By Chaniru Senhas and Nimuthu Pathiraja from Grade 6
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, school was closed and both of us were very bored waiting for school to re-open.
And then suddenly, something unexpected happened! We were given school accounts and were asked to sign in to Microsoft Teams. This was a mind-blowing idea for us.
Online learning is very different from normal learning and also exciting. It has its pros and cons, and it took a long time to get used to “the new normal”. But it has been a really enjoyable experience, and now we have got used to it, we love it.
On the day of the first online session, our heads were bubbling with anticipation. It was a brand new experience for us and filled us with excitement. The sessions were short and scattered with fun.
Lucky for us, our parents were always there to remind us the time of the online sessions, and wake us up in the morning for them.
But sometimes we wake up early in the morning and get ready for the online sessions and get in front of our laptops, only to find that it is cancelled. We didn’t mind those occasions too much.
All the teachers sent us videos before every lesson, and during the class sessions teachers shared their screens and showed us very creative presentations. We realised that teachers had worked very hard on creating the presentations.
Another thing was sharing our science experiments. We recorded videos and uploaded them to our Class Team. Then the teachers gave feedback on our experiments and corrected the mistakes. Once, even the Principal replied on one of our experiments!
For us probably the best part about online learning was the assignments. Teachers would make assignments on Microsoft Word or Forms and they would upload it with a due date.
Another useful thing was when you could not come to the class, the meeting would be recorded and saved. Sometimes this came in handy when we didn’t want to wake up early!
We can always write the short notes that were given because many teachers uploaded the notes to the Class Notebook, which is a place where teachers can handout quizzes and homework for us.
We can always get organized and know when our next meetings are coming up through the calendar and notifications. And, you can always share school documents via OneDrive and jot down notes online.
One of the main advantages was when you had a question about any assignment, you could simply ask the teacher when they were online.
Although there were many advantages with online learning, there were some disadvantages as well. One was that in case of a power cut you would have to wait. Both of us had the problem of slow network connection as well.
Sometimes as soon as the class finishes, we get calls from friends asking what teacher did today!
We also had to share our devices with our siblings who think it is fun to trouble and distract us during online classes!
There were also some things which we missed a lot like the library, playing with our friends, and the traditional morning assembly.
Through it all, the teachers were very committed to making sure we covered all the work. We are extremely grateful to everyone in school who helped us.
Thank you!
