Navigating the new Covid-19 normal: the challenges and attitudes of teachers and students during online learning in Qatar

Abstract

This inquiry sought to explore the teachers’ and students’ challenges and attitudes concerning mandatory online instruction at the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020. Using a qualitative case study, a single international school in Doha, Qatar was sampled to participate. The data was generated from interviews with seven teachers who participated in one-on-one in-depth interviews and from six groups of students who participated in focus group discussions. An inductive data analysis approach was employed to analyse the data. The findings revealed various technical, pedagogical, and social challenges experienced by both teachers and students. The participants’ attitudes to online learning were mixed as others preferred this mode of learning while some preferred learning in physical classrooms. The implications point toward the need for teacher professional development that targets the use of online teaching platforms. They further point to the need for teachers and school administrators to find strategies to make online learning more interactive and to assign work that reduces the amount of time spent on the screen.