Online teaching in Serbia and the Republic of Srpska at the COVID-19 outbreak: Teachers' experiences

Abstract

The purpose of this pilot study is to determine the nature, management and quality of experimental forms of online teaching based on the teachers' three-month teaching experience gained in the academic year 2019/20, and to identify the major social, economic and psychological factors that might be related to the way the online teaching as alternate modality was realized in all educational levels in Serbia and the Republic of Srpska at the COVID-19 outbreak. The conducted research involving 283 language and literature teachers was done by using the quantitative and qualitative method, and the survey questionnaire consisting of one open-ended and ten closed-ended questions was the measuring instrument. The responses are analyzed and classified into several categories according to their common denominator. The results highlighted the main challenges the teachers faced while teaching online, pointed to the key limitations of relying on face-to-face teaching as the only accessible delivery mode and provided the relevant insights regarding the directions for further investigations in online teaching in the field of humanities.