Post-pandemic pedagogy: Emergency remote teaching impact on students with functional diversity

Area of Science:

• Education
• Psychology
• Linguistics

Background:

• The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated a rapid shift from traditional face-to-face instruction to Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT).
• This transition presented significant challenges for all students, particularly those with functional diversity.
• Existing research often overlooks the specific experiences of students with functional diversity in remote learning environments.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate parents' perspectives on Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT) for students with functional diversity during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• To understand how children's functional diversity influenced their participation and experience in ERT.
• To gather insights and suggestions for improving future remote education for students with special needs.

Main Methods:

• Conducted semi-structured interviews with 12 parents of students with functional diversity.
• Created a unique qualitative dataset of humanistic-linguistic data in Modern Greek.
• Employed a novel data analysis approach combining manual qualitative descriptive analysis with AI-based linguistic analysis (semantic and sentiment analysis).

Main Results:

• Identified specific ways students with functional diversity responded to ERT.
• Documented how functional diversity impacted online course attendance and engagement.
• Revealed parents' evaluations of the educational effectiveness of ERT and observed changes in their children's psychological and emotional states.
• Parents reported an overall negative impact of ERT on their children.

Conclusions:

• Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT) posed substantial learning, psychological, and technical obstacles for students with functional diversity.
• The study highlights the critical need for tailored support and resources for students with functional diversity in remote learning settings.
• The research contributes a valuable dataset and a novel mixed-methods analysis approach to understanding this underrepresented group's educational experiences.