According to the cognitive determinants of environmental preference stated above, here I will analyze and compare a physical and an online learning environment based on my personal experiences.
For the physical one, I would like to talk about my literature class at the university. I remember it was an ugly, small, cold and wooden floor classroom. The wall was painted in light green (an old color) and the light was not good. The coherence of the class was not good for learning to take place, although the teacher tried to do her best…it was impossible. Furthermore, there were not any stimuli for catching students’ attention or make them feel comfortable, all the students were looking at the clock all the time, waiting for the class to finish everything in that class seemed to be complicated, maybe because we were not interested on the class. All the classes it was the same, it became a routine and a torture.
The virtual environment I want to talk about is Wiziq. This environment is organized cognitively, it has everything we could need in a physical classroom: whiteboard, markers, pencils, notebook, highlighter, eraser, a projector (the same screen), and the most important, it allows synchronous interaction. It is an interesting environment that can stimulate participation and discussion. It is friendly user and allows to present different contents through different media. Finally, it allows recording the session, which help learners to review the lesson as many times as they want and learn in their own pace.
