Educating Children and Navigating Digital Literacy in COVID-19: Latina Mothers and Mother-Child Pedagogies

Abstract

This article reports on a qualitative study of 22 Latina mothers and their experiences supporting their children’s remote education during COVID-19. Drawing on digital literacies and mujerista theory, the authors analyzed focus group data to find the following: Latina mothers’ struggles involved not just understanding online learning platforms but an educational system that was not responsive to the economic constraints and stressors faced by families; Latina mothers  perceived the school district’s response to COVID-19 as performative and inadequate; Latina mothers developed mother-child pedagogies or pedagogies in which the mother and child are involved in teaching to and learning from each other. The findings lend support to the idea that the digital literacy divide does not exist outside of social and economic structures, and to the resourcefulness of everyday Latina mothers.