Use of Active Learning During Emergency Remote Teaching in COVID-19 Pandemic

The mandatory isolation caused by COVID-19 required the adoption of emergency remote teaching, which caused difficulties for instructors, especially for those who use active learning that depends on student participation in class. This study aimed to investigate the ability of instructors to apply active learning effectively given the pandemic context. This was a cross-sectional observational study carried out in an undergraduate medical school. The sample was composed from one to three classes of 28 instructors that were observed synchronously. Each class was analyzed using a form created from an adaptation of the PORTAAL tool, aiming to evaluate quantitatively essential elements for active learning. We observed that the mean times devoted to activities and active participation of students were 54.8% and 33.1% of the total class time, respectively. Among the time spent in student interactions, the intra-group demanded the highest percentage of the class time. Additionally, 22.0% of the activities presented a high level in Bloom's taxonomy and there was a positive correlation between the percentage of activities at higher Bloom levels and the percentage of class time with student participation, intra-group or between-group interactions, supporting the use of higher-order cognitive skills in a collaborative and student-centered context. In conclusion, our findings indicate that some instructors were able to apply essential elements for an active and collaborative learning even during the emergency remote teaching.