I'm finally ready to begin using Italki for Spanish lessons (probably one lesson every week or so). I don't have a computer with a camera right now, though. I have a decent Samsung smartphone, though, and use it for video calls with family and friends all the time (through Skype or Duo). I'm wondering if others here have used their smartphones for lessons, or if most of you use computers. I guess I'm just concerned if using a smartphone instead of a computer would be seen as inconvenient/tacky by the teacher on the other end.
Thanks very much for reading.
I use Skype to have my lessons, and I use both my cell phone and a computer at the same time. The reason is Skype works better on my cell phone. The sharing of files, the corrections, the messages back and forth, etc. are done on the computer. Everything is synced up instantaneously.
As a student and a teacher on italki I will give my personal opinion.
As a teacher: I HATE when students use their smartphones (unless what they are looking for is extremely informal lessons, those types of students who don't even care about reading corrections or seeing the word written).
Why do I hate? Because most of the times, it's very inconvenient to send anything, like, a google doc, pdf, files or even for casual skype or (any other program's) chatbox. There are students who look for structured lessons (they feel the need to see materials or something prepared by the teacher) but then they use their smartphones or tablets for the lesson and everything that the teacher had prepared is in vain because both parts get stressed with the delays to open a file and sometimes to READ what it is on the file, anyways.
As a student, I always use my computer and when something happens and the only thing left is my tablet or smartphone, then I let my teacher know and tell him or her that I'm okay with only an informal conversation but I still apologize for not using a laptop.
