Dealing With Time Zones In Online Learning

Hi there. In this education post, I talk about time zone differences in online learning.

Some private education jobs involve working with students in a different country and time zone. I have one case where the student moved from Toronto to Japan. She goes to school in Japan for a temporary period. Maybe her parents have contract work in Japan or something.

Finding A Good Time For Both Time Zones

With my case, the student is in Japan. Japan is 13 hours ahead of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. This student comes in at 5PM EST which is 6AM in Japan time. This is really early for her. I don't know when her school in Japan starts.

If she wanted an evening session in Japan time, then it would be morning EST time. A morning session in Japan is an evening session in EST time. I suppose 6AM for her works.

Awareness That Student May Not Be At 100%

Since the student is in Japan doing a learning session at 6AM, she is definitely not at 100%. Her wake up time may have been at 5:30AM. She could be eating breakfast while doing the online session. Not everyone is a morning person, so this particular student may have a slow start as she is not fully awake.

Dealing with overseas online students is not common. However, it does exist when it comes to online learning. A lot of the teach English online deals with young learners who are overseas. The instructor has to deal with odd hours to accommodate students or the students have to adjust to the other time zone or both find a good time that considers both time zones.