Online Classes Don’t Work? Or Are We Teaching Them the Wrong Way?

By Dr. Fariha Gul

Author, Consultant, Researcher and Educationist

One of the most common statements I hear in education circles today is: “Students don’t learn anything in online classes.”

This perception has become so widespread that many institutions treat online teaching merely as a temporary or emergency solution rather than a serious pedagogical space. But the real question is not whether learning happens online. The real question is whether we know how to design learning for the online environment.

During the pandemic years, most universities and schools rapidly shifted their traditional lectures to Zoom or other digital platforms. What many educators actually did was transfer the same lecture-based model into a digital space, expecting the same engagement and outcomes. Unsurprisingly, this approach produced fatigue, disengagement, and minimal participation.

When students are asked to sit passively in front of a screen for long hours, the problem is not the technology. The problem is pedagogy.

Research in digital learning consistently shows that effective online education requires a different instructional design approach. It requires structured interaction, intentional engagement strategies, and carefully designed learning activities that keep students cognitively involved rather than simply present.

Unfortunately, many educators were never trained in online pedagogy, digital engagement strategies, or technology-integrated assessment methods. As a result, online classes often become long monologues rather than interactive learning experiences.

However, when designed properly, online learning can be extremely powerful. In fact, well-structured digital classrooms can sometimes offer greater participation, more inclusive discussions, and richer learning analytics than traditional classrooms.

So what actually makes online learning effective?

Here are a few practical strategies that significantly improve learning in digital classrooms:

1. Micro-Learning Instead of Long Lectures: Students rarely stay attentive during long online lectures. Breaking sessions into 10–15 minute learning segments followed by discussion, polls, or short tasks can dramatically improve engagement.

2. Interactive Learning Activities: Using breakout discussions, collaborative documents, problem-solving tasks, and digital brainstorming tools keeps students actively involved rather than passively listening.

3. Visible Participation Mechanisms: Structured participation, through chat responses, quick polls, reflective prompts, or short quizzes, ensures that every student contributes, not just a few vocal participants.

4. Digital Assessment for Learning: Short formative assessments during the session help instructors track understanding in real time rather than discovering learning gaps at the end of the semester.

5. Human Presence in the Virtual Classroom: Students learn better when instructors build social presence, acknowledging students by name, encouraging peer dialogue, and creating a sense of learning community.

These strategies are simple but transformative. Yet many educators have never had the opportunity to systematically learn or practice them.

This is exactly why capacity building for effective online teaching has become one of the most urgent professional development needs in higher education today.

Over the past few years, I have been working on training educators in designing engaging online learning environments, focusing on practical strategies that can immediately improve student participation and learning outcomes.

Through structured seminars and faculty workshops, I help educators explore:

• Evidence-based strategies for effective online teaching

• How to design engaging digital classrooms

• Practical tools for increasing student interaction

• Techniques for managing attention and participation online

• Simple digital assessment methods that improve learning feedback

These sessions are not theoretical lectures. They are hands-on, practical workshops where educators experience the strategies themselves and learn how to apply them in their own courses.

If your institution is still struggling with low engagement in online classes, the problem may not be the format, it may simply be the absence of the right pedagogical tools.

Online learning is not the future anymore. It is already part of our educational reality. The real challenge now is ensuring that it becomes meaningful, engaging, and effective.

If your university, faculty development center, or institution is interested in organizing a seminar or professional development workshop on effective online teaching, I would be happy to collaborate.

Because when online teaching is done right, learning does not just happen , it can thrive.