Abstract:

For more than ten years, I have been a university teacher and an instructor in Cisco Networking Academy Program and Juniper Networks Academy Alliance operating at the Institute of Applied Computer Science at the Lodz University of Technology. I have a vast experience in teaching and preparing various training courses in computer networks.

The coronavirus pandemic has changed dramatically the functioning of the university where I work. That has provided me with an opportunity to take part, as a student, in two training courses related to programming and network security. Those courses differed, most of all, in the type of the teaching environment:
- non-supervised – only the access to training materials was provided, students did tests and exercises on their own;
- supervised – the access to training materials, tests and exercises to be done by students on their own, but also a constant contact with the instructor, continuous monitoring of learning progress, the laboratory environment installed on a computer locally.

As a result, I was able to analyse both those methods from the viewpoint of a course participant, compare them, and verify what is, in my opinion, more effective in the process of acquiring knowledge.

Of course, it is extremely difficult to assess both those forms of remote education objectively from one’s own perspective. I was really surprised how much the virtually permanent contact with the instructor, his motivation, and quick explanations of all doubts accelerated the process of gaining knowledge as compared to the other training course.

The paper presents a detailed description of both courses, in particular the description of differences in:
- materials for a participant to study on their own;
- the environment for practical tests of acquired skills;
- mechanisms of verifying the acquired knowledge (tests and exams).

Those differences (which were sometimes minor and inconsequential at the first glance) contributed significantly to the assessment of the methods of remote education and influenced the results of the comparison of both methods.

Keywords:

e-learning, non-supervised environment, supervised environment.