The advantages of online learning Essay

Despites the advantages of educational video games in STEM education, some educators support online learning could be an effective supplementary to traditional lectures. Similar to educational video games, online courses allow students to learn at their own pace and promote communications in online forums (Snyder, 2013, para. 5-7). Furthermore, online courses are less expensive than traditional lectures and education video games because they require less land, equipment and faculty (Friedman, 2013, para. 4). Online video records of lectures allow students to go over course materials repeatedly and thus concentrate on the most difficult and important theories in STEM. Meanwhile, as STEM courses have challenging exercises, students could discuss those exercises via online forums and virtual discussion boards.
However, different from educational video games, online courses could distract students from learning course materials. A recent research in 2015 found that students tend to memorize less materials when watching video lectures and the frequency of mind-wandering increases (Jacobs, 2015, para. 10-11). Learning and remembering theories in STEM fields are the most important reason why students go to schools every week. Without the support of basic knowledge in STEM fields, students would have difficult time solving complicated real problem because they do not have theories in their minds. In contrast, as mentioned in previous paragraphs, educational video games in STEM motivate students to voluntarily comprehend course materials. Additionally, researchers mentioned like the difference between live theaters and preaches, people are less interested when they are told by tedious voices on the screen (Jacobs, 2015, para. 12). On the contrary, video games promote interactions because they give feedbacks to users simultaneously and users have the full control of games. To sum up, video games, instead of online courses, can supplement conventional lectures because keep student interested in STEM and motivated to learn about STEM.
In conclusion, traditional lectures where students simply listen to lecturers are ineffective in educating students in STEM fields because they may reduce students' interest, discourage creativity and increase fail rate. In order to fulfill the increasing requirements for the number and quality of STEM talents, video games can be considered as an educational tool to assist students in STEM fields because they are more effective in keeping students' interest, promoting the development of creativity and promoting active learning. Future video games will continue contributing to students' creativity by providing more freedom and relating more game contents to real life. Since video games have more advantages than traditional lectures, an increasing number of schools and courses will use video games as teaching assistances in the future, but this does not mean that video games should no longer be improved. Although the video game industry are developing incessantly, video games that are designed specifically for education do not receive much attention from the society. Due to the lack of quality standards and distribution approaches, educational video game development are very unstable (Mayo, 2009, p.81). One possible solution is to establish an official organization to regulate the design, manufacture and distribution of educational video games.