Abstract:

The transition back to live and in person instruction after the COVID-19 lockdown has brought challenges to higher education classroom. At the same time, it has provided a unique opportunity to compare the relative merits of online vs. in-person instruction, particularly to those faculty and students who may otherwise not have been familiar with the online classroom prior to being required to use it during the lockdown. Based on this experience, were there clear preferences for online vs in-person teaching and learning? To the authors' surprise, anecdotal evidence suggested that the online classroom was perceived as beneficial in some cases, even under the conditions of sudden transition to it and after the lockdown ended. As a result, the authors conducted a qualitative study to attempt to identify comparative faculty and student preferences for type of classroom (online vs. in-person) upon continued transition back to in-person instruction after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic. In-depth individual interviews were conducted with 9 College of Education faculty representing both curriculum and instruction and educational leadership. These interview subjects also represented a variety of prior experience with online teaching, from none to extensive (all-online instructional programs). They were asked five questions:
1) Please share your experiences with the sudden move to all-online teaching,
2) How did you adjust to this sudden move to the all-online instruction?
3) What were the specific challenges you faced?
4) What were your own and your students’ feelings about the return to the in-person classroom format?
5) Are there any final reflections you’d like to share? Emergent themes reflected mixed results regarding both faculty and student preferences for classroom format. They varied depending on such factors as specific course content, the faculty member’s attitudes and any prior experience with online teaching and learning, and student support if any from fellow cohort learners. The online classroom was found to possess some specific efficiencies of sharing instructional content and interacting with students, even post-pandemic. These findings suggest specific implications for continuing to leverage such efficiencies of online teaching and learning as a viable and welcomed choice for adult learners, even as the return to in-person instruction post-pandemic has continued. Recommendations for enhancing both online and blended instruction are offered, as well as future research directions to further identify circumstances where a specific classroom format may be beneficial to faculty and students.

Keywords:

Online learning, online teaching, preferences for online vs in-person instruction, post-COVID return to in-person instruction.