365吃瓜部落

Arguably, one of the biggest benefits to online and distance learning is the freedom it allows students to study at a time and place that best suits their needs. For eighteen year old Andrew who lives in East Asia, this benefit was a huge help when balancing his education alongside family commitments.

鈥淚 have quite a lot of family obligations, such as babysitting and chores. I study mostly in the daytime, sometimes at night when I鈥檓 free.鈥� 

When diving into how Andrew manages his study around other areas of responsibility, he replied: 鈥淚t鈥檚 hard to say, sometimes you just need encouragement to continue. I work hard when I can, but somehow just rest (sometimes for months, even two or three) when the situation is difficult for me. 

Andrew encourages other students in the same position to: 鈥淔orgive yourself at that time and tell yourself things will get better at some point, and you can keep on studying.鈥�

For students who find themselves trying to balance many areas of their life, online course tutors are incredibly important and strive to support students where possible. We asked Andrew for his views on 365吃瓜部落 tutors and the service received, to which he positively replied: 鈥淵es, they were helpful at answering questions (many thanks to Jane, Amanda, Prof. Pearson and Jonathan!), as English is not my first language, I still have to use Google a lot to find some meanings of some of the terms.鈥�

鈥淚 suggest students who don鈥檛 speak English as their first language take account of the language difficulty when planning their study schedule. For example, sometimes it is suggested that one hour is needed to study the topic, but it might take me three. But when I come back to review it, it may take me just 30 minutes. Practice makes perfect!鈥�