This article will guide you on how to create a Student survey about Online Learning. With Specific, you can build a conversation-driven survey in seconds—just generate your survey and start gathering insights right away.
Steps to create a survey for students about online learning
If you want to save time, just generate a survey with Specific and watch the magic happen. Creating semantic surveys is effortless with the right AI survey maker like Specific:
Tell what survey you want.
Done.
You honestly don't even need to read further. The AI will create your student survey with expert knowledge about online learning and even ask smart, contextual follow-up questions to extract deeper insights and richer feedback.
Why student surveys about online learning matter
We see the impact of student feedback on shaping modern education, especially in online formats. Let’s start with a reality check: over 90% of college students believe tuition should be reduced for online classes [1]. That’s a huge signal that students feel the value equation is shifting, and administrators or teachers need to know what’s missing, what’s working, and how to fix it.
If you’re not running these surveys, you’re missing opportunities to uncover friction points—like tech struggles, gaps in engagement, or challenges with course delivery. For instance, surveys have found that more than 60% of teens fear falling behind academically with distance learning [2]. Without direct feedback, it’s a guessing game to know what students really need to thrive in online learning environments.
The benefits of a student recognition survey or gathering candid feedback include:
Pinpointing topics or tools that confuse students
Improving course design and delivery based on real feedback
Making students feel heard and valued, which can improve retention
The importance of student feedback can’t be overstated—skip it, and the risks include declining engagement and programs that don’t address real pain points.
What makes a good online learning survey?
You want your survey to deliver both quality and quantity of responses. A strong survey should have:
Clear, unbiased questions that make sense to students
A conversational tone—students give more honest and thoughtful responses when it feels natural
Here’s a quick comparison to highlight the difference:
Bad practices | Good practices |
---|---|
Complicated, jargon-heavy language | Simple and student-friendly wording |
Leading or biased questions | Open-ended, nonjudgmental prompts |
Stiff, corporate tone | Conversational, relatable chat |
Ultimately, you’ll know the survey is good if students respond in high numbers and leave thoughtful, context-rich answers.
Question types and examples for student survey about online learning
We use several question types in a student survey about online learning, each driving unique insights. Let’s break down the best options and when to use them:
Open-ended questions are perfect for uncovering fresh perspectives or hidden pain points—use them any time you want honest student-driven input. For example:
What’s one thing that makes online learning easier or harder for you?
Can you describe a specific challenge you’ve faced during virtual classes?
Single-select multiple-choice questions keep answers structured and make analysis easier, especially for common scenarios or preferences. When you want to see the most frequent bottlenecks or popular tools, try:
Which aspect of online learning do you find most challenging?
Staying focused
Accessing materials
Technical issues
Engaging with classmates
NPS (Net Promoter Score) question is always a smart move when you need to benchmark satisfaction and predict retention—just ask students how likely they are to recommend your online learning platform. To instantly generate an NPS survey for students, try this NPS survey generator:
How likely are you to recommend our online learning program to a friend? (0 = not at all, 10 = extremely likely)
Followup questions to uncover "the why": These questions kick in when a student’s response needs more detail or context. Use them to clarify vague answers or get to the story behind the choice. For example:
Can you tell me more about what made that online class difficult?
If you want to dig deeper into best practices and explore a full list of recommended questions, check out our guide on best questions for student survey about online learning.
What is a conversational survey?
Conversational surveys flip the typical form experience into a friendly chat—questions flow naturally, follow-ups are context-aware, and students barely notice they’re taking a survey. This isn’t just about looking cool: it builds trust, increases completion rates, and helps students relax into giving richer feedback. Using an AI survey generator like Specific is very different from manual form creation—it’s faster, smarter, and turbocharges the depth of insight you get.
Manual surveys | AI-generated conversational surveys |
---|---|
Boring, one-size-fits-all forms | Dynamic chat that adapts to each student |
Easy to ignore or abandon | Feels like a friendly conversation |
No follow-up to unclear answers | Automatic clarifications for deeper insight |
Why use AI for student surveys? In short, it takes away all the gruntwork—from survey building to analysis. An AI survey example built with Specific doesn’t just ask the basics: it auto-generates expert questions, adapts tone, and instantly follows up to clear up ambiguities. For students, it’s a smooth chat—no boring forms. For you, it’s higher response rates and better data. If you’re ready to start, check out our detailed guide to creating a survey that actually delivers insights.
Because Specific is focused on best-in-class conversational surveys, both students and survey designers benefit: the process stays easy, feedback feels meaningful, and analysis is painless.
The power of follow-up questions
Don’t underestimate the value of follow-ups—automatic clarifying questions are a game changer for student surveys about online learning. With Specific, the AI asks smart, context-aware questions right after each student’s initial answer, in real time (learn more about automatic followup questions). The result? Far richer insights, less ambiguity, and no need to chase students for clarification later. It saves teams huge amounts of manual work that would otherwise go into messy back-and-forth emails.
Student: “I struggled with classes last semester.”
AI follow-up: “Can you share more about what made those classes particularly challenging for you?”
How many followups to ask? You generally need 2-3 well-placed followups—but as soon as you’ve collected the info you’re after, move on. With Specific, you can set this up easily so the AI never gets stuck over-asking, and there’s always a skip option to keep the flow natural.
This makes it a conversational survey—students are gently probed like in a real conversation. That’s the key to honest, high-quality feedback.
AI-powered analysis, response summaries: Even with lots of free-form answers, analysis is simple. AI surfaces themes and lets you chat about survey responses (learn how to analyze survey responses), so you’re never overwhelmed by unstructured data.
This way of collecting and clarifying feedback is new—give it a try and see how easy it is to generate a survey that truly understands your students’ experiences.
See this online learning survey example now
Ready to unlock student insights with a conversational survey? Try creating your own survey now and see just how quickly you can drive meaningful improvements for your online learning program.