Learning online has many advantages with one of them being the convenience of not having to leave home to study, and engaging in a more personal experience through the comfort of your own home. Here at 3 Real Mates, we offer such a service. Our online tutors and students have the pleasure of learning from home, and learning not from just teachers, but their ‘real mates’. Our program is designed to enhance not just the English language, but to form real friendships, between our tutors and our students. Our students are aiming to study and live in Australia, so we feel it is utmost important to set them up with the advantage of pre-learning the Australian way of life, culture, currency, and how to build friendships, so they are already deep in knowledge of their future life before they arrive on foreign shores.
Our carefully designed classes allow for active interaction and engagement between the participants. Our classes are limited to up to 5 students ensuring that each student receives a lot more attention and support. Through interactive functions, our courses allow students and teachers to provide immediate responses to content delivered through lectures, discussion, and other multimedia materials in class. This characteristic of online courses provides a more traditional class atmosphere and can be used to promote higher levels of engagement than standard courses might allow.
Multimedia tools available in online setups are a unique asset for the design of online courses. For instance, different students have different levels of comfort participating in class. Some are comfortable speaking up in class, whereas others prefer to quietly listen. Text chat functions can be used concurrently with discussion in an audio-conference setup to encourage students to find ways to participate in writing as an initial step toward full participation in discussion. Additionally, many online tools enable methods that are not readily available in traditional classroom setups. Immediate access to multimedia tools, such as visual image files, including animations and videos as well as static slides, are often combined with annotation tools. This makes the class more fun and students and tutors have all the resources they need to communicate effectively at their fingertips.
The design and setup of our online courses present a smaller gap from traditional classroom environments that many students are familiar with. Consistent audiovisual images of peer students give a lively feeling to the participating students in a way that is more familiar to them, and encouragement and support from teachers are communicated through tone of voice, gestures, and facial expressions. Creating a community or classroom atmosphere is smoother in our online course environment that mirrors experiences students are used to in a traditional classroom environment.
Lastly, all our classes are monitored for quality and training purposes. This also ensures a safe and reliable environment for both students and tutors. Constructive feedback and monitoring also allows for customised training and mentoring ensuring all our classes are conducted to the highest degree, all course requirements are met and that the classes are benefiting both students and tutors alike. This is the foundation of the reputation and quality our company has built and maintained.
