Online Chemistry Education Challenges for Rio de Janeiro Students during the COVID-19 Pandemic

• Published in: Journal of chemical education 2020-09, Vol.97 (9), p.3396-3399
• Main Authors: Soares, Ricardo, de Mello, Márcia Cristina Santiago, da Silva, Cleyton M, Machado, Wilson, Arbilla, Graciela
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Access to Computers; Barriers; CAI; Chemistry; Computer assisted instruction; COVID-19; Distance Education; Education; Educational activities; Educational Technology; Electronic Learning; Equal Education; Foreign Countries; Geographic Regions; Learning Processes; Online Courses; Online instruction; Organic Chemistry; Pandemics; Rural areas; School Closing; Schools; Science Instruction; Science Laboratories; Science Teachers; Students; Tablet computers; Teacher Competencies; Teachers; Teaching; Teaching methods; Technological Literacy; Television
• ISSN: 0021-9584; 1938-1328
• DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.0c00775

Thirty-six days after the beginning of the 2020 school year in Brazil, the Rio de Janeiro state education system began an unprecedented disruptive period due to the COVID-19 crisis, which abruptly affected general educational activities, particularly chemistry teaching. An adaptation to a new paradigm of remote teaching and massive use of online educational technology alternatives was tentatively performed, generating lessons for improving implemented actions. Educational institutions prepared independent teaching strategies to provide remote chemistry classes for a total of nearly 397,700 students who were able to begin or continue chemistry classes. This “snapshot” of a daily-life reality faced by professionals engaged in chemistry education in Rio de Janeiro’s schools identified the following factors that negatively affected the implemented actions: the applied television broadcaster essentially covered only the heavily urbanized region, leaving out rural and impoverished areas; a significant absence of adequate technological equipment (e.g., smartphones, tablets, notebooks) for students; pedagogical limitations of instructors, without sufficient training to use online technologies; and inherent limitations of video classes, which do not adequately substitute for practical learning in chemistry laboratories. Strategy improvements are imperative, considering that students face the challenge of increasingly being protagonists for the organization and management of the teaching–learning process.