Students resort to abusing teachers and creating mischief in Zoom classes rather than studying.
Shivani Mishra
Bengaluru, April 11, 2020
Across the country, students are reportedly paying no attention during the classes scheduled on Zoom. They resort to abusing teachers in different ways.
S. Venugopal, a Physics professor at CMR University, expressed her disappointment with this behavior of students and said, “Students have found fun elements in zoom classes as well. There are very few who pay attention and respond to the teachers, others are either there for the sake of attendance or to have fun. They change their names to escape from being identified. We don’t have any other choice but to keep up with it, as learning has to go on.”
The Zoom application facilitates online classes connecting hundreds of participants at a time. It’s the preferred alternative to teaching-in-person.
Teachers have reported that the students write obscene comments in the comment section when the classes are in session. They scribble all over the sheets provided to them to solve problems on the app, teachers interviewed by Newsnet reported. Teachers say the students change their names into those of politicians and chat publicly, asking teachers to comment on issues, and a few students connect only via audio, while others simply join the meeting, disconnecting both audio and video. They start playing T.V or music in the background in order to distract the class, teachers said.
Dean of R.V. College informed Newsnet that one student shared his screen and played porn in the middle of a lecture back in March, post which he asked the students for an assurance that such actions will not be repeated in the future, “else the faculty will discontinue taking the classes,” he said.
Rahul Tyagi, a B-tech IInd year student said, “Even during normal classes, students tend to disturb the class one way or the other but there the teacher can easily identify and punish the person but that’s not the case with Zoom classes, so it’s obvious that this will happen.” He said that the screen time of a student plays an important role, “it’s bearable during college lectures but on Zoom classes, long hours of lectures are just unbearable.”
DV Ramakrishna, Principal of Kendriya Vidyalaya RWF said, “It’s the tendency of a few students to disturb the class. It’s nothing new. Teachers are trained to deal with them in classes so they can do it during online classes as well.” He expressed the need for teachers to get stricter, to understand the complete functioning of the Zoom app so that everything remains under control, and students aren’t able to create any mischief, thus making learning through Zoom classes more effective.
After such incidents, colleges are now planning to switch to other apps for conducting online classes, keeping in mind that the other apps don’t have features that can be misused, and documents can still be shared easily during the lectures.
Only a few students pay attention during the class, the rest disconnect their audio and video and attend the class just for the sake of attendance.
FEATURE IMAGE CREDITS: Author
