Blogs:

Most of us fail to understand how education can flourish out of a classroom. There are multiple questions regarding this, like the interaction between teachers and students and also interaction between students. Unschoolers and Homeschoolers tend to opt for solutions like debate and speech leagues, cooperative classes for different subjects, field trips and more. This can expand the learning experience and decentralize the same. Let us look at some of these problems sorted out by online courses and distance education. 

Delivery of Content:

Educations which are institutionalized stresses on the fact that students should be able to learn in a manner which can help them regurgitate the information in a successful manner via exams and testing. On the other hand decentralized education stresses on the fact that a student should learn in a manner so that they are capable of mastering the information and not only regurgitate the same. The MIT’s Open Course Ware which is the most decentralized operates in this manner, besides which you have:

* Udacity which emphasizes on mastery learning, making sure that a student has more than one attempt to demonstrate the acquired knowledge and move on only when they are able to master the subject completely.

* Code School is about creation and learning. Students get an opportunity to not only learn but also implement their acquired knowledge during the course. After completions, the student is capable of applying this knowledge in the outside world with the right tools.

Receiving Feedback:

A student is able to track the progress with the listed below institutes like:

* Udacity, which have quizzes in their videos to ensure that the material is understood. They have also included problem sets which are different from the quizzes and tend to enhance your earning experience. Final exams are offered at the end of the course.

* Livemocha is one place where the students can receive feedback instantly through interaction with the tutors and native speakers. 

*CodeHero offers exercises which are interactive, which students are required to complete before they move on.
Non-traditional courses tend to offer feedback considered as more meaningful and short as compared to the traditional system of grading. Feedback works out more effective as students are able to keep a total track of their progress.

Certification:

Certification is no big problem these days as you have most of these online and distance learning courses are providing certificates and records in multiple ways.

* Udacity offers resume’s of students to more than 20 companies. The certification provided by them is recognized by technology companies actively recruiting students from here.

* edX which is a joint venture between Stanford and MIT, awards certificates to those students who are masters in their course.

* Code Hero tends to award badges after completion of a course.

* Smarterer gives you an opportunity to take tests so that you can prove your skills in different subjects. This can be shared on Social networking sites and there are multiple recruiters who can pick you up.

In short, you can benefit with the non-traditional methods of education in similar ways to the traditional education. There are negligible disadvantages to this as most distance learning courses and online courses have taken a different approach and do have successful students passing out of here.