COVID ‐19 and online teaching in higher education: A case study of Peking University

“However, very meager research is done in relation to the field of education on how COVID-19 or even SARS affected the educational system (Bao, 2020; Sintema, 2020; Yan, 2020). stakeholders with an opportunity to continue learning while preventing the spread of the virus.”

“Many studies recognized the shift towards online learning as forceful, but important for continuing the learning process (Bao, 2020; Halim, Hashim, & Yunus, 2020; Hodges, Moore, Lockee, Trust, & Bond, 2020; Yee, 2013; Zhu, Chen, Avadhanam, Shui, & Zhang, 2020).”

“(Alam, 2020; Bao, 2020).”

“This rapid evolution at such a large scale has influenced the students of all age groups (Hasan and Bao 2020).”

“This group, however, formed the smallest group of teachers—this is an observation not new to the study of teacher preparedness and the shift to OTL during crisis (Bao, 2020; Rapanta et al., 2020).”

“According to (Bao,2020; UNESCO, 2020), many of these institutions have rushed and established online classes to try to fill the void that is like to last for the rest of the academic year in areas that are adversely affected.”

“The sudden need to adapt to online teaching and learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic challenged the digital readiness of teachers and students all over the world (Bao, 2020; Crawford et al., 2020; Demuyakor, 2020; Händel et al., 2020; International Association of Universities, 2020).”

“On par with universities around the globe, UEK has been keeping higher education afloat during this tough time [50,51].”

“However, the implementation of online learning posed different risks, problems and challenges to both the teachers and students, especially in the higher education institutions (HEIs) (Bao, 2020).”

“Such activities which can enhance student learning skills in online classes (Bao, 2020).”

“For example, Bao (2020) pointed out that the effectiveness of online learning relies on students’ self-directed learning attitude or personality, rather than on their ability to master the use of technological devices.”

“The COVID-19 pandemic undermined existing practices and changed the rules in unpredictable ways (Bryson et al., 2020; Horton, 2020; Žižek, 2020).”

“One consequence is that HEIs in many countries directed their teaching staff to move teaching and learning to online platforms - where possible - without delay, and to do so as comprehensively as possible [4, 5].”

“This is consistent with previous research which indicated that the sudden emergence of COVID-19 means some instructors and students are facing extra challenges because of a lack of online teaching and learning experience [25].”

“Bao (2020) also stressed the need to provide psychological support to the university community.”

“…an inevitable requirement for HEIs to ensure that the different educational services and programs for the stakeholders (e.g., teachers, students) are sustained (Bao, 2020; Kummitha, 2020; Okoye et al., 2021; Reimers et al., 2020; UNESCO, 2014, 2016, 2021a; Viner et al., 2020; Woolliscroft, 2020).”

“With some exceptions, the studies that do address teachers either fail to separate students from teachers in reporting survey results (Slimi, 2020), or provide only general reflections and recommendations on the transition (Bao, 2020; Dhawan, 2020; Rapanta et al., 2020; Rashid & Yadav, 2020).”

“Online instructors should possess vast knowledge to implement e-learning successfully in the classroom (Bawane & Spector, 2009).”

“[7] A similar situation happened at Peking University, where 2613 undergraduate online courses and 1824 graduate online courses were prepared [8].”

“…students to learn online etc. Studies show that the success of online teaching can also be affected by institutional characteristics, such as technical support, pedagogical support or the school vision about the implementation of online or/and blended learning (see Almpanis, 2015; Bao, 2020).”

“Documents on strategies and mental health The most co- cited article (Bao, 2020) reported six specific instructional strategies for improving student engagement based on observations of Peking University's online education during COVID- 19.”

“For instance, teachers can enhance the teacher-student connectedness using facial expressions and body languages, whose influences could be affected in an online context, which leads to greater reliance on voice communication (Bao 2020).”

“the amount of speech presented to high school students on key knowledge, using a smaller number of words [46].”

“While there is an increased interest in understanding how universities responded to the pandemic (Bao, 2020; Greene, 2020; Lim, 2020; QS, 2020), there are few studies reflecting on the abrupt switch to online teaching and the significant impact on society and the educational processes is currently…”

“There is no doubt that The COVID-19 pandemic forced educational institutions to switch teaching and learning to online and this sudden migration amplified the existing and new challenges of Technology Supported Learning, and there have recently been few publications that draw on some of the lessons learned through the…”

“Familiarity of technological skills was not found to be an influential factor for both students and teachers, manifested in their rating results for items Sb-03 and Tb-03, which is in line with Bao’s viewpoint [35] that learning attitudes outweigh technology skills regarding online learning.”

“This was found to significantly affect the students’ preference and might be related to the challenges encountered during distance education [24].”

“A recent paper on the effects of COVID-19 on a Chinese university emphasized often neglected factors such as speakers' voices, their body language, and other social aspects that can hardly be transmitted via common text-based forms of e-learning (Bao, 2020).”

“Many universities across different countries have experienced an unprecedented transition from face-to-face to various forms of online education and remote learning amid the COVID-19 outbreak and subsequent lockdowns as discussed in case studies in China [9], India [10], Bulgaria [11], Pakistan [12], and Germany [13],…”

“During remote course delivery, students may not always have access to appropriate interactive technologies, learning materials or to adequate productive environments (Bao, 2020).”

“Bao (2020) explains how universities have had to transition from classroom-based education to online education as the pandemic spreads.”

“In [3], five major principles with context to improving the impact of online teaching have been stated.”

“That is, due to tertiary institutions’ quick shifting to the online learning modality, college students are left to overcome great online learning shock (American Campus Communities 2020), so as to reduce learning loss and maintain subjective well-being during the period of an unprecedented crisis (Hasan & Bao 2020).”

“Research focus on online education and teaching has increased because of the worldwide spread of COVID19, for instance, in the contexts of mainland China (Bao 2020; Zhang et al.”

“Many studies have reported that closure of educational institutes due to the COVID-19 lockdown will have a significant impact on the education that demands online learning (Bao, 2020).”

“Besides, public and private sector educational institutions have also moved their courses, and learning material on the online learning platforms ( Bao, 2020 ).”

“The COVID-19 pandemic has compelled many educational institutions to transition quickly from traditional education meth-ods to virtual learning to limit physical contact and reduce the spread of the virus (Budayová et al., 2022; Bao, 2020).”

“Specifically, in higher education, this change represents in a positive way the creation of online platforms which provides increased accessibility to resources and allows for agile updates to course content, which are critical in a rapidly evolving field like higher education [3,5].”

“However, due to the sudden emergence of Covid-19, most faculty members faced unforeseen challenges, including lack of online-teaching experience, lack of time for preparing distance-learning courses, and figuring out how to make use of support from educational technology teams (Bao 2020).”

“Teacher or teaching staff is the main part in the implementation of pursuit, a massive change from the traditional/face-to-face teaching and learning process without any preparation to learning that is carried out online (Bao, 2020; Basilaia & Kvavadze, 2020).”

“In China, more than 500 Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) are offered with nearly 300 million people to enroll (Bao, 2020).”

“Data analysis Data were analyzed using content analysis, with four main stages: decontextualization, recontextualization, categorization, and compilation (Bengtsson, 2016).”

“Principles with high impact for online education are (i) high relevance between online training design and student learning, (ii) efficient provision of online training information and active student participation, (iii) adequate assistance provided by teachers to students, and (iv) emergency plan for dealing with une…”

“While more research on this topic is surely emergent, so far, academic studies have focused on the experiences of teachers (e.g., Bao, 2020; Ferdig et al., 2020; Johnson et al., 2020; Reich et al., 2020), administrators (e.g., Ferdig et al., 2020; Johnson et al., 2020), or policy makers (e.g.,…”

“According to Bao (2020), the signi fi cant impact of COVID-19, that is, widespread use of digital works, would set new trends for the future; hence, it is now more pressing to ensure that the digital learning environments provided by higher education institutions are accessible and inclusive Moriña…”

“…is measured through the relevance of instructional design and student learning, effective delivery of instructional information, adequate support provided to students, and high-quality participation and engagement of teachers and students in online classrooms (Bao 2020; Dumford and Miller 2018).”

“Further to the above, Moawad investigated the stress caused by online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic among Saudi university students, studying 2271 male and female students at King Saud University [19].”

“…to remote teaching in higher education Recent literature has focused on how institutions and programmes adapted to online teaching and learning (Bao, 2020; Flores & Gago, 2020; Quezada et al., 2020; Zhang et al., 2020) and on how students experienced it considering specific aspects of this…”

“Bao (2020) highlighted the delivery of a massive number of online courses, and certain teething problems related to both the technology and its usage (Demuyakor, 2020).”

“Therefore, some countries started to implement e-learning or online education as a solution to this problem or at least to mitigate serious consequences (Bao, 2020).”

“Since the rapid deployment -282- of the pandemic, inevitable academia faces unpredictable challenges such as insufficient online teaching experience, preparing the context, and inadequate educational technology support (Bao, 2020).”

“The most frequently cited references are Cao et al. (2020) (106 times), Bao (2020) (93 times), Dhawan (2020) (72 times), and Sahu (2020) (70 times).”

“In this sense, suggestions narrowly oriented towards individual academics’ instructional and pedagogical strategies (see Bao, 2020; Rapanta et al., 2020) can be limiting and even dangerous.”

“Often discussion boards are also utilized to increase student comprehension and for instructor feedback (Bao, 2020).”

“Students' engagement in digital learning environments has received more attention since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic (Bao, 2020; Villela et al., 2020).”

“Students often have problems such as lack of self-discipline, suitable learning materials, or good learning environments when they are selfisolated at home [14].”

“Because mandated online teaching has been implemented in response to potential school shutdowns, it definitely necessities school support (Bao, 2020).”

“However, whilst the findings of this study and the pieces of evidence we drew from the literature (see: Background information) (AIESAD, 2020; Bao, 2020; Chick et al., 2020; Kummi-tha, 2020; LALA, 2020; OECD, 2017; Reimers et al., 2020; UNESCO, 2020; Viner et al., 2020; Woolliscroft, 2020)…”

“According to the study by Bao (2020), the five most important areas of online education during COVID-19 that higher educational institutions must address are highly integrated online instructional design and student learning, efficient and effective delivery of online classes, sufficient support…”

“Even at the international level, there is little research on satisfaction with online teaching (cfr. Bao, 2020; Mishra et al., 2020) which, in contrast to our study, used semi-structured interviews or case studies.”

“Moreover, the few studies that focus on teachers’ experiences do not concentrate on the pedagogical transformation of the Chinese HEIs and its short and long-term implications [4,6,8,37].”

“In the same vein, by studying the sentiment and emotional valence (intensities) of the comments provided by the students in SET towards the teachers’ recommendations, which forms part of the main contributions of this paper; it is deemed to be a useful method towards achieving, both in theory and in practice, the afor…”

“For example, one researcher observed issues with the transition to online learning at a Peking University and put forth instructional recommendations to achieve a successful transition to online learning (Bao 2020).”

“Online assessment is a huge task, most of the faculty and students are struggling to get the appropriate one [2, 9].”

“…have been closed online learning by utilizing platforms in the form of applications, websites, social networks, and learning management systems (Bao, 2020; Basilaia & Kvavadze, 2020; Gunawan et al., 2020) so that an electronic/e-module-based teaching material can be developed with the help of…”

“The results reveal the vital role of MAG in developing higher education teachers’ TPACK and the significant and positive impact it has on TPACK, supporting H2 which aligns with previous research (Bao 2020; Maipita et al. 2023).”

“Consequently, Students had to take online classes from home due to millions of teachers fast transitioning to teaching in front of computers (Bao, 2020).”

“104 monitor their progress, which means that this model of learning is more focused on the students and offers flexibility in choosing the proper time for their studies (Bao, 2020; Dyrbye et al., 2009).”

“E-learning was the prevalent pedagogical practice during the COVID-19 pandemic and several studies have documented the negative effects of isolation on students’ psychological wellbeing (Antonini Philippe, Schiavio, & Biasutti, 2020; Arslan, Yıldırım, & Aytaç, 2020; Cao et al., 2020; de Oliveira Araújo, de Lima, Cidad…”

“In the case of the current coronavirus situation, social distancing and isolation have become new norms and while some initial studies [3; 18; 24] have reported that a shift to online learning has been well accepted, many others [5; 38; 40] have highlighted the challenges many students face like poor time management […”

“Consequently, there is a pressing need to innovate and implement alternative education and assessment strategies [25,26].”

“…based on social constructivism, which promotes online learning and knowledge acquisition through idea generation, idea organizing, and intellectual convergence (Demuyakor, 2020; Harasim, 2017), and has been adapted in other online learning studies due to its applicability in e-learning (Bao, 2020).”