Online Teaching during COVID 19 : Attitude and Challenges faced by School Teachers

Abstract

The survey was conducted during the difficult circumstances amid the coronavirus pandemic when the schools and colleges across India have been shut since mid-March. After a few days, an unplanned and rapid move to online teaching and learning with no training to teachers, insufficient bandwidth and little preparation got initiated by all educational institutions. Online mode of teaching, undoubtedly, is a good stopgap arrangement with no other option. Keeping in view the present scenario an online survey was conducted to study the challenges faced by teachers during online teaching. 3550 teachers from different  schools volunteered to participate in this online survey. The data was collected with the help of a questionnaire constructed by investigators. The major findings of the survey revealed that about 82% of the teachers are taking online classes for the first time. Lack of appropriate materials and resources, Technical problems, Lack of in service training, difficulty in assembling all the students for the class, Lack of cooperation from the parents, Lack of internet facilities to the students, difficulty to follow up the learning of students are the major challenges faced by them. Further, teachers have a highly positive and favourable attitude towards on line teaching but due to lack of efficacy and training in online mode of teaching they feel that they can teach better in traditional teaching. The key recommendation suggested by this study is that teachers need to be equipped with the pre-service and in-service awareness training programmes on e-learning technology.