What are the benefits of teaching English online?
eLearning or digital language learning is being increasingly adopted by language schools to teach English online (Or any foreign language). As with most subjects, is more effective when interacting synchronously with a teacher – face to face in real-time.
Benefits of using Learning to teach English:
- Adapt to trends and student demands for online services (online education is growing at 23% p.a)
- Extends a schools reach beyond their physical locations
- Increase student enrollments
- Gives a competitive advantage over schools without an online offering
- Provides more flexible employment options for hiring native speaking teachers from overseas
So what is e-learning? E-learning can be broadly categorized into 3 main categories:
- Online learning: including self-paced courseware, interactive courses, virtual classrooms, and may be used in conjunction with face-to-face traditional teaching i.e. blended or hybrid learning
- Digital learning resources such as e-textbooks and e-gradebooks
- Mobile learning apps including educational games and other mobile services
The promise and challenge of technology in language learning outlines challenges and strategies for language schools implementing e-learning components into their programs.
In one of our recent blog posts Challenges and Strategies for Teaching Online Classes – the Research explores these challenges and strategies for learning languages and e-learning in more detail.
Resources to teach English online
Language schools use different online resources in a broad number of ways:
- As a stand-alone program to teach online classes for distant learning
- As an extension for before and after the student attends their school. It takes time for students to become proficient in a language and extending students’ learning experience, is one aspect of gaining proficiency
- As a supplement to a traditional classroom environment
Self-paced alone courses are not enough though especially to teach English or a foreign language. Research has found that online courseware i.e. modules that are self-paced without a teacher (asynchronous learning alone) have high student drop- out rates , and that is despite the perceived benefits that this type of e-learning offers.
The British Council has a good post on: How to get started as an online teacher of English
When considering teaching English classes online, you will need to think about your strategy and delivery of the course. This involves using digital resources for your virtual classroom. Ideally you should use a variety of media for different learning types and to keep students engaged:
- Video and audio files
- Documents and graphics
- Collaborate on written examples and vocabulary
LearnCube’s Virtual Classroom software simplifies delivery of online courses by providing a platform for live online classes, self-paced eCources and the administration of schedules and payments.
