PHYSIOTHERAPY UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT EXPERIENCE OF ONLINE LEARNING DURING THE COVID-19

G.A.D. Perera¹, S. Fernando¹

Background: COVID-19 continues to heavily impact higher education across the globe. As a result, the distance learning methods been introduced to replace social contact. In order to continue the teaching and learning process during this challenging time, a series of online teaching and learning sessions were conducted. However online learning is a novel experience for physiotherapy education in Sri Lanka.

Purpose: To assess the experience gained through online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic situation during March to May 2020 for Physiotherapy Undergraduates of the Faculty of Allied Health Sciences, Kothelawala Defence University (KDU).

Methods: A series of online sessions were introduced via Microsoft teams as well as narrated PowerPoint presentations. Google class room discussions were also conducted during the period of 16th March to 30th May 2020. A 28-item questionnaire was distributed via email to physiotherapy undergraduates of all four years of the KDU programme to assess this new experience of online learning and the potential barriers.

Results: Out of 147 undergraduates, 122 (82.99%) responded. More than 2/3 (69%) of the respondents agreed that online teaching and learning helped them to continue their academic studies during this pandemic season. Online sessions through Microsoft teams was the first choice of 71.3% and for 23.8% it was narrated PowerPoint presentations. The preferences selected were based around key features of the teaching methods and the environment. Environment noises, connection problems and technical errors were the key issues related to teaching and learning, and weather barriers (rain and thunder) and inadequacy or lack of appropriate place for learning were the identified the key environmental barriers. However, 70% of the participants were satisfied overall in regard to the learning achieved the online whereas 7% expressed complete dissatisfaction.

Conclusion(s): During the Covid-19 lockdown online teaching and learning was included for the first time in Sri Lanka for the physiotherapy undergraduates. This experimental approach for physiotherapy education was successful for the majority of students.

Implications: Further developments including more adequate setup facilities and better preparation by students to reduce the barriers will provide a good platform to use overcome the social distance and to enable the continuation of academic activities, especially when social distancing and/or lockdown is required through a pandemic of other such disaster.

Funding, acknowledgements: Self-funding

Keywords: online teaching, Distance learning, Physiotherapy undergraduate

Topic: COVID-19

Did this work require ethics approval? No

Institution: General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University

Committee: University Ethical Review Committee

Reason: This is about Students' feed back on teaching learning.