ISRRT_COVID-19_book

Shifting to online learning and student impact
Aarthi Ramlaul and Hesta Friedrich-Nel
Introduction: learning about what lockdown meant to educators and students
The lockdown measures implemented to curb the spread of the coronavirus in March 2020
necessitated the change from face-to-face to online teaching to ensure the continuity of
education delivery. While this posed extraordinary challenges for university lecturers and
students, there were also unanticipated benefits. This chapter aims to present the
perspectives of lecturers from the UK and South Africa in terms of the change to online
learning, the challenges, benefits, and the impact of online learning on students.
The terms ‘lockdown’ and ‘social distancing’ worked their way into our new lexicon while the
word “unprecedented” found its way to becoming one of the most popularly coined words in
these last 18 months. Lockdown has been a measure to restrict people’s movement resulting
in quarantine in their homes or places of residence. This was seen as an imperative to control
the spread of infection. Another measure implemented was social distancing, which involved
everyone maintaining a distance of 2m between them except if you lived in the same
household. Households became bubbles and support networks over time. As a world, we
became familiar with the terms “lockdown” and “social distancing” during the COVID-19
pandemic.
For students living in halls or other student accommodation, however, the lockdown was a
time of considerable distress due to them being isolated from their family and peers, mainly
due to the delays from the Government granting permission for them to return home during
the lockdown. It was a precarious time for academics as students turned to academic staff for
guidance. We were none the wiser regarding the pandemic and it was a time of learning for
all. Schools and universities were instructed to close but all teaching, learning, and
assessment were to continue using online means. There was much uncertainty with
ambiguous, often conflicting advice but clear in the message to “stay at home”.
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