Exploring Educational Practices in Emergency Remote Teaching. The Role of Educational Neuroscience

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic led to an abrupt shift from conventional in-classroom teaching to an online form of synchronous distance education. In this context, educators faced the challenge to modify their teaching (planning, design and implementation) in order to answer the need for Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT), which arose during the past months. However, were they ready – or appropriately trained – to teach online at such short notice? What is more, did they manage to integrate the principles of online learning into their teaching practices according to the results of research from the field of educational neuroscience? In order to answer these questions, a qualitative small-scale research was conducted, using interviews with eight educators from private secondary schools in Greece. The research findings lead to the conclusion that the educators lack the theoretical knowledge of relevant learning theories for distance learning and, at the same time, seem to ignore the results of research in educational neuroscience, which clearly suggest the need to integrate multiple representational models into the learning process to activate different areas of the trainee’s brain to facilitate the learning of the latter. Moreover, important factors for effective learning, such as collaboration, interaction and time, are neglected during their teaching planning and design. Hence, it is proposed that educators should be trained according to the Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework in the principles of distance learning and educational neuroscience, in order to be more effective in the planning, design, and implementation of teaching.