From the Classroom into Virtual Learning Environments: Essential Knowledge, Competences, Skills and Pedagogical Strategies for the 21st Century Teacher Education in Kenya

Abstract

As teachers in Kenya begin to migrate from the classroom to virtual learning spaces following COVID 19 pandemic, there is pressing need to realign Teacher Education to requisite Knowledge, competences, skills, and attitudes that will support online teaching. This chapter explores these needs using a combination of lived experiences and literature review that captured a meta-analysis of research trends on e-learning. While trends in Teacher Education indicate progression towards adoption of technology, there are disparities between the theory and practice. Evidence from recent research and reports; and the recollected experiences confirmed knowledge, competence, skills and pedagogical gaps in the implementation of online learning, that have been exacerbated by COVID-19. The researcher recommends that teacher education should sensitize and train teacher trainees on how to access, analyze and use new knowledge emerging with technology; they also should be coached on how learners learn with technology and on fundamentals of the communication process. Particularly the course on educational technology, should focus on how to create and manage online courses. The 5-stage E-Moderator Model and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) are recommended as effective pedagogical scaffold for online teaching.