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Emergency Distance Education (EDE), Urgent Transition to Distance Learning from the Perspective of UAE University Teachers |
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PP: 1923-1934 |
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doi:10.18576/isl/120534
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Author(s) |
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R. Ben. Amor,
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Abstract |
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| To combat the spread of COVID-19, education systems around the world were facing an unprecedented challenge of mass university closures. This research attempts to analyze this sudden and urgent transition to Distance Learning, which was a new experience for 93.9% of UAE university teachers. We have called this urgent situation “Emergency Distance Education”, to which we have given a definition. A survey was conducted among 240 teachers to express their opinion on this new way of teaching, and to answer a set of questions, such as: what were their main challenges? did they provide theoretical courses in the same way as practical courses? and what do they suggest as future solutions for best practices in Distance Learning? As result, we found three categories of challenges raised by the respondents, namely: Pedagogical, Technical, and Interaction problems. The results of this study show that the greatest number of teachers were suddenly transferred to Distance Education without having previous experience. And the most notable suggestion made by more than 60% of teachers, and which could be an open path to a new field of study, is that the measure of a credit hour in Distance Education compared to that in face-to-face must be reviewed.
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