Problem and Challenges Faced by Students, Parents, and Teachers in Google Classes & Television Lessons

Abstract

The qualitative study was carried out under Thimphu Thromde, Bhutan, to assess the use of Google class and Television lessons during the emergence of COVID-19 in the 2020 academic year. The study used Google class & Television lesson observations to gain the first-hand experience and face-to-face interviews with students, parents, and teachers to get in-depth views. The Google class and television lesson observation and interview data were analyzed using emerging themes. The findings revealed that Google class and Television lessons played an essential role in making up lessons lost during schools' closure. However, the study further revealed some pertinent issues related to the Google class and Television lessons, including students resorting to copying assignments and homework directly from friends or copying directly from textbooks and the internet. Students were overburden by the heavy load of assignments assigned by different subject teachers, among many others. More preparedness and training for teachers in ICT based pedagogy was required. The study might draw policy attention to consider the problem and challenges before implementing Google class and Television lessons shortly to avoid pitfalls. The study was limited to the Thimphu Thromde, Bhutan, using a small sample size of students, parents, and teachers. A future mixed-method research approach uses surveys with students, parents, and teachers; focus group discussions with students, parents, and teachers; and policymakers' interviews are recommended.

Global emergency remote education in secondary schools during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Most of the evidence came from students (64%, n = 52 studies), followed by teachers (53%), parents (6%) and school leaders (5%), although some studies did not specify whether their teacher respondents were also part of the school leadership team (see Appendix G). Very few studies triangulated data from multiple sources; for example, one study interviewed students, parents and teachers on the use of Google Classroom and television lessons (Dorji, 2021); one study explored student, teacher and school leader perceptions (Niemi & Kousa, 2020); and one study conducted focus groups with teachers, students, parents and school leaders (Education Scotland, 2021). As has been highlighted previously (Bond, 2020b), this is likely due to research manageability and access to participants during the pandemic.…”

Students’ Acceptance of Google Classroom for Teaching and Learning in Bhutanese Secondary Schools

“…The probable non-significance result in this instance; could be attributable to the lack of proper professional development opportunities for teachers and students alike (Kado et al, 2020;Wangmo et al, 2020). As stated above, the Bhutanese institutions and education system still lack the proper infrastructure to successfully implement technology for teaching and learning (Dorji, 2021). Besides, the finding indicates that students' BI is likely to depend on individual passion and goals to learn new things, technology in this case, rather than on accessibility to the experts and support from the institutions they are working for.…”

“…This seemingly is conflicting conclusion that may be due to the fact that Bhutanese students do not utilize any web-based learning management systems in the past. As pointed by Dorji (2021), GC as a web-based learning platform was only used by both teachers and students during the quarantine and school closures. Issues similar to this were communicated in contexts of higher education (Choeda et al, 2016) even though higher education institutions in Bhutan used virtual learning environments a decade ago.…”