Abstract
COVID-19-related closures of educational institutions have prompted universities around the world to mobilize remote learning solutions to ensure educational continuity. Universities were swift in their response and provided multiple remote learning solutions including different forms of online learning to reach students during university closure. This chapter discusses a study that explored the lived experiences of university lecturers who participated in online teaching during the pandemic. These experiences help us to draw lessons that can inform us about the quality of student engagement during online learning. An actor-network theory-informed study design method was used to follow the actors in action. The data was collected through a mixture of data collection including semi-structured interviews, observations, and documents analysis. The analysis shows that online learning was the main method of instruction deployed by universities in Zimbabwe during the pandemic. Lecturers reported a wide range of online learning experiences engaging students in active learning.
TopExploration Of Issues
The COVID-19 has caused an unprecedented crisis in all areas. This emergency has led to massive closure of face-to-face activities of educational institutions in many countries to prevent the spread of the virus and mitigate its impact. At the peak of the crisis, in late March 2020, close to 1.6 billion learners worldwide were affected by school closures (World Bank, 2020). Educational institutions struggled to achieve timely compliance with physical distancing measures to contain the spread of the pandemic and to switch from face-to-face training to remote learning (Chun, Comyn, & Moreno da Fonseca, 2021).
In Zimbabwe, the sudden outbreak of Covid-19 came at a challenging time. Universities had just opened doors to students for the first semester of the year in March 2020. Like any other affected country, the government of Zimbabwe took measures to avoid the spread of the virus. The Ministry of Health and Childcare placed travel restrictions on students and staff unless there was a critical reason. In that case, relevant authorities would need to be consulted. In this regard, universities in Zimbabwe stopped carrying out their teaching and learning activities using face-to-face contact and adopted different forms of remote learning strategies including online learning. Bbefore the pandemic, online learning was considered as an option of traditional face to face learning, whereas during the COVID 19, it became an indispensable method for continuing teaching and learning in many universities in Zimbabwe. Universities were therefore forced into an online learning experiment of unprecedented scale and scope.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Active Learning: Refers to a wide range of teaching strategies that engage students as active participants in their learning during class time with their teacher.
Blended Learning: Also known as hybrid learning , is a method of learning and teaching model that takes place in both a traditional classroom setting and an online learning environment.
Learning Engagement: Is the ability to motivationally and behaviourally engage in a learning activity with the learner taking responsibility for choices, utilising feedback, assessing personal behaviour and analysing appropriate responses to engage with learning opportunities and autonomously taking action for improvement.
Online Learning: This is an umbrella term that includes any type of learning that is accomplished on a computer and usually over the internet.
Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19): Is an infectious disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus.