The way an online classroom and a more traditional classroom work is completely different. Since you are not physical with any of your other classmates, you need to use a forum to communicate and have a classroom discussion. Most classes will require you to post message every week to show that you are actually logging on every week and doing the work. Assignments are kind of similar. You will receive a syllabus of your entire class schedule and you will refer to it every week for your assignments. They way this is set up actually allows you to do work far in advance, and it gives you plenty of time to get everything done. The way I see it online classes tend to have more freedom with class work, while in school classes you can get more hands on assignments as well as help from your instructor easily.
The environment of an online class will be complete different from a typical class room. When you take online classes you do the work on your own time, within the time limit you are given of course. You can do it from the comfort of your own home, or the library or even at the office if you can. This also means you need to keep up with the work yourself. Since you do not go to a class room with your teacher and classmates you must keep up with your work every week. You do not have a designated time every week to go to a university building and sit in a class room with people. Now this can go either way, the freedom you have to build your class work into your schedule is amazing and it’s the cherry on top for me. How ever since you are looking at a computer screen and not physical there, you don’t