Seventeenth International Conference on Technology, Knowledge, and Society

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has had an enormous impact on many aspects of human life. One of the most important impacts can undoubtedly be seen in education systems all over the world. The Ministry of Education of Iran provided a mixed approach toward education for children: face-to-face alongside the online-learning. Although after surging the disease, only online-learning has been adopted. In this new circumstance, many unfolded issues have arisen. This research aims to explore the attitudes, impressions, and statements of children (Ages 6-12) and their parents toward this new phenomenon (online-learning). Therefore, we conducted online face-to-face interview with parents and their children separately (50 families altogether). Findings demonstrate that lack of suitable quality of learning applications, digital gap, anxiety of some students about misunderstanding, lack of opportunity for teachers and student to send feedback to each other, and ambiguity of the role of parents in facilitating the process of learning are some of the prominent factors that influence the negative attitude toward the current online-learning. Nevertheless, parents’ increased awareness about the quality of education, and more and faster awareness about their children’s weakness in comprehending some courses are some of the positive aspects of the story. Altogether, most parents agree with hybrid learning for the post-corona period provided that firstly all necessary measurements to fill the digital gap are implemented; secondly, troubleshooting technical problems hindering the proper learning; thirdly, face-to-face learning should be seen a base and online learning as a complimentary procedure.