The classroom has been the historic place of learning. That seems obvious, with venerable institutions such as Harvard and Stanford having churned out thousands of bright highly educated graduates over the years. These graduates have gone on to become captains of industries as diverse as science and computing. But has the classroom, a room adorned with desks, blackboards, and eager students, always been the primary learning center?

Looking back through history at the crowds of intellectuals who surrounded the likes of Socrates as he mused over philosophical issues, one might take pause. A lot of great thinking came out of the ancient Greek meetings of the minds, and theirs was no classroom based system. How about the great thinking behind the thousands of inventions credited to Thomas Edison? He did his best work in a lab, usually alone or with an assistant. But never did he seem to spend his time trying to learn the ins and outs of a light bulb inside of a classroom. No, he instead created an environment in which it was safe to learn, to experiment, to fail. Most modern classrooms do not offer this feeling. Students feel embarrassed to even give short speeches in front of their peers, let alone to fail in a colossal fashion.

As physical classrooms give way to digital learning environments, something seems lost in the transition. The student interactions have disappeared. Or have they? The format has changed, but interaction is still a large part of the learning process. For those studying with online programs, web based forums exist to pass questions back and forth, similar to the set up of partner study groups. Not only do students partake of this methodology, but professors also drop in to answer questions which students pose. The format cuts down on such fears as being afraid to fail in front of other students.