Life Inside Elementary Schools
Although some higher educational institutions already offered online learning opportunities, many professors were not teaching remotely, choosing to continue providing their courses face-to-face. The younger the learner, the more difficult it was for educators to contemplate teaching online. Some educators have participated in extensive training in delivering content online, including Google and Apple Classroom Trainings. Colleges and universities had entire departments to support distance learning programs and classes. Two areas of the education system that were the least prepared to move to remote learning were the early child care and elementary education teachers. Working with young children, these two groups of educators used technology to enhance instruction but rarely to deliver instruction.
Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT), although not a new educational reality, became necessary for teachers and media coordinators in 2020-2021 due to a crisis to find another way to deliver education. Hodges et al. (2020) identify ERT as
…a temporary shift of instructional delivery to an alternate delivery mode due to crisis circumstances. It involves the use of fully remote teaching solutions for instruction or education rather than delivering instruction face-to-face or as blended or hybrid courses and that will return to that format once the crisis or emergency has abated.
The critical difference between ERT and online learning is the purpose of the instruction. ERT is temporary and used in a crisis or emergency to provide learners with as much continuity as possible. The purpose of online learning is to systematically move face-to-face instruction to an online format through extensive planning and preparation. K-12 teachers found themselves in an ERT situation. Although this forced ERT came because of a pandemic in 2020, teachers in Southeastern North Carolina and other locations that experience disasters and weather phenomena, such as hurricanes, have been forced into similar situations in the past. This current need for ERT allowed online learning to be used and understood. Teachers and media coordinators established sustainable strategies for delivering learning remotely, not only for the period schools were closed but for enhanced instruction when schools were open again. These strategies had the potential to improve education permanently, meeting the need of all learners. Teachers and media coordinators worked together to access, compile, and present engaging, interactive learning for students learning at home.