Investigating Benefits and Barriers of Distance Education during Coronavirus Pandemic

Abstract

This study aims to identify benefits and barriers to distance education, particularly from the perspective of teachers in Saudi Arabia. As the applied data collection tool, a questionnaire was distributed to the general education teachers in three districts. The sample size of the study was 1076 teachers. The results revealed that despite several benefits gained from distance learning, there are also some barriers. Teachers found that the most important advantage in distance learning is the acquisition of technical skills during the online teaching processes, they learn more and use digital education platforms, they have sufficient time to prepare the scientific content, they were able to provide adequate technical solutions for their courses, and they have the opportunity to use multiple media to deliver their courses. With the introduction of distance learning, teachers have explored new ways to deliver course contents to students. It has fostered better ways to provide more interactive real-time and on-demand teaching and learning using modern technology, thus, helping teachers become familiar with the use of electronic resources. It seems that teachers invest in technical methods to enhance students’ performance. Also, teachers reported some obstacles that they face during remote teaching. Most of these problems are connection problems applied with devices and the internet, lack of students’ motivation to learn in distance, problems associated with urban learners.

Çocuk Gelişimi Öğrencilerinin Uzaktan Eğitime Yönelik Algılarının Metaforlar Yoluyla Belirlenmesi

“…Bu nedenle, uzaktan eğitim günümüz eğitim sistemlerinde önemli bir yer edinmiştir. Uzaktan eğitimin, kitlesel öğrencilere düşük maliyetle eğitim sunma, fırsat eşitliği sağlama, erişimi kolaylaştırma ve eğitimde esneklik sağlama gibi avantajları bulunmaktadır (Abbasi vd., 2020;Alotaibi, 2021;Neroni vd., 2019).…”