With new developments in technology and increased access to the Internet, there is a growing trend towards online learning. It’s thought that the drawbacks of studying online outweigh the benefits. In my opinion, I partly agree with that statement and believe that there exists many potential advantages that learners need to make use of.

      On one hand, there is no doubt that online learning can bring about some disadvantages. Firstly, concentrating on the screen for such a long time may result in some health problems such as short-sightedness, headache, eye- tired ness and even spinal problems or eating disorder. Secondly, the quality of the lessons can be considereably affected when students or teachers have low-bandwitdth internet connections. The bad signal, not only causes speech disruption and frustration to the person experiencing it, but also prevents the whole class from exchanging ideas, provide knowledge effectively. Thirdly, online learning is only effective with self-disciplined ones. A lot of teenagers are easily distracted from learning by some games or social websites like Facebook, Instagram… Thus, without any supervision from adults, they can’t resist to temptation and end up in having no knowledge at all .

         On the other hand, it’s undeniable that there are several benefits in online learning. Firstly learning online at home is a convenient method to aquire knowledge for those who can’t afford the time and even money to take offline course. For example, busy students can study at a time that suits their tight schedule and don’t have to spend time travelling to classes. Furthermore, you can easily download class materials, files and store them on your computer or print them out so that you can review them anytime free. Last but not least, during Covid-19 epidemic, social distancing is very essential, online learning helps to restrict the rate of infection and keep us safe.

           To sum up, distant learning is both a positive and a negative trend. Students can benefit a lot from online learning, but also have to be aware of the disadvantages that it creates in order to gain knowledge fully, perform well in classes and achieve higher results.