Chung et al. , 2020a). This could be due to financial constraints that restrict students from buying mobile data or Wi-Fi connections that are suitable for online learning (Sim et al. , 2021). As stated by Chung, Subramaniam and Dass (2020b), 60. 2% of university students in West Malaysia had issues with internet connectivity when attending online classes. This was especially so in rural areas, whereby students were not able to have proper connection to the Internet to take their classes. The major effects of having poor Internet connection is not being able to download materials needed for the lessons, as some materials could take a long time to download (Hijazi & AINatour, 2021). Not only that, but poor connectivity leads to students being ‘kicked out’ of class and the inability to log into a course from the beginning (Dinh & Nguyen, 2020). Furthermore, students would not be able to listen or contribute to the lecture as well, as poor connectivity causes the students to lag in the middle of class. This could be damaging to students, as they would not be able to understand the course, which would lower their morale in learning the subject. Moreover, limited resources were one of the problems that teachers and students face in online learning. Due to the sudden shift, the students were not able to obtain proper laptops or mobile devices in order to attend online classes. According to Chung, Subramaniam and Dass (2020), 32. 6% of diploma students in West Malaysia and 42. 7% of degree students in East Malaysia had slow personal laptop and devices. Some students may even lack space in their gadgets to install the necessary applications for online learning. This could be due to financial constraints, as they are not able to afford high capacity computers, laptops and handphones (Sim et al, 2021). As stated by a study done by Anderson and Perrin (2018), some students had to share their electronic gadgets and mobile data with siblings. Thus, this could hinder the students’ learning, as their devices could not cope with online lectures done live. Also, since students are not able to access libraries and the facilities in campus, they could not obtain books and materials needed for their assignments. In addition, students also seem to face issues with lack of interaction. As stated by Sim, Sim and Quah (2021), online learning had slowed down the process of teaching and learning due to long queues for questions. This is due to the lack of timely feedback given. Also, since the shift from physical classes to online classes were rapid, teachers were unable to cope with the sudden change, thus there was a lack of clarification in the assignments and lecture given to students (Hijazi & AINatour, 2021). Not only that, but the teachers struggle to manage classrooms in online learning. The teachers felt like they had no control over the class as they were unable to communicate with students (Kolesova et al. , 2021). With the added problem of poor connectivity among students, they are unable to receive timely feedback nor communicate with students during group activities, which hinders them from learning and understanding the course in class (Adnan & Anwar, 2020). Therefore, students struggled to adjust to the new online learning environment because they were not able to interact properly with their peers or their lecturers. Moreover, another problem with online learning is that the teaching methods used in classes. Many university students in Malaysia find that the lecturers different online learning methods used in class were confusing for them (Sim et al. , 2021). University students, especially in University Teknologi Mara (UiTM), had too many different online learning methods. Even though a LMS Learning system has been set up for students to use, the lecturers do not take advantage of them (Sim et al. , 2021). Instead, the lecturers use other platforms that are more convenient to them, which could potentially confuse students. This could be due to a significant digital gap among instructors of various ages (Shafie et al. , 2019). The effects of having many different teaching methods is that students could get confused on which platforms to use for each course they take. Also, if the students are unable to understand how the online learning platform works, then the student may be reluctant to attend online classes. Furthermore, another problem that many researchers have overlooked is motivation in students when having online classes. According to Herguner, Son, Herguner Son and Donmez (2020), motivation is important in online learning as it has a great effect on students’ attitudes and learning habits. Based on the research done by Sim, Sim and Quah (2021), and Chung, Subramaniam and Dass (2020b), there is a significant amount of university students in Malaysia that lacked the motivation to learn when classes are being conducted online. Some students from Sim’s research had mentioned that they struggled with online learning because they feel that this mode of learning is a lonely, boring experience. As a result, students lack concentration in online learning and some students would even fall asleep during online learning (Morgan, 2020). Recommendations Based on the problems mentioned above, the stakeholders involved, which are the teachers, students, government, internet service, providers and more, had tried to combat the issues. According to Chung, Subramaniam and Dass (2020), private telecommunication companies in Malaysia, such as Maxis, Digi and more, had offered a free one gigabyte of broadband data between 8pm to 6pm daily. This is so that students are allowed to engage in online learning without using money. However, this is insufficient for the students as they had mentioned that the data was slow and a live-streaming lecture could take up more than 1 gigabyte (Chung, 2020b). Hence, to solve the issues of Internet infrastructure, the government should look into long term infrastructure investments for students and teachers alike so that they are able to conduct online classes at ease. Not only the government, but the university should also consider improving internet connectivity within their campus as well. This is because some students may come to campus to attend online lectures, as their home could have weak internet connection. As online learning could be the new norm in many universities, it is important to improve internet connectivity. Another recommendation provided by Hijazi and AINatour (2021), is for universities to form partnerships with mobile network operators so that they are able to reduce costs on students, which increases internet availability for students in the future. Besides that, some solutions that could be considered when it comes to the limited resources is by having the government provide money for students to support them with online learning. By giving money to students, they are able to obtain the necessary means for online learning, such as proper laptop and mobile devices. This also means that the students would not have to share their devices among each other. Also, universities should also provide necessary resources for students to understand the subject matter, as well as doing their assignments. This could be done by providing an online learning resource library whereby students are able to obtain different materials needed for their classes, such as journal articles, textbooks and so on. Some solutions that could solve the issues with the lack of interaction in classes is by improving on the activities and practices given to students. In order to have a more interactive class, the teacher should try and implement more engaging activities so that it would encourage students to interact with each other. For example, teachers could provide online materials like a virtual debate in order to encourage interaction among students. Also, if online learning were to be long-term for students, the lecturers should implement a long-term strategy for blended learning, which incorporates both online and face-to-face learning (Dinh & Nguyen, 2020). This strategy combines a critical component of social work education with the convenience and flexibility of online lectures, resulting in increasing students’ satisfaction and performance. Furthermore, in order to deal with the issues of having too many teaching methods used in class, the lecturers should come together and discuss having synchronisation of online platforms for online teaching and learning. This is so that students could avoid problems with lecturers using different online platforms for different subjects, which would help alleviate students’ anxiety when they attend classes (Chung et al. , 2020). In addition, by having lecturers go for training sessions, they could learn how to organise online classes for the students, and be more effective in delivering online learning contents to the students. With this, students may be less confused on the subject matter and would be motivated to learn. Lastly, to solve the issues of motivation among students, the teachers should plan and redesign their lessons in order to cater to the needs of the students (Sim et al. , 2021). This could be reducing the time for online delivery of lessons so that students would not be overburdened with long lectures and a huge amount of assignments. Not only that, but it would help students retain their attention span on the screen, which would solve students’ boredom in class. Educators could also implement motivating instructional methods, like virtual tours or virtual field trips so that it would inspire students and foster learning opportunities for students to be more productive in classes. Conclusion In summary, there are five problems and solutions pertaining to online learning had been mentioned in this paper. The first problem is due to Internet infrastructure, and how students have been dealing with poor Internet connection as well as unstable mobile data when attending online classes. This could be solved by having government provide free Internet connection and having universities provide better connectivity in campus for students to attend classes with ease. Furthermore, the second problem was limited resources in terms of electronic gadgets and library resources. The possible solutions could be that the government were to provide money for students to afford proper devices and having universities provide an online library for students. Then, the third problem is the lack of interaction in class, as students were unable to interact with their peers and their lecturers. The possible solutions for this problem are to improve on activities given to students and teaching methods on blended learning for future use. Moreover, the fourth problem presented is the excessive amount of teaching methods and the solution is for lecturers to come together and collectively decide on a teaching method and an online platform to use during online lectures. This is to ensure that students would not get confused on which platforms to use. Lastly, the final problem presented is the lack of motivation for students to attend online classes. This is could be solved by restructuring their lesson plans and activities in order to cater to the needs of the students. Additionally, having more motivating instructional methods of teaching would make students more productive. Therefore, it is important that the stakeholders involved to take these problems into consideration to further improve online education for students. This is so that students are able to have a fruitful education despite the dire situation. As mentioned by Ruth (2018), drastic changes need to be made so that the attitudes towards all aspects of online learning would be positive for students, instead of being a huge burden on them.