When the School Door Closes, Do Teachers Open a Window? Using Mixed Methods to Investigate Teachers’ Online Teaching Practices and Momentary Experiences in Crisis

Abstract

The crisis of COVID-19 significantly disrupted global education and overturned our understanding of classroom setting in secondary education. This study adopted a mixed methods design to categorize the daily instructional practices of teachers in the early stages of school closure using content analysis and to test the resulting framework using ANOVA. A total of 48 teachers provided five-day diary entries in which they recorded episodic activities and subjective experiences, reported daily teaching techniques, and rated their subjective teaching quality. Four emergent online teaching orientations emerged from the data: 1 nonreciprocal knowledge understanding (1NRKU), 2 nonreciprocal knowledge construction (2NRKC), 3 reciprocal knowledge understanding (3RKU), and 4 reciprocal knowledge construction (4RKC). The results also showed that teachers adopting different online teaching orientations described their experiences differently. Teachers adopting 2NRKC, 3RKU, and 4RKC experienced significantly higher daily teaching satisfaction; teachers adopting 3RKU and 4RKC perceived significantly better student engagement. In terms of teaching readiness, teachers adopting 2NRKC, 3RKU, and 4RKC had significantly more experiences of online professional development and significantly better distance teaching TPCK. This study is innovative in presenting momentary data, which sheds light on future programs for customized professional development that will help prepare teachers for the next educational crisis.