Young Children’s Online Learning and Teaching: Challenges and Effective Approaches

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected teachers’ practices at all education levels worldwide. Alternative educational practices are, in a smaller or larger extent, implemented online in response to the global pandemic, including early childhood and primary education. Access to recent research outcomes on effective approaches to quality online teaching is fundamental in preschool and in the first critical years of primary school. In this chapter, we provide a review of the key challenges that online classes pose for young children and teachers. In parallel we discuss, based on professional and research-informed insights, best practice principles for online teaching to support preschool and primary school teachers to transform online approaches into effective teaching practices for meeting children’s needs. Both the challenges and the effective online approaches are grouped under two main headings with each heading being related to several outcomes. A major challenge occurring during online classes, falling under the first heading, is the limited face-to-face interaction between learners and teachers. The second challenge is concerned with difficulties in oral and written language. This chapter concludes with a reflection on the implications for the use of best practice principles for online teaching in the early childhood and primary school setting.