CLASSROOM TEACHING IS BETTER THAN ONLINE TEACHING - A SURVEY REPORT IN MEDICAL COLLEGE MANDI H.P

Around the world even the developed countries are stunned by this pandemic causing extensive pain. India is no exception and the Government has imposed a nation – wide lockdown to help restrain the virus. At the onset of the pandemic, medical students in the midst of the session were suddenly pulled out of their studies and same for 3rd and 4th years medical students clerkships were abruptly pulled out of clinical care. Faculty scrambled to adjust learning experiences by switching to online cases and remote activities to prepare students for required exams and to build clinical reasoning skills without the face to face patient encounter. In such a situation, where educational institutions across the country have been closed, both teaching and learning have affected millions of students. As per the orders from the.Government, Universities the colleges have started offering online classes to students. The objective of these online classes is to make sure that students do not lose out on any teaching and learning activities during the lockdown. This paper examines the impact of lockdown on students of medical institutions, the challenges they are facing due to lockdown.

Around the world even the developed countries are stunned by this pandemic causing extensive pain. India is no exception and the Government has imposed a nation -wide lockdown to help restrain the virus. At the onset of the pandemic, medical students in the midst of the session were suddenly pulled out of their studies and same for 3 rd and 4 th year's medical students clerkships were abruptly pulled out of clinical care. Faculty scrambled to adjust learning experiences by switching to online cases and remote activities to prepare students for required exams and to build clinical reasoning skills without the face to face patient encounter. In such a situation, where educational institutions across the country have been closed, both teaching and learning have affected millions of students. As per the orders from the.Government, Universities the colleges have started offering online classes to students. The objective of these online classes is to make sure that students do not lose out on any teaching and learning activities during the lockdown. This paper examines the impact of lockdown on students of medical institutions, the challenges they are facing due to lockdown.

Introduction:-
Digital medical education is in its infancy in the geographically challenging and mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh. To limit the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic,educational institutions in Himachal Pradesh have remained closed for more than a month and medical colleges are no exception. Recently, however, Himachal Pradesh Govt. and H P University has instructed its affiliated institutions to run online classes for students so that there would be no delay (lag) in the academic calendar.
Six Medical Colleges (Five Govt. & one Private) affiliated to the H P University are scattered all over Himachal Pradesh, enrolling 100 to 150 students in each year for the bachelor's degree (MBBS). Each student learns about 5 years in different fields of medicine until they graduate, post graduate studies continue for the next 3 years, before they can become specialists.

ISSN: 2320-5407
Int. J. Adv. Res. 8(10), 1165-1170 1166 In order to combat the spread of coronavirus, various webinars are conducted, with the help of the IT department of each medical college to educate medical professionals. Online teaching for medical undergraduates would be an innovative step in medical colleges for engagement with locked down students 1 . Many challenges were faced for both students and teachers during online teaching. Some popular web portals like Zoom and Skype are being used for teaching and learning purposes 2 .

Data And Methods:-
This is an online survey based study of the 353 undergraduate Medical students and BSc.
Nursing students from Sh. Lal Bahadur Shastri Government Medical College Mandi at Nerchowk Himachal Pradesh.

Data Collection And Procedure:
An online survey was conducted from 16 September to 21 September 2020. A structural questionnaire link using 'Google form' was sent to students through whatsApp. Consent was taken before participation in the online survey. A total 353 students provide complete information regarding the survey.

Results:-
For this study, 353 MBBS and Nursing students from Sh. Lal Bahadur Shastri Government Medical College Mandi at Nerchowk was included. There were male 95(26.8%) and female 246 (69.5%) and prefer not to say were 12 (3.7%). Sex distribution of subjects based on gender wise distribution in Himachal Pradesh is shown in Figure 1. Observation:- The survey shows that 99% of the students have adopted the online education system. It is observed that classes of 15 to 20 hours a week are provided to all the students, 74% of students actually attend lectures between 10-15 hours in a week and rest up to 20 hours. 90% students use mobile and rest laptops. 56% are comfortable while attending lectures from home. In this survey, different types of questions were asked regarding online teaching, in which 85% students disagree with the statement that online teaching is better than traditional teaching. The online lectures given by the teachers were very helpful for the students and they were evaluated during the online classes and teachers were easily approachable for their queries. The survey shows that 43% students feel online teaching effective to overcome the scare of COVID-19, only 19% say no. ( Table-1

& 2)
When asked for quality of online teaching and online classes required more time than on-campus classes, results shown in Figure -   Beside subject teaching they were also asked about their general well being by the teachers. When asked about the advantage of online teaching 43% said yes, 22% said no and rest were confused. The study shows 84% of students agree with the statement that an online teaching environment disrupts effective learning. When asked about whether online teaching helped them to be self disciplined the response was comparable.
It is also revealed in the survey that teachers have adopted this system keeping in mind the future and precious time of their students and have tried to give their best but practical and clinical knowledge is not possible through online teaching. Maximum students believe that high quality learning without face to face interaction can take place and the quality of online teaching was fair.

Discussion:-
According to our study, the missing element in the effectiveness of online study was clinical practice. Nothing can replace seeing a patient because clinical experience and human interaction are extremely important for the practice of medicine 3 . Online education is considered to have a broader reach than traditional classroom teaching 4 . No doubt that online teaching has broader reach than traditional teaching but it can't create the same atmosphere as traditional teaching, nor take the place of classroom teaching.
During lockdown, with the closure of universities and Medical Colleges, such physical and social interaction has been restricted resulting in stress. As far anxiety is concerned, students, researchers and health professionals reported a moderate level of anxiety 5 . Further in the current study, it is evident that depression was not reported for students and online teaching was effective to overcome the scare of COVID-19 and online lectures delivered to them by faculty were much helpful.
Flexibility is one of the most often cited advantages of online learning, according to students. Study reported that flexibility was one of the most important factors in choosing to learn online, even though most of the students reported that they could have taken a campus-based learning 6 . In the present study, maximum students appreciate the flexibility that online courses offered for their own time management. They adore the freedom of doing their work when and where they wanted.
The similar study was conducted by various authors and found positive thought among students about e-learning. There is also a great interest and increasing use of these e-learning programmes for academic use. But, many of them do not wish for e-learning. They only like virtual Learning like face to face learning or traditional learning 7 .
At the end, our system of Medical Colleges will have undergone profound and unanticipated changes. It's unknown how long and how these students will perform clinically in residency. The summer months will be used for makeup time for rising 4th year students and provide preclinical skills building time for rising 3rd year students. Therefore, the clerical work will be shortened to accommodate a short academic year 8 .

Conclusion:-
The present study, teachers have adopted this system keeping in mind the future and precious time of their students and have tried to give their best but practical and clinical knowledge is not possible through online teaching. Maximum students believe that high quality learning without face to face interaction can take place and the quality of online teaching was fair.