Exemplar Teachers Teaching Online During the COVID-19 Crisis

• In Event: Chilean Students' Experiences of Higher Education in Disruptive Times

Abstract

One of the main features of teaching during the pandemic has been the prevalence of videoconferencing. Reports have highlighted the complex nature of this environment for attempting to replicate face-to-face (for example, Rapanta et al, 2020). However, little is known about the actual interaction that has been taking place through videoconferencing. Classroom interaction is important because research has demonstrated that students learn better in courses where teachers deploy active and engaging approaches to teaching (Schneider & Preckel, 2017). Nevertheless, even before the pandemic, there were doubts on how widespread interactive teaching was (Stains et al., 2018)
In order to capture online interaction in emergency remote teaching, we developed an observation protocol. We started with the well-known COPUS (Smith el al, 2013) as the basis, because its mainly descriptive nature and easiness of use. Several development efforts lead to a new online observation protocol called OPTIC.
We observed 32 higher education exemplars teachers. They all had received good teaching prizes and/or actively participated in teaching research and development. These teachers came from three HEIs (two universities and one technical and further education institution), which had implemented specific initiatives to enhance student access and retention. They were observed twice and interviewed once to make sense and to deepen on their online classroom practices.
Results showed a range of practices: from more traditional (online) lectures to teachers engaging in diverse online interactions. At the same time, most of them interacted using digital tools afforded by videoconferencing (for example, online surveys, online collaboration tools, small group discussions). Also, results demonstrated that online interaction does not only happen verbally, as in face-to-face but also writing in chats became an essential part of teacher-student interaction. Interviews expanded our understanding of this phenomenon. Emerging themes showed that crucial transition facilitators to emergency remote teaching were videoconferencing and LMS training, peer support, and positive students’ participation. At the same time, teachers tried to bring what they considered good teaching practices in face-to-face to the online milieu. For example, interaction, making contents attractive and promoting deep reflection. Besides, they added that, in the pandemic scenario, taking students’ emotional well-being into consideration became a key part of their teaching experience.

References

Rapanta, C., Botturi, L., Goodyear, P., Guàrdia, L., & Koole, M. (2020). Online university teaching during and after the Covid-19 crisis: Refocusing teacher presence and learning activity. Postdigital Science and Education, 2(3), 923-945.

Schneider, M., & Preckel, F. (2017). Variables associated with achievement in higher education: A systematic review of meta-analyses. Psychological bulletin, 143(6), 565.
Smith, M. K., Jones, F. H., Gilbert, S. L., & Wieman, C. E. (2013). The Classroom Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM (COPUS): A new instrument to characterize university STEM classroom practices. CBE—Life Sciences Education, 12(4), 618-627.

Stains, M., Harshman, J., Barker, M. K., Chasteen, S. V., Cole, R., DeChenne-Peters, S. E., ... & Young, A. M. (2018). Anatomy of STEM teaching in North American universities. Science, 359(6383), 1468-1470.

Authors

• Daniel Ponce, Catholic University of Chile

• Carlos Gonzalez, Universidad Catolica de Chile