Slovenian parents’ views on emergency remote schooling during the first wave of the covid-19 pandemic

Abstract

In early 2020, the whole world was confronted with the emergence of the new SARS-CoV-2 virus. Due to restrictive measures, Slovenia, like most other countries, was forced to close all educational institutions. Teaching and learning shifted from classrooms to an online environment, which was a major challenge for teachers, students and their parents and required a significant amount of adaptation and effort. In May 2020, we conducted a study to investigate parents’ attitudes toward emergency remote schooling. The study included 313 parents of students from the last triad of primary (compulsory) school (Grades 7-9; 12-15 years old), 147 parents of secondary school students (Years 1-3; 15-18 years old) and 35 parents of students in their final (4th) year of secondary school (18-19 years old). Specifically, parents of primary school adolescent children, in particular, reported having the most difficulty coordinating their work and the remote schooling of their child, and they also reported more difficulty motivating their child to complete schoolwork at home than the other two groups of parents did. Parents of secondary school students in Year 4 were most likely to miss personal contact with the teacher and rated emergency remote schooling as more stressful than the other two groups of parents. In general, parents rated emergency remote schooling to be more complicated and difficult than traditional classroom instruction. Most parents agree that such schooling provides students with less knowledge, which is also less consolidated, although they perceived teachers’ remote help for students quite positively. They also believe that online education will become important in the future.