Teaching during unprecedented times of the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

This research aimed to explore the experiences of social studies teachers in online teaching in the Maltese context. Data collection was conducted via focus group discussions; during such discussions, participants were asked to reflect on and discuss their experiences of online teaching, taking barriers and facilitators of teaching into consideration. The study involved ten social studies teachers from state schools. The teachers involved in this study have more than ten years of teaching experience, which helps them to compare and contrast their experiences of teaching in class with online teaching. Thematic analysis was used to identify themes within the data. The findings of the study suggest that teachers experienced moments where they collaborated with other teachers; they also had moments where they reached out to students or provided support to students and also their development as teachers with regard to integrating new technology with remote teaching. The study also found barriers and facilitators of online teaching. The barriers include student disengagement due to external factors (home environment, socioeconomic background), lack of discussions in synchronous online lessons, unpreparedness due to the sudden shift to online teaching and subject alienation since social studies had a reduced lesson per week and had to record lessons that resulted in teachers uncertainty since they got no feedback from students on the recorded lessons. Teachers have also identified some facilitators of teaching, which include their adaptability to improvise by still providing students with educational content; multimodal practices have helped students to be more involved in their learning; school assistance was also a major factor since they assisted teachers with training for online teaching, disciplining students and also help with contacting parents when students are disengaged or misbehaving. Teachers have also expressed how students were contacting them directly during school closures through VLEs, or MS Teams, which has allowed them to help students with their assigned work. These findings give clear insights into social studies teachers’ perceptions of online teaching and their experiences of adapting to emergency remote online teaching.