Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic forced German universities to adjust their established operations quickly during the first nationwide lockdown in spring 2020. Lecturers and students were confronted with a sudden transition to remote teaching and learning. The present study examined students’ preparedness for and perspective on this new situation. In March and April 2020, we surveyed n = 584 students about the status quo of their perceived digital literacy and corresponding formal learning opportunities they had experienced in the past. Additionally, the students reported the direction of changes in key study characteristics they expected from this new situation. Moreover, they reported the extent to which they believe they will be able to master this new study situation successfully. Two categories of independent variables were considered: context-related variables and person-related variables. Our results show that students did not have many learning opportunities to promote their digital literacy, suggesting that they were not appropriately prepared for this new situation. Results for digital literacy vary by competence area. However, there is a positive correlation between past formal learning opportunities and corresponding digital competences. Master students reported more learning opportunities and higher digital literacy only in one competence area compared to bachelor students. Regarding the expected change of key study characteristics, some characteristics were expected to worsen and fewer to improve. A multiple regression analysis explained 54% of the estimated probability of successful remote learning. Students’ age, state anxiety, positive state affect, general self-efficacy, the availability of an own workplace, past learning opportunities in digital content creation, and the estimated preparedness of lecturers for remote teaching were significant explaining factors. Our results provide valuable insights into the perspective of students on studying during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. We discuss important factors that should be addressed by educational measures in the future.
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic has strong impacts on people’s everyday life and society on a large scale (Nicola et al, 2020)
In addition to an analysis of expected changes in study characteristics due to a sudden transition to remote learning, the present study focused on factors that might explain interindividual differences in the belief that one can still learn successfully in this new situation
This study shows that students lacked formal learning opportunities to promote digital literacy at the early stages of the pandemic
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic has strong impacts on people’s everyday life and society on a large scale (Nicola et al, 2020). The pandemic has significantly amplified the digital transformation of university teaching and learning. University students’ express concerns about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on physiological, psychological, and educational issues (Branquinho et al, 2020). The present work pursued three objectives for addressing this student perspective: First, it analyzes the status quo of students’ digital literacy and corresponding formal learning opportunities before the transition to remote learning. This analysis provides an assessment of whether students were adequately prepared for sudden remote learning and identifies areas of competence in which targeted support in formal university teaching would need to be strengthened
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