Online courses 

call for a greater amount motivation and self-discipline than a

classroom-based course. A classroom has one or more instructors and peers, who can

hold a student accountable for their course-work. In contrast, online courses involve

setting our own goals, tracking progress and meeting deadlines. Online learning gives

our children a better start

Having access to digital learning modules in the classroom can help teach our young

students more than ever before. With virtual simulations and models, teachers are able

to communicate subjects that may have previously been out of reach.31 Aug 2016Online

learning is education that takes place over the Internet. It is often referred to as

“e- learning” among other terms. However, online learning is just one type of

“distance learning” - the umbrella term for any learning that takes place

across distance and not in a traditional classroom. Finally, education is not just about

subject knowledge but also about developing social skills and sportsmanship among the

students, which is built over years. Relying solely on online education may hinder the

holistic development of children, and many may underperform later in their professional

and personal lives.23 Sep 2020Online education has gained immense popularity among

working professionals and students pursuing higher education. These categories of

online learners find immense benefit in the autonomy and flexibility that these courses

offer. Online courses can be planned around their schedule which may include full-time

employment, internships and caring for family. Online learning can also help them take

out some quiet time to study.

Distance learning has been around for a long time, even before technology made it

extremely accessible. Traditional schooling is now seeing an increased proliferation of

virtual training materials and online courses. Even in a world of tried and tested

schooling systems and curricula, the most successful schools are the ones who adapt

to the changing times, as well as to the expectations of students, parents and the

society. If online education is here to stay, then what are its implications for traditional

learning? Instead of focusing on pros and cons, the conversation we should be having

today is about leveraging online education to make our education systems more

conducive to learning.

Online courses call for a greater amount motivation and self-discipline than a

classroom-based course. A classroom has one or more instructors and peers, who can

hold a student accountable for their course-work. In contrast, online courses involve

setting our own goals, tracking progress and meeting deadlines. One does not learn

effectively in isolation so online courses do offer discussion forums, email and one-on-

one support. Technology also adds on to the visual experience by incorporating

animations that can be used interactively for effective learning and communication.

The classroom advantage

A school provides structure, support, and a system of rewards and penalties to groom

its students. Traditional classroom education offers the benefit of face-to-face

interactions with peers which are typically moderated by a teacher. It provides children,

especially those in their early developmental years, with a stable environment for social
interactions, helping them develop skills like boundary setting, empathy and

cooperation. It also allows plenty of room for spontaneity, unlike a virtual learning setup.

Online education in the context of schooling

As students progress to higher classes in school, they seek more autonomy and

intellectual freedom. Online learning can help them pursue highly individualised learning

programmes, possibly even college level courses. These, combined with hands-on

exercises, real world exploration, and thorough assessments, can be highly beneficial to

their learning progress. They can explore their options by trying out introductory topics

from different fields, before committing to a specialisation. Online learning platforms can

help these students become more independent learners, before they make their way

into college. I believe that we must not hold back students from pursuing an online

course but instead provide them guidance as they navigate through it.

Mobile apps that provide enhanced learning opportunities for school children have

become quite popular as of late. Since mobile phones have already found their way into

their hands, these apps are being used to supplement classroom learning. Teachers

and parents need to act as anchors and mentors, curating the kind of educational

content students are exposed to, during this tricky phase of exploring the right career to

pursue.

Virtual public schools, that offer full fledged K-12 education have already sprung up in

some parts of the world. They even offer a combination of the traditional system with

online education. There are programmes that provide support to families that wish to

home-school their children in the form of online course material. These programmes
bring parents and teachers into the fold, by involving them in their child’s education from

the get go. However, their effectiveness in the long term needs to be studied.

Online learning programmes will also open up opportunities for children from the weaker

socio-economic communities who have limited access to learning resources i.e.

teachers, text books and infrastructure. It will connect them to a global network of online

learners, exposing them to new perspectives. The ideas that they receive will not be

limited by the number of heads in one classroom.

Online education for educators

Online education can also be designed to accommodate a variety of learning styles

among students. As educators, it is likely that we will have to put in additional efforts to

incorporate online learning programmes into the curriculum in the most suitable manner.

Online training programmes are helping teachers/educators advance their skills in

curriculum implementation, policy, education systems and leadership, both

independently and with the support of their institutions. It lets them collaborate with their

peers and learn new instructional skills that are relevant to their career. These

programmes can help them develop new skills and capabilities in their students with the

help of technology and interdisciplinary approaches.

As the overlap of the traditional and online modes of education is becoming more and

more inevitable, we owe it to our students to make their education relevant to their

future through ingenuity, passion and careful planning.

Authored by Naveen K M, managing director, Trio World Academy, Bangalore.

Impact of Online Education on

Families: Understanding the Transition

to Remote Learning

View all blog posts underArticles | View all blog posts underBachelor's in Human Development

and Family Studies

With the onset of a global pandemic, families have adjusted to a rapid move to online

education. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey, 93% of

households with school-age children have had experience with some form of socially

distant learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a majority of those households

using some form of online learning.

For many families, the shift has been difficult. Issues of accessibility have impacted

lower-income families disproportionally as they may not have access to two

requirements for online learning: high-speed internet service and a computer. A

National Education Association (NEA) report estimates that 13.5 million children ages 5-

17 don’t have access to these technologies.

Families have also struggled to understand how online learning impacts the education

and development of their children and overall family dynamics. As educators and

parents have had some time to adjust to the upheaval that the pandemic has caused,

both the advantages and disadvantages are becoming clearer. For instance, a joint

study from the NEA and National PTA on the impact of online education found that most

students feel they are getting a good education, despite feeling pressure from learning,

emotional, economic, and health stressors.

Impact of Remote Learning on Children’s

Education
In April 2020, which was when school closings in the U.S. peaked, approximately 55.1

million students were affected. Educators are still learning how the switch to online

learning will affect students in the long term. Researchers worry about a “COVID-19

slide” that’s much like the “summer slide” — the learning loss students experience over

the summer — but on a larger scale.

Parents are concerned, too. According to data from parents of K-12 students polled by

the Pew Research Center:

 65% of parents are concerned about their children possibly falling behind academically

due to school disruptions and online learning.

 63% of parents are concerned about their children having too much screen time.

 60% of parents are concerned about their children being able to maintain social

connections.

 59% of parents are concerned about their children’s emotional well-being.

Factors that may determine how a student’s education fares during online learning

include individual learning style, learning environment, and level of parental

involvement. The most common reasons children have struggled with the change from

the classroom environment include the following:

 Digital inequity. The children who have struggled the most lack access to consistent

high-speed internet service and a one-to-one device for online learning. Successful

online learning isn’t possible without these technologies, and millions of students simply

don’t have them.

 Lack of structure. Many students perform best in a structured environment with a set

routine. These students may be more distracted at home. They may skip assignments

or class meetings, an action that can negatively impact online education. Many parents

are working while their children engage in online learning. These families especially

may struggle to offer the same level of structure at home that children get at school.

 Decreased engagement. Many students struggle with the lack of face-to-face

interaction with their teachers and peers during online learning. Teachers may not be

able to tell which students are on task and which students need more support.
 Disengaged students may not participate in class discussions online, and if a whole

class is disengaged, that makes for one quiet, unproductive class meeting.

While the switch to online education has been hard for many, some students have

thrived during the shift. Educators and parents alike are taking notice, with many

considering how this could lead to permanent changes when students move back to the

classroom. Teachers, parents, and students have seen some benefits of online

learning, including the following:

 More flexible schedules. Many children struggle with an on-campus school day’s rigid

schedule, which can negatively impact their grades and retention. These students may

thrive on the flexibility that remote learning provides.

 More self-paced instruction. Some students may benefit from breaking assignments

into manageable chunks and taking a break when needed, advantages not always

available in an on-campus environment. During online learning, students find it easier to

work at their own pace.

 Fewer distractions. Students who are easily distracted or anxious may find it easier to

concentrate and focus on schoolwork at home. Shy students may struggle to answer

questions or participate in class but find it easier to participate online.

 Improved self-regulation skills. Students are working more independently by tracking

their schedules, remembering what time meetings are, setting time during the day to

work on assignments, and tracking due dates.

 More sleep. Students are also benefiting from more sleep. One simple impact of online

education is that children are better rested, which improves learning outcomes.
 Impact of Online Education on Children’s

Development
Beyond the educational impacts of online learning are its developmental impacts.

Children learn much more than reading and math when they attend school in person;

they also learn critical social and emotional skills they’ll carry into adulthood. As with

educational performance, the switch to online education can affect children differently.

Parents are right to wonder about the impacts on the social and emotional development

of their children.

Social Development

Online education doesn’t offer the same social benefits that children receive when

interacting with peers or teachers. Many parents are seeing the negative impacts of

school disruptions and switch to remote learning. Children may be:

 Disengaged. Families are finding that many students are skipping classes or playing

games instead of doing classwork. For many students, interacting with peers was the

best part of school. Without that social connection, those students may struggle to

remain engaged at all. Students may also have difficulty reading and communicating

emotional cues via online video platforms.

 Isolated. Families worry that students are socially isolated during online learning. While

many parents have worked to reduce the amount of time their children spend in front of

a screen, those children may now spend several hours each day on a computer for
 school with little human interaction. The lack of one-on-one interaction can especially

hinder younger students from developing social skills.

 Unmotivated. Peer relationships can foster a sense of motivation. When students work

on group projects or presentations, or even just interact in class discussions, it can be

motivating. When forced to work in isolation, they no longer have that motivation.

Other students may welcome the lack of social pressure that comes with online

learning. The social aspect of the classroom can be a distraction for some students and

anxiety inducing for others. Many children have flourished during online learning

because they aren’t feeling the social pressure that comes with being on campus.

In particular, children who may be the victims of bullying at school have found online

learning to be a welcome respite. Other students may feel relief from not having the

pressure to look good or meet certain social expectations, and shy or anxious

students may find it easier to reach out for teacher assistance. A lack of social activities

such as clubs or sports teams can also allow students to focus more intensely on their

schoolwork and improve their study habits.

Emotional Concerns

A big question parents may be asking is what the emotional impact of online education

is on their children. The uncertainty and disruption of the pandemic, coupled with the

subsequent shift to online learning, can take an emotional toll on children. Additionally,

according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 3.7 million children ages 12-

17 receive mental health services at school, meaning that during the time many children

may need help the most, they aren’t at school to receive it. The most pressing emotional

concerns are:
 Depression. The social isolation a child may feel during online education can lead to

depression. Additionally, children who get a lot of confidence from school may be

struggling without the individual feedback they usually receive from teachers.

 Pandemic concerns. Children may be worried about themselves or family members

contracting COVID-19. They may have loved ones who are sick with the virus or may

have lost a family member.

 Financial worries. Some parents have lost their jobs or income because of COVID-19,

a loss that stresses everyone in the household, including children.

Compound all these concerns with the disruption in routine that the switch to online

learning has caused and it can be a lot for a child to handle. Parents want to support

their children emotionally but may not know the best way to do that.

Impact of Virtual Schooling on Family Dynamics

When schools and businesses began shutting down in the early days of the COVID-19

pandemic, parents hastily transformed rooms in their homes to classrooms and offices.

One child may work at a desk in a bedroom while another may use a table in the dining

room for online classes. A parent or parents may also be trying to work remotely from

other rooms in the home.

Parents have not only shifted the space in their homes but also taken on new roles as

remote learning leaders or virtual learning teachers. According to a Learning Heroes

survey, parents estimate that they spend an average of 2.5 hours each day helping their

children with schoolwork, but this can vary based on the number and ages of children.
 Some parents have even left their jobs to devote time to supporting their children during

online learning or supplementing school-provided lessons.

These drastic changes have stressed families already frazzled about health and

financial security; however, many families are focused on the bright side. Positives

include the following:

 Parents may feel more connected to their children’s day-to-day education.

 Parents may better understand what their children are learning.

 Parents may have a stronger understanding of their children’s academic strengths and

weaknesses.

 Parents may have a closer relationship with their children’s teachers.

Resources for Navigating the Impact of Online

Education
Parents are doing the best they can to manage a situation that remains uncertain and

disruptive. Families want their children to succeed during remote learning, and some

resources can help them achieve this. Parents should explore these resources for tips

and tricks on navigating online learning.

 Common Sense, “Parent Tips and Tricks for Distance Learning” : Learn how to

encourage and motivate children to succeed in online learning with these tips.

 Mom.com, “8 of the Best Virtual Learning Resources for Parents” : Discover parent-

approved apps and websites to enhance online learning.

 New York Public Library, Remote Learning Resources: Kids & Teens : Delve into online

education resources from the New York Public Library.

 Office of Elementary and Secondary Education, Resources for Parents and Families for

Remote Learning: Explore ways to support children’s social, emotional, and behavior

skills with these resources.

 U.S. News & World Report,  “10 Teaching Resources for Parents During COVID-19”:

Find additional resources to help children learn at home.

Online Learning Provides an Opportunity for

Growth
Parents are concerned about the long-term effects of online learning on their children.

The transition has disrupted education for children, as well as affected their social,

emotional, and mental well-being. Parents are justifiably concerned about the negative

effects of online learning, but there have also been some positive takeaways.

Parents, teachers, and students were blindsided when the pandemic forced schools

across the country to close. Even as some schools have begun to reopen, others have

remained closed and millions of students are still learning remotely to some degree. As

the impact of online education becomes more apparent, families and educators can

learn valuable information and use this as an opportunity to grow.

The World Health Organization has declared Covid-19 as a pandemic that has

posed a contemporary threat to humanity. This pandemic has successfully forced

global shutdown of several activities, including educational activities, and this has
resulted in tremendous crisis-response migration of universities with online

learning serving as the educational platform. The crisis-response migration

methods of universities, faculty and students, challenges and opportunities were

discussed and it is evident that online learning is different from emergency

remote teaching, online learning will be more sustainable while instructional

activities will become more hybrid provided the challenges experienced during

this pandemic are well explored and transformed to opportunities.

According to Huang et al. (2020), a novel corona virus, known as Covid-19, was

discovered in the last month of the year 2019, in a seafood market in Wuhan.

Clinical analysis results of the virus showed person-to-person transmission (Li et

al., 2020; Paules et al., 2020; Wang, Cheng, et al., 2020). The Director General

of WHO in March 2020 (WHO, 2020) declared Covid-19 as a pandemic after

assessment of the rapid spread and severity of the deadly virus across the globe

with additional announcement of social distancing as a means of curbing the

spread of the pandemic. Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary (2020) referred to

pandemic as “an outbreak of a disease that occurs over a wide geographic area

and affects an exceptionally high proportion of the population”. Social distancing

is conscious increment in the physical gap between people in order to curb

dissemination of disease (Red Cross, 2020). This pandemic has forced global

physical closure of businesses, sport activities and schools by pushing all

institutions to migrate to online platforms. Online learning is the use of internet

and some other important technologies to develop materials for educational

purposes, instructional delivery and management of program (Fry, 2001).

Hrastinski (2008) stated that the two types of online learning, namely

asynchronous and synchronous online learning, are majorly compared but for

online learning to be effective and efficient, instructors, organizations and

institutions must have comprehensive understanding of the benefits and

limitations. This article discussed the crisis-response migration methods of higher

institutions of learning, students and faculty members into online learning, the

opportunities and challenges with respect to Covid-19, and also add value to the

existing body of literature on online learning by providing comprehensive

awareness on the migration methods of instructional delivery adopted by

universities, faculty and students, challenges and opportunities as the world

battle to eradicate the pandemic.

Review of literature

Digital transformation is not a novel phenomenon, and it has been accompanying

higher education institutions for some years now (Kopp et al., 2019; Leszczyński

et al., 2018). Digital transformation of Higher Education institutions is a topical

issue that several stakeholders of education must feel concerned about, abilities

to apply ICT in every spheres of life are on incremental level, thus universities
must be up to the task of preparing potential professional to be able to face

challenges and provide solutions (Bond et al., 2018; Sandkuhl &

Lehmann, 2017), and this transformation has suggested the integration of

sustainable management to be able to adjust to the modifications enforced as a

result of novel technologies (Abad-Segura et al., 2020) and pandemic recently.

Digital transformation in the context of higher education institutions can be

regarded as the summation of all digital processes required to accomplish

transformation process that gives higher education institutions the opportunities

to positively apply digital technologies optimally (Kopp et al., 2019). This process

also consists of adequate strategic preparation, trust establishment, thinking in

processes, amalgamation and reinforcement of all parties involved, separate,

collaborative and organizational knowledge (Cameron & Green, 2019). Hiltz and

Turoff (2005) argued that the contemporary transformation will be seen as

revolutionary modifications in the specifications of higher education as a process

and as an institution in the next 50 years because the transformation has moved

face-to-face instructional programs using objectivist, teacher-centered teaching

method, for thousands of home-grown, provincial and domestic universities to

online and hybrid programs applying digital technologies in enhancing

constructivist, learner-centered, cooperative pedagogy for some hundred “mega-

universities” that function worldwide. These researchers added that online

learning is a novel social process that has been gathering momentum as the

surrogate for customary face-to-face classroom, but viewed from the perspective
of replacement processes that has been branded as disruptive processes. Covid-

19 pandemic initiated digital transformation of higher education, and as a result

of the crisis brought by the Covid-19 pandemic, novelties in higher education that

would typically take many years because of differing managerial regulations were

presented quickly within limited number of days (Strielkowski, 2020) and this has

also turned the branding of online learning as disruptive process to a “messiah”

status.

While assessing the assumptions surrounding the digital transformation of higher

education institutions, Kopp et al. (2019) gave five common assumptions that are

considered more of hindrances to digital transformation of higher education

institutions as against contributions to its realization and these assumptions are

related to (i) change, (ii) pace, (iii) technology, (iv) competences and (v)

financing. Digitalization in higher education institutions should not be referred to

as e-learning since online learning is only one of the several features of digital

transformation of higher education institutions. Online learning is the educational

usage of technological devices, tools and the internet (Means et al., 2009),

Tallent-Runnels et al. (2006) added that the persistent increase in technological

innovation and internet accessibility has increased the motivation for online

learning since the beginning of the millennium, but Joshi et al. (2020) concluded

that the instructional achievement of online learning is debatable because it

causes absence of face-to-face relationship among learners, learners and

instructors. Hodges et al. (2020) differentiated adequately planned online

learning experiences from courses presented online as response to crisis. These

researchers went further to refer to online education during this pandemic as

“emergency remote teaching” because the latter is in contrast with quality or

effective online learning.

Effective online education consists of online teaching and learning, boosting of

several research works, principles, prototypes, theories, ethics and appraisal of

benchmark concentrations on quality online course design, teaching and learning

(Hodges et al., 2020; Bozkurt & Sharma, 2020), since it has been confirmed that

effective online learning is a byproduct of cautious design and planning of

instruction with the application of organized model for designing and

development of instruction (Branch & Dousay, 2015). The absence of the

cautious design and development process (Branch & Dousay, 2015) in the

migration process gave birth to the rejection of the contemporary online

education experience during this pandemic as effective online education but

rather as emergency remote teaching (Bozkurt & Sharma, 2020; Hodges et

al., 2020; Vlachopoulos, 2020).

Crisis-response migration methods

Online leaning is not a novel discovery, hints on online universities degrees’

surface as far back 1980s, coupled with 1990s and 2000s as optimal maturation
time for online education, and another undeniable fact is that online education

has regularly been viewed from the perspective of good-to-have alternative but

not a serious-mission model to guarantee steadiness of instructional activities

(Ribeiro, 2020). The global acceptance of social distancing policy, as announced

by WHO as a measure to curb the spread of Covid-19, has forced schools to

close their doors, and this has caused unexpected disruption of traditional

teaching and learning method.

The good-to-have narrative changed as a result of the global closure of schools

has part of measures to maintain social distancing in order to curb rapid

transmission of Covid-19, schools switched instructional activities to remote

learning platforms and this migration came with several logistical challenges, and

one major issue is that the migration has caused compulsory modification in the

attitudes of education administrators, instructors and learners on the significance

of online learning (Ribeiro, 2020). Some schools ran distance education

programs prior to the emergence of Covid-19 pandemic, and this actually

assisted some of these higher citadels of learning in their migration process.

After the announcement of physical closure of schools by the governments as a

means of curtailing the global and community rapid spread of the pandemic, the

only option available for universities to adopt is online learning. Universities

across the globe engaged in digital transformation process in order to leave up to

their objectives. The transformation process was smooth for some institutions,
while some responded with crisis-response migration process due to the

pandemic, as cited by Hodges et al. (2020) and Manfuso (2020). The crisis-

response migration methods employed by some universities can be classified

into two parts, namely External-Assisted Migration and External-Integrated

Migration. The crisis-response migration methods discussed below addressed

the movement of instruction online to give room for flexibility of teaching and

learning that will be devoid of geographical and time limitations, but the speed in

which the online movement of instruction was projected to take place was

extraordinary and surprising. This shows that in genuineness, the migration was

limited to instructional delivery approaches, methods and tools.

External-Assisted Migration in this article is referred to as situation whereby

universities make use of Web 2.0 platforms designed by external corporate

bodies or organizations. In external-assisted migration, some of these institutions

provided data of students and faculty members for easy migration and

applications of these Web 2.0 platforms, such as MicroSoft 360, Moodles,

etc. External-Integrated Migration on the hand refers to a situation whereby

universities integrate Web 2.0 platforms designed by external corporate bodies or

organizations into their personal online learning platforms, such integrated

applications are BigBlueButton, Google Classroom, etc. It is also important to

note that both External-Assisted Migration and External-Integrated Migration offer

the same features for instructional delivery and assessment through video

conferencing, submission of assignments, forum discussion, assessment, etc.

The crisis-response migration process of students and faculty members can also

be viewed from the level of their digital competence and availability of information

on online learning. Contemporary students and some faculty members are digital

natives, since digital natives are the group of people born and raised during

digital period (Prensky, 2001), and they are expected to be tech-savvy. However,

a substantial number of them do not have the skills expected of digital natives

(Bennett et al., 2008), which also prompted Shariman et al. (2012) to conclude

that the effects of new digital technologies to redefine literacy are yet to be fully

revealed. In the case of university students in developing country just like every

other country where schools are yet to attain the full stage of digital

transformation of educational activities, it took some students and faculty

members more time to migrate into the emergency remote teaching through Web

2.0 platforms made available by their respective institutions.

Challenges

With Covid-19 pandemic, it has become clearer that education system is

susceptible to external dangers (Bozkurt & Sharma, 2020). Ribeiro (2020) rightly

noted that this digital transformation of instructional delivery came with several

logistical challenges and attitudinal modifications. Feldman (n.d.) while

addressing student assessment during this pandemic on how districts can

legislate unbiased and evenhanded grading policies based on these

recommendations; (i) pandemic-related anxiety will have negative effects on

student academic performance, (ii) academic performance of students might be

affect by racial, economic and resource differences, and (iii) the larger parts of

instructors were not effectively ready to deliver high-quality instruction remotely.

The challenges discussed here are limited to digital transformation of

instructional operations during the period of Covid-19 pandemic.

Technology

Online learning in its entirety is dependent on technological devices and internet,

instructors and students with bad internet connections are liable to be denied

access to online leaning. The dependency of online learning on technological

equipment and the provision of the equipment was a big challenge for

institutions, faculty and learners. D. Yates (personal communication, March 17,

2020) while answering a question posted on Research Gate, by John R.

Yamamoto-Wilson a retired professor from Sophia University, on the effects of

Covid-19 and online learning on instructors and teaching stated that students

with outdated technological devices might find it hard to meet up with some

technical requirements of online learning, citing an example of a student who

wanted to take mid-semester e-quiz by using Respodus. This particular student

could not download the browser after several attempts and it was later

discovered that she was using an outdated device that is not compatible with the

browser. This researcher also cited students with accessibility problems that may

find it difficult to follow instructions posted on the course announcement section

of programs and a typical example of that is when the instructor posted on the

course announcement page that there won’t be class on a particular date, one of

the students still sent mail asking if class will hold on that date.

Socio-economic factor

As a result of inequality in the socio-economic status of students, some rely on

the computer and free internet in school (Demirbilek, 2014), and due to the

closure of schools, the migration process of these set of students is expected to

be slow. It becomes undeniable that students with low socio-economic

background will definitely find it difficult to migrate as early as expected since

they cannot come to school due to the pandemic. Fishbane and Tomer (2020)’s

research findings on what students with no internet access are to do during this

Covid-19 pandemic show that as the level of poverty increases in the community,

the rate of internet accessibilities declined rapidly and by implications, students

with no or low socio-economic power to afford broadband connection are most

vulnerable to fall behind or encounter additional challenges to meet up with

others in online learning.

Human and pets’ intrusions

Human and pets’ intrusion here is the unexpected appearance or interruption of

family members, friends and or pets that may cause disruption or diversion of

online learning participants’ attention during the online teaching and learning

process. Malcolm Brown, the Director of Learning Initiatives at EDUCAUSE also

cited pets’ intrusions, through situations where online learnings are in progress

via videoconference and someone’s pet such dogs will be barking, or cat will

walk across the table (Manfuso, 2020). Another intrusion linked to family

members of online learning participants, when classes are in progress, can be

found on a video file from St J. D.S.G. Pietermaritzburg (2020).

Digital competence

Digital competence is the group of skills, knowledge and attitudes needed when

using ICT and digital devices to perform responsibilities, such as problem

solving, information management, collaboration with respect to effectiveness,

efficiency and ethics (Ferrari, 2012). In this jet age, not all digital natives

possessed digital competence that are not limited to education but all spheres of

life (Bennett et al., 2008). Students and instructors with low digital competence

are liable to lack behind in online learning. According to a video file by

AlkaPwnige (2020), there are situations whereby online learning participants go

naked unconsciously by either visiting the comfort station or dressing up for the
online class, and this can be linked to unconscious use of the platform as a result

unethical use of digital devises that can be avoided through digital competence.

Due to digital transformation of instructional activities during this pandemic,

libraries are to follow the trend in order to deliver effective services to faculty,

students and other stakeholders through digital library, students and faculty with

low digital competence might find it difficult to make optimal utilization of the

digital library. Omotayo and Haliru (2020) has established digital competence as

a variable with positive correlation and substantial effects on the application of

digital library by higher education learners.

Assessment and supervision

After instructional delivery here comes assessment where instructors measure

learning activities to ascertain the instructional objectives through test, quiz and

examination. Osterlind (2002), there exists numerous literature on test and

measurement theory and analysis with little details on planning, development and

test items writing by instructors. In online learning, assessments are often carried

online whereby instructors are limited to proxy supervision of learners making it

impossible to regulate and control cheating (Arkorful & Abaidoo, 2015). There are

several students testing formats that are applicable with e-learning and according

to Osterlind (2002), such ICT-enhanced testing formats include constructed-

response, performance-based formats, sentence-completion or short-answer,

matching, true-false and cloze-procedure. Flaherty (2020) added that Kevin

Gannon, the Director of Center for Excellence in Teaching, Grand View

University in a contemporary publication, has opined that he’s a strong advocate

of considerable modification of grading systems during this pandemic because it

is unimaginable to claim that learners are getting the same learning experiences

and chances through online learning during this pandemic and this will make

assessment more complicated.

Heavy workload

The quick and sudden digital transformation process of universities has huge

workload on ICT units of institutions to build e-platforms, integrated existing

external applications into their systems and as well as full migration into external

applications. Instructors also share part of the workload because they are

responsible for transforming their course contents to be e-platform-friendly to the

learners. This heavy workload is expected to cause unforeseen financial and

time cost (Akkoyunlu & Soylu, 2006). Monique Sendze, the Chief Information

Officer for the Colorado School of Mines in interview granted to EdTech

Magazine, stated that they were on crisis-response mode of acquiring new

licenses and improvement of current licenses to carter for the tremendous

increase in the number of users that will be using e-learning tools of the school

simultaneously (Manfuso, 2020). D. Yates (personal communication, March 17,

2020) made reference to the complaints of students receiving more emails from

the university, some of these emails contain important messages, while others

are irrelevant messages and to instructors, these emails are irrelevant to them

because those messages are students focused. These loads of emails have

added to the stress of students and faculty and this may result in mental health

problems.

Compatibility

The compatibility of online learning with social science and humanities has been

proved effective while researchers have also contested its compatibility with

sports sciences, engineering and medical sciences where hands-on practical

experiences are required as part of instructional activities (Leszczyński et

al., 2018). Remote laboratories are used as alternative laboratories in online

learning and such virtual laboratories offered by online learning can only fill the

theory-to-practice hole (Iqbal et al., 2015). Online learning cannot be effectively

and efficiently applied in some disciplines and this compatibility gap is yet to be

filled (Leszczyński et al., 2018). According to Murphy (2020), based on the

Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) recommendations, medical

students were directed to abstain from having direct contact with patient in the

middle of March 2020, medical-trainees of Brown University were in clerkships

and the school were able to “augment” medical students training by migrating
some aspects of clinical education to online platform. However, those students

are to go back to the wards to complete the direct-patient interaction that is

required in clerkship as soon as the suspension due to the Covid-19 has been

lifted. This implies that online learning is not compatible with clinical but can only

be used to augment face-to-face training method pending the time there will be

chance to go back to the normal traditional setting (Leszczyński et al., 2018).

Boczkowska et al. (2018) recommended that e-learning programs are necessary

systems of continual education and to advance the value education in

emergency nursing, additional work need to be directed to the enhancement of

online learning programs.

Opportunities

Online learning on its own has advantages, such as flexibility (Smedley, 2010),

interactivity (Leszczyński et al., 2018; Wagner et al., 2008), self-pacing

(Amer, 2007) and opportunities, the current increase in its adoption by

universities is born of their desire to direct their actions toward alignment with

both local and global practices and policies to overcome the spread of Covid-19

pandemic and maintenance of academic calendar. Universities and other

educational platforms have responded to the pandemic with quick digital

transformation of their educational activities. Apart from the educational and

economical roles of universities, Wang and Zha (2018) also recognized the social
roles of universities as the world battle for the eradication of the pandemic.

According to Manfuso (2020), Greg Flanik, Chief Information Officer of Baldwin

Wallace University in Ohio, stated that when they were informed of the digital

transformation of instructional activities, he told his team to make the best use of

the opportunity offered by the crisis since they have always said that to get

everybody to make use of online learning tools would be an ultimate

accomplishment. Greg Flanik continued by adding that online learning has

provided a clear roadmap that educators need to take advantage and engage

major stakeholders in education to create novel market for instructional delivery

and the longer the pandemic lasts, the more likely online learning becomes a

general acceptable mode of teaching and learning.

Research innovations

This pandemic is, no doubt, a threat to humanity (Poon & Peiris, 2020),

considering the state of emergency declared by WHO as a result of the rapid

spread and severity of the deadly virus across the globe. As researchers spring

into actions on finding short-term and long-term solutions to the threat posed on

humanity by the virus, there is a need for instructional technologists most

especially researchers in distance education to also take advantage of the

sudden increase in participants of online learning as opportunities for research

advancement in order to provide novel innovations to meet latest challenges of

online learning. These research advancements should cover the following: (a)

the need to provide models to accommodate the contemporary changes in online

learning, (b) review the process of digital transformation of institutions, (c)

designing of more scalable and personalized online learning models, (d)

designing of online learning model that will reduce the workload on the

instructors, (e) redesign the learning process. N. N. Hameed (personal

communication, April 4, 2020) added that there is global diversion of academic

attentions to Covid-19, it is expected that most researchers will spring into

research activities because of the topical issue and massive research

publications and innovations will be recorded.

Technological innovations

Universities and other research centers across the globe are saddled with the

responsibilities of providing research avenues for researchers’ collaboration in

order to produce positive results as early as possible for the prevention and

control of the pandemic. As a result of these responsibilities and within short-term

frame, some universities in North Cyprus have produced several scientific

innovations to assist frontlines (i.e. health workers) in the battle to eradicate the

pandemic and to the general public in order to stop the rapid spread of the virus.

These scientific innovations, to mention a few, include “3D Multiplexer Ventilator”

(Near East University, 2020), “Medical Shields” (Eastern Mediterranean

University, 2020). Beech (2020) likened the technological innovation

opportunities brought by Covid-19 to that of Second World War that ushered in

rocket technology and digital computer, and according to this World Economic

Forum writer, some of the urgent technological innovations brought by Covid-19

era include 3D Printed Hands-Free Door Openers, Basic Ventilators, Spiderman

Wrist-Mounted Disinfectant Sprays, Wristband that rings whenever someone

wants to touch his/her face.

Monique Sendze as rightly quoted in Manfuso (2020) interview, Information

Technology professionals responded quickly to the crisis like a SWAT crew to

provide solutions, with the current technological interventions provided by IT

professionals during this Covid-19 pandemic, there is no doubt that they are up

to the task in providing more if more crisis erupts. Thus, this can be adopted in

continuity of business, adversity rescue strategies.

Socio-economic interventions

Developed nations have been offering palliatives to their citizens and residents in

order to cushion the effect of the global lockdown on the people and to a large

extent, these palliative measures do not exempt public and private organizations,

institution donations etc. University communities in North Cyprus have called on

alumni, public and private organizations and other relevant bodies in providing

socio-economic supports to the students. These socio-economic supports

include food items, stoppage of increment in tuition debt policy on students,

psychological and medical assistance to students and residences. According to

Fishbane and Tomer (2020), some Internet Services Providers have stated

providing socio-economic intervention programs such as provision of free

broadband to college and K-12 learners in the USA, while digital inclusion

campaigner EveryoneOn has opened a search engine to assist people according

to their ZIP code find low-cost internet bundle programs. Eastern Mediterranean

University in conjunction with TurkCell also keyed into such socio-economic

intervention as the form of corporate social responsibilities and service innovation

to provide free internet for their students and faculty (Ogunmokun, Eluwole, et

al., 2020; Ogunmokun, Unverdi-Creig, et al., 2020; Ogunmokun & Timur, 2019).

Joosub (2020) also in the spirit of reducing the financial burden of internet data

subscription on university students in order to access their online learning

platforms during this Covid-19 pandemic, Vodacom has launched special

bundles and also increased their zero-rated offer to all public citadels of learning

in South Africa for students and faculty of those institutions to have internet

access.

Discussion and conclusion

It is visible that instructional technology, as a research field with several sub-

divisions, has played a major role in cushioning the effect of this pandemic on
educational activities by serving as the only platform for instructional design,

delivery and assessment platforms. Wang, Cheng, et al. (2020) as researchers

across all disciplines strive to invent preventive and control mechanism for the

pandemic, there is a need to share contemporary research findings in order to

promote collaborative enquiry and technological networking for the assurance of

viable Covid-19 studies. Online education is deeply rooted in adequate planning

and designs of instructions with several available theories and models, but the

migration process of the universities to online education becomes questionable

because these processes witnessed the absence of proper planning, design and

development of online instructional programs due to the pandemic. The crisis-

response migration methods adopted by universities are limited to delivery media

without taking cognizance of effective online education theories and models.

Thus, the crisis-response migration due to the pandemic should not be equated

with effective online education or digital transformation of universities but rather

be seen from the perspective emergency remote teaching platforms. To address

digital competence as an emergency remote teaching problem, Ala-Mutka et al.

(2008) suggested that educational institutions need not design a separate

platform for learning digital skills, but it should be embedded in teaching and

learning process of all subjects, while Omotayo and Haliru (2020) also added that

learners must be motivated to get digital competency for them to remain relevant

in modernity. There exist needs for researchers in educational technology to

direct research advancement toward the development of alternative assessment

approaches that will be devoid of cheating and plagiarism with adequate

attention on the recommendations of Feldman (n.d.) for unbiased and equitable

assessment systems for future reoccurrence of such pandemic, since education

system is vulnerable to external problems of this kind (Bozkurt & Sharma, 2020).

Online learning elements are technology- driven and dependent on internet

facilities, educational institutions can collaborate with telecommunication

industries to either subsidize the cost of internet subscriptions or provide free

browsing data to the students and instructors as part of their corporate social

responsibilities. For educators, research actions need to be also geared toward

the development of a uniform online learning model that will be applicable to all

disciplines to solve the problem of compatibility. The global acceptance and

experience of contemporary online learning (i.e. emergency remote teaching), as

some may call it, will definitely lead to situations where students and faculty will

get used to application of technological devises and tools for teaching and

learning, and this usage will, no doubt, go beyond school into the place of work.

Han and Ellis (2019) suggested the need for faculty to assist students in

recognizing the values of learning via blended discussions and also elucidate on

the integration of online discussion and traditional face-to-face learning.

Additionally, implementation of technical solutions to test and measurement in

remote emergency teaching need to consider test item analysis and field trial as

opined by Osterlind (2002). Human and pets’ intrusion can also be either

reduced to the nearest minimum or totally eradicated through setting up of

separate online learning studio/library where those intrusions will be restricted.

Despite the sudden migration of instructional delivery to online platforms by

universities and other citadel of learning during this pandemic, provided the

challenges experienced by faculty and students are well explored and

transformed to opportunities, it is evident that online learning will be sustained

and educational will become more hybrid. Development of emergency remote

teaching evaluation instrument is to have more revealing information on the

crisis-response migration methods and challenges experienced by the students

and faculty as discussed in this study for further research becomes

recommendable.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors

Olasile Babatunde Adedoyin is currently a Ph.D. scholar in Computer

Education and Instructional Technologies at Near East University. His research

interests include online learning, digital competence andeducational tourism.

Emrah Soykan was born in Nicosia in 1988. After having graduated in Science

at the Lefkosa Türk High School in Nicosia in 2006, he obtained a Bachelor’s

degree in Computer Education and Instructional Technologies at the Near East

 University in 2010. After finishing his undergraduate course, he furthered his

studies and earned a Master’s degree in 2012 in Computer Education and

Instructional Technologies as well. During his years at Master level, Mr Soykan

undertook various courses, attended conferences and society services and

worked on different projects. He finished his Ph.D. on the same subject at the

Near East University in 2016.

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What factors impact on primary school

students’ online engagement for learning

and entertainment at home

  Jingyan Lu & 

 Qiang Hao 

Journal of Computers in Education volume 1, pages133–150 (2014)Cite this

article

 8627 Accesses

 5 Citations

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Abstract

Informed by the difference of children’s Internet use in formal and informal

contexts, this study aims to move away from studying children’s more

predictable Internet use in school settings to learning how children use the

Internet at home, and what factors impact their online behavior in such

contexts. Students from grade 3 to 6 from a school in a medium-sized city in

China participated in the study. The data reveal that children use the Internet

for both entertainment and learning purposes and these two factors are

correlated. However, factors influencing Internet use for the two purposes are

to some extent different. The study suggests that there is a need to zoom in

and analyze children’s Internet use in informal contexts, rather than assume
that learning at home is just an extension of learning at school. Policy makers

and educators may use information about how children use the Internet at

home to improve pedagogy to bridge the gap between school and home.

Introduction

With the increasing popularity and affordability of Information

Communication Technology (ICT), children can now access the Internet from

home via multiple devices, including desktop computers, laptops, and mobile

devices. At the same time, improvements in formal and informal education

have enabled young children to steadily improve their information literacy

skills. It is no longer surprising to see primary school and even pre-school

children using computers and mobile devices to play games, watch videos, or

listen to music online. In developed countries, earlier concerns about a ‘digital

divide’ among children due to inequalities in access to ICT have been replaced

by concerns of ways in which they use it in school to learn (Bingimlas 2009;

Webb 2005; Kerawalla and Crook 2002). However, school and home settings

are constituted of different ecologies with different cultures (Stevenson 2011;

Stephen et al. 2008), it is too soon to judge that one is inferior to the other and

to assume that children should use ICT at home in a similar way as they use it

in school.
Given the importance of ICT use at home, this study adopts an exploratory

approach to investigate how primary school students in China use Internet at

home and the individual and contextual factors that influence their online

activities. School and home Internet use would not be compared as there is

evidence that responses of students to using the Internet for lessons at school

is becoming well established (Pelgrum 2008; Hayes 2007; Becta 2002). Policy

makers, educators, and researchers have a more pressing need to better

understand how and why students use the Internet outside school in order to

bridge the gap between school and home learning environments and to

leverage opportunities for inspiring students to learn in both settings.

Background

Using the Internet in non-school contexts

While earlier studies have shown that differences in the availability and use of

ICT in schools are correlated with inequalities in family socio-economic status

(SES), these differences have been narrowed down as ICT becomes less

expensive and more popular in daily life. However, as concerns over an

impending digital divide have waned, concerns over an emerging learning

divide, i.e., differences in how children use ICT and new media to learn, have

grown (OECD 2012). Given that how students use ICT in school is largely

determined by their teachers, the types of media students use, and how and
why they use them are to a certain extent predictable. Consequently, sources

of this divide may be found in non-school settings.

Compared with the many studies focussing on how students use ICT in school

settings, significantly fewer have focused on their use of ICT in non-school

settings and most of these have focused on how students should use ICT and

media at home (Rideout et al. 2010; Roberts et al. 2005). However, large

variations have been found in how students use ICT outside school due to

different kinds of factors. A number of individual factors, e.g., age, gender, and

academic performance, and context factors, e.g., SES has been intensively

investigated. Although a great deal of efforts has been directed to supporting

Internet use of students at home, primary school students have received much

less attention than their older counterparts. It could be assumed that the use

of the Internet is less popular among younger children. This has been found to

be the case in developed countries, such as the UK (Selwyn et al. 2009).

Factors related to students’ Internet use

Individual factors

Most relevant studies have reported gender differences in Internet use. Many

have identified a gender gap in computer use with boys generally spending

more time on computers than girls. Due to this, boys have been found to have
stronger computer skills and to be more motivated to get involved in

computer-related activities than girls (Losh 2004; OECD 2007; Rideout et

al. 2010). Further, boys and girls have been found to engage in different types

of online activities. Boys spend more time playing computer games and

watching online videos (Luckin et al. 2008; Rideout et al. 2010; Roberts et

al. 2005), while girls spend more time participating in online social networks.

Rideout et al. (2010) found that 95 % of teenage girls participated several

times a week in at least one online communication activity compared to 84 %

of teenage boys. Gender difference in online activities tends to increase among

older teenagers (15–18 years) as opposed to their younger counterparts (9–

14 years) (Lenhart et al. 2007). Despite the differences found in most studies,

some studies report little or no gender differences in the online activities of

boys and girls (Broos 2006; Livingstone and Bober 2004).

Age is the other factor influencing the online activities of students. Studies in
the US and Europe have generally found that younger students (9–12 years)

and older students (15–18 years) have different patterns of Internet use. Older

students tend to spend more time on the Internet, and to engage in more types

of online activities such as, watching video clips, chatting on Instant Message,

or browsing news items than their younger counterparts (Lenhart et al. 2007;

OECD 2012; Rideout et al. 2010; Roberts et al. 2005; Steeves 2005).

Especially, online communication activities (e.g., visiting social network sites

and chatting on Instant Message) have become more obviously popular as

students enter adolescence (Livingstone et al. 2010).

Academic performance has always been a focal point of ICT studies

as there has always been a concern that the more time students spend engaged

in non-school related online activities, the less time they will have for study.

This will in turn have a negative impact on their academic performance. The

Kaiser Family Foundation has confirmed these concerns by reporting a

negative relationship between non-school Internet use and academic

performance: heavy computer users generally have lower grades and lower

levels of confidence (Rideout et al. 2010; Roberts et al. 2005). Wainer et al.

(2008) found that this negative relationship was more evident among younger

students (9–13 years) than among older ones (15–17 years. However, some

studies report a positive relationship between ICT use and specific skills

(O’Hara 2008; Subrahmanyam et al. 2000). Inconsistent findings concerning

correlations between Internet use and academic performance could be due to

different types of Internet use. Thus, to get a better understanding of Internet

use and academic performance it would be useful to categorize online

activities and examine relationships among those that are more relevant to

academic performance.
Context factors

The context factors examined in this study include family social-

economic status (SES; including family income and parental education) and

offline home activities such as watching TV, reading books, and

communicating with other family members.

Family income is assumed to be related to home Internet access.

Livingstone and Bober (2004) found that 88 % of middle class children had

home Internet access, while only 61 % of working class children did. However,

as ICT devices have become more affordable, this gap has narrowed. OECD

(2012) reported that in Europe more than 95 % of teenagers have at least one

Internet-connected device at home. While Internet access is no longer an issue

for most people, one study (Wainer et al. 2008) found that in Brazil, low-SES

children spent more time on the Internet than high-SES children. One

explanation could be that families with lower income cannot afford the cost of

their children participating in other extracurricular activities and thus the

Internet is a feasible alternative.

Level of family education has also been found to be related to children’s

Internet use (Zhao 2009). Broos (2006) found that mothers’ level of education

was significantly related to the types of online activities (e.g., learning and
social networking) of their adolescent daughters. Lenhart et al. (2007)

reported that children from high-SES and well-educated families were more

likely to try new Internet activities, such as downloading podcasts or

contributing to video sharing sites.

It is generally believed that new and traditional media are in competition.

When TV was introduced, parents and educators were worried that students

would spend less time reading. Similar concerns were expressed when the

Internet was introduced. Ten years ago, students spent more time watching

TV than they did online (Livingstone and Bober 2004). Recent studies show

that students spend more time on the Internet than watching TV (Lenhart et

al. 2007; Rideout et al. 2010). However, this does not necessarily mean that

teenagers will spend the time they used to spend watching TV surfing the

Internet. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, heavy Internet users

reported that they spent the same amount of time watching TV as light

Internet users (Rideout et al. 2010; Roberts et al. 2005). Similarly, it was

thought that children would spend less time reading print material as they

spent more time surfing the Internet. However, it has been found that heavy

and light Internet users spend the same amount of time reading print material

(Rideout et al. 2010).
A paradox of social-connected isolation exists for students using Internet

(OECD 2008). The Internet has often been characterized as a “devil” that

drives individuals to spend most of their time away from family and friends

(Bargh and McKenna 2004). As ICT devices and Internet access become more

popular among teenagers, concerns are growing that they may spend less time

in face-to-face communication with family and friends. However, it has also

been reported that as more students share videos or pictures on the new social

media or communicate on social networks, they are opening new channels of

communication with friends and people they do not know (OECD 2008).

Previous studies have provided valuable information on the influence of

computer and Internet use on three types of activities: watching TV, reading

books, and communicating with family and friends. However, the correlation

between Internet use and the three types of activities has not been thoroughly

explored. If Internet use does not necessarily displace these activities, may it

merge with or stimulate them? Similar questions remain to be answered.

Young children and Internet in China

Since the beginning of the 21st century, ICT has achieved great progress in

primary and secondary schools in China (Wang et al. 2005). Recently, China

has identified the development of ICT in education as a major goal in its

2010–2020 plan for educational reform and development (Ministry of

Education of China 2012). China’s ICT policy is transforming its schools into

digital campuses and ICT is being integrated into more and more classes.

More Chinese students are integrating ICT and Internet into both their formal

learning at school and their informal learning at home (Center of Preventing

Youth Internet Addiction 2013). With the spread of ICT to everyday life,

children are learning how to use the Internet at an earlier age. According to a

2011 national survey (Centre of Young Pioneers of China 2011), 82 % of

Chinese families with 10- to 17-year-old children had Internet access and

87.5 % of Chinese families with younger children had Internet access.

Students rated social interaction and entertainment as their primary reasons

for going online, but they also said that the Internet made learning easier.

Comparing this data with data from the US and Europe (Lenhart et al. 2007;

Luckin et al. 2008), it could be seen that the Internet access gap between

Chinese children and children from developed countries has narrowed

significantly. However, there is little research investigating how Chinese

children use the Internet at home and what factors impact their home online

activities.

Research questions

This study investigates a number of individual and contextual factors that

influence Internet use by primary school students at home. Thus, it is

concerned with how these individual and context factors relate to students’

different online activities at home. The study poses two questions:

1. (1)

Whether and how individual and context factors are related to students’

online learning activities at home?

2. (2)

Whether and how individual and context factors are related to students’

online entertainment activities at home?

Methods

Participants

One public school in a medium-sized city in eastern China was selected as the

sample for this study. More than 56 % cities in China are medium sized

(Editorial committee of annual report on development of small- and medium-

sized cities in China 2010), so students from such a city are comparatively

more representative of children receiving education in urban areas than their

counterparts living in big or small cities. The selected school ranks among the

best primary schools in the city’s local ranking system. Surveys were sent to all
students in grades 3 through 6. 846 students (response rate 95.7 %)

responded to the surveys.

Survey design

We investigated how young students used Internet at home based on three

Individual factors: Grade, Gender, and Academic Scores (average scores in

mathematics and Chinese from the last semester), Offline Activities (including

time on reading, watching TV, and communicating with family members), and

context factors: SES (including parental education and family income).

As the lines between using different types of media/technology blur, it is

becoming more complicated to differentiate, count, and categorize types of

media used (e.g., students watch TV programs on mobile phones rather than

on TV). Thus, it is difficult to clearly describe what students do by specifying

the devices they use. Consequently, we categorized what they used Internet

for, such as looking for information, reading news, watching videos, no matter

what device they used e.g., computer, mobile phone, or tablet. The survey

consisted of seven items which are divided into two categories, one about

using the Internet for learning and the other about using the Internet for

social and entertainment purposes (See Appendix 1 for the Survey).

The seven items were designed with four point Likert-scale formats in which

never, occasionally, sometimes, and often were assigned to 0, 1, 2, and 3,

respectively. Exploratory factor analysis indicates all items have high loadings

on the two factors (Table 1). Confirmatory factor analysis was run to test if the

two-category model is fit: CFI is .97 and RMSEA is .045, which prove good

model fit. The Cronbach alpha for the Learning and Entertainment subscale

are 0.56 and 0.76, respectively.

Table 1 Exploratory factor analysis on the seven items on using

Internet at home

Full size table

Data sources and data analysis

Two types of data were collected for data analysis: (1) Exam scores

(mathematics and Chinese scores) from the previous semester and (2) Survey

data including individual and context factors, and items on how students use

Internet. Students were asked to answer the survey items together with their

parents. Since exam items differed for different grades, raw scores were

transformed into standardized Z scores. Averages were calculated on

mathematics and Chinese scores to represent the academic performance of

students. For survey items, averages were calculated on the items in two

categories each and transformed into two new variables: Using Internet for

learning and Using Internet for Entertainment.

Independent variables are context factors and individual factors. Context

factors included education levels of father and mother, and family income.

Individual factors included gender, grade, academic performance, and time

spent reading books, watching TV, and communicating with parents.

Hierarchical multiple regression was used to examine the relationship

between context and individual factors with two dependent variables,

respectively: using Internet for learning and using Internet for entertainment.

The context factors were entered into the regression model in the first step

and the individual factors were entered in the second step. The purpose is to

differentiate the prediction of the two types of factors.

Results

Descriptive analysis

Data from 846 students were collected and 36 of them were excluded from

analysis due to missing major information in the survey. Among all students,

40.3 % were girls and 59.7 % were boys.

Table 2 gives a descriptive summary of all survey items. It can be seen that the

average family annual income of most students is between RMB 20,000 and

RMB 50,000 (Mean = 2.52). The fathers and mothers of most students had

high school degrees [Mean (father) = 3.13, Mean (mother) = 2.87]. With

respect to traditional activities at home, most students invested about the

same amount of time in reading (Mean = 2.58) and communicating with

parents (Mean = 2.50), but relatively less time on watching TV (Mean = 1.69).

For activities relevant to Internet use, students generally reported that they

used Internet more frequently for learning (Mean = 1.63) than for

entertainment (Mean = 1.22). They used networks more often to seek

information (Mean = 2.07) relevant to learning than to other online activities.

Students reported that they rarely visited social network communities

(Mean = 0.68). There were no significant differences in network engagement

for other purposes. Table 3 shows the correlations among major variables.

Using Internet for learning and entertainment has significant positive

correlation (r = .19, p < .01).

Table 2 Descriptive analysis on the items in the survey

Full size table

Table 3 Zero-order correlations among major variables (N = 849)

 Full size table

Multiple regression

Multiple regression analyses were run to examine the impact of independent

variables on the two dependent variables—using Internet for learning and

using internet for entertainment, respectively.

In the regression model predicting Using internet for learning, all

independent variables accounted for about 11 % of variance. The context

factors were significant predictors (R 2 = .027, p < .01), among which mother’s

level of education was the only significant predictor (t = 2.52, p < .01). When

students' personal information was added to the model, there was a significant

change of variance (adjusted ∆R 2 = .083, p < .001). Exam scores

(t = 2.52, p < .05), Time spent reading (t = 2.57, p < .05), Grade level

(t = 6.03, p < .001), and Time spent watching TV (t = −2.36, t < .05) were

significant predictors for Using internet for learning (Table 4).

Table 4 Multiple regression analysis in predicting Using internet

for learning

Full size table

In the regression model predicting Using internet for entertaining, all

independent variables accounted for about 28 % of variance. The context

factors were significant predictors (R 2 = .024, p < .001). Unlike the model

predicting Using internet for learning, family income (t = 3.97, p < .001) was

the significant predictor. When individual factors were added to the model,

family income factor remained and there was a significant change of variance

(adjusted ∆R 2 = .258, p < .001). Time spent watching TV (t = 5.39, p < .001),

Grade level (t = 11.27, p < .001), and Gender (t = −5.55, p < .001) were

significant predictors for Using internet for entertaining (Table 5).

Table 5 Multiple regression analysis in predicting Using Internet

for entertainment

Full size table

Discussion

This study explored the factors and patterns of factors explaining home

Internet use for learning and entertainment by primary school students in

China. Results showed that home Internet use for these two purposes was

related but there were major differences in patterns of factors predicting the

two.
Online learning and entertainment at home: connections

Both context and personal factors have a significant impact on children using

Internet for learning and entertainment though different predictors were

found to have effects on learning and entertainment. Using the Internet for

learning and entertainment is positively correlated which implies that

students who spent more time using the Internet to learn also tended to spend

more time using Internet for entertainment or vice versa. This finding goes

against the assumption that using Internet for learning and for entertainment

competes with each other (Eynon and Malmberg 2011; Lee et al. 2005). It

suggests that there might be a synergy between online learning and

entertainment in informal contexts. More studies are needed to examine the

connections between using Internet for learning and entertainment in

informal context.

Age has been found to be a significant factor for both online learning and

online entertainment. The finding that older students spend more time

learning online is consistent with earlier studies on the effect of age but with

details on how such change happens among primary school students (Lenhart

et al. 2007; OECD 2012; Ofcom 2007). This positive correlation implies that

students might be asked to use more media or the Internet to look for

information or to communicate with classmates for school work as they move

to a higher grade; or their increased information literacy skills gained with age

enable them to use Internet to learn. Age is also the most significant factor in

the entertainment model. Older students engage in more social interaction

and entertainment activities. This is also consistent with most western survey

findings on the effect of age (Lenhart et al. 2007; OECD 2012). Comparatively,

age showed larger effects on entertainment than on learning. As students age,

they will have more accessibility, motivation, and skills that enable them to

socialize online. However, learning online seems to be only affected by age at a

moderate level and this effect might be limited to the nature of school tasks.

Thus, instructional design might want to borrow ideas from online

entertainment, to motivate students and amplify the impact of learning.

Online learning and entertainment at home: different patterns

The two regression models are different in the other predictors except for age.

In the model that explains how children use Internet for learning, five

significant predictors accounted for 11 % variance: the older students are

(discussed earlier), the better their academic performance; the more time they

spend on reading print material and the higher their mothers’ education level,

the more time they would invest in online learning; more time they put on TV,

less time they invest on online learning.

1. (1)
 Time spent reading on print media and students’ academic

performances are found to be positively related to using networks for

learning. Considering that students’ academic performances are also

positively correlated with time spent on print media (see Table 3), the

possible explanation could be that students who performed

academically better are more likely to develop the reading habit, and

they tend to extend the learning behavior (e.g., reading books) to

network use. The positive correlation between students’ academic

performance and time spent on print media was also identified by some

literature (Rideout et al. 2010; Roberts et al. 2005). As for the reason

why this correlation is limited to print media, it could be that media for

knowledge acquisition in schools largely remains print, especially in

developing countries.

2. (2)

Mothers’ education level is also found to be positively related to

students’ network use for learning, while fathers’ is not. This result is

consistent with most studies on parents’ education in which mothers

play a more important role in children’s education than fathers

(Beller 2009; Johnston et al. 2005; Korupp et al. 2002).

 3. (3)

Time on TV is negatively correlated with online learning. The more time

students watch TV, the less time they spend on learning online. Thus,

watching TV is a competitor for students using Internet for learning.

In the regression model (Table 5) explaining using Internet for entertaining,

four significant predictors account for 28 % of variance, which makes the

model stronger than the one explaining using internet for learning. Except for

the age effect, the other three factors in using Internet for entertainment

model are different from the factors in using internet for learning model:

gender, time spent on TV, and family income. Time spent on TV and family

income is positively related with using Internet for entertainment.

1. (1)

The finding that children from families with higher income spend more

time online for entertainment is consistent with findings in the

literature (Livingstone and Bober 2004; OECD 2012). Families with

higher income could afford their children more devices with Internet

access, and these children are more likely to have their own computers,

laptops, or mobile phones, which allow them more time to explore or

relax online.
2. (2)

It is interesting to note that watching TV plays opposite roles in the two

regression models. The more time students spend watching TV, the less

inclined they are to using Internet for learning, but more possible for

entertainment. Consistent with previous studies on the role of TV

(Ofcom 2007; Rideout et al. 2010), this finding provides a new

perspective on the role of the Internet and TV. TV is mainly an

entertainment medium, while the Internet plays a more complex role

even in the lives of primary school students: they go online not only for

entertainment, but also for social interaction and learning.

3. (3)

Gender is found to have a significant effect on using the Internet for

entertainment. Boys use the Internet more intensively than girls for

entertainment purposes. When the types of online activities are checked,

boys are found to engage in all four types of entertainment activities,

including consuming multimedia, playing games, chatting online, and

visiting SNS. This finding is similar to the finding of Hasebrink and his

colleagues (Hasebrink et al. 2011) in the UK, but goes against some

previous studies (Lenhart et al. 2007; Livingstone et al. 2010;

 OECD 2012) in which gender was found to have little influence on

teenagers’ Internet use.

4. (4)

Different from prior studies in US or Europe, parents’ education does

not have a significant effect on children’s use of Internet for

entertainment. This might be explained by the culture factor. Educated

Chinese parents might focus on guiding their children to be more

involved in learning activities, but somewhat neglect children’s social or

entertainment activities.

Although online learning and entertainment are correlated, they are predicted

by different factors. Understanding what these factors are and how they are

related with online learning and entertainment at home is of great value. For

instance, academic performance and reading are found to be related with

online learning but not to online entertainment, which implies that online

learning might be an extension of offline learning, and online entertainment

might not be blamed for children’s poor academic performance.

Prior concerns about a digital divide (Livingstone and Bober 2004) caused by

inequalities in SES, have more recently been replaced by concerns about a

learning divide (Hasebrink et al. 2011; OECD 2012). This study found that

family income has no impact on using Internet for learning, while parents’

education does. However, family income has an impact on using the Internet

for entertainment, while parental education does not. This difference implies

that using the Internet at home involves different activities which should be

scrutinized as they are predicted by different factors. Parents’ education can

teach children how to use the Internet for learning but not enough to guide

them for socialization and entertainment. On the other hand, family income

might ensure children access facilities for entertainment but not be helpful for

learning.

TV time has been a major factor in most studies of the relationship between

old and new media, but findings of these studies vary: some found that new

media displaced the time of old ones (Subrahmanyam et al. 2000;

Marketingcharts 2013), and some suggested that there is a combination effect

between the two kinds of media (Ofcom 2007; Rideout et al. 2010). In our

study, by differentiating the purpose of using Internet, we identified different

relationships of the two activities with TV time. Using the Internet for learning

competed with watching TV, while using Internet for entertaining has

combination effect with watching TV. In recent years, as the boundary

between old and new media blurs (Rideout et al. 2010; Subrahmanyam et

al. 2000), more and more people are choosing watching videos or reading
online, we might need new perspectives to interpret the relationship of new

and old media.

It has been a concern that children might have less time for communicating

with their parents as they spend more time online (OECD 2008). In this study,

we did not find such a correlation, either in online learning or online

entertainment.

Using Internet at home and at school: understanding and building

connections

Although our study focuses on using the Internet at home, it was stimulated

by studies comparing ICT use at school and at home (Grant 2011; Jewitt and

Parashar 2011; Selwyn et al. 2009; Stevenson 2011; Kent and Facer 2004). We

would also like to see whether our findings have implications for teaching and

learning with ICT in school settings. For a long time, it has been assumed that

use of ICT in the home should replicate or extend its use in school settings

(Kerawalla and Crook 2002). However, most studies have identified

discrepancies between school and home ICT use. Some researchers have

thought that this might be due to inequalities in Internet access and thus, have

implemented programs to reduce such differences so as to improve students'

access and use ICT at home with the hope to improve their learning and
motivation in general (Jewitt and Parashar 2011). However, some studies have

also revealed cultural differences between home and school use of ICT and the

tension between the expected and actual ICT use among students

(Stevenson 2011). This urges us to take a practical perspective or bottom-up

method to study ICT use in the home, e.g., ICT use is multifaceted and

determined by multiple factors, rather than take a confirmatory perspective

that home ICT should be guided for learning or toward school-like activities.

Formal and informal learning are used to characterize the learning that

usually happens in and out of school. When it refers to learning with ICT, it is

difficult to differentiate between “formal” and “informal” as students might

gain more experience in learning with ICT out of school context. Thus, to

reinforce the disconnection between school and home ICT use or to

overemphasize the model of school ICT use might create difficulty for

communication between the two settings. Although students might spend

much time using Internet for entertainment purposes, their report on the

preference of specific tools (e.g., SNS) should be taken seriously by schools as

what should be counted as effective use of technology for learning (Jewitt and

Parashar 2011).

Limitations
All the sample students come from the same school due to resource limits of

this study. Therefore, whether the findings could be generalized to a broader

context needs further examination in future studies. Stratified sampling on a

larger scale could be adopted in the future study (i.e., sampling from different

schools in different cities).

Survey is the only tool used in this study to explore how students use Internet

for learning and entertainment at home. The level of realism may be

negatively affected since participants are studied outside of the context where

they use Internet. Ethnographical research or field study could be employed to

zoom into the students’ online activities at home to explain the findings from

current study.

Conclusions

Application of educational ICT in China is still in its early stage. Since 2000,

the Chinese government has invested billions of dollars in setting up basic ICT

infrastructures, using ICT to improve teaching and learning and in reducing

inequalities between urban and rural schools. However, in light of the

immense amount of time, money, and efforts that western countries have been

investing in the ICT in education, China has a lot of catching up to do.

According to the data collected in this survey, inequalities of Internet access,

at least in urban areas of China, is no longer a big problem. This implies that

educational policy makers should shift their focus from basic ICT

infrastructures' construction to the emerging learning divide.

The empirical data presented in this paper brings out the possibility that

students’ ICT use in informal contexts is an important contributor to the

emerging learning divide, which necessitates further research in students’

home ICT use in China. To connect to home learning and improve school

learning efficiency, schools need to understand students’ own preference and

online activities.

The data also reveals that online entertainment is not necessarily a negative

factor in improving students’ learning. The boundary between online learning

and entertainment is getting blurry, and it should be taken seriously whether

borrowing elements in students’ favored online entertainment would improve

their learning efficiency. This field needs more research in future.

Besides, this study also leads to the understanding that in solving the learning

divide problem, some factors should be given more attention than others.

Family SES plays an important role in students’ online activities.

Comparatively, parents’ education has a more significant influence in

students’ online learning, which indicates that further research focusing

specifically on parents’ education and students’ online activities is needed.

More exploration in improving students’ online learning by educating parents

is one of the future research directions.

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Download references

Author information

Affiliations

1. Faculty of Education, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam

Road, Pokfulam, Hong Kong

Jingyan Lu

2. Learning, Design and Technology, The University of Georgia,

Room 110, 850 College Station Road River Crossing, Athens,

GA, 30605, USA

Qiang Hao

Corresponding author
Correspondence to Jingyan Lu.

Appendix 1

Survey on primary school students’ Internet use activities (translated from

Chinese)

1. 1.

What is your gender?

1. A.

Male

2. B.

Female

2. 2.

Which grade are you in?

3. 3.
 What is your father’s education level?

1. A.

Primary school

2. B.

Middle school

3. C.

High school or equivalent

4. D.

Minor bachelor degree

4. F.

Master degree or above

5. E.

Bachelor degree

6. 4.
 What is your mother’s education level?

1. A.

Primary school

2. B.

Middle school

3. C.

High school or equivalent

4. D.

Minor bachelor degree

5. E.

Bachelor degree

6. F.

Master degree or above

7. 5.
 What is the average annual family income?

1. A.

Less than 20,000 RMB

2. B.

Between 20,000 and 50,000 RMB

3. C.

Between 50,000 and 100,000 RMB

4. D.

Between 100,000 and 200,000 RMB

5. E.

Between 200,000 and 500,000 RMB

6. F.

More than 500,000 RMB

8. 6.
 How much time do you spend on watching TV per day?

1. A.

About 30 min

2. B.

About 1 h

3. C.

About 2 h

4. D.

About 3 h

9. 7.

How much time do you spend on communication with your families?

1. A.

Less than 10 min

2. B.
 About 30 min

3. C.

About 1 h

4. D.

About 2 h

5. E.

About 3 h

10.8.

The following questions are about your Internet use behavior at home

(using mobile devices are also considered). Please choose among the

four options for each question:

1. A.

Often

2. B.

Sometimes
3. C.

Occasionally

4. D.

Never

1. (1)

Do you discuss with your classmates on doing homework, or

other things related to learning online?

2. (2)

Do you use Internet to do your homework?

3. (3)

Do you search for information or material related to

learning online?

4. (4)
 Do you listen to music, watch movie, or view pictures online

(Downloading music, movie, and pictures is also

considered)?

5. (5)

Do you play games online?

6. (6)

Do you chat with friends online?

7. (7)

Do you visit social network sites (e.g., Sina Microblog)?

Strengths and Weaknesses of Online

Learning

All educators approach this new paradigm with varying degrees of

enthusiasm and concern. Are you optimistic or skeptical about Online

Learning? Are you interested in knowing how delivering courses online can

improve your teaching and offer unprecedented learning opportunities for

your students, or do you want to know what you will be up against as you

plan and deliver your classes online? It is important to consider both the

pros and cons of online learning so you can be better prepared to face the

challenge of working in this new environment as well as embrace the new

opportunities that it has to offer. Strengths or Weaknesses? You choose

which link to follow first, but please look at both – it’s only fair!

Strengths

Weaknesses

Strengths of Online Learning

There are many reasons why online programs have become a popular form

of distance learning in higher education today. The online environment

offers unprecedented opportunities for people who would otherwise have

limited access to education, as well as a new paradigm for educators in

which dynamic courses of the highest quality can be developed. Here is a

list of some of the major benefits of online programs:

Anywhere…

The main advantage of asynchronous online learning is that it allows

students to participate in high quality learning situations when distance and

schedule make on-ground learning difficult-to-impossible. Students can

participate in classes from anywhere in the world, provided they have a

computer and Internet connection. In addition, the online format allows

physically challenged students (and teachers) more freedom to participate

in class. Participants access the Virtual Classroom through their computers

instead of having to “go to class” physically.

Anytime, Any Pace…

The Virtual Classroom is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Time efficiency is another strength brought by the online learning format.

Asynchronous communication through online conferencing programs

allows the professional juggling work, family, and study schedules to

participate in class discussions. There is no question about doing the work;

just do it at the times that are more convenient. Students can access their

courses at any time of day or night. Further, they have continuous access

to lectures, course materials, and class discussions. This is particularly

convenient for those who may need to reread a lecture or take more time to

reflect on some material before moving on.

Synergy

The online format allows a dynamic interaction between the instructor and

students and among the students themselves. Resources and ideas are

shared, and continuous synergy will be generated through the learning

process. Each individual can contribute to the course discussions and

comments on the work of others. The synergy that exists in the student-

centered Virtual Classroom is one of the most unique and vital traits that

the online learning format possesses.

High Quality Dialog

Within an online asynchronous discussion structure, the learner may reflect

on comments from others before responding or moving on to the next item.

This structure allows students time to articulate responses with much more

depth and forethought than in a traditional face-to-face discussion situation

where the participant must analyze the comment of another on the spot

and formulate a response or otherwise lose the chance to contribute to the

discussion.
Student Centered

Within an online discussion, the individual student responds to the course

material (lectures and course books, for example) and to comments from

other students. Students usually respond to those topics within the broader

conversation that most clearly speak to their individual concerns. These

situations result in smaller conversations taking place simultaneously within

the group. While students should read all of their classmates’ contributions,

they actively engage in only those parts of the dialog most relevant to their

own interests. In this way, students control their own learning experience

and tailor the class discussions to meet their own specific needs. Ideally,

students make their own individual contributions to the course while at the

same time taking away a unique mix of relevant information.

Level Playing Field

In the online environment, learners have a certain measure of anonymity.

Discriminating factors such as age, dress, physical appearance, disabilities,

race, and gender are largely absent. Instead, the focus of attention is

clearly on the content of the discussion and the individual’s ability to

respond and contribute thoughtfully and intelligently to the material at hand.

Access to Resources

It is easy to include distinguished guest experts or students from other

institutions in an online class. Furthermore, today’s students have access

to resources and materials that may be physically located anywhere in the

world. An instructor can compile a resource section online with links to

scholarly articles, institutions, and other materials relevant to the course

topic for students to access for research, extension, or in depth analysis of

course content material.

Creative Teaching

The literature of adult education supports the use of interactive learning

environments as contributing to self-direction and critical thinking. Some

educators have made great strides in applying these concepts to their on

ground teaching. However, many classes still exist which are based on

lectures and rote memorization of material. The nature of the semi-

autonomous and self-directed world of the Virtual Classroom makes

innovative and creative approaches to instruction even more important. In

the online environment, the facilitator and student collaborate to create a

dynamic learning experience. The realization of a shift in technology

creates the hope that those who move into the new technology will also
leave behind bad habits as they adopt this new paradigm of teaching. As

educators transform their courses to take full advantage of the online

format, they must reflect on their course objectives and teaching styles.

Many of the qualities that make a successful online facilitator are also

tremendously effective in the traditional classroom.

Weaknesses of Online Learning

While online programs have significant strengths and offer unprecedented

accessibility to quality education, there are weaknesses inherent in the use

of this medium that can pose potential threats to the success of any online

program. These problems fall into six main categories:

1. Technology

Equity and Accessibility to Technology

Before any online program can hope to succeed, it must have students who

are able to access the online learning environment. Lack of access,

whether it be for economic or logistic reasons, will exclude otherwise

eligible students from the course. This is a significant issue in rural and

lower socioeconomic neighborhoods. Furthermore, speaking from an

administrative point of view, if students cannot afford the technology the

institution employs, they are lost as customers. As far as Internet

accessibility is concerned, it is not universal, and in some areas of the

United States and other countries, Internet access poses a significant cost

to the user. Some users pay a fixed monthly rate for their Internet

connection, while others are charged for the time they spend online. If the

participants’ time online is limited by the amount of Internet access they

can afford, then instruction and participation in the online program will not

be equitable for all students in the course.

Computer Literacy

Both students and facilitators must possess a minimum level of computer

knowledge in order to function successfully in an online environment. For

example, they must be able to use a variety of search engines and be

comfortable navigating on the World Wide Web, as well as be familiar with

Newsgroups, FTP procedures, and email. If they do not possess these

technology tools, they will not succeed in an online program; a student or

faculty member who cannot function on the system will drag the entire

program down.

Limitations of Technology

User friendly and reliable technology is critical to a successful online

program. However, even the most sophisticated technology is not 100%

reliable. Unfortunately, it is not a question of if the equipment used in an

online program will fail, but when. When everything is running smoothly,

technology is intended to be low profile and is used as a tool in the learning

process. However, breakdowns can occur at any point along the system.

For example, the server which hosts the program could crash and cut all

participants off from the class; a participant may access the class through a

networked computer which could go down; individual PCs can have

numerous problems which could limit students’ access; finally, the Internet

connection could fail, or the institution hosting the connection could

become bogged down with users and either slow down or fail altogether. In

situations like these, the technology is neither seamless nor reliable, and it

can detract from the learning experience.

2. The Students

While an online method of education can be a highly effective alternative

medium of education for the mature, self-disciplined student, it is an

inappropriate learning environment for more dependent learners. Online

asynchronous education gives students control over their learning

experience and allows for flexibility of study schedules for non traditional

students; however, this places a greater responsibility on the student. In

order to successfully participate in an online program, students must be

well organized, self-motivated, and possess a high degree of time

management skills in order to keep up with the pace of the course. For

these reasons, online education is not appropriate for younger students

(i.e. elementary or secondary school age) and other students who are

dependent learners and have difficulty assuming responsibilities required

by the online paradigm.

3. The Facilitator
Lack of Essential Online Qualities

Successful on-ground instruction does not always translate to successful

online instruction. If facilitators are not properly trained in online delivery

and methodologies, the success of the online program will be

compromised. An instructor must be able to communicate well in writing

and in the language in which the course is offered. An online program will

be weakened if its facilitators are not adequately prepared to function in the

Virtual Classroom.

An online instructor must be able to compensate for lack of physical

presence by creating a supportive environment in the Virtual Classroom

where all students feel comfortable participating and especially where

students know that their instructor is accessible. Failure to do this can

alienate the class both from each other and from the instructor. However,

even if a virtual professor is competent enough to create a comfortable

virtual environment in which the class can operate, still the lack of physical

presence at an institution can be a limitation for an online program. For the

faculty as well as the participants, such things as being left out of meetings

and other events that require on-site interaction could present a limiting

factor in an online program.

4. The Administration and Faculty

Some environments are disruptive to the successful implementation of an

online program. Administrators and/or faculty members who are

uncomfortable with change and working with technology, or feel that online

programs cannot offer quality education, often inhibit the process of

implementation. These people represent a considerable weakness in an

online program because they can inhibit its success.

Sometimes administration cannot see beyond the bottom line and look at

online programs only as ways to increase revenues and are thus not

committed to seeing online programs as a means of providing quality

education to people who would otherwise not be able to access it. In such a

case, an institution that is not aware of the importance of proper facilitator

training, essential facilitator characteristics, and limitations of class size

would not understand the impact that these elements can have on the

success of an online program.

5. The Online Environment

Levels of Synergy

Online learning has its most promising potential in the high synergy

represented by active dialog among the participants, one of the most

important sources of learning in a Virtual Classroom. However, in larger

classes (20 or more students), the synergy level starts to shift on the

learning continuum until it eventually becomes independent study to

accommodate the large class. At this point, dialog is limited as well as

interaction among participants and the facilitator. The medium is not being

used to its greatest potential.

What Should Not Be Taught Online

Even with recently generated excitement and enthusiasm for online

programs, it is important to recognize that some subjects should not be

taught online because the electronic medium does not permit the best

method on instruction. Examples include: hands-on subjects such as public

speaking, surgery, dental hygiene, and sports where physical movement

and practice contribute to the achievement of the learning objectives.

These subjects are probably best taught in a face-to-face traditional

learning environment. Hybrid courses may represent a temporary solution

to this problem, thus making that portion of the course more accessible to a
greater number of people who would otherwise have difficulty getting to

campus. However, solutions of that sort still underline the fact that online

teaching cannot satisfy all educational needs and goals. Just because it

may be technologically possible to simulate a physical learning experience,

this does not necessarily mean that it is the best way to teach it.

6. The Curriculum

The curriculum of any online program must be carefully considered and

developed in order to be successful. Many times, in an institution’s haste to

develop distance education programs, the importance of the curriculum and

the need for qualified professionals to develop it are overlooked.

Curriculum and teaching methodology that are successful in on-ground

instruction will not always translate to a successful online program where

learning and instructional paradigms are quite different. Online curriculum

must reflect the use of dialog among students (in the form of written

communication) and group interaction and participation. Traditional

classroom lectures have no place in a successful online program.

Education of the highest quality can and will occur in an online program
provided that the curriculum has been developed or converted to meet the

needs of the online medium.

Today is a very exciting time for technology and education. Online

programs offer technology-based instructional environments that expand

learning opportunities and can provide top quality education through a

variety of formats and modalities. With the special needs of adult learners

who need or want to continue their education, online programs offer a

convenient solution to conflicts with work, family, and study schedules.

Institutions of higher education have found that online programs are

essential in providing access to education for the populations they wish to

serve. In order for an online program to be successful, the curriculum, the

facilitator, the technology, and the students must be carefully considered

and balanced in order to take full advantage of the strengths of this format

and at the same time avoid pitfalls that could result from its weaknesses.

The COVID-19 has resulted in schools shut all across the world. Globally, over 1.2 billion children are out

of the classroom.

As a result, education has changed dramatically, with the distinctive rise of e-learning, whereby teaching

is undertaken remotely and on digital platforms.

Research suggests that online learning has been shown to increase retention of information, and take

less time, meaning the changes coronavirus have caused might be here to stay.

While countries are at different points in their COVID-19 infection rates, worldwide there are currently

more than 1.2 billion children in 186 countries affected by school closures due to the pandemic. In

Denmark, children up to the age of 11 are returning to nurseries and schools after initially closing on 12

March, but in South Korea students are responding to roll calls from their teachers online.

With this sudden shift away from the classroom in many parts of the globe, some are wondering

whether the adoption of online learning will continue to persist post-pandemic, and how such a shift

would impact the worldwide education market.

Even before COVID-19, there was already high growth and adoption in education technology, with global

edtech investments reaching US$18.66 billion in 2019 and the overall market for online education

projected to reach $350 Billion by 2025. Whether it is language apps, virtual tutoring, video

conferencing tools, or online learning software, there has been a significant surge in usage since COVID-

19.

How is the education sector responding to COVID-19?

In response to significant demand, many online learning platforms are offering free access to their

services, including platforms like BYJU’S, a Bangalore-based educational technology and online tutoring

firm founded in 2011, which is now the world’s most highly valued edtech company. Since announcing

free live classes on its Think and Learn app, BYJU’s has seen a 200% increase in the number of new

students using its product, according to Mrinal Mohit, the company's Chief Operating Officer.

Tencent classroom, meanwhile, has been used extensively since mid-February after the Chinese

government instructed a quarter of a billion full-time students to resume their studies through online

platforms. This resulted in the largest “online movement” in the history of education with approximately

730,000, or 81% of K-12 students, attending classes via the Tencent K-12 Online School in Wuhan.

Other companies are bolstering capabilities to provide a one-stop shop for teachers and students. For

example, Lark, a Singapore-based collaboration suite initially developed by ByteDance as an internal tool

to meet its own exponential growth, began offering teachers and students unlimited video conferencing

time, auto-translation capabilities, real-time co-editing of project work, and smart calendar scheduling,

amongst other features. To do so quickly and in a time of crisis, Lark ramped up its global server

infrastructure and engineering capabilities to ensure reliable connectivity.

Alibaba’s distance learning solution, DingTalk, had to prepare for a similar influx: “To support large-scale

remote work, the platform tapped Alibaba Cloud to deploy more than 100,000 new cloud servers in just

two hours last month – setting a new record for rapid capacity expansion,” according to DingTalk CEO,

Chen Hang.
Some school districts are forming unique partnerships, like the one between The Los Angeles Unified

School District and PBS SoCal/KCET to offer local educational broadcasts, with separate channels focused

on different ages, and a range of digital options. Media organizations such as the BBC are also powering

virtual learning; Bitesize Daily, launched on 20 April, is offering 14 weeks of curriculum-based learning

for kids across the UK with celebrities like Manchester City footballer Sergio Aguero teaching some of

the content.

What does this mean for the future of learning?

While some believe that the unplanned and rapid move to online learning – with no training, insufficient

bandwidth, and little preparation – will result in a poor user experience that is unconducive to sustained

growth, others believe that a new hybrid model of education will emerge, with significant benefits. “I

believe that the integration of information technology in education will be further accelerated and that

online education will eventually become an integral component of school education,“ says Wang Tao,

Vice President of Tencent Cloud and Vice President of Tencent Education.

There have already been successful transitions amongst many universities. For example, Zhejiang

University managed to get more than 5,000 courses online just two weeks into the transition using

“DingTalk ZJU”. The Imperial College London started offering a course on the science of coronavirus,

which is now the most enrolled class launched in 2020 on Coursera.

Many are already touting the benefits: Dr Amjad, a Professor at The University of Jordan who has been

using Lark to teach his students says, “It has changed the way of teaching. It enables me to reach out to

my students more efficiently and effectively through chat groups, video meetings, voting and also

document sharing, especially during this pandemic. My students also find it is easier to communicate on

Lark. I will stick to Lark even after coronavirus, I believe traditional offline learning and e-learning can go

hand by hand."

The challenges of online learning

There are, however, challenges to overcome. Some students without reliable internet access and/or

technology struggle to participate in digital learning; this gap is seen across countries and between

income brackets within countries. For example, whilst 95% of students in Switzerland, Norway, and

Austria have a computer to use for their schoolwork, only 34% in Indonesia do, according to OECD data.

In the US, there is a significant gap between those from privileged and disadvantaged backgrounds:

whilst virtually all 15-year-olds from a privileged background said they had a computer to work on,

nearly 25% of those from disadvantaged backgrounds did not. While some schools and governments

have been providing digital equipment to students in need, such as in New South Wales, Australia, many

are still concerned that the pandemic will widenthe digital divide.
Is learning online as effective?

For those who do have access to the right technology, there is evidence that learning online can be

more effective in a number of ways. Some research shows that on average, students retain 25-60%

more material when learning online compared to only 8-10% in a classroom. This is mostly due to the

students being able to learn faster online; e-learning requires 40-60% less time to learn than in a

traditional classroom setting because students can learn at their own pace, going back and re-reading,

skipping, or accelerating through concepts as they choose.

Nevertheless, the effectiveness of online learning varies amongst age groups. The general consensus on

children, especially younger ones, is that a structured environment is required, because kids are more

easily distracted. To get the full benefit of online learning, there needs to be a concerted effort to

provide this structure and go beyond replicating a physical class/lecture through video capabilities,

instead, using a range of collaboration tools and engagement methods that promote “inclusion,

personalization and intelligence”, according to Dowson Tong, Senior Executive Vice President of Tencent

and President of its Cloud and Smart Industries Group.

Since studies have shown that children extensively use their senses to learn, making learning fun and

effective through use of technology is crucial, according to BYJU's Mrinal Mohit. “Over a period, we have

observed that clever integration of games has demonstrated higher engagement and increased

motivation towards learning especially among younger students, making them truly fall in love with

learning”, he says.
A changing education imperative

It is clear that this pandemic has utterly disrupted an education system that many assert was already

losing its relevance. In his book, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, scholar Yuval Noah Harari outlines how

schools continue to focus on traditional academic skills and rote learning, rather than on skills such as

critical thinking and adaptability, which will be more important for success in the future. Could the move

to online learning be the catalyst to create a new, more effective method of educating students? While

some worry that the hasty nature of the transition online may have hindered this goal, others plan to

make e-learning part of their ‘new normal’ after experiencing the benefits first-hand.

The importance of disseminating knowledge is highlighted through COVID-19

Major world events are often an inflection point for rapid innovation – a clear example is the rise of e-

commerce post-SARS. While we have yet to see whether this will apply to e-learning post-COVID-19, it is

one of the few sectors where investment has not dried up. What has been made clear through this

pandemic is the importance of disseminating knowledge across borders, companies, and all parts of

society. If online learning technology can play a role here, it is incumbent upon all of us to explore its full

potential.
 Impact of online classes on the satisfaction

and performance of students during the

pandemic period of COVID 19

 Ram Gopal, 

 Varsha Singh & 

 Arun Aggarwal 

Education and Information Technologies (2021)Cite this article

 30k Accesses

 23 Altmetric

 Metricsdetails

Abstract

The aim of the study is to identify the factors affecting students’ satisfaction

and performance regarding online classes during the pandemic period of

COVID–19 and to establish the relationship between these variables. The

study is quantitative in nature, and the data were collected from 544

respondents through online survey who were studying the business

management (B.B.A or M.B.A) or hotel management courses in Indian

universities. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the proposed

hypotheses. The results show that four independent factors used in the study

viz. quality of instructor, course design, prompt feedback, and expectation of

students positively impact students’ satisfaction and further student’s

satisfaction positively impact students’ performance. For educational

management, these four factors are essential to have a high level of

satisfaction and performance for online courses. This study is being conducted

during the epidemic period of COVID- 19 to check the effect of online teaching

on students’ performance.

Introduction

Coronavirus is a group of viruses that is the main root of diseases like cough,

cold, sneezing, fever, and some respiratory symptoms (WHO, 2019).

Coronavirus is a contagious disease, which is spreading very fast amongst the

human beings. COVID-19 is a new sprain which was originated in Wuhan,

China, in December 2019. Coronavirus circulates in animals, but some of

these viruses can transmit between animals and humans (Perlman &

Mclntosh, 2020). As of March 282,020, according to the MoHFW, a total of

909 confirmed COVID-19 cases (862 Indians and 47 foreign nationals) had

been reported in India (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020).

Officially, no vaccine or medicine is evaluated to cure the spread of COVID-19

(Yu et al., 2020). The influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on the education

system leads to schools and colleges’ widespread closures worldwide. On

March 24, India declared a country-wide lockdown of schools and colleges

(NDTV, 2020) for preventing the transmission of the coronavirus amongst the

students (Bayham & Fenichel, 2020). School closures in response to the

COVID-19 pandemic have shed light on several issues affecting access to

education. COVID-19 is soaring due to which the huge number of children,

adults, and youths cannot attend schools and colleges (UNESCO, 2020). Lah

and Botelho (2012) contended that the effect of school closing on students’

performance is hazy.

Similarly, school closing may also affect students because of disruption of

teacher and students’ networks, leading to poor performance. Bridge (2020)

reported that schools and colleges are moving towards educational

technologies for student learning to avoid a strain during the pandemic

season. Hence, the present study’s objective is to develop and test a conceptual

model of student’s satisfaction pertaining to online teaching during COVID-19,

where both students and teachers have no other option than to use the online

platform uninterrupted learning and teaching.

UNESCO recommends distance learning programs and open educational

applications during school closure caused by COVID-19 so that schools and

teachers use to teach their pupils and bound the interruption of education.

Therefore, many institutes go for the online classes (Shehzadi et al., 2020).

As a versatile platform for learning and teaching processes, the E-learning

framework has been increasingly used (Salloum & Shaalan, 2018). E-learning

is defined as a new paradigm of online learning based on information

technology (Moore et al., 2011). In contrast to traditional learning academics,

educators, and other practitioners are eager to know how e-learning can

produce better outcomes and academic achievements. Only by analyzing

student satisfaction and their performance can the answer be sought.

Many comparative studies have been carried out to prove the point to explore

whether face-to-face or traditional teaching methods are more productive or

whether online or hybrid learning is better (Lockman & Schirmer, 2020; Pei &

Wu, 2019; González-Gómez et al., 2016; González-Gómez et al., 2016). Results

of the studies show that the students perform much better in online learning

than in traditional learning. Henriksen et al. (2020) highlighted the problems

faced by educators while shifting from offline to online mode of teaching. In

the past, several research studies had been carried out on online learning to

explore student satisfaction, acceptance of e-learning, distance learning

success factors, and learning efficiency (Sher, 2009; Lee, 2014; Yen et

al., 2018). However, scant amount of literature is available on the factors that

affect the students’ satisfaction and performance in online classes during the

pandemic of Covid-19 (Rajabalee & Santally, 2020). In the present study, the

authors proposed that course design, quality of the instructor, prompt

feedback, and students’ expectations are the four prominent determinants of

learning outcome and satisfaction of the students during online classes

(Lee, 2014).

The Course Design refers to curriculum knowledge, program organization,

instructional goals, and course structure (Wright, 2003). If well planned,

course design increasing the satisfaction of pupils with the system (Almaiah &

Alyoussef, 2019). Mtebe and Raisamo (2014) proposed that effective course

design will help in improving the performance through learners knowledge

and skills (Khan & Yildiz, 2020; Mohammed et al., 2020). However, if the

course is not designed effectively then it might lead to low usage of e-learning

platforms by the teachers and students (Almaiah & Almulhem, 2018). On the

other hand, if the course is designed effectively then it will lead to higher

acceptance of e-learning system by the students and their performance also

increases (Mtebe & Raisamo, 2014). Hence, to prepare these courses for

online learning, many instructors who are teaching blended courses for the
first time are likely to require a complete overhaul of their courses

(Bersin, 2004; Ho et al., 2006).

The second-factor, Instructor Quality, plays an essential role in affecting the

students’ satisfaction in online classes. Instructor quality refers to a

professional who understands the students’ educational needs, has unique

teaching skills, and understands how to meet the students’ learning needs

(Luekens et al., 2004). Marsh (1987) developed five instruments for

measuring the instructor’s quality, in which the main method was Students’

Evaluation of Educational Quality (SEEQ), which delineated the instructor’s

quality. SEEQ is considered one of the methods most commonly used and

embraced unanimously (Grammatikopoulos et al., 2014). SEEQ was a very

useful method of feedback by students to measure the instructor’s quality

(Marsh, 1987).

The third factor that improves the student’s satisfaction level is prompt

feedback (Kinicki et al., 2004). Feedback is defined as information given by

lecturers and tutors about the performance of students. Within this context,

feedback is a “consequence of performance” (Hattie & Timperley, 2007, p. 81).

In education, “prompt feedback can be described as knowing what you know

and what you do not related to learning” (Simsek et al., 2017, p.334).

Christensen (2014) studied linking feedback to performance and introduced

the positivity ratio concept, which is a mechanism that plays an important role

in finding out the performance through feedback. It has been found that

prompt feedback helps in developing a strong linkage between faculty and

students which ultimately leads to better learning outcomes (Simsek et

al., 2017; Chang, 2011).

The fourth factor is students’ expectation. Appleton-Knapp and Krentler

(2006) measured the impact of student’s expectations on their performance.

They pin pointed that the student expectation is important. When the

expectations of the students are achieved then it lead to the higher satisfaction

level of the student (Bates & Kaye, 2014). These findings were backed by

previous research model “Student Satisfaction Index Model” (Zhang et

al., 2008). However, when the expectations are students is not fulfilled then it

might lead to lower leaning and satisfaction with the course. Student

satisfaction is defined as students’ ability to compare the desired benefit with

the observed effect of a particular product or service (Budur et al., 2019).

Students’ whose grade expectation is high will show high satisfaction instead

of those facing lower grade expectations.

The scrutiny of the literature show that although different researchers have

examined the factors affecting student satisfaction but none of the study has

examined the effect of course design, quality of the instructor, prompt

feedback, and students’ expectations on students’ satisfaction with online

classes during the pandemic period of Covid-19. Therefore, this study tries to

explore the factors that affect students’ satisfaction and performance

regarding online classes during the pandemic period of COVID–19. As the

pandemic compelled educational institutions to move online with which they

were not acquainted, including teachers and learners. The students were not

mentally prepared for such a shift. Therefore, this research will be examined

to understand what factors affect students and how students perceived these

changes which are reflected through their satisfaction level.

This paper is structured as follows: The second section provides a description

of theoretical framework and the linkage among different research variables

and accordingly different research hypotheses were framed. The third section

deals with the research methodology of the paper as per APA guideline. The

outcomes and corresponding results of the empirical analysis are then

discussed. Lastly, the paper concludes with a discussion and proposes

implications for future studies.

Theoretical framework

Achievement goal theory (AGT) is commonly used to understand the student’s

performance, and it is proposed by four scholars Carole Ames, Carol Dweck,

Martin Maehr, and John Nicholls in the late 1970s (Elliot, 2005). Elliott &
Dweck (1988, p11) define that “an achievement goal involves a program of

cognitive processes that have cognitive, affective and behavioral consequence”.

This theory suggests that students’ motivation and achievement-related

behaviors can be easily understood by the purpose and the reasons they

adopted while they are engaged in the learning activities (Dweck &

Leggett, 1988; Ames, 1992; Urdan, 1997). Some of the studies believe that

there are four approaches to achieve a goal, i.e., mastery-approach, mastery

avoidance, performance approach, and performance-avoidance

(Pintrich, 1999; Elliot & McGregor, 2001; Schwinger & Stiensmeier-

Pelster, 2011, Hansen & Ringdal, 2018; Mouratidis et al., 2018). The

environment also affects the performance of students (Ames & Archer, 1988).

Traditionally, classroom teaching is an effective method to achieve the goal

(Ames & Archer, 1988; Ames, 1992; Clayton et al., 2010) however in the

modern era, the internet-based teaching is also one of the effective tools to

deliver lectures, and web-based applications are becoming modern classrooms

(Azlan et al., 2020). Hence, following section discuss about the relationship

between different independent variables and dependent variables (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
Proposed Model

Full size image

Hypotheses development

Quality of the instructor and satisfaction of the students

Quality of instructor with high fanaticism on student’s learning has a positive

impact on their satisfaction. Quality of instructor is one of the most critical

measures for student satisfaction, leading to the education process’s outcome

(Munteanu et al., 2010; Arambewela & Hall, 2009; Ramsden, 1991). Suppose

the teacher delivers the course effectively and influence the students to do
better in their studies. In that case, this process leads to student satisfaction

and enhances the learning process (Ladyshewsky, 2013). Furthermore,

understanding the need of learner by the instructor also ensures student

satisfaction (Kauffman, 2015). Hence the hypothesis that the quality of

instructor significantly affects the satisfaction of the students was included in

this study.

 H1: The quality of the instructor positively affects the satisfaction of the

students.

Course design and satisfaction of students

The course’s technological design is highly persuading the students’ learning

and satisfaction through their course expectations (Liaw, 2008; Lin et

al., 2008). Active course design indicates the students’ effective outcomes

compared to the traditional design (Black & Kassaye, 2014). Learning style is

essential for effective course design (Wooldridge, 1995). While creating an

online course design, it is essential to keep in mind that we generate an

experience for students with different learning styles. Similarly,

(Jenkins, 2015) highlighted that the course design attributes could be

developed and employed to enhance student success. Hence the hypothesis

that the course design significantly affects students’ satisfaction was included

in this study.
  H2: Course design positively affects the satisfaction of students.

Prompt feedback and satisfaction of students

The emphasis in this study is to understand the influence of prompt feedback

on satisfaction. Feedback gives the information about the students’ effective

performance (Chang, 2011; Grebennikov & Shah, 2013; Simsek et al., 2017).

Prompt feedback enhances student learning experience (Brownlee et

al., 2009) and boosts satisfaction (O'donovan, 2017). Prompt feedback is the

self-evaluation tool for the students (Rogers, 1992) by which they can improve

their performance. Eraut (2006) highlighted the impact of feedback on future

practice and student learning development. Good feedback practice is

beneficial for student learning and teachers to improve students’ learning

experience (Yorke, 2003). Hence the hypothesis that prompt feedback

significantly affects satisfaction was included in this study.

 H3: Prompt feedback of the students positively affects the satisfaction.

Expectations and satisfaction of students

Expectation is a crucial factor that directly influences the satisfaction of the

student. Expectation Disconfirmation Theory (EDT) (Oliver, 1980) was

utilized to determine the level of satisfaction based on their expectations

(Schwarz & Zhu, 2015). Student’s expectation is the best way to improve their
satisfaction (Brown et al., 2014). It is possible to recognize student

expectations to progress satisfaction level (ICSB, 2015). Finally, the positive

approach used in many online learning classes has been shown to place a high

expectation on learners (Gold, 2011) and has led to successful outcomes.

Hence the hypothesis that expectations of the student significantly affect the

satisfaction was included in this study.

 H4: Expectations of the students positively affects the satisfaction.

Satisfaction and performance of the students

Zeithaml (1988) describes that satisfaction is the outcome result of the

performance of any educational institute. According to Kotler and Clarke

(1986), satisfaction is the desired outcome of any aim that amuses any

individual’s admiration. Quality interactions between instructor and students

lead to student satisfaction (Malik et al., 2010; Martínez-Argüelles et

al., 2016). Teaching quality and course material enhances the student

satisfaction by successful outcomes (Sanderson, 1995). Satisfaction relates to

the student performance in terms of motivation, learning, assurance, and

retention (Biner et al., 1996). Mensink and King (2020) described that

performance is the conclusion of student-teacher efforts, and it shows the

interest of students in the studies. The critical element in education is

students’ academic performance (Rono, 2013). Therefore, it is considered as

center pole, and the entire education system rotates around the student’s

performance. Narad and Abdullah (2016) concluded that the students’

academic performance determines academic institutions’ success and failure.

Singh et al. (2016) asserted that the student academic performance directly

influences the country’s socio-economic development. Farooq et al. (2011)

highlights the students’ academic performance is the primary concern of all

faculties. Additionally, the main foundation of knowledge gaining and

improvement of skills is student’s academic performance. According to Narad

and Abdullah (2016), regular evaluation or examinations is essential over a

specific period of time in assessing students’ academic performance for better

outcomes. Hence the hypothesis that satisfaction significantly affects the

performance of the students was included in this study.

 H5: Students’ satisfaction positively affects the performance of the

students.

Satisfaction as mediator

Sibanda et al. (2015) applied the goal theory to examine the factors persuading

students’ academic performance that enlightens students’ significance

connected to their satisfaction and academic achievement. According to this

theory, students perform well if they know about factors that impact on their
performance. Regarding the above variables, institutional factors that

influence student satisfaction through performance include course design and

quality of the instructor (DeBourgh, 2003; Lado et al., 2003), prompt

feedback, and expectation (Fredericksen et al., 2000). Hence the hypothesis

that quality of the instructor, course design, prompts feedback, and student

expectations significantly affect the students’ performance through

satisfaction was included in this study.

 H6: Quality of the instructor, course design, prompt feedback, and

student’ expectations affect the students’ performance through

satisfaction.

 H6a: Students’ satisfaction mediates the relationship between quality of

the instructor and student’s performance.

 H6b: Students’ satisfaction mediates the relationship between course

design and student’s performance.

 H6c: Students’ satisfaction mediates the relationship between prompt

feedback and student’s performance.

 H6d: Students’ satisfaction mediates the relationship between student’

expectations and student’s performance.

Method

Participants

In this cross-sectional study, the data were collected from 544 respondents

who were studying the management (B.B.A or M.B.A) and hotel management

courses. The purposive sampling technique was used to collect the data.

Descriptive statistics shows that 48.35% of the respondents were either MBA

or BBA and rests of the respondents were hotel management students. The

percentages of male students were (71%) and female students were (29%). The

percentage of male students is almost double in comparison to females. The

ages of the students varied from 18 to 35. The dominant group was those aged

from 18 to 22, and which was the under graduation student group and their

ratio was (94%), and another set of students were from the post-graduation

course, which was (6%) only.

Materials

The research instrument consists of two sections. The first section is related to

demographical variables such as discipline, gender, age group, and education

level (under-graduate or post-graduate). The second section measures the six

factors viz. instructor’s quality, course design, prompt feedback, student

expectations, satisfaction, and performance. These attributes were taken from

previous studies (Yin & Wang, 2015; Bangert, 2004; Chickering &

Gamson, 1987; Wilson et al., 1997). The “instructor quality” was measured

through the scale developed by Bangert (2004). The scale consists of seven

items. The “course design” and “prompt feedback” items were adapted from

the research work of Bangert (2004). The “course design” scale consists of six

items. The “prompt feedback” scale consists of five items. The “students’

expectation” scale consists of five items. Four items were adapted from

Bangert, 2004 and one item was taken from Wilson et al. (1997). Students’

satisfaction was measure with six items taken from Bangert (2004); Wilson et

al. (1997); Yin and Wang (2015). The “students’ performance” was measured

through the scale developed by Wilson et al. (1997). The scale consists of six

items. These variables were accessed on a five-point likert scale, ranging from

1(strongly disagree) to 5(strongly agree). Only the students from India have

taken part in the survey. A total of thirty-four questions were asked in the

study to check the effect of the first four variables on students’ satisfaction and

performance. For full details of the questionnaire, kindly refer Appendix

Tables 6.

Design

The study used a descriptive research design. The factors “instructor quality,

course design, prompt feedback and students’ expectation” were independent

variables. The students’ satisfaction was mediator and students’ performance

was the dependent variable in the current study.

Procedure

In this cross-sectional research the respondents were selected through

judgment sampling. They were informed about the objective of the study and

information gathering process. They were assured about the confidentiality of

the data and no incentive was given to then for participating in this study. The

information utilizes for this study was gathered through an online survey. The

questionnaire was built through Google forms, and then it was circulated

through the mails. Students’ were also asked to write the name of their college,

and fifteen colleges across India have taken part to fill the data. The data were

collected in the pandemic period of COVID-19 during the total lockdown in

India. This was the best time to collect the data related to the current research

topic because all the colleges across India were involved in online classes.

Therefore, students have enough time to understand the instrument and

respondent to the questionnaire in an effective manner. A total of 615

questionnaires were circulated, out of which the students returned 574. Thirty

responses were not included due to the unengaged responses. Finally, 544

questionnaires were utilized in the present investigation. Male and female

students both have taken part to fill the survey, different age groups, and
various courses, i.e., under graduation and post-graduation students of

management and hotel management students were the part of the sample.

Results

Exploratory factor analysis (EFA)

To analyze the data, SPSS and AMOS software were used. First, to extract the

distinct factors, an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed using

VARIMAX rotation on a sample of 544. Results of the exploratory analysis

rendered six distinct factors. Factor one was named as the quality of

instructor, and some of the items were “The instructor communicated

effectively”, “The instructor was enthusiastic about online teaching” and “The

instructor was concerned about student learning” etc. Factor two was labeled

as course design, and the items were “The course was well organized”, “The

course was designed to allow assignments to be completed across different

learning environments.” and “The instructor facilitated the course effectively”

etc. Factor three was labeled as prompt feedback of students, and some of the

items were “The instructor responded promptly to my questions about the use

of Webinar”, “The instructor responded promptly to my questions about

general course requirements” etc. The fourth factor was Student’s

Expectations, and the items were “The instructor provided models that clearly

communicated expectations for weekly group assignments”, “The instructor

used good examples to explain statistical concepts” etc. The fifth factor was

students’ satisfaction, and the items were “The online classes were valuable”,

“Overall, I am satisfied with the quality of this course” etc. The sixth factor was

performance of the student, and the items were “The online classes has

sharpened my analytic skills”, “Online classes really tries to get the best out of

all its students” etc. These six factors explained 67.784% of the total variance.

To validate the factors extracted through EFA, the researcher performed

confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) through AMOS. Finally, structural

equation modeling (SEM) was used to test the hypothesized relationships.

Measurement model

The results of Table 1 summarize the findings of EFA and CFA. Results of the

table showed that EFA renders six distinct factors, and CFA validated these

factors. Table 2 shows that the proposed measurement model achieved good

convergent validity (Aggarwal et al., 2018a, b). Results of the confirmatory

factor analysis showed that the values of standardized factor loadings were

statistically significant at the 0.05 level. Further, the results of the

measurement model also showed acceptable model fit indices such that CMIN 

= 710.709; df = 480; CMIN/df = 1.481 p < .000; Incremental Fit Index (IFI) = 

0.979; Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) = 0.976; Goodness of Fit index (GFI) = 

0.928; Adjusted Goodness of Fit Index (AGFI) = 0.916; Comparative Fit Index

(CFI) = 0.978; Root Mean Square Residual (RMR) = 0.042; Root Mean

Squared Error of Approximation (RMSEA) = 0.030 is satisfactory.

Table 1 Factor Analysis