STUDENTS learning on the Internet can do as well or better than pupils in a conventional classroom, New Scientist magazine reports today.
The scientific journal said an experiment with 33 sociology students at an American university found that students who learned on the Internet scored 20 per cent higher in examinations than those taught in the classroom.
Prof Jerald Schutte, of California State University in North ridge, found after dividing his statistics class into two groups - traditional and on line - that the on line group also spent more time on class work, understood the material better and collaborated more. "I would say the collaboration resulted from the panic of having no face to face interaction," Prof Schutte said.
The traditional group was taught each Saturday for 14 weeks, while the on line students met only for examinations at the beginning and the end of the course. The Internet students, however, used electronic mail to collaborate in groups and had weekly discussions on the Internet with Prof Schutte.
"We believe you can't dispense with the intervention of a teacher, at least in schools, though the results are perfectly plausible for university age students," Mr Jeff Morgan, director of communications at the British Council of Educational Technology, told New Scientist.