Spatial troubles with teaching under COVID-19

Abstract

This essay explores the multifaceted underpinning that spaces provide to social affairs, in particular, educating. It does this by examining a particular episode, involving spaces of educating, that reveals this support through its undermining: the sudden rushes to home and online teaching that university instructors in the US underwent in the spring of 2020. Part one of the essay outlines a practice theoretical account of the spaces of social life according to which there are three principal spaces of sociality: material spaces, activity spatialities, and places. The discussion compares this account to educational literature interested in the significance of space for education, contrasts it with a rival ontological viewpoint found in this literature, and concludes with a sketch of the evolving ecology of education bundles. Part Two then uses this account to diagnose spatial challenges that instructors faced that spring when they suddenly found themselves at home teaching. The contrast between what happened then and normal educating at universities makes clear just how crucial diverse spatial features of social life can be to the successful carrying on of education practices. The conclusion points out that this episode also affirms that one form of continuing education for educators is becoming conscious of, better appreciating, and acting on things they already know.

Living at Work: Teaching Online During the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…According to Schatzki (2022), "Crises have a knack of revealing structures that are unattended to until the crisis occurs" (p. 307). The COVID-19 pandemic, resultant lockdown, and mandatory working from home were crises that presented opportunities for institutional practice arrangements to be reconfigured.…”

Facing the world: Pedagogical praxis through a postpandemic prism

“…SARS-Cov-2 drove most higher education teachers and learners out of the familiar encompassing places (Schatzki, 2021) for teaching and learning on campus. Sjølie et al (2020) described some of the changes that happened when teachers and learners were catapulted into workspaces at home (e.g., home office, kitchen table, bedroom), using the resources and infrastructure available at home (e.g., more or less reliable internet access, workspace furniture, home computing resources), often while competing with partners or children for limited internet access and for time and space in the household for uninterrupted work.…”

Primary Mathematics School Teachers’ Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge and Learners’ Achievement

“…Rapanta, Botturi, Goodyear, Guàrdia, and Koole (2021) add that it enables teachers, researchers, and teacher educators to move beyond simplistic approaches that treat technology as a "add-on" and instead focus on the connections between technology, content, and pedagogy as they play out in more ecological classroom contexts. As Schatzki (2021) points out, teachers have frequently undervalued the function of space and other tangible (and digital) components of social life in arranging instructional activities. Teachers of all grades and situations were advised to take charge of the learning situation by rethinking, reassessing, and rebuilding their pedagogical techniques in light of the educational world's lack of preparation to react to this crisis (UNESCO 2020).…”