Barriers to Distance Learning: Perceptions Of Secondary School Teachers and Students in Serbia

One of the most current issues facing modern pedagogical theory and practice is distance learning. Since the Covid-19 virus pandemic outbreak, this specific teaching context has become the only hope for education systems globally. Given the role and importance that distance learning has today, our paper is focused on studying its barriers in immediate secondary school practice. This research is part of a broader study that involves a more thorough study of distance learning, which was conducted on a sample of 422 students and 120 secondary school teachers in Southeast Serbia. The aim of this paper is to identify the most common barriers to distance learning and answer the question of whether there are differences in the attitudes of teachers and students about the barriers they encountered during the first months of its implementation. In terms of frequency, the results of the conducted research show that evaluation-related barriers are the most common, while the learning material and technical barriers to distance learning are the least common ones. The research has shown that teachers statistically more often highlight evaluation-related, organizational/administrative and social/emotional barriers, while in practice, students more often experience learning content-related barriers. The results also confirm positive correlation in the participants’ attitudes about the analyzed barriers and directly point to the conclusion about their objective perception and critical reflection on this problem by emphasizing the importance of didactic elements such as: quality of the teaching process, level of knowledge acquired, objectivity of assessment, etc. in relation to the learning material and technical side of teaching. These conclusions point to a number of pedagogical implications by which the new, specific teaching context can be significantly improved.

Egyptian Educators’ Online Teaching Challenges and Coping Strategies during COVID-19

The present descriptive study investigated the challenges experienced and the coping strategies used by Egyptian university educators from different institution types while teaching online during the pandemic. The cross-sectional study drew participants (N = 222) from three different academic institution types, private universities, public universities, and adult education institutions, who responded to a survey that examined the technical, professional, administrative, social, and psychological challenges teachers encountered as well as their coping strategies. Data were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. Results indicated that the challenges and coping strategies reported by teachers varied according to the teaching context and the requirements of each academic institution. The most reported challenges experienced were exhaustion, internet problems, technical issues, and anxiety. Despite the challenges, participants reported a few positive effects, including feeling more productive, being motivated to learn something new, feeling appreciated by the students and administration, and feeling confident using online teaching tools. Results also revealed that the participants used social and professional strategies to cope with the circumstances accompanying the sudden shift to online teaching. The results indicated how challenges faced by educators from different institution types may diminish with more training on, and experience with, online teaching, forming communities of practice as well as other coping strategies they developed. Such findings should be helpful to educators, institutions, and policymakers in different academic institutions all over the world and in various teaching contexts.

Investigating Creativity in Online K-12 World Language Classrooms

This chapter outlines creativity in the world language classroom through the results of a mixed-methods study during the COVID-19 pandemic. While there has been a growing interest in creativity within education, little has been researched related to creative and uncreative factors in the language classroom, specifically in an online teaching context. For this reason, this research study explores creativity in the online world language K-12 classroom by examining teaching artifacts self-selected by K-12 language teachers, as well as interviews with interested participants. Findings suggest that creativity is multidimensional with creative factors overlapping within artifacts. Additionally, teachers have persisted throughout the pandemic to integrate creativity in order to engage students with the content in various ways, harness student attention, and give students choice. In addition, teachers have used various technologies to provide opportunities for students to work asynchronously and synchronously.

Egyptian Educators’ Online Teaching Challenges and Coping Strategies during COVID-19

The present descriptive study investigated the challenges experienced and the coping strategies used by Egyptian university educators from different institution types while teaching online during the pandemic. The cross-sectional study drew participants (N = 222) from three different academic institution types, private universities, public universities, and adult education institutions, who responded to a survey that examined the technical, professional, administrative, social, and psychological challenges teachers encountered as well as their coping strategies. Data were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. Results indicated that the challenges and coping strategies reported by teachers varied according to the teaching context and the requirements of each academic institution. The most reported challenges experienced were exhaustion, internet problems, technical issues, and anxiety. Despite the challenges, participants reported a few positive effects, including feeling more productive, being motivated to learn something new, feeling appreciated by the students and administration, and feeling confident using online teaching tools. Results also revealed that the participants used social and professional strategies to cope with the circumstances accompanying the sudden shift to online teaching. The results indicated how challenges faced by educators from different institution types may diminish with more training on, and experience with, online teaching, forming communities of practice as well as other coping strategies they developed. Such findings should be helpful to educators, institutions, and policymakers in different academic institutions all over the world and in various teaching contexts.

An informational sociobiological explanation of the constitution of the human body

Background: Pedro Ortiz (1933-2011), in the latest four decades of his life, developed the Informational Sociobiological Theory (IST) in a university teaching context that became the foundation of post-grade studies in neuroscience in Peru. The IST looks for a totality explanation of the phenomena of the universe proposes an explanation of the constitution of the human body. In what consist this explanation of the configuration of the human body? Methods: A bibliographical qualitative study was conducted starting from primary documental sources. It was considered among the sources, all related to the editorial project Books of Social Psychobiologic (elaborated by Ortiz during the first decade of this age). The results have been presented across a conceptual analysis, narrative and graphic, oriented to expose Ortiz’ ideas in relation to the human body’s morphology. Results: The structural architecture of the human body, and in particular in one person; shows five levels of complexity which begins in cells, the intercellular matrix, the neural system, the paleocortical psyche, and neocortical psyche. In this involve explanation, the organs of the body are essentially tissue systems, and are integrated (subsumed) at the neural level (which informationally goes through the plexuses, ganglia, and subcortical nuclei). The two levels of superior complexity to the neural system, are the space of the psychic activity, unconscious and conscious, which is suprastructurally to all bodily structures. Ortiz is settled on a different monism: that guides us to imagine and think that all psychic activity is suprastructural to the body. Conclusions: There is an original explanation of the human body within the IST. This informational morphology dialogues with the knowledge of biology, neurology, anatomy, physiology, embryology, and histology, and is proposed as a structuring element in all the conceptual architecture that represents the IST.

Reflection on action: peer micro-teaching process of prospective EFL teachers and class teachers focusing on mother tongue teaching

Teaching experience plays a productive role in teacher professional development, so it is necessary to examine such experience systematically, either as reflection on action or reflection in action. In a sense, reflection has the power to help the teacher connect experience and theoretical knowledge and to use each area of expertise more efficiently (Knezevic and Scholl 1996). Therefore, reflection is an important ‘tool’ to articulate how we know what we do when we teach (ibid.). For this reason, micro-teaching is an opportunity to link theory and practice, critically evaluate one’s teaching skills and to discuss alternative approaches and solutions for the specific teaching context with peer colleagues. This paper will focus, firstly, on the micro-teaching process by explaining the background of this procedure and then by giving the detailed description of the two micro-teaching sessions conducted in January and February 2020 at the Faculty of Education in Jagodina, University of Kragujevac, Serbia. Secondly, it will consider giving feedback to others, in person and online, using video records, self-evaluation and reflection in peer-teaching process. Finally, the paper will evaluate two peer micro-teaching sessions with a focus on student-student, interaction in university teaching context and advantages and disadvantages in teaching English as a foreign language on one side, and Serbian as the mother tongue on the other.

CARACTERÍSTICAS E TENDÊNCIAS DAS PUBLICAÇÕES NOS ANAIS DO SEMINÁRIO DE EDUCAÇÃO GEOGRÁFICA

Este trabalho estuda as características e tendências das produções acadêmicas sobre a Educação Geográfica apresentadas em três anais do Seminário de Educação Geográfica. Este evento é bienal, realizado desde 2015, pelo Grupo de Estudos e Pesquisas em Educação Geográfica (GEPEG) da Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB), campus I, João Pessoa-PB. A metodologia utilizada neste artigo foi a pesquisa bibliográfica, e a análise de conteúdo disponibilizou procedimentos para exame de 175 trabalhos científicos, entre artigos e resumos expandidos. As produções destacam, de modo geral, relatos de experiências realizadas na Educação Básica e na Educação Superior. O interesse desses trabalhos incide nestas cinco temáticas: representação espacial, formação de professores, formação de conceitos, conteúdo-método, contexto de ensino e didática da Geografia. A análise aqui apresentada traça um perfil das pesquisas desenvolvidas em cursos de graduação e pós-graduação em nível local (Paraíba), regional (Nordeste) e nacional (Brasil). Isso pode estimular o desenvolvimento de novas pesquisas e a formação de professores de Geografia. Palavras-chave Educação Geográfica, Trabalho científico, Pesquisa bibliográfica, Formação de professores, Evento científico. CHARACTERISTICS AND TRENDS OF PUBLICATIONS IN THE ANNALS OF THE GEOGRAPHIC EDUCATION SEMINAR Abstract This work surveys the characteristics and trends of academic productions on Geographic Education presented in three annals of the Geographic Education Seminar. This event is biennially held since 2015 by the Group of Studies and Research in Geographic Education (GEPEG) of the Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB), campus I, João Pessoa-PB. The methodology used in this article was the bibliographic research, and the content analysis provided procedures for examining 175 scientific papers, including articles and expanded abstracts. The productions highlight, in general, reports of experiences carried out in Basic Education and in Higher Education. The interest of these works focuses on these five themes: spatial representation, teachers` training, concept training, content-method, teaching context and didactics of geography. The analysis presented here outlines a profile of the research developed in undergraduate and graduate courses at local (Paraíba), regional (Northeast) and national (Brazil) levels. This can foster the development of new research and the training of geography teachers. Keywords Geographic Education, Scientific work, Bibliographic research, Teacher’s training, Scientific event.

Shadowing Procedures in Teaching and Their Future

Shadowing has become popular in the Japanese EFL teaching context over the past two decades. Accumulated research data indicates that shadowing is effective for listening skill development and teaching pronunciation. This article first summarizes how to use shadowing to teach listening through an example of a lesson procedure based on previous research. Subsequently, it proposes a procedure for teaching pronunciation. Finally, it proposes research areas that can be explored for the development of shadowing as a teaching technique. シャドーイングは最近の二十年間、日本の英語教育において、広く認識されるようになった。これまでの研究によると、シャドーイングはリスニング力の向上および発音指導への可能性も提唱されている。本稿では、初めに過去の研究に基づいたリスニング指導法としてのシャドーイング活用法を、１つの授業を例として概観する。その後、発音指導の手順も提唱する。最後に、指導法として、シャドーイングの今後の発展に寄与するであろう研究分野についても議論を深める。